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“The Matrix Resurrections” is the first “Matrix” movie since 2003's " The Matrix Revolutions ," but it is not the first time we’ve seen the franchise in theaters this year. That distinction goes to “ Space Jam: A New Legacy ,” the cinematic shareholder meeting for Warner Bros. with special celebrity guests that inserted Looney Tunes characters Speedy Gonzales and Granny into a scene from “ The Matrix .” Speedy Gonzales dodged slow-motion bullets; Granny jumped in the air and kicked a cop in the face like Trinity. The 2003 animation omnibus “The Animatrix” detailed how the Matrix was created, how an apocalyptic war against robots led to human suffering being harvested to fuel a world of machines; there should be an addendum that includes this scene from “Space Jam: A New Legacy” to show what it all led to.  

This is the reality that we live in—one ruled by Warner Bros.’ Serververse—and it is also the context that rules over “The Matrix Resurrections.” The film bears the name of director Lana Wachowski , returning to the cyberpunk franchise that made her one of the greatest sci-fi/action directors, but be warned that no force is remotely as strong as Warner Bros. wanting a lighter and brighter take on “The Matrix.” “The Matrix Resurrections” is a reboot with some striking philosophical flourishes, and grandiose set-pieces where things go boom in slow motion, but it is also the weakest and most compromised “Matrix” film yet.  

Written by Wachowski, David Mitchell , and Aleksandar Hemon , “The Matrix Resurrections” is about building from beloved beats, characters, and plot elements; call it deja vu, or just call it a convoluted clip show. It starts with a new character named Bugs ( Jessica Henwick ) witnessing Trinity’s famous telephone escape before having her own swooping, bullet-dodging getaway, and later throws new versions of previous characters into the the mix. The wise man of this saga, Morpheus, is no longer played by Laurence Fishburne , but Yahya Abdul-Mateen II , who looks just as cool in dark color coats and sunglasses with two machine guns in hand, but has a confusing purpose for being there. “The Matrix Resurrections” will bend over backward, bullet-time style, to explain why he is. The same goes for how heroes Neo and Trinity return, even though “The Matrix Revolutions” put a lot of care into killing them off. This is the kind of movie in which it truly doesn’t matter when you last saw the original films; your experience might be even better if you haven’t seen them at all.  

It is also about making you painfully conscious of what constitutes Matrix intellectual property, as it places Keanu Reeves ’ hero Neo, known in the Matrix as a brilliant video game programmer named Thomas Anderson, in a board room with a bunch of creatives, trying to come up with ideas for a sequel. He has received pressure from his boss (and Warner Bros.) after his game “The Matrix” was a hit; “bullet-time” is discussed with awe by stock geek characters as something that needs to be topped. This is one of the movie’s more reality-shifting ideas—to frame “The Matrix” as a new type of simulation, one that was created by Thomas Anderson inside the actual Matrix, as taken from his dreams that come from taking a blue pill daily, instead of the eye-opening red pill he took in the original 1999 film. And yet like many of the Warner Bros.-related meta redirections, it all ends up adding so very little to the bigger picture.  

“The Matrix Resurrections” brings back the love story of Trinity (Carrie Anne Moss) and Neo, our two cyber heroes whose romantic connection gave the earlier films a sense of desperation larger than the apocalypse at hand. But here, they do not know each other, even though Thomas’ video character Trinity looks a lot like Moss. In this world, she’s a customer in a Simulatte coffee shop named Tiffany that he’s hesitant to talk to, in particular because she has kids and a husband named Chad (played by Chad Stahelski ). Reeves and Moss are both invested in this whimsical arc about fated lovers, but the movie plays too much into this nostalgia as well, relying on our emotions from the past movies to largely care about why they should be together.  

The movie’s greatest stake is in the mind of Thomas, one that's been having daydreams that are clips from the "Matrix" movies, while sitting in a bathtub with a rubber ducky on his head. He receives some guidance from his therapist, played by Neil Patrick Harris , who tries to make sense of the break from reality that previously had Thomas attempting to walk off a roof, thinking he could fly. Harris’ part should remain a mystery, but let’s say it’s an unexpected role that does get you to take him seriously, including how he analyzes our own understanding of “The Matrix.” Meanwhile, it becomes apparent that just as Morpheus is a little different than we remember, there’s a new version of big baddie Smith, played by Jonathan Groff , trying to imitate Hugo Weaving ’s slithering line-delivering that comes from a tightly clenched jaw. There are also copies of agents that take over bodies and wear impeccable suits and ties, chasing after the good guys. 

Plenty of Matrixing is in store once Thomas believes Morpheus, but it's more fun to witness in the movie than for anyone to explain in detail. But it includes the feeling of Thomas going back to where it all began, including a training sequence in which Reeves and Abdul-Mateen II do a rendition of the dojo scene in “The Matrix,” only this time Neo leaves with a different power that requires less movement. And as part of Neo’s journey back down the rabbit hole, there’s a breakneck, candy-colored fight sequence on a speeding train, in which Johnny Klimek and Tom Tykwer ’s blitzing score seems to be powering the locomotive. 

Expositional philosophizing is also a part of the “Matrix” experience, and there’s a great line here from one of the film’s villains about fear and desire being the two human modes (you can practically imagine the line scribbled in Wachowski’s notebook). But these wordy passages also conceal the movie trying to move the goal posts, that the rules of the Matrix can change however its saga about cyber messiahs needs it to keep making sequels. And while the apocalyptic, real world action has always been less exciting than the stylized anarchy up in the Matrix, that gap of intrigue is felt even more here. Behind the screens, with Neo, Trinity, and others plugged in, certain returning members of the underground land of Zion like Niobe ( Jada Pinkett Smith, aged forward) try and fail to convince you that this story absolutely needs to be told, and that THIS is the ultimate world-saving chapter, even though the franchise no longer feels dangerous. That latter note becomes all the more obvious when “The Matrix Resurrections” gives us a micro, cutesy, fist-bumping descendant of the sentinel machines that used to rip human beings to shreds.  

It’s the action that proves to be the purest element here, robust and snazzy—for years we have been watching directors imitate what Wachowski did with her sister Lilly with “The Matrix” films, and now we can get caught up again in her fast-paced action that marries kung fu with acrobatic gunplay, often in lush slow motion. For all of this movie’s cheesy talk about bullet-time (almost killing the fun of being in awe of it), “The Matrix Resurrections” doubles up with certain scenes that combine two different slow-motion speeds in the same frame, painting some exhilarating, big-budget frescos with dozens of flying extras and hundreds of bullets. The film’s grand finale is an action gem, as it thrives on how much adrenaline you can get from layering multiple big explosions as things suddenly crash into frame, all during a high-speed chase.  

And yet once the adrenaline from a sequence like that wears off, you can’t help but think about the guy who sat near Steven Soderbergh on an airplane and watched a clip show of explosive action scenes , virtually making the director want to quit filmmaking back in 2013. There’s incredible merit in the action seen in “The Matrix Resurrections,” but those aren’t the elements that free the mind of the medium like bold storytelling, like “The Matrix” preached and then became a game-changing classic, only to become a docket for satisfying shareholders. Blue pill or red pill? It doesn’t matter anymore; they’re both placebos.  

Available in theaters and on HBO Max tomorrow.

Nick Allen is the former Senior Editor at RogerEbert.com and a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association.

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The Matrix Resurrections (2021)

Rated R for violence and some language.

148 minutes

Keanu Reeves as Thomas A. Anderson / Neo

Carrie-Anne Moss as Tiffany / Trinity

Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Morpheus

Jonathan Groff as Smith

Jessica Henwick as Bugs

Neil Patrick Harris as The Analyst

Jada Pinkett Smith as Niobe

Priyanka Chopra as Sati

Christina Ricci as Gwyn de Vere

• Lana Wachowski

Writer (based on characters created by)

• Lilly Wachowski
• David Mitchell
• Aleksandar Hemon

Cinematographer

• Daniele Massaccesi
• Joseph Jett Sally
• Johnny Klimek

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The astonishing, angry Matrix Resurrections deals with what’s real in a world where nothing is

A furious Lana Wachowski fights back with a love story

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[ Ed. note: Minor spoilers for The Matrix Resurrections follow.]

The story: A man named Thomas is told that the world is not what he thought it to be, and despite the passion of the messenger and the void in his own life, he refuses to believe. He wants to see for himself. He wants, as the Gospel of John recounts, to feel the wounded flesh of the resurrected Christ, to feel where the nails were hammered into his hands. In his doubt, he becomes a myth, the first man to doubt the gospel, only to believe there is truth there when he’s standing in front of the gospel’s corporeal form.

Another version of the story: A man named Thomas Anderson lives a respectable life at the end of the 20th century, a gifted programmer at a nondescript software company. Everything is as it should be, and yet there is a void in him. Messengers find him and tell him his suspicion is correct, that this world is an illusion, yet he refuses to believe. Not until he takes a pill and wakes up in a nightmare, where he, along with everyone else he thought he knew, is plugged into a machine from birth until death, living in a simulation he never doubted until he could feel the wounds in his own flesh, where the machines jacked him into a digital world called the Matrix. Over the next 22 years, Mr. Anderson’s story in The Matrix becomes a different, newer myth, disseminated through the burgeoning internet and refracted through various subcultures. Depending on which set of eyes it encountered, the story’s symbolism and themes took on new meanings, some thoughtful and enlightening, others strange and sinister.

The Matrix Resurrections ’ third version of this story: Once again, there is Keanu Reeves’ Thomas Anderson, a gifted programmer who suspects his world is wrong, somehow. Once again, he is contacted by people claiming to confirm his suspicions. Once again, he refuses to believe. For a little while, the story seems the same, to the point where it doesn’t seem worth telling. Yet the world it’s being told to — our world, the one where we’ve returned to see a new film called The Matrix for the first time since 2003’s The Matrix Revolutions — is very different. In the final days of 2021, Thomas, just like those watching him, has much more to doubt. And Resurrections finds its meaning.

Directed by Lana Wachowski from a script she co-wrote with David Mitchell and Aleksandar Hemon, The Matrix Resurrections is about doing the impossible. On a very basic level, it’s about the insurmountable and inherently cynical task of making a follow-up to the Matrix trilogy, one that breaks technical and narrative ground the way the first film did. On a thematic one, it’s an agitprop romance, one of the most effective mass media diagnoses of the current moment that finds countless things to be angry about, and proposes fighting them all with radical, reckless love. On top of all that, it is also a kick-ass work of sci-fi action — propulsive, gorgeous, and yet still intimate — that revisits the familiar to show audiences something very new.

Reloading, but not repeating

The Matrix Resurrections soars by echoing something old. A familiarity with The Matrix and its sequels, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions , comes in handy when entering the new film, as the first task Wachowski, Mitchell, and Hemon go about resolving in Resurrections is extricating Thomas Anderson — better known as Neo — from his fate in Revolutions . Slowly, they reveal how Neo, seemingly deceased alongside his love and partner Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), may or may not have survived to once again become Thomas Anderson, a blank slate who has trouble telling what’s real and what is not.

This Thomas Anderson is also a programmer, but now a rockstar of game development, responsible for the most popular video game trilogy ever made: The Matrix. These games are effectively the same as the Matrix film trilogy that exists in our world, a story about a man named Neo who discovers that he is living in a dream world controlled by machines, and that he is The One destined to help humanity defeat them.

Like Lana Wachowski, who co-created the Matrix films with her sibling Lilly decades ago, Thomas is asked to make a sequel to the Matrix trilogy, one that his parent company — also devilishly named Warner Bros. — will make with or without their input. So, as Thomas goes about his task, his reality takes on an M.C. Escher-esque level of circuitousness. Was the Matrix trilogy a series of games of his making? Or did they really happen, and he is once again a prisoner of the Matrix? Why is there a woman named Tiffany (Carrie-Anne Moss) in this world with him, one who strongly resembles the deceased Trinity of his fiction? Wachowski layers these questions in disorienting montage with voyeuristic angles, presenting Thomas’ presumed reality with just enough remove to make the viewer uncomfortable, and cause them to doubt, as Thomas does.

