This holiday season is bringing us some serious blockbuster movies. Last week, it was Spider-Man: No Way Home, and this week we get both The King’s Man and The Matrix Resurrections. With the Matrix, you get to watch it either in the theaters or on HBO Max. Let’s dive into this long-awaited addition to the Matrix film legacy.
The First Matrix
Let me get one thing out of the way. I think the first Matrix movie was outstanding. Groundbreaking from a visual standpoint and also the concept was really original. However, I didn’t love 2 & 3 anywhere near as much. Now to be fair, sequels that measure up to, let alone surpass, their predecessors are few and far between (The Godfather II, Christmas Vacation, Thor: Ragnarok, Spider-Man: No Way Home, etc.).
So, while I enjoyed various parts of Matrix 2 & 3, I also kind of think it might have been best to just leave it at one historic movie. Just realize that I bring that mindset to The Matrix Resurrections, which may be very different from your experience with the series.
A Very Meta Matrix
The first 30-40 minutes is really about setting up the story. It’s a combination of a reboot to the first film and a very meta nod toward that film. Thomas Anderson (aka Neo) is back in the real world, but instead of a low-level computer programmer by day and hacker by night, he is a famous video game designer.
His creation - a video game version of The Matrix. It includes Neo and Trinity as characters and essentially tells the story of Neo’s story from the previous films (not really sure if it went beyond the first film, but you get the idea). Neo sees a therapist for his issues perceiving reality, as he can’t entirely separate the story from his game and the real world. We get a number of scenes that are extremely reminiscent of the Matrix.
Neo also has a business partner who informs him that despite their agreement to never create a sequel game to The Matrix, they are now being forced to do it.
This leads to a sequence of Neo meeting with a bunch of young game designers as they brainstorm aspects of the new game. It’s kind of hilarious and Neo is clearly in a bad place as he sits motionless, surrounded by these fanboys and girls talking about how they can improve on bullet-time and other aspects of the ‘game’ and obviously the movie. It’s very, very meta and self-aware of the legacy the movie has.
Neo and Trinity
Neo isn’t along in this new Matrix, as Trinity is also there, but she has no memory of who she was. She is a middle-aged wife and mother of 2 young boys. But, she can’t help but also build motorcycles on the side, an aspect of her Trinity personality showing through.
She and Neo are regularly near each other (at coffee shops and restaurants) but have never interacted until the movie gets moving along. He sees her and knows she seems just like Trinity from his game.
Eventually, a group of people who have broken free of the Matrix, led by a rule-breaking captain find Neo and convince him to come out of the Matrix and enter the ‘real’ world again. It obviously takes some convincing, but Neo eventually takes the Red Pill and is freed.
The ‘real’ world has changed a bit. It’s still the dystopian future where humans are essentially living batteries for the AIs that rule the world and use the Matrix to keep humans trapped in their minds. Initially, Neo is saddened to think that his sacrifice in the third film had no effect at all.
But, he learns that isn’t entirely true, as various computer programs and machines have broken free of the AI hive mind structure and are now working with the free humans in a new secret city called Io. We meet a few characters from the original movies, now much older (it’s been around 60 years since Neo’s sacrifice).
It turns out that Neo and Trinity did indeed die in that film, but the AIs rebuilt their bodies from their DNA and were somehow able to fully recreate their minds or ‘souls’ I guess, as well.
There is no longer a war between humans and AIs. It seems the machines allow the humans to live in their seclusion at least to some extend. They still try to avoid the Sentinels, but we never really see any of that happening. Neo wants to go back to free Trinity, and after initially being denied by the rulers of Io, he and his new crewmates formulate a plan to get her out.
Agents, Swarms, and the New Matrix
Neo and his team return to the Matrix to free Trinity, along with an elaborate plot to get her body out of the incubator where she is being kept. I won’t go into the details. But, it leads to a showdown between Neo and the architect of the new Matrix, who happens to be Neo’s therapist.
His new Matrix worked best when Neo and Trinity were in it and kept near each other, but kept from actually interacting. When they do finally interact and Trinity wakes up, the battles pick up.
Instead of just agents, the new Matrix has ‘swarms’ where essentially every person can be activated to do the bidding of The Analyst (Neo’s therapist) and used to swarm attack anyone it wants. This includes having them dive out of high-rise buildings to act like human bombs.
We get a lot of fight sequences and carnage. This includes fights between Neo and his business partner, who turns out to actually be Agent Smith, laying low and hiding out from the AIs who run the world. The fights are large and epic but don’t really break any new ground from a visual perspective.
The One…er Two?
Eventually, Neo and Trinity are trapped on top of a high-rise, with the only option being to jump. It’s too far to reach the next building (again, there’s my issue with Neo not being all-powerful, even though he should be) and instead begin to fall.
But suddenly, Trinity is flying and saving Neo as they fly away from the army of possessed humans and are pulled out of the Matrix. We geeΩt a nice ‘real world’ reunion between the two, who still very much love each other.
We then get a final scene that is very reminiscent of the original film, as Trinity and Neo fly in to the Matrix (apparently Neo remembers how to fly now) and confront The Analyst.
Trinity gives him an updated version of Neo’s phone call to the AIs in the original film, in each case saying they are going to make ‘some changes’. And then they fly off to begin remaking the Matrix. The End.
Watch it or Not?
So, first and foremost, this isn’t a bad movie. I’m not sure it’s a particularly good one either. It has a lot of fun playing with elements of the first movie and I largely enjoyed the first 30-40 minutes.
But, once Neo was fully awakened and back in the ‘real world’ it started to feel like the same old story again. The twist with Trinity also being The One (so, now there are Two?) was a surprise, but I’m not sure it was necessary or even makes sense, as the Oracle was always talking about The One.
All this aside, if you’re a big fan of the franchise, then you pretty much have to see it. But, you may not love it as much as you hope.