Casting the previous films as in-world video games allows The Matrix Resurrections to function as a refreshingly heavy-handed rebuke of the IP-driven reboot culture that produced the film, where the future is increasingly viewed through the franchise lenses of the past, trapping fans in corporate-controlled dream worlds where their fandom is constantly rewarded with new product. That video games are the chosen medium for The Matrix Resurrections ’ satire is icing on the cake: an entire medium defined by the illusion of choice, a culture built around the falsehood that megacorporations care about what their customers think when they have the data to show that every outrage du jour will still result in the same record-breaking profits.

As one of Thomas’s colleagues bluntly puts it: “I’m a geek. I was raised by machines.”

Bugs in the system

The opening act of The Matrix Resurrections is wonderfully confounding, a delicious way to recreate the unmooring unreality of the original to an audience that has likely seen, or felt its influence, countless times. Yet as it replicates, it also diverges. This is not, as the hacker Bugs (Jessica Henwick) notes early on, the story we know.

Bugs is our window into what’s new in Resurrections , a young and headstrong woman dedicated to finding the Neo that her generation knows only as myth. Her zealotry puts her in hot water with her elders; outside of the Matrix, humanity has eked out a small but thriving post-apocalyptic life, resting on the uneasy treaty between man and machine that Neo brokered at the end of the original trilogy. By constantly hacking into the Matrix to find Neo, Bugs threatens that peace — yet it’s a risk that Bugs and her ragtag crew (which includes a phenomenal Yahya Abdul-Mateen II in a role that’s not quite who viewers think he is) feel is worth taking. Because despite the war fought to free humanity from machine enslavement, much of humanity is still choosing to remain in the Matrix. The real world being real is not reason enough for anyone to wake up from the dream world.

But the hope of rescuing Neo is only half of the story. Wachowski makes a dazzling pivot halfway through The Matrix Resurrections , one that underlines a focal shift from individual freedom to human connection: The Resistance learns that it may be possible to free Trinity again as well, although by means never tried before. It’s a mission that isn’t likely to succeed, but in this strange new future, it’s the only one worth living and dying for. In pivoting to a mission to save the theoretical Trinity, Resurrections takes the messaging of the original film a step further. It’s not enough to free your mind; in fact, it’s worthless if you don’t unplug in the interest of connecting and loving those around you.

This back half gear-shifts into something much more straightforward, and frankly, it whips. It’s The Matrix as a heist movie. Because of this genre pivot, Resurrections ’ action takes on a different flavor from that of its predecessors. While weighty, satisfying martial arts standoffs are still in play, they’re not the centerpiece, as “Thomas” and “Tiffany” are the heart of the film, played by actors 20 years older and a little more limited in their choreography. Instead, The Matrix Resurrections chooses to dazzle with gorgeous widescreen set-pieces, big brawls, and visual effects that once again astonish while looking spectacularly real. Wachowski and her co-writers split the action as Bugs and her crew — who don’t get enough screen time but all make a terrific impression — race to find where their heroes may be hidden in the real world, and “Thomas” tries to get “Tiffany” to remember the love they once shared. All of the heady philosophy that these movies are known for is put into direct action, as the machines show off the ways they’ve changed the Matrix in an effort to not just keep a Neo from rescuing a Trinity, but to imprison him again.

In this sequence and throughout, The Matrix Resurrections relishes in being a lighter, more self-aware film than its predecessors, a movie about big feelings rendered beautifully. Its score, by Johnny Klimek and Tom Tykwer, reprises iconic motifs from original Matrix composer Don Davis’ work while introducing shimmery, recursive sequencing, a sonic echo to go with the visual one. While legendary cinematographer Bill Pope is also among the talent that doesn’t return this time around, the team of Daniele Massaccesi and John Toll bring a more painterly approach to Resurrections . Warm colors invade scenes from both the Matrix and the real world; the latter looks more vibrant than ever without the blue hues that characterized it in the original trilogy, while its digital counterpart has now changed to the point where it’s painfully idyllic, a world of bright colors and sunlight that is difficult to leave.

Embodying those changes is Jonathan Groff as a reawakened Smith, Neo’s dark opposite within the Matrix. Groff, who steps in for a role indelibly portrayed by Hugo Weaving, is the audacity of The Matrix Resurrections personified: He nails a character so iconic that recasting it feels like hubris, yet also finds new shades to bring to an antagonistic role in a world where villains only appear human, when in fact they’re often ideas. And ideas are so hard to wage war against.

Systems of control

If the old Matrix films are about lies we are told, the new Matrix is about lies we choose. In spite of its questions, 1999’s The Matrix hinges on the notion that there is such a thing as objective truth, and that people would want to see it. On the cusp of 2022, objective truth is no longer agreed upon, as pundits, politicians, and tech magnates each present their vision of what’s real, and aggressively market it to the masses. Our current crisis, then, is whatever you choose it to be. You just have to choose a side in the war: one to be us, and another to be them.

“If we don’t know what’s real,” one character asks Neo, “how do we resist?”

In returning to the world she created with her sibling, Lana Wachowski makes a closing argument she may very well not get to have the last word on. The Matrix Resurrections is a bouquet of flowers thrown with the rage of a Molotov cocktail, the will to fight tempered by the choice to extend compassion. Because feelings, as the constructs that oppress humanity in the Matrix note, are much easier to control than facts, and feelings are what sway us. So what if Neo fights back with a better story? A new myth to rise above the culture war?

It doesn’t have to be a bold one. It can even be one you’ve heard before. About a man named Thomas who can’t shake the idea that there’s something wrong with the world around him, that he feels disconnected from others in a way that he was never meant to be. And when others finally tell him that he’s living in an illusion, he doesn’t quite believe them — not until he sees something, someone, for himself that reminds him of what, exactly, he is missing: that he used to be in love.

The Matrix Resurrections hits theaters and HBO Max on Dec. 22.

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‘the matrix resurrections’: film review.

Neo is back in Lana Wachowski’s very self-referential fourth ‘Matrix’ film.

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Given the peculiar nature of Lana Wachowski ’s The Matrix Resurrections and the plot’s reliance on details many will consider spoilers, it seems wise to get something out of the way: If you loved The Matrix and hated the sequels (or simply found them unsatisfying), go see this one. Have a blast. (But wear a mask.)

If you’re in the much smaller club that believes the sequels were underappreciated examples of brainy mythmaking, it’s possible Resurrections will break your heart: While it doesn’t pretend the jumbo-sized plots of those two films didn’t happen, it does jettison much of their self-importance, and feels little need to blow viewers’ minds with new ideas or technical inventions.

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Release date: December 22 (Warner Bros. Pictures)

Cast: Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Jessica Henwick, Jonathan Groff, Neil Patrick Harris, Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Jada Pinkett Smith

Director: Lana Wachowski

Screenwriters: Lana Wachowski, David Mitchell, Aleksandar Hemon

It is, in other words, the kind of sequel Hollywood wants most — practically the same thing as the first, with just enough novelty to justify its existence — albeit one that thinks it can have it both ways, both bowing to and sneering at the industry’s need for constant regurgitation of familiar stories. It’s impossible to explain that sentence without revealing details of the film’s premise, so read on at your own risk.

Whatever exactly happened to Neo when he appeared to sacrifice himself at the end of film three, he’s back in the digital simulation now, living again as a two-decades-older Thomas Anderson. Anderson has become a successful video game designer whose greatest creation was (get this) a trilogy of hit games called The Matrix . Part of Anderson knows these games are a story he actually lived, but he has allowed the squares around him to convince him he’s mentally ill: He regularly sees an unnamed analyst (Neil Patrick Harris) who gives him meds (blue pills, natch) and helps talk him through the violent episodes in which he imagines the whole world is a simulated reality he needs to escape from.

Anderson hasn’t exactly left his fight against the Matrix behind — he’s written bits of code, “modals,” in which AI characters play through variations of scenes he can’t stop thinking about — but professionally, it’s his distant past. Imagine his shock when an associate tells him that “our beloved parent company, Warner Bros.” has decided it’s time to make a Matrix sequel, and is going to do it with or without Anderson’s involvement.

Something like this apparently happened in our own world: Several years ago, there was talk of a Wachowski-free reboot being written by Zak Penn, possibly to star Michael B. Jordan. Two years later plans had changed, with Lana Wachowski, sans original partner Lilly, on board to direct and cowrite.

Whatever the meaning of Lana’s go-it-alone move, or its possible relation to the film’s pairing of sole-creator Thomas with a morally and creatively suspect business partner (Jonathan Groff), there’s no misunderstanding what comes next onscreen. In a long sequence where shallow youngsters brainstorm Anderson’s new game for him, the filmmakers distance themselves from their project. They make fun of moviegoers who found the sequels’ philosophical ambitions pretentious, imagining the audience as lunkheads who just want more bullet time. And once this self-serving interlude is finished, that’s almost exactly what they give them.

In a sequence intentionally reminiscent of its counterpart in the first film, Thomas Anderson gets another chance to follow mysterious strangers out of the simulation his brain lives in. Things are a bit different with this extraction, but not too different: As the film condescendingly notes, “a little nostalgia” goes a long way to soothe anxiety in those transitioning from one reality to another. (Maybe that explains why Wachowski uses so many clips from the earlier films, needlessly illustrating Neo’s memories throughout this adventure.)

Eventually we’re with Neo in the “real” world, where flesh-and-blood survivors have learned to work with some of the machines they once battled. This community, still stuck far below Earth’s surface, has seen ups and downs since Neo left. Without giving anything away (or pointing out the screenplay’s unanswered questions), let’s just say Resurrections has a satisfying explanation for why Laurence Fishburne’s Morpheus has been replaced with one played by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II.

Another familiar face or two will appear, but Neo’s most important teammates are newcomers who were inspired by legends of his exploits to make their own escapes from the Matrix. Chief among them is Bugs (Jessica Henwick), who can kick a lot of simulated ass despite wearing sunglasses whose frame swipes straight through the middle of her field of vision. (The movie’s outré wardrobe, designed by Lindsay Pugh, is a lot of fun, but those glasses cross the line.)

Carrie-Anne Moss features prominently on the movie’s poster, but prepare to wait a long time for Trinity. She’s been re-Matrixed too, and the fictional life she was given there has a hold on her. Machine guns, flying robots and pods of goo notwithstanding, some of the picture’s most engaging scenes are those in which Neo/Thomas interacts with Trinity in that world, where she’s a married mother named Tiffany, and tries to coax her into remembering the life they once shared.

Rescuing Trinity becomes the sole point of the film, allowing us to mostly stop keeping track of all the Oracles and Architects and Keymasters and whatever that bogged the sequels down. As that mission develops, we piece together the ways Wachowski (writing with novelists David Mitchell and Aleksandar Hemon) has reconceived some figures from the original trilogy. These reimaginings mostly make sense, and they open up new interpretative possibilities for fans who feel these action blockbusters merit close analysis. But they tend to work better on paper than on screen, failing to crystalize meaning, sound and image as perfectly as, say, Hugo Weaving did as Agent Smith.

As for the action, it’s thoroughly enjoyable even if you’ve mostly seen it before. Ordinary inhabitants of the Matrix sometimes get transformed into a mindless swarm of attackers — not as chilling as watching Agent Smith possess other people’s bodies, but good for some zombie-apocalypse-style battles (and for a fight on a Japanese Shinkansen that owes something to Train to Busan ). Bullet time gets tweaked, not as a tool for cinematic excitement, but as a way to knock the air out of Neo’s sails.

Resurrections leaves plenty of things unexplored. For a movie that so loudly makes reference to the real world, its failure to address the place “red pill” symbolism has found in right-wing propaganda comes as a mild surprise. (The dialogue even contains the word “sheeple,” a favorite of those selling conspiracies online.) And there’s nothing here to inspire hope that, should Warners or whomever insist on more sequels, they’d be worth seeing. But as someone who watched Reloaded and Revolutions more than once, trying unsuccessfully to believe they were good (and who’d happily take a blue pill that erased them from my memory), I actually look forward to seeing this one a second time.

Full credits

Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures Production companies: Village Roadshow Pictures, Venus Castina Productions Cast: Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Jessica Henwick, Jonathan Groff, Neil Patrick Harris, Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Jada Pinkett Smith Director: Lana Wachowski Screenwriters: Lana Wachowski, David Mitchell, Aleksandar Hemon Producers: James McTeigue, Lana Wachowski, Grant Hill Executive Producers: Bruce Berman, Jess Ehrman, Garret Grant, Terry Needham, Michael Salven, Karin Wachowski Directors of photography: Daniele Massaccesi, John Toll Production designers: Hugh Bateup, Peter Walpole Costume designer: Lindsay Pugh Editor: Joseph Jett Sally Composers: Johnny Klimek, Tom Tykwer Casting director: Carmen Cuba

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The Matrix Resurrections Reviews

A sleek, meta, & complex return to this franchise makes for an ALMOST Perfect sequel even if it’s second half could of been stronger

Full Review | Jul 26, 2023

Lana Wachowski delivers a surprisingly meta, self-aware movie about the original trilogy packed with bold, fascinating ideas but an absolutely terrible execution.

Full Review | Original Score: C- | Jul 25, 2023

The Matrix Resurrections can be merited for its attempt to honor its predecessors, even if it becomes distracted by trying to please its parent studio.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/10 | Feb 23, 2023

I especially love the costuming in the film. This isn’t a standard legacy-quel, and it’s all the better because of that.

Full Review | Feb 10, 2023

Out of everyone in Resurrections, my two favorite characters are Jessica Henwick as Bugs and Jonathan Groff as Smith. They give the best performances in the movie, though the whole cast is strong, and they offer us something fresh within the Matrix lore.

Full Review | Original Score: 8/10 | Dec 30, 2022

"Resurrections is a film that argues against its own existence while bringing new weight to a universe that has captivated audiences for two decades."

Full Review | Nov 19, 2022

Never mind blue pills and red pills. The bitterest pill to swallow is the fact that The Matrix Resurrections is okay but it is not The One.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Nov 12, 2022

At best, The Matrix Resurrections comes off as a bad parody. At worst, it ruins The Matrix films that came before. I hated every single second of it.

Full Review | Sep 18, 2022

The ways in which it was commenting on itself and how the world has evolved since the last film came out, and the state of entertainment, and the world, and politics... I felt like I was on the same page and that made this an enjoyable viewing for me.

Full Review | Sep 11, 2022

A high octane, nostalgic thrill ride with a little bit too much self awareness and an unnecessarily convoluted (even by Matrix standards) plot.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Aug 22, 2022

“Resurrections” is a slog, overburdened by endless exposition and lacking anything that feels remotely fresh.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 16, 2022

Daring, evolve[s] its franchise while mining nostalgia with care and savvy, and make[s] the utmost of its biggest strengths — Reeves and Moss, clearly, who could melt faces with their chemistry.

Full Review | Jul 8, 2022

... Distills brilliance and intelligence. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Jun 28, 2022

An uneven film that starts out unprejudiced and self-referential, comfortably and happily winking at the first three films of this saga, but then gets stuck in and endless loop trying to explain the unexplainable. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Jun 17, 2022

There's no denying the aspiration to create a story that revels in both provocative themes and thrilling large-scale entertainment.

Full Review | Original Score: 6/10 | Jun 5, 2022

The Matrix Resurrections evolves the original trilogy's anti-capitalist metaphor and places it front and center for all to see, ensuring that no one can look away from it's message that only community and resistance can save the day.

Full Review | May 30, 2022

A tetralogy was not achieved. The Trilogy remains intact.

Full Review | May 12, 2022

The Matrix Resurrections is the biggest, gayest, and campiest tentpole movie in years! It has action, it has gays, it has leather, it has latex, and its all done with its over-the-top tongue fully in cheek!

Full Review | Original Score: A+ | Apr 4, 2022

Rename this film to: Why Lana didn't want make a sequel but didn't want anyone else to do it for fear the original trans allegory would be completely erased from the legacy of the Matrix franchise and it turned into a cis male bullet time p0rno.

Full Review | Original Score: F | Apr 4, 2022

The Matrix Resurrections is one of the most ambitious and self-referential blockbusters you're likely to see, but it isn't anywhere near as clever as it thinks it is.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Mar 28, 2022

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‘The Matrix Resurrections’ Review: Slipping Through Dreamland (Again)

Keanu Reeves plunges down the rabbit hole once more in this familiar-seeming mind-game movie, the fourth in the series.

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By Manohla Dargis

After she chases the White Rabbit down a very long tunnel, Alice enters a low, dim hall. There are doors up and down the passageway, but they’re all locked. As she walks through the hall, Alice wonders how she’s ever going to get out. You may find yourself asking much the same question while watching the fourth movie in “The Matrix” series, as it alternately amuses and frustrates you with its fantastical world.

The series first invoked Lewis Carroll’s elusive bunny in the first movie, the 1999 genre game changer that was jointly directed by the Wachowski siblings and soon set audiences’ heads on fire. “ Follow the white rabbit ” Neo, a.k.a. the One (Keanu Reeves, cinema’s ideal savior), reads on his desktop monitor, shortly before doing just that. The chase continued and at times seemed never-ending as it endured through two sequels, comics and video games. It also provided grist for reams of articles, dissertations and scholarly books (“The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real”), taking its place as one of contemporary pop culture’s supreme interpretive chew toys.

The series resumes in “The Matrix Resurrections,” which nudges the cycle forward even while it circles back to swallow its own tail. Once again, Reeves plays both Thomas Anderson and Neo, who exist in separate yet conjoined realms. Anderson’s world resembles our own (though airlessly art directed) but is a software program called the Matrix that’s run by artificially intelligent machines. Here, human avatars go about their business believing themselves free. In the series’ wittily perverse take on the circle of life, these machines keep human bodies — Anderson’s included — imprisoned in goo-filled vats, using the energy from these meat puppets to power the Matrix.

Directed solely by Lana Wachowski, “Resurrections” announces its intentions after the opening credits, with their streams of cascading green code. Somewhere in the illusory world, a woman with short hair fights unsmiling men in suits and shades, a setup that mirrors the banging preliminaries in the original film and makes you ache for Carrie-Anne Moss’s Trinity, Neo’s comrade in arms. Don’t worry, she’s onboard, too, just wait. Now, though, two others are also watching the action along with us, including a guy wearing a headset (Toby Onwumere) who analyzes the action like a sports commentator just before Bugs (Jessica Henwick) jumps into a very familiar fray.

What follows plays like a loving, narratively clotted tribute video to the “Matrix” cycle itself complete with innumerable bullets and almost as many flashbacks to the younger Neo. (You don’t need to revisit what happened earlier in the cycle, the movie does it for you.) Once again, Anderson is in dreamland writing code, this time for his role as a video game designer working on a project called Binary. Speaking of which: As before, he also has an apparent choice to remain ignorant about his existential condition or embrace its painful truth. He also meets a mysterious figure called both Agent Smith and Morpheus (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, whose velvety, sepulchral voice adds shivers of danger).

There have been some significant cast changes since the third movie. Alas, missing in action are both Hugo Weaving and Laurence Fishburne, who added gravitas and much-needed wit. Instead, a silky Jonathan Groff now prowls around menacingly, his boyishness having been nicely weaponized for his role as a sly trickster. A less happy addition is Neil Patrick Harris, who delivers an unhelpful, one-dimensional performance as the Analyst. Still, not much here is different other than some of Reeves’s facial creases and salt-and-pepper hair. Characters still wear fetish clothing or nubby threads, and still keep fighting the fight as they brawl and yammer through the labyrinth.

Some of that yammering is amusing simply because “The Matrix” (and its successors) are exemplars of what’s been called mind-game movies, “a ‘certain tendency’ in contemporary cinema,” as the film theorist Thomas Elsaesser put it. Like others of this type, “The Matrix” plays with the perception of reality held by both the protagonist and the audience, poses questions about the limits of knowledge and addresses doubts about other minds and worlds. What makes mind-game movies especially fascinating — and helps explain their cultish appeal — is how they draw spectators into the game, partly by showing them worlds that they recognize. Or, as Morpheus put it once upon a time: “You’ve felt it your entire life, that there’s something wrong with the world.”

So, yes, “You have many questions,” as a character called the Architect tells Neo in “The Matrix Reloaded.” No kidding! That movie offered some persuasive, or at least tantalizing, answers: The world is an illusion, a simulation, an ideological prison, but it’s possible to escape with lots of guns and cool kids in black, that is until the sequel. The first movie offered viewers doors that they — unlike Alice — could open, allowing them to enter more rabbit holes. Once there, one of the more resonant readings, as the critic Andrea Long Chu has explained, is that “The Matrix” has been embraced by trans women as an allegory for gender transition. In this take, the world of illusions is the gender binary.

Whatever the limits of allegory, this interpretation is both intriguing and touching. (Lana’s sister Lilly Wachowski has said “that was the original intention.”) It adds emotional resonance to “Resurrection,” which gets a great deal of mileage from its — and our — nostalgic yearning, appreciatively stoked by Reeves and Moss’s reunion. The actors’ sincerity and effortlessly synced performances have always been this series’ greatest special effects, and watching them slip back into their old roles is a pleasure. The movie they’re in is still as beholden to the same old guns and poses as the earlier ones, the same dubious ideas about what constitutes coolness, the same box-office-friendly annihilating violence. But it’s still nice to dream of an escape with them.

The Matrix Resurrections Rated R for extreme gun and other violence. Running time: 2 hours 28 minutes. In theaters and on HBO Max .

An earlier version of this review misidentified the movie in which the Architect was a character. It was “The Matrix Reloaded,” not   the first “Matrix.” 

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Manohla Dargis has been the co-chief film critic since 2004. She started writing about movies professionally in 1987 while earning her M.A. in cinema studies at New York University, and her work has been anthologized in several books. More about Manohla Dargis

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The Matrix Resurrections is more interested in being self-aware than being good

A fantastic setup to a tepid sequel.

By Adi Robertson , a senior tech and policy editor focused on VR, online platforms, and free expression. Adi has covered video games, biohacking, and more for The Verge since 2011.

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The Matrix Resurrections warned me its existence was a bad idea, and I kept watching anyway. I really have nobody but myself to blame.

The Matrix Resurrections is, to its credit, a fairly weird film — but one that’s often more concerned with being self-aware than being good or enjoyable. Directed by Lana Wachowski instead of the typical Wachowski-sister duo, Resurrections starts with an intriguing bit of metatextual loopiness before devolving into a tepid sequel. It’s a gratingly uncool and reactive cut-up of an effortlessly cool and timeless work, albeit seemingly deliberately so. It seeks to dissect the adulation and mythos that have grown up around The Matrix over 22 years but without the masterful craftwork that inspired that adulation in the first place. And worst of all, the kung fu isn’t very good.

Resurrections is a direct sequel to 2003’s The Matrix Revolutions , continuing the story of Neo, Trinity, and a few other well-known characters from the Matrix trilogy. (If you don’t know who these people are or you haven’t thought about them much since then, I would strongly recommend brushing up.) But in spirit, it’s a sequel to the entire Matrix cultural phenomenon that began in 1999. And without getting into specifics, I don’t mean this in some abstract thematic way. Resurrections’ narrative is very directly responding to decades of people analyzing everything from The Matrix’s bullet time sequences to its transgender subtext .

It’s a promising premise for a new installment in the series, and the early execution is fantastic. Resurrections’ opening calls back to an iconic Matrix scene while stylishly introducing new characters and teasing a compellingly trippy plot, complete with a new palette that spices up the series’ classic monochrome with patches of slick color. It’s followed by an effectively cringeworthy sendup of a specific media industry that will remain nameless. It echoes Matrix contemporary The Thirteenth Floor — as well as its predecessor, the Rainer Fassbinder film World On A Wire — with a story about losing track of the line between reality and fantasy but freshly made for a world where that philosophical dilemma has permeated pop culture.

If you want to know as few plot points as possible about The Matrix Resurrections, you can skip this paragraph. But if a little context is helpful, the film begins with Neo (Keanu Reeves) and Trinity (Carrie Anne-Moss) having been reinserted into a version of the Matrix simulation. The pair don’t know each other and have no memory of their earlier selves, and the former has achieved lonely fame inside the simulation while the latter has a family and a quiet life.

Keanu Reeves’ rubber duck is just as good in context

Reeves is a lot of fun to watch in the film’s first act, where he’s playing a world-weary man who’s sick of being lauded as a visionary for creating something he now finds fundamentally silly even as it nearly ruined his life. (A shot of him lying in a bathtub with a rubber duck on his head is as good in context as it was in the film’s trailer.) Moss gets to try out a less austere and more human version of Trinity, and her story touches on interesting questions about what attachment means inside a virtual world. The original Matrix was about a young, alienated loner, but Resurrections takes more seriously the idea that you could find meaning with other people in an activity that remains essentially fake.

From the beginning, though, the writing often feels disposable. Where The Matrix yearned to talk about big ideas like free will and the nature of reality, Resurrections is a series of burns on techbros, obsessive fans, the media industry, people who think quoting movies makes them cool, and other lesser contemporary villains.

The original film was obviously also a product of its time, riffing on tropes about corporate cubicle workers, virtual reality utopianism, and 20th-century ennui. But it used these specifics as the building blocks for a world that was self-contained and compelling even after the underlying cultural moment passed. In The Matrix Resurrections , these elements are tangential commentary that never anchors itself in a larger plot — particularly because when that larger plot does barge in, it’s flat at best and vicariously embarrassing at worst.

Like the original Matrix trilogy, Resurrections eventually revolves around questions about Neo being “the One,” a figure with the power to control the Matrix. But unlike those films, Resurrections doesn’t establish why it matters.

Resurrections centers Neo and Trinity’s love story but in a disjointed and frustrating way

The Matrix set its stakes high by painting a nightmarish future where humanity was perpetually at the brink of total enslavement, and its few free members lived a life of constant fear, and the One was a weapon that resistance fighters had spent their whole lives searching for. Its oft-maligned sequels eased up on this grimness, but in exchange, the films introduced characters with homes and families and orgiastic dance parties — most of them cared about Neo, not because of some idol-like affection, but because he might save those things. (The key exception, a figure introduced in The Animatrix dubbed “The Kid,” had his hero-worship played as a poignant joke.) Even a character like Laurence Fishburne’s Morpheus, who built his life around finding and protecting Neo, was motivated as much by the concept of faith as a personal attachment to the man.

There’s none of this in Resurrections . For one thing, the film barely bothers explaining what happened as a result of The Matrix Revolutions’ ending, when Neo’s powers finally helped him broker peace between humans and machines. Far from ignoring the sequels, it directly incorporates footage from them and features some returning characters. But it also quietly reverses large parts of them for no satisfying reason, making the import of everything Neo and Trinity did in those films unclear.

For another, the film’s new characters have virtually no motivations outside a fandom-like obsession with Neo. The heroes, who are functionally almost interchangeable except for the blue-haired Matrix escapee Bugs (Jessica Henwick), think he’s an awesome guy and want — as a literal stated mission — to help him get his “mojo” back. The villains are obsessed with tormenting him for underexplored reasons, even when that gets in the way of their theoretical actual job.

Meanwhile, Neo himself has no interest in anything except rekindling his relationship with Trinity. The Matrix films made the love story between the two an ever-larger part of the narrative as the trilogy progressed, and it’s obviously what Wachowski wants to focus on here. But it’s written in a way that makes Neo come off as either selectively amnesiac or chillingly unconcerned about the fate of the human race. His incuriosity about anything except Trinity also wastes opportunities to help explain foundational plot points, which instead get brought up and almost immediately abandoned. And the pair’s interactions, despite being the supposed heart of the film, are oddly disjointed. Wachowski has definitely read all those essays about Trinity Syndrome , but Trinity’s character arc is still patchy and weak — full of moments that describe the existence of conflicts instead of letting them unfold.

The Matrix’s sequels had countless flaws, but they showcased the Wachowski sisters’ straightforward knack for visually memorable set pieces and elaborate choreography. Resurrections has only one sequence that even approaches the fun of The Matrix Reloaded’s sprawling car chase or The Matrix Revolution’s giant mech battle, and it’s over far too quickly. It barely tries to capture the magic of the original Matrix’s gunplay and wire-fu, either. Its fight scenes draw more strongly from the post- Bourne Identity school of choppy pragmatic combat, and they become progressively more perfunctory, more pointlessly derivative, and harder to follow thanks to a penchant for crowd scenes involving the film’s equivalent of zombies.

But most frustratingly of all, Resurrections seems dedicated to shooting itself in the foot — and distinctly not dodging the bullet — with Matrix callbacks that undercut its own strengths.

In a couple of casting decisions that are technically spoilers but have been confirmed online already, the film introduces Watchmen’s Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as a new iteration of Morpheus and Mindhunter’s Jonathan Groff as a new version of the villain Agent Smith. It suits the film’s stated theme of evolution and repetition in theory, but in practice, it puts both men in the position of rehashing past iconic performances — in Abdul-Mateen’s case, from one of the most powerfully charismatic actors in Hollywood. He ends up playing little more than a collection of glib quips in an admittedly great suit, while Groff gets his shot at a uniquely hateable performance smothered by intercuts to Smith’s original actor Hugo Weaving.

There’s no good reason to do this. Narrative continuity doesn’t demand either man appear: Smith’s destruction was a central element of The Matrix Revolutions , and Morpheus was canonically murdered in a video game by flies . Both roles could have been more compellingly written as original characters. The film runs in too many directions for the reincarnated Smith and Morpheus to spend time grappling with their evolution, they retain almost none of their original motivations, and Neo is too busy worrying about Trinity to engage with either. (The fact that Fishburne and Reeves had by far the most chemistry and the best-shared arc of any two Matrix cast members makes this doubly sad.)

Smith’s presence is particularly unnecessary because he’s not even the primary antagonist. That dubious honor goes to a new character who’s written like a chatbot trained on the comments in a “high-IQ rationalist skeptics” subreddit, except that this description at least implies some kind of explanation for why he would exist.

The film’s recast roles feel like an act of cynicism

Instead, the recasting feels like an act of frustrated cynicism, the logical conclusion of Marvel-style storytelling where viewers can only care about a new character if they’re a reincarnation of an old one. Given the explicit narrative of the film, I’d even believe the awkwardness of it is intentional. Resurrections spends its entire first act telling audiences that a new Matrix installment would be a hollow byproduct of corporate coercion dressed up as an innovative reworking of a classic. Like almost any recent major franchise film or game that supposedly “deconstructs” its predecessors, it’s given the freedom to posture at subversion before delivering the exact thing it’s required to.

As someone who was shaped deeply by The Matrix , it’s a little sad to walk away from The Matrix Resurrections with the impression that fandom and franchise-based media have soured its legacy badly for Wachowski. I was a tween when it premiered, and it’s the first film I can remember processing as a kind of overwhelming aesthetic experience instead of a story that happened to involve moving pictures. Watching it decades later, it’s a perfect gestalt of memorable dialog, alluring conspiracism, kinetic camera work, and stylish violence. The Matrix is more than ripe for a self-aware joke — but not one built for a machine that won’t allow it the decency of a punchline.

The Matrix Resurrections will premiere December 22nd in theaters and on HBO Max.

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‘The Matrix Resurrections’ Review: The Boldest and Most Personal Franchise Sequel Since ‘The Last Jedi’

David ehrlich.

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It’s fitting — maybe even fate — that “Spider-Man: No Way Home” should be the biggest and virtually only movie in the world on the week that “ The Matrix Resurrections ” is released. Both are mega-budget, meta sequels that feed on our collective familiarity with their respective franchises. One is a poison, the other its antidote.

One is a safe plastic monument to the solipsism of today’s studio cinema; an orgiastic celebration of how studio filmmaking has created a feedback loop so powerful that it’s programmed audiences to reject anything that threatens its perfection (and to clap like seals for anything that reaffirms it, even if that means cheering for the “unexpected” return of heroes and villains they were once eager to leave behind). The other is a jagged little red pill of a blockbuster that exhumes its intellectual property with such a pronounced sense of déjà vu that the comforts of its memory start to feel like the bars of a cage, and the perfect circle of its feedback loop blurs into a particle accelerator spinning faster and faster in order to create something new and romantic. One is a crowd-pleasing testament to the idea that even (or especially) the biggest fictions can shrink our imaginations. The other is a fun, ultra-sincere, galaxy brain reminder that we can only break free of the stories that make our lives smaller by seeing through the binaries that hold them in place — us vs. them, real vs. fake, corporate product vs. personal art, reboot vs. rebirth, etc. vs. etc.

If “No Way Home” is the snake eating its tail with such reckless abandon that it fools itself into thinking it’s full, “The Matrix Resurrections” is the rare blockbuster that dares to ask what else might be on the menu. It’s the boldest and most vividly human franchise sequel since “The Last Jedi” (if also messier and more postmodern than Rian Johnson’s miraculous addition to the “Star Wars” canon). It will likely prove the most divisive as well. Doubling down on the “Alice in Wonderland” spirit of its franchise, “The Matrix Resurrections” is a movie that will only appeal to fans interested in seeing how deep the rabbit hole goes; anyone simply looking for more “Matrix” isn’t just shit out of luck, they’re in for an experience that will toy with their expectations for more than two hours without fulfilling a single one of them.

Once upon a time — at the brink of history between one century and another — there was a corporate drone who doubted the true nature of his world and grew obsessed with finding the man who could show him what lay behind the curtain. This time around, Thomas Anderson ( Keanu Reeves ) is the creative genius who designed that curtain, and he’s doing everything he can to convince himself that nothing is on the other side. Those glitches he sees in the code of reality? There are prescription blue pills for that. What about the nagging suspicions that his face isn’t right? That he somehow knows Tiffany ( Carrie-Anne Moss ), the badass soccer mom he keeps seeing at the Simulatte coffee shop? That the hit trilogy of video games he created about a war between humans and the machines who kept their minds enslaved in some kind of computer matrix wasn’t a story he came up with, but something he remembered from another life? All fodder for Thomas’ therapy sessions with his Analyst (Neil Patrick Harris), who has a logical answer ready for every question.

The brilliant conceit of “The Matrix Resurrections” — and this is not a spoiler by any measure — is that it’s about someone who doesn’t want to disbelieve in his life. Not again. Not after his last breakdown almost ended in suicide. And it’s not like Thomas is stuck in some anonymous noir city programmed for the characters of a simulation. On the contrary, he lives in a recognizable San Francisco so bright and poppy that every window of his skyscraper office appears to provide its own Instagram filter. Things may be going too well for them to seem real, as Thomas’ boss and corporate partner Smith (Jonathan Groff) is happy to point out in a very familiar cadence, but he’s earned his success. It’s only when Warner Bros., the parent company that owns his gaming studio, starts pressuring Thomas to reconsider his refusal to make a “Matrix 4” that he begins to reflect on what that success means, and what it may have wrought.

The cheekily self-reflexive “Resurrections” rests closer to something like “The Souvenir Part II” or “Twin Peaks: The Return” than to “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” and all of the other recent blockbuster sequels made to consecrate their own mythologies. Lana Wachowski ’s reluctant trip back to the signature franchise she invented with her sister kicks off by admitting — in shockingly direct terms — that it only exists because Warner Bros. was going to make another movie with or without her. And so, with the help of co-writers David Mitchell and Aleksandar Hemon, she used the opportunity to reflect upon that cultural hunger for more of the same. If the trilogy generated several billion dollars in revenue by telling a paradigm-shifting tale about the limitless power of a free mind, why is Hollywood still stuck in a creative death spiral? What does “The Matrix” tell us about the real world (and vice-versa) in a new millennium where the basic premise of a shared reality no longer seems valid? And what could Neo, the real Thomas Anderson, possibly do about it after he and the love of his life both died in the war against the machines?

“The Matrix Resurrections” answers all of those questions to one extent or another, but the real beauty and synaptic thrill of Wachowski’s film lie in how it forces audiences to ask those questions themselves. It’s not enough to suspect that you’re dreaming; you have to want to wake up. The fact that Thomas Anderson is uncharacteristically reluctant to do so makes him a more compelling avatar for us than ever before, even as we find ourselves rooting for the new faces there to prod him along.

Some of those new faces are attached to new names. Jessica Henwick ’s Bugs is the single most electric addition to the franchise since the original, even if her earnestly punkish gunslinger spends large chunks of this movie re-watching the events of “The Matrix” from behind the walls (think of the Avengers revisiting the Battle of New York in “Endgame,” except here everything is curiously just a little bit different). The other key character is someone we know, but don’t quite recognize. His name is Morpheus, but here he’s played by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II instead of Laurence Fishburne. The role hasn’t been recast so much as reprogrammed, and Morpheus 2.0 is learning how to become his namesake in real-time, as if he, Bugs, and the rest of their team were trying to “Shutter Island” Thomas into remembering that he’s really Neo. It’s a process that makes for this film’s most ecstatic moments, as Wachowski races through a glossy speed-run of the original movie’s greatest hits in a way that might seem like cheap nostalgia if not for the dizzying vertigo of its déjà vu.

It goes without saying that Thomas eventually rediscovers his inner Neo and becomes determined to dive back into whatever Matrix he came from and rescue Trinity (or is that Tiffany?) from her Chad of a husband, but “Resurrections” is such a remarkable head trip because the rest of the movie continues the first act’s fixation on disentangling people from their most comforting fictions. Maybe Tiffany doesn’t want to leave her family and her foam lattes behind and go back to a subterranean hell future where she’ll be mired in a war against squid robots. Maybe some people loved “The Matrix,” understood its bold-faced message about the illusion of choice, and still decided that they preferred a five-figure salary and the occasional steak over volunteering on the Nebuchadnezzar for gruel. Others might have mistaken one pill for another, and unwittingly aligned themselves with the same forces choking off their freedom. “If we don’t know what’s real,” Abdul-Mateen’s Morpheus-que character says, “we can’t resist.”

So no, this isn’t simply a continuation of where “The Matrix Revolutions” left off, but rather a vision of the future shaped by the last two decades of our collective past. And Wachowski hammers that point home from start to finish, as “Resurrections” bears little resemblance to the franchise’s previous installments. Gone are the hyper-rigid compositions that helped make “The Matrix” so iconic, its shots arranged with the airless precision of the cyberpunk anime cels that inspired them. Gone too is the Oz-like emerald and black color scheme that defined the computer world, and the impossible action scenes that turned it into a digital playground for choreographer Yuen Woo-ping. Instead, Wachowski’s latest film retains the vibrant look of “Cloud Atlas” and “Sense8,” that aesthetic enriched by a looseness that allowed the director to keep her camera rolling for 30 minutes at a time and find each scene in post.

The paradox of “The Matrix” has always been that the real world in these movies looks fake, while the computer simulation more resembles our reality. “Resurrections” is able to stretch that feeling to new heights by populating “the real world” full of more unbelievable effects (include a manta ray robot destined to become your new best friend) and an almost documentary-like sense of verisimilitude made uncanny by the fact that every polygon is just a little too shiny. Something about Thomas’ San Francisco sticks in your teeth in a way that neither he nor we can ignore.

That approach doesn’t do the fight sequences any favors, but the good news is there aren’t that many of them. This won’t sound like an endorsement, but it helps to know going in: “The Matrix Resurrections” isn’t cool. At all. Not that anyone who’s followed the Wachowskis’ recent work will be surprised that this movie only uses spectacle as an on-ramp for unalloyed “love will save the world” sentiment. The action here is seriously unexciting compared to even the trilogy’s wonkiest setpieces.

If most of the combat is forgettable, with the 57-year-old Reeves appearing to save what’s left of his body for “John Wick 4,” that’s only a major problem during the small handful of action scenes that aren’t in service to bigger ideas. A climactic motorcycle chase through downtown San Francisco is riveting (and eerie) because of how literally it illustrates the dangerous hold that fiction can have over waking life. The rooftop helicopter battle that follows might have been unsatisfying if not for how poetically it locates the essence of human freedom amid the acceptance of a fait accompli.

This whole movie is like that final leap of faith: an IMAX-sized dance between desire and fear that Wachowski stages with someone else’s money and a loving smile on her face. Not everything adds up on first watch: Some of the fan-servicey bits are clunky as hell (Priyanka Chopra Jonas’ part is one long monologue of future heist gobbledygook, like a cross between “Ocean’s Eleven” and “The Jabberwocky”), and even diehard fans may not appreciate that “Resurrections” maintains franchise tradition of making all the real-world scenes faintly insufferable.

Then again, this is a movie that strives to bridge the divide between real and fake, past and future, choice and illusion. It’s a movie that knows people will always yearn for what they can’t have as they dread to lose what they already do, and fall prey to certain fictions regardless of how many times someone tells them to seize control of their minds. Best of all, its emphasis on the romance between Neo and Trinity allows “Resurrections” to become a devastatingly sincere movie about how love is the best weapon we have to make sense of a world that fills our heads with the white noise of war and conflict on a forever loop. All of us are stuck in our reboots. But at a time when mega-budget franchise movies can only be about themselves, Lana Wachowski has made one that pushes beyond the dopamine hit of cheap nostalgia and dares to dream up a future where mainstream films might inspire us to re-imagine what’s possible instead of just asking us to clap at the sight of history repeating itself.

“The Matrix Resurrections” opens in theaters and on HBO Max on Wednesday, December 22.

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'The Matrix Resurrections' Proves It's Worth Returning to the Well for Love | Review

Director and co-writer Lana Wachowski helms one of the most romantic and meta Matrix movies yet.

Editor's note: The following review contains mild, non-plot spoilers for The Matrix Resurrections.

Action filmmaking has seen several pivotal titles that singularly redefined the genre over the decades, with movies that tested and in many cases broke through the ceiling of what audiences and even creators thought could be achieved on-screen. In the year leading up to the millennium, no film succeeded at this more than The Matrix . In fact, you could probably divide most sci-fi movies into two categories from that moment on: those that came before The Matrix , and those that came after. The first Matrix movie wasn't just a breath of fresh air in Hollywood filmmaking; it became a cultural moment that permeated our society, a work of fiction to be dissected by fans, a fame vehicle for its young lead Keanu Reeves , and eventually, fodder for plenty of MTV Movie Awards parodies. The massive success of the film would go on to spawn two sequels, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions , filmed back-to-back in one long run of production and released in the same year of 2003, although each follow-up was met with diminishing critical response in spite of being box office hits. The growing franchise also led to the release of The Animatrix , a series of short anime movies. Pretty soon it became obvious that Warner Bros. just wanted to keep the Matrix train running by whatever means necessary.

When a long-awaited sequel was announced back in 2019 , it was anyone's guess how the creators would approach the concept, especially since it's a question that has loomed over the sisters' heads even as they worked on other films together like Jupiter Ascending and Cloud Atlas . Eventually, Lana Wachowski came back to make The Matrix Resurrections solo, directing and co-writing the film alongside her Sense8 series finale collaborators David Mitchell and Aleksandar Hemon — which, if you know the Netflix show, should already clue you in about the type of sequel movie you're in for. With these three at the helm, The Matrix Resurrections becomes an acutely meta and epically romantic film — one that also asks us to question things like our own instinct to reach for nostalgia, or our reliance on sequels and reboots to comfort ourselves rather than wholly original ideas.

The Matrix Resurrections is set approximately twenty years after the events of the last movie — coincidentally, almost as many years as it took this sequel to come out. Neo (Reeves) is living what appears to be a rather mundane life in San Francisco as Thomas Anderson, a virtuoso game programmer whose most successful and award-winning title to date is, surprise-surprise, The Matrix . He's clearly going through some shit on a personal level, evidenced by his constant visits to his therapist ( Neil Patrick Harris ), who prescribes him suspicious blue pills when he confesses to having odd visions and dreams, as well as the strange desire to try jumping off of buildings to see whether he can fly. He's also captivated by a woman ( Carrie-Anne Moss ) that frequents the coffee shop near his office but is still trying to work up the nerve to introduce himself to her. When Anderson's business partner Smith ( Jonathan Groff ) approaches him about the heavy demand for a new Matrix game, it sends Neo into a spiral of ennui and creative listlessness, one that is unexpectedly broken when he's approached by two strangers, the blue-haired Bugs ( Jessica Henwick ) and a man calling himself Morpheus ( Yahya Abdul-Mateen II ).

Summarizing up the film aside, what do you do when you've already smashed through the ceiling as far as action moviemaking is concerned? If you're Lana Wachowski, apparently that involves focusing on the bigger question hovering around this sequel by textually wrestling with what it means to contribute to franchise culture by making Resurrections in the first place. It's evident from the jump that Wachowski's script, at least in part, serves as a mouthpiece for her to make one thing plain to fans — the overlords at Warner Bros., as Groff's Smith so directly states to Neo, were planning to make a Matrix sequel with or without the original creative team. It's a moment in the movie that's played for humor, but the underlying cynicism rings distinct: you wanted me to make another Matrix film? Well, here it is, and you can take it or leave it. There's also even more weight to the scene when one recalls the fact that Resurrections almost never saw the light of day; when the movie had to halt production for pandemic reasons, Wachowski reportedly considered leaving it unfinished and had to be convinced by the cast to come back and resume filming.

RELATED: Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss on ‘The Matrix Resurrections’ and When They Realized What Trinity Means to People

Fortunately, what results from Wachowski's return to the franchise is well worth plugging back in for — and while Resurrections does afford screentime to plenty of action as well as keen philosophizing about free will vs. choice and the switch to manipulating feelings over facts in this new version of the Matrix, it's never been clearer that the crux of this franchise is a love story. In a realm defined by technology and science, Neo and Trinity have been linked by the most illogical concept of all: fate. Although the movie introduces each of them as having no idea who the other person is or what they even mean to one another, there's still an unconscious charge that happens the first time they shake hands, a magnetic pull that continually brings them into each other's orbit in spite of greater forces conspiring to keep them apart. Their romance in this movie is not implicit by any means, and the love that Wachowski still openly holds for that story persists through every single emotional beat of its script. When Neo finds himself awakened to the reality of this new Matrix, courtesy of a red pill from Morpheus 2.0, his sole mission becomes about how to save Trinity — and his love for her defines every single choice he makes from that moment on. Reeves and Moss sell the relationship between their characters in every scene, from quiet conversations over a coffee shop table to standing on the precipice of a skyscraper, weighing whether or not to jump into the unknown together.

Cast-wise, there's as much to love from the crop of newcomers as there is with the franchise's legacy players. Henwick's Bugs is the character whose unwavering optimism drives most of the story as she works tirelessly to free Neo from the Matrix. Abdul-Mateen's Morpheus serves as less of a guiding figure in this new iteration and more of a force designed to shake Neo out of his complacency, as well as inject plenty of levity. As the Analyst, Harris is responsible for delivering much of the sequel's metaphysical monologuing, which he commits to with a blend of menace and sangfroid. And Groff absolutely makes a meal out of the scenery as the newest incarnation of Smith, capable of alternating between charming and sinister energy without missing a beat.

The place where Resurrections does fall a little short is with its action. The sequel continues to emphasize all of the ways in which the Matrix eschews the laws of physics, resulting in many thrilling visuals, but the film, at many points, oddly veers away from the wire-fu and wide camera angles that the first movie became defined by. The result is a lot of frenetic and close-up perspective on certain sequences that makes the action very difficult to parse. It's a minor quibble in the overall delivery of the plot, but this is one particular instance in which leaning on nostalgia might have served the sequel better rather than trying to deliver something so divergent in terms of camerawork.

The most common question that circles around sequels, especially ones that are finally released after years of waiting, is whether they were even worth making to begin with. With The Matrix Resurrections , Wachowski has succeeded in not simply providing her own answer but conveying a film that represents the story she was most interested in telling after all this time, for better or worse. The Matrix Resurrections is an admirable follow-up in that it's less concerned with being the movie any fans might believe they want and instead serves up a sequel that will invite lots of conversation, encourage us to parse through the story code, and ultimately linger behind in our minds long after the credits roll.

The Matrix Resurrections premieres both in theaters and on HBO Max on December 22.

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The Matrix Resurrections review – drained of life by the Hollywood machine

Keanu Reeves is back as cyberpunk icon Neo but fans of the original will find this cynical reboot a bitter pill to swallow

E ighteen years after what we thought was the third and final Matrix film, The Matrix Revolutions , Lana Wachowski has directed a fourth: The Matrix Resurrections. But despite some ingenious touches (a very funny name, for example, for a VR coffee shop) the boulder has been rolled back from the tomb to reveal that the franchise’s corpse is sadly still in there. This is a heavy-footed reboot which doesn’t offer a compelling reason for its existence other than to gouge a fourth income stream from Matrix fans, submissively hooked up for new content, and it doesn’t have anything approaching the breathtaking “bullet time” action sequences that made the original film famous.

The first Matrix was a brilliant, prescient sci-fi action thriller that in 1999 presented us with Keanu Reeves as a computer hacker codenamed “Neo”, stumbling across the apparent activity of a police state whose workings he scarcely suspected. Charismatic rebel Trinity ( Carrie-Anne Moss ) brings Neo to the mysterious figure of Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) who offers our reluctant hero one of the most famous choices in modern cinema: the blue pill or the red pill. The first will allow Neo back into his torpid quasi-contentment, the second will irreversibly reveal to him the truth about all existence. He swallows the red and discovers all our lives exist in a digitally fabricated, illusory world, while our comatose bodies are milked for their energies in giant farms by our machine overlords.

A vivacious and underrated sequel, The Matrix Reloaded , appeared in 2003 and later in the same year The Matrix Revolutions, in which the idea ran definitively out of steam: the awful truth was that the drab “reality” in which the rebels were fighting their tedious intergalactic war against these machines looked like Battlefield Earth , the dire sci-fi movie starring John Travolta.

But the red pill and the blue pill was an irresistible meme gifted to political discourse at the dawn of the online age. Christopher Nolan’s Inception was surely influenced by The Matrix and when Succession ’s digital media baron Lukas Matsson, played by Alexander Skarsgård, contemptuously compares social media users to Roman slaves, he is echoing ideas touted by the original film. Jeff Orlowski’s documentary The Social Dilemma , about social media serfdom, comes with Matrix-esque imagery – and Mark Zuckerberg is attempting to craft a new digital world called Meta. Moreover Lilly Wachowski, the original’s co-director, has intriguingly discussed the world of Matrix and its relevance to the dissenting politics of gender.

The fourth movie wittily begins by showing us Neo in haggard and depressed middle age, operating under his normal name Thomas Anderson: he is an award-winning but burnt-out game programmer. But there are weird eruptions from within his alt.reality: an activist called Bugs (Jessica Henwick) tries to make contact with him, along with a renegade government agent (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) who has assumed the persona of Morpheus. Meanwhile, Thomas’s obnoxious billionaire employer Smith (Jonathan Groff) seems a parallel version of the sinister Agent Smith played by Hugo Weaving in the original films. But Thomas’s analyst ( Neil Patrick Harris ) is on hand to assure him that this is all just his imagination. But is it? And is Thomas still deeply in love with Trinity, whom he sees every day in his local coffee shop?

In some ways, The Matrix Resurrections has a degree of charm as a love story of middle age, and usually returning action franchises give their ageing male lead a younger female co-star. Not here: it’s a pleasure to see Moss return, but a shame to see her given so little interesting to do. The Matrix is an idea that is most exciting when it is starting to come apart: when there is a glitch. But the franchise is now a glitch-less narrative: we basically know all about the illusion and the “Battlefield Earth” reality out there in space which is where we are largely marooned: a huge, dispiriting crepuscular ruined cityscape glowing at its rocky edges, like the Verneian interior of a volcano. And the nature of the machines’ thinking and their motivations is not really solved by this fourth film, despite some playful new ideas about whether some of them are disloyal to their side. Lambert Wilson’s character The Merovingian, a veteran of the Machine War, returns, ranting enjoyably about the superiority of art, music and pre-digital conversation.

Really, Resurrections doesn’t do much to remove the anticlimax that hung like a cloud over the cinema auditorium at the end of the third film in 2003. This movie is set up to initiate a possible new series, but there is no real creative life in it. Where the original film was explosively innovatory, this is just another piece of IP, an algorithm of unoriginality.

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The Matrix Resurrections

Return to a world of two realities: one, everyday life; the other, what lies behind it. To find out if his reality is a construct, to truly know himself, Mr. Anderson will have to choose to ... Read all Return to a world of two realities: one, everyday life; the other, what lies behind it. To find out if his reality is a construct, to truly know himself, Mr. Anderson will have to choose to follow the white rabbit once more. Return to a world of two realities: one, everyday life; the other, what lies behind it. To find out if his reality is a construct, to truly know himself, Mr. Anderson will have to choose to follow the white rabbit once more.

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• Trivia Laurence Fishburne told Collider movie news that he was not in this Matrix movie. When questioned, he replied that someone would have to ask Lana Wachowski because he didn't have an answer for that.
• Goofs Exactly at the 30:16 mark, Trinity's reflection is seen on the glass table she and Neo are having coffee over. This is a completely different person, Trinity's DSI, to show the viewers how Neo sees Trinity and how she really looks to everyone else, a subtle proof Trinity's digital self image has also been altered by the system. After realizing this, the story Trinity tells Neo about her telling her husband Chad she looks like Trinity, and her husband subsequently laughing about it makes perfect sense as her DSI looks completely different.

The Analyst : Quietly yearning for what you don't have, while dreading losing what you do. Desire and fear.

• Crazy credits There is a final scene after the end credits where the game development team from Deus Machina briefly debate the future of entertainment media.
• Connections Edited from The Matrix (1999)
• Soundtracks Music from The Matrix, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions Written by Don Davis

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• Runtime 2 hours 28 minutes
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The Matrix Resurrections review: After an 18-year gap, it's time to get red-pilled again

Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss reunite for a sequel that's surprisingly romantic.

Senior Editor, Movies

All that's old is Neo again. But before we dive back into Matrix mythology for this belated-but-welcome sequel, it's worth recalling what a lumbering mastodon the sci-fi-action genre had become by the late-1990s: Phantom Menace dullness and two killer-asteroid movies. In its moment, 1999's The Matrix vibrated with ideas, not merely "bullet time" but internet paranoia, hacker fashion, and (whoa) kung fu. Even if the movie's two sequels cribbed too much from the messianic-hero playbook, the good work was done.

Less one Wachowski (Lana directs while Lilly steps away), The Matrix Resurrections could never be as radical as the original. But credit a meta screenplay by Wachowski, David Mitchell, and Aleksandar Hemon for finding an inspired way in: Today's Thomas Anderson ( Keanu Reeves ) — older, salt-and-pepper-bearded, and lent the extra indignity of lanky Belushi hair — mopes in his San Francisco office, a game designer past his prime. His corporate overlords (Warner Bros., showing good humor) want a sequel to his classic Matrix trilogy.

Already we know something's off, even as the clues pile up: Jefferson Airplane's psychedelic "White Rabbit" on the soundtrack; a smarmy therapist ( Neil Patrick Harris ) prescribing blue pills for anxiety; flirty looks from that cute mom in the Simulatte coffeehouse, Tiffany ( Carrie-Anne Moss , just as fierce two decades on). Soon enough, another dapper Morpheus ( Yahya Abdul-Mateen II ) strolls out of a stall in the company bathroom and we're zooming into — out of? — a different reality.

It's a do-over without a full share of wonderment, but still a lot of fun. Wachowski retains a singular eye for shiny plasticity and sharp edits, even if you miss the verbal tartness of OG cast member Hugo Weaving ( Hamilton 's bitchy King George, Jonathan Groff , does what he can with a new antagonist). And like many of today's epics, there's an expositional sag in the middle.

But Resurrections does eclipse its predecessors for full-on, kick-you-in-the-heart romance: Reeves and Moss, comfortable with silences, lean into an adult intimacy, so rare in blockbusters, that's more thrilling than any roof jump (though those are pretty terrific too). Their motorbiking through an exploding city, one of them clutching the other, could be the most defiantly sexy scene of a young year. B+

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• Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss resurrect a 20-year love story with The Matrix 4.0
• See The Matrix Resurrections cast reflect on Trinity and Neo's 'beautiful love story'
• What even is The Matrix ? Lana Wachowski and her stars address decades of theories

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Review: Lana Wachowski’s ‘The Matrix Resurrections’ is a deeply felt, colorful remix

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The Times is committed to reviewing theatrical film releases during the COVID-19 pandemic . Because moviegoing carries risks during this time, we remind readers to follow health and safety guidelines as outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and local health officials .

When the Wachowski siblings, Lana and Lilly, changed the film landscape (and popular culture) forever with 1999’s “The Matrix,” a philosophical sci-fi film that questioned the very nature of existence itself, it was no surprise that Warner Bros., the studio behind the movie, asked them to make a few more. They obliged in 2003, with “The Matrix Reloaded” and “The Matrix Revolutions,” though the sequels effectively killed off the idea that we’d ever hang with Neo and Trinity again.

But the powers that be will always want more, and so a sequel to the trilogy, “The Matrix Resurrections,” arrives 18 years later. But this isn’t just another rehash. Rather, the film asks us to question the utility of sequels, reboots and the constant churn of intellectual property, especially when the original lesson of “The Matrix” was to awaken oneself to the system, and then bring the whole thing crashing down.

Lana Wachowski enthusiastically takes on this almost impossible task of plugging back into the Matrix to mine the code for new ideas. Lana’s sister Lilly sits out “The Matrix Resurrections,” but Wachowski has brought on writer David Mitchell, who wrote the novel “Cloud Atlas,” which the Wachowskis adapted to the screen in 2012 , and a writer on their Netflix series, “Sense8,” to co-write the script. The result is a swift, self-reflective, often funny and always original reimagining of the material, which sees Wachowski reassessing the existing characters and lore of “The Matrix” while embroidering the text with new ideas and details. It’s less of a reboot than a remix, and this time, it’s a bop.

Wachowski has infused the world with an exciting new cast of characters, playing roles both familiar and fresh. It feels good to be back with these beloved characters, some of whom have taken on new and, it must be said, hotter forms (looking at Jonathan Groff and Yahya Abdul-Mat een II , specifically).

The story of “The Matrix Resurrections” is indeed familiar too. A man named Thomas Anderson ( Keanu Reeves ) leads a repetitive, uninspiring life behind a desk and has the nagging feeling that there’s something else out there for him. But this time around, he’s a video game designer, the brains behind a revolutionary game called “The Matrix,” the narrative of which is essentially the first trilogy of films. The game came from his memories of his time as Neo, not that he’s necessarily aware of that. As his boss, Smith (Groff) presses Thomas and his team for a remake of the game, a new group of Matrix-hopping hackers, including the awesome Bugs (Jessica Henwick), is ripping through the code, searching for Neo. When they find Thomas and once again offer him the red pill to escape the Matrix, the renewed Neo only has one goal: go back and find his one true love, Trinity ( Carrie-Anne Moss ).

This film is all about the “re” — the reboot, remix, reimagining, reassessment, the (literal) resurrection of the man who died for our machines — and the Neo myth has influenced a whole new generation, including Bugs and her tough, androgynous, multiculti crew. The new blood brings new life to the text, which could otherwise be just a clever dig at sequel culture, but the film is also deeply earnest and deeply felt, especially when it comes to the core love story, the swooning romance between Neo and Trinity.

Wachowski brings this unapologetic earnestness and sense of pleasure to “The Matrix Resurrections,” which is also a welcome reminder that big action films can be well lit, stunningly designed and, yes, colorful too. She invites the audience to have as much fun as she’s having revisiting this world that initially defined her career, and she seems to apply her full self to this text, bringing an irreverent and infectious zeal to the resurrection. The fact that this ends with an exaltation to “paint the sky with rainbows!” tells you all you need to know about her attitude in this latest trip into the Matrix.

Walsh is a Tribune News Service film critic.

‘The Matrix Resurrections’

Rated: R, for violence and some language Running time: 2 hours, 28 minutes Playing: Starts Dec. 22 in general release; also available on HBO Max

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The Matrix Resurrections Review: The Wachowskis Were the True Oracles

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Science fiction, in its most perfect form, operates like a Möbius strip. It critiques the present by speculating about the future. Then, years later, early adherents look back and analyze its predictions, knowing full well that sci-fi set the blueprint for the world they’re living in. Utopic or dystopic, the future always folds back on itself. Rarely, though, do the creators of sci-fi get to revisit the worlds they built after the events they anticipated are set in motion. In this, Lana and Lilly Wachowski are all but singular.

When The Matrix came out in 1999, it was a beautifully realized cyberpunk fable. It took the hopeful energy of the early internet years and envisioned what might happen if humanity’s reliance on connectivity and thinking machines led to its near-demise. It was a grim prediction, but one in a long line of sci-fi stories that foretold the near-future. Brave New World presaged antidepressants. Philip K. Dick warned readers about androids, and now fears of AI revolts creep up when we dream of electric sheep (or at least watch a Boston Dynamics robot dance ). Everyone who makes surveillance tech surely knows the year 1984. Would virtual and augmented realities even exist if it weren’t for William Gibson’s Neuromancer and the USS Enterprise ’s holodecks?

What the Wachowskis predicted in The Matrix —a world where artificial intelligence turns people into batteries and runs a simulation to keep them docile—hasn’t entirely come to pass, but hints of it are everywhere. No one lives in a simulation, but Silicon Valley can’t get enough of the metaverse , which often feels just a few clicks West. Scientists are working on brain-computer interfaces that could, many years from now, send virtual experiences to our brains . AI doesn’t generate our reality (probably), but it does live in our cars and TVs and toothbrushes. You don’t need a red pill to experience the real world, but the conspiracy-laden, right-wing internet has co-opted “ red-pilling ” to mean waking up to the many ways liberalism is poisoning America. (Or something.)

Tech geniuses who currently run the world grew up with The Matrix , and now they’re gunning to make the simulation real. Only many seem to have forgotten the dangers that came with it, missing the point the Wachowskis were trying to make. “Readers often assume that authors are happy when they ‘predict’ future events ‘correctly,’” writer Madeline Ashby noted in WIRED’s Future of Reality issue , “but rarely are we asked about the queasy feeling of watching one's worst vision come to pass.”

( Spoiler alert: Plot points for The Matrix Resurrections follow.)

It’s this queasy feeling that permeates The Matrix Resurrections. It’s almost as if Lana Wachowski has seen the worst of her own ideas start to take form and wants to ring the alarm. Set in San Francisco, the movie takes place some 60 years after the events in The Matrix Revolutions , the final in the original trilogy. Neo (Keanu Reeves) and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) have been reinserted into the Matrix, duped into forgetting their days as saviors. Thomas Anderson is now a successful video game designer at a studio called Deus Ex Machina (LOL). He’s responsible for a trilogy of games known as The Matrix , which eerily resemble the events of the Wachowskis’ first three films. He’s now working on a new game called Binary —presumably a reference to coding language, but also a not subtle nod to red pill vs. blue pill, real vs. fake, free will vs. destiny, and, perhaps, the fact that gender is not either/or.

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Or at least that’s what he’s working until he gets called into the office of his boss (played by Jonathan Groff) and told that Warner Bros., his studio’s parent company, wants to make a sequel to the trilogy “no matter what.” (This is especially funny given that the Wachowskis spent years saying “no” to the real-life Warner Bros. about revisiting the franchise.)

What follows is a metanarrative about both the impact of the Matrix games in the Matrix and the Matrix movies in the world of the viewer. Wachowski devotes an entire montage to the message of the original trilogy—it was about cryptofascism! and trans identity! and capitalism!—and how audiences want a sequel that feels “fresh.” Game designers utter phrases like “reboots sell,” and “we need a new bullet time,” while Thomas Anderson struggles to separate fiction from reality.

All of this could be mind-numbing if it wasn’t so self-aware, if it didn’t seem like Wachowski and her cowriters David Mitchell and Aleksandar Hemon weren’t engaged in the smartest bit of trolling in cinema, shrugging off every critique that has been, or could be, leveled at the franchise. Think it’s too soon to go back to a series of films that only ended 18 years ago? There’s someone ready to remind you that “nothing comforts anxiety like a little nostalgia.” (Has Wachowski been reading my work ?!) Can it often feel too cute or self-aware? Yes, but for the fans it’s winking at, the result is flattering.

That’s also just the first third. The remainder gets into the meat of the original trilogy’s stoned-philosopher ideas. There is a lot of talk of choice, and how often in life options aren’t options at all. The idea of fiction vs. reality comes up a lot , as do the facts vs. feelings debates that have permeated America’s political discourse.

Truth (heh) be told, all of this would be downright corny in any other movie; it might even be corny in this one. But set against the backdrop of what the Matrix franchise is, and what it’s come to mean, it’s tolerable. The Matrix Resurrections was made for those who have spent the last 22 years immersed in the franchise. New characters and new obstacles emerge, but there’s also no doubt Resurrections is about getting the band back together for one more show—even if Reeves and Moss spend most of their time with a new cast of characters and Morpheus is now New Morpheus ( Yahya Abdul-Mateen II ), a different iteration of the character played by Laurence Fishburne in the original movies. The motifs—cascading green code, simulation theory, white rabbits—remain the same, a recursive loop that, while not new, plays a familiar melody. That’s the point; they’re still relevant because the lessons of The Matrix remain unlearned.

In different circumstances, this repetitiveness would be a problem, a spell cast to repel the unfamiliar, the newcomers. But in a time when “red-pilling” is a political buzzword and you can say “we’re living in the Matrix” to just about anyone and they’ll understand the gist, how many uninitiated ones are left?

Lana and Lilly Wachowski’s original vision feels so real today largely because they gave it language. No, AI overlords haven’t built a giant simulation. But we do spend a lot of time living as avatars, allowing social media companies to build livelihoods off of our creative and intellectual output. The 20-plus years after the release of the first Matrix have so upended reality that the phrase “alternative facts” means something. This is likely why Resurrections fixates on the impact its previous installments had on the world. It doesn’t apologize for what it wrought; it just lives in the zeitgeist it created.

Midway through The Matrix Resurrections , the new Morpheus attempts to convince Neo that the Matrix, the thing he’s been trying to forget, is just a virtual reality. This has always been the head-trip of the Matrix movies too. They’re where viewers go to escape, but two decades later, their concepts have moved from the screen to meatspace. With Resurrections , the years of discourse about the franchise have found their way into its next chapter. Is there anything new here? Hmm, dunno. But it’s nice to go back down the rabbit hole. Science fiction, in its most perfect form, operates like a Möbius strip.

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The Matrix Resurrections Is a Messy, Imperfect Triumph

After all this time, what does the blockbuster have left to offer? At its platonic ideal, a big-budget, mass-marketed movie induces pleasure. With swift and bright characterization, it allows actors to operate in a grander register, aching to fill the space of dizzying visual landscapes around them. Bombast and awe on all fronts. Maybe it’s difficult to identify an ideal blockbuster in contemporary Hollywood, drawn as it is to weak craft, characters with little interior dimension, and an understanding of representation that reduces gender, race, and sexuality to items on a marketing checklist rather than world-building attributes of a story. This is the cinematic reality into which The Matrix Resurrections enters, over 20 years after its original incarnation debuted in 1999: A universe laden with sequels and reboots and constantly updated IP. A universe in which imagination has curdled into what can most easily be bought and sold. And yet here is Lana Wachowski, pushing back against the tired form and offering audiences something fresh, curious, and funny as hell.

Teetering between a meta-reckoning with the legacy of the first trilogy and a sincere blooming of a whole new story that feels boldly romantic, Lana Wachowski’s first solo feature is a thrilling triumph. It is impossible to overstate the influence of the previous three movies — particularly 1999’s The Matrix — on American culture, launching “red pill” into dark internet circles, prompting the kids I grew up with to nonchalantly wear latex and leather in the Miami heat, forcing action films of its time to claw upward in the direction of the Wachowski sisters’ cyberpunk-inflected aesthetic, which itself pulled from a wild array of influences. The world has changed dramatically since Neo first bent out of the way of incoming bullets, and yet The Matrix Resurrections easily makes a case for its own existence. After decades of audiences attempting to slot the franchise into one category of interpretation or another, the film argues against any imagined binary to show that beauty is found between such extremes. Wachowski builds on what of the greatest and most singular aspects of the original trilogy: its queerness.

Playing with ideas of memory and nostalgia could have led Resurrections to have a self-satisfied, airless quality. Instead, it feels emotionally expansive and intellectually sly. Much of the first act works to actively critique nostalgia for nostalgia’s sake, and how it is exploited by those in control, whether machine overlords or Hollywood studios. (“Nothing comforts anxiety like a little nostalgia,” Yahya Abdul-Mateen II’s Morpheus says.) Resurrections is messy and imperfect, too, often eschewing easily digestible plotting in favor of an ambitious eccentricity, a reminder that bombastic storytelling is best translated by artists who are willing to fail. From the revelatory production and set design to the warmth of the cinematography by John Toll and Daniele Massaccesi to the updated action scenes, Lana Wachowski proves how powerful a blockbuster can be in the hands of those with vision and ambition. But it’s the kind of film whose very foundation makes it tricky to discuss in depth without tracing the narrative and emotional shape of it. I recommend going into the film with an open heart, an open mind, and little knowledge of the nitty gritty turns in the story, some of which I’m about to examine. You’ve been warned.

Early in the film, inside a slick high-rise office overlooking the nearly too-perfect San Francisco skyline, a gaggle of video game developers argue about what the Matrix is an allegory for. Is it trans rights and politics? Is it capitalist exploitation? The scene has a rhythmic dexterity, as the developers volley forth opinion after opinion. It’s poised to be hilarious, and it is. Among the developers is Thomas Anderson (Keanu Reeves), who in this new world is a famous video-game designer who created a game called The Matrix to much acclaim. He’s a suicide survivor, having once lept from a building on a clear sunny day believing he could fly. When his business partner (Jonathan Groff) says he must design a new Matrix game despite his vowing not to, his reality starts to slip. Is he losing his mind or is the Matrix he supposedly created something more than a game?

Wachowski and co-writers David Mitchell and Aleksander Hemon play out this anxiety with a consistent intrusion of clips from the previous films, a strategy that doesn’t always work. But when it does, it’s sublime. Like in the scene where Thomas Anderson slips from this therapist’s (Neil Patrick Harris) grasp and realizes he is indeed the Neo of his video game. His memory of meeting Morpheus (Lawrence Fishburne then, Abdul-Mateen II now) is projected onto a ripped projector screen that acts as a doorway, figuratively and literally. Freed from a prison once again, Neo learns it has been 60 years since he and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) traveled to the machine city, sacrificing their lives for their revolutionary cause. He must determine: Can he free Trinity, too, or is she happy in this false new world where she is a married mother of two with a penchant for motorcycles? Neo never truly believed in himself as the One, but Trinity did. How can he be what everyone believes him to be without her?

The Matrix Resurrections might lack the ground-shaking originality of its 1999 predecessor, but it manages to chart a stunning, divergent path, philosophically and cinematically. Whereas the previous Matrix films were committed to a green-dominated, cool-toned color palette, Resurrections simmers with far greater warmth — amber-hued sunlight streaming through the real world. The fight choreography, from John Wick ’s Chad Stahelski (Reeves’s Matrix stunt double, who plays Trinity’s husband in the new film), is more chaotic and rough-hewn; bodies crash into one another haphazardly, lacking the grace and fluidity Yuen Woo-ping brought to the original movies. The costume design led by Lindsay Pugh brings back gothic sensibilities with restraint, forgoing fetish wear but remaining committed to the epic-ness of flowing silhouettes. The sets are littered once again with mirrors that glisten with thematic resonance. The film commits to granting audiences joy in ways that feel primal (exceedingly hot, well-dressed people are kicking unholy amounts of ass) and earnest (Wachowski does not abandon the previous films’ core belief in hope and community building).

That joy emanates through the cast. Harris’s naturally haughty, self-satisfied miasma works perfectly. Groff is cheeky and charismatic as a rebooted version of Agent Smith, his fight scene with Neo in an abandoned building being one of the highlights of the film. Decked in finely tailored suits the color of marigolds and deep ocean waters, Abdul-Mateen II slinks and struts with the grace of a true movie star, winking at Morpheus’s love of theatrics. (The fact that Fishburne wasn’t asked to be a part of the franchise rebirth hangs over the performance, though.) Jessica Henwick exudes hope, grounding the unexpected coalition that pins the movie together. The new actors, even when they’re playing old characters, are so much more than energetic doppelgängers of the Matrix heroes and villains who came before them, absorbing well the aesthetic differences between this reboot and the trilogy.

But for all its strengths — retreading and remixing the franchise while charting a bold new course for the canon — The Matrix Resurrections would fail if it wasn’t for the chemistry of Reeves and Moss. The former has by now solidified his place as a major movie and action star several times over, seamlessly moving from tickled bewilderment to sincere fear to absolute control on screen. Watching Moss, with her cutting gaze and sharp physicality, I can’t help but mourn for the career she deserved. Together, there is an inherent optimism — about the human spirit, about the will to overcome a narrowing force — that flits open when they share a scene. It’s along the arc of Neo and Trinity’s romance that Resurrections separates itself from its recent blockbuster brethren. Behind a meta-narrative storytelling approach and all that stylistic gleam, The Matrix Resurrections is ultimately a love story — romantic, yes, and a paean to the community necessary for that romance to blossom into resistance. Wachowski is bold enough to argue that in a strategically queer-fashioned world, where boundaries break and the limits of the human body are rejected, choosing love is still a radical decision.

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‘The Matrix Resurrections’ review: Lana Wachowski cleverly reimagines the original

Movie review.

The first “Matrix” movie is the best one by far. In 1999, it redefined sci-fi filmmaking. With its bullet time, its pinwheeling wire-work fight scenes and its incredibly dense multilayered plotting, it was like nothing moviegoers had seen before in a big-screen Hollywood picture.

The two sequels, both released in 2003, “The Matrix Reloaded’ and “The Matrix Revolutions,” didn’t really measure up. They amplified the original but broke no new ground.

Enter “The Matrix Resurrections.” It harks back directly to the original, with several characters explicitly acknowledging the connection: “After all these years, to be going back to where it all started. Back to the ‘The Matrix,’ ” one intones.

Its opening scene is a reprise of the start of the original, with a squad of cops, soon to be dead, busting in on the character Trinity. Off to the side an observer watches and remarks, “We know this is how it all began.” And then promptly realizes something, somehow, is different.

And away we go. Through the looking glass (literally) into a “Matrix” world both very familiar and oddly strange. Mimicking the original, and then bending it.

Writer-director Lana Wachowski, flying solo this time without sibling Lilly, her collaborator on the previous three pictures, operates from the premise that the original has become so deeply embedded in popular culture that we the audience are living in a world shaped by “The Matrix.”

Neo. Trinity. Morpheus. Red Pill. Blue Pill. All are instantly recognizable pop cultural touchstones. Fans of the series know them. Or think we do. Wachowski cleverly plays with that.

Keanu Reeves, bearded and these days answering to the name Thomas Anderson, his moniker before he took the red pill, is a renowned video game designer. His game? “The Matrix.” His fame? Universal. People around the world love that game. They revere him. Fans go gaga in his presence. He’s the star of a big corporation. His games have inspired three movies. Warner Brothers, he’s told in a board meeting, wants a fourth.

He’s abashed by this fame and also disturbed. He doesn’t know the source of his inspiration for the game. He has no memory of being Neo. Well, that’s not quite true. He has nightmares. Flash-cut visions of scenes from “The Matrix” series bedevil his brain. He’s in therapy. “Am I crazy?” he asks his therapist, played by Neil Patrick Harris. “We don’t use that word in here,” Harris replies. There’s something about him, as he says it. Something indefinably off.

Eventually Anderson encounters a mom named Tiffany (Carrie-Ann Moss) in a coffee shop. They both seem familiar to each other. “Have we met?’ she asks. Not as far as he knows.

“The Matrix,” at heart, is a grand love story between Neo and Trinity/Tiffany, and the story as it develops is of two people trying with agonizing slowness first to recall and then rekindle the great love they had.

Other well-known characters enter. Here’s Morpheus. But he’s not played by Laurence Fishburne. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, a very authoritative presence, now has the role. Agent Smith is here, but Hugo Weaving is not. Jonathan Groff has the part, mimicking Weaving’s distinctive vocal inflections. And the character is Anderson’s boss at the video game company.

Unlike other franchises where actors are swapped in and out of iconic roles and the change is unacknowledged — think James Bond — Wachowski makes the changes a crucial part of the story. Abdul-Mateen explains to Anderson/Neo that he is indeed not the Morpheus Neo knows and that’s why Neo doesn’t recognize him. Reality in “The Matrix” is plastic, fungible. “What is reality?” is the key question in “The Matrix.” The machines that control the humans in the Matrix use carefully constructed fantasy to conceal the real nature of the world of the Matrix, where human beings are used as unconscious fuel for the machines.

Greatest-hits set pieces from “The Matrix” — the dojo bout between Neo and Morpheus, the bruising gravity-defying fights with Smith — are re-created but with subtle changes. Thus is ”The Matrix,” reimagined. Wachowski has taken the familiar and modified it in such a way to make it seem new. It’s a brilliant act of transformation.

With Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Jessica Henwick, Jada Pinkett Smith, Neil Patrick Harris. Directed by Lana Wachowski, from a screenplay by Wachowski, David Mitchell and Aleksandar Hemon. 136 minutes. Rated R for violence and some language. Opens at multiple theaters, and streams on HBO Max , starting Dec. 22.

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The matrix resurrections, common sense media reviewers.

Promising sequel devolves into mindless action movie.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

The Matrix movies offer plenty to think about, eve

Neo and Trinity are a little like superheroes, ris

While Neo's ethnicity isn't specificed, star Keanu

Guns and shooting. Falls from high places. Fightin

People are shown partly naked when waking up in go

Two uses of "f--k," plus "s--t," "ass," "bitch," "

Batman toy figure visible. Lego mentioned. Referen

Main character drinks clear liquor from a bottle a

Parents need to know that The Matrix Resurrections is the long-awaited (but underwhelming) fourth Matrix movie, the first since 2003's The Matrix Revolutions . Expect effects-heavy action violence, including lots of guns and shooting; fighting, kicking, and punching; bloody wounds (a throat…

Positive Messages

The Matrix movies offer plenty to think about, even if no conclusions are really drawn. The idea of some people being asleep inside an artificial reality while others are "awake" speaks to our turbulent times and can be interpreted many ways. The idea of choice is also important; each person must make their own choices. On the other hand, the characters choose to risk the lives of a civilization to save one person.

Positive Role Models

Neo and Trinity are a little like superheroes, risking their lives and facing tough enemies to try to make the world a better place. They do cause quite a bit of chaos, but a lot of it is in the "fake" world, so it doesn't really matter much.

Diverse Representations

While Neo's ethnicity isn't specificed, star Keanu Reeves is of English, Native Hawaiian, Chinese, Portugese, and Irish descent. He's surrounded by a diverse group of actors, including Morpheus, who's Black; Sati, who's Indian; and Bugs, who's of mixed Chinese and Zambian descent. Women are equally as tough and capable as men and are shown in leadership positions. Two of the main villains are White men. Director Lana Wachowski is a trans woman.

Did we miss something on diversity? Suggest an update.

Violence & Scariness

Guns and shooting. Falls from high places. Fighting, punching, kicking, etc. Bloody wounds, spitting blood. Throat-slicing. Characters jump from high buildings, becoming "human bombs" and smashing into things below. Vehicle chases. Explosions. Spooky "dream" effects: A character's mouth disappears, etc.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

People are shown partly naked when waking up in goop-filled chambers in the "real" world; nothing explicit shown (everything carefully covered up). Revealing outfits.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

Two uses of "f--k," plus "s--t," "ass," "bitch," "d--k," "goddamn," "hell," "MILF," "G-damn," "oh my God." Suggestions of the f-word: "effin'," "effed," "WTF." Middle-finger gesture.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Products & Purchases

Batman toy figure visible. Lego mentioned. References to Bugs Bunny. (All are properties of Warner Bros., the film's distributor.)

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Main character drinks clear liquor from a bottle as a form of self-medication; the suggestion is that he's had too much. Secondary character sips a martini. Cigarette smoking. Characters take red and blue pills.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that The Matrix Resurrections is the long-awaited (but underwhelming) fourth Matrix movie, the first since 2003's The Matrix Revolutions . Expect effects-heavy action violence, including lots of guns and shooting; fighting, kicking, and punching; bloody wounds (a throat is sliced, and a character spits blood); and explosions, chases, and unsettling "dreamy" visual effects (a man's mouth vanishes, etc.). Characters jump from high buildings, becoming "human bombs" and smashing into things below. People wake up partly naked in goop-filled chambers, but nothing explicit is shown. Language includes two uses of "f--k," plus several uses of "s--t" and sporadic uses of other words. Main character Neo/Thomas Anderson ( Keanu Reeves ) drinks clear liquor from a bottle, and other characters sip a martini or smoke cigarettes. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

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Community Reviews

• Parents say (14)
• Kids say (29)

Based on 14 parent reviews

White men as villains equals diverse representation?

Not enough sex, drugs or swearing. just enough violence., what's the story.

In THE MATRIX RESURRECTIONS, Thomas Anderson ( Keanu Reeves ), now famous for having developed a successful trilogy of games called The Matrix , is working as a video game designer in San Francisco. He sees a therapist ( Neil Patrick Harris ) and takes medication to control his strange "visions" and keep himself grounded in reality. In a cafe, he spots Tiffany ( Carrie-Anne Moss ), who somehow looks familiar. Meawhile, a scrappy young freedom fighter named Bugs ( Jessica Henwick ) infiltrates an experimental computer simulation designed by Anderson and discovers an alternate version of Morpheus ( Yahya Abdul-Mateen II ). Together they find the clues they need to track Neo down and set things right. But once he's awakened and in the "real" world again, Neo longs to find Trinity. So the heroes launch an impossible rescue mission that could doom all humans.

Is It Any Good?

The fourth Matrix movie kicks off with a great idea (and a reason to continue with the story 18 years later), but unfortunately that idea peters out, and the movie gets stuck in a very old rut. Directed and co-written by Lana Wachowski (working, for the first time, without her sister Lilly ), The Matrix Resurrections begins with a savage satire on corporate greed and conniving marketers as Anderson's video game company revs up for a new sequel that he doesn't want to make. ( Christina Ricci appears in a hilarious small role as a particularly tacky marketer.) Wachowski keeps up a certain queasy tension during this first part, including a brilliant montage sequence -- set to the tune of, of course, "White Rabbit" -- that demonstrates how mundane and meaningless this existence is.

As with the original The Matrix (1999), there's a great mystery afoot, with odd little clues everywhere. (Whats up with Reeves' reflection in the computer monitor?) And, ironically, a video game focus group asks all of the questions that viewers are likely asking: What's real, and what's not? What matters, and what doesn't? But at some point near the halfway mark, The Matrix Resurrections reveals everything. The deliciousness is gone, and everything is about planning for the big rescue, fights, chases, and explosions. And without the masterful fight choreography of Yuen Woo-ping , who worked on the first three films, even these look painfully ordinary. The movie seems to have forgotten its original satirical intentions and just swallowed its own blue pill.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about The Matrix Resurrections ' violence . How did it make you feel? Was it exciting? Shocking? What did the movie show or not show to achieve this effect? Why is that important?

How does the movie fit in with the other movies in the Matrix series? How does it compare? Is there a good reason to revisit the world of the Matrix after 18 years? Why, or why not?

How can the idea of the Matrix -- some people are asleep inside an artificial reality, while others are "awake" -- apply to real life? Which option would you choose?

What does the movie have to say about the idea of franchises, sequels, and marketing? Does the movie itself rise above all that?

Did you notice positive representations in the movie? Why is diversity in the media important?

Movie Details

• In theaters : December 22, 2021
• On DVD or streaming : December 22, 2021
• Cast : Keanu Reeves , Carrie-Anne Moss , Jessica Henwick , Yahya Abdul-Mateen II
• Director : Lana Wachowski
• Inclusion Information : Female directors, Transgender directors, Asian actors, Polynesian/Pacific Islander actors, Female actors, Black actors
• Studio : Warner Bros.
• Genre : Science Fiction
• Topics : Adventures
• Run time : 148 minutes
• MPAA rating : R
• MPAA explanation : violence and some language
• Last updated : September 19, 2023

Did we miss something on diversity?

Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by suggesting a diversity update.

Suggest an Update

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The Matrix Resurrections Review

22 Dec 2021

The Matrix Resurrections

The legacy of 1999’s The Matrix endures and evolves. It has been exalted, co-opted, bastardised. With every passing day, the film, directed by Lilly and Lana Wachowski , seems to mean different things to different people, who all claim it as their own. To some it’s merely the groundbreaking, hugely influential, oft-imitated sci-fi action movie that’s rarely been bettered. To some it’s a trans allegory. To some it’s about truth, and reality, and sheeple. “Take the red pill,” tweeted Elon Musk in May 2020. “Taken!”, responded Ivana Trump. “Fuck both of you,” replied Lilly Wachowski. Thank you and goodnight.

Lilly has sat out the fourth instalment, preferring to move onto other things, so this is a Lana joint. And she has made a film about legacy itself: about Neo and Trinity’s legacy, about Keanu Reeves ’ and Carrie-Anne Moss ’ legacy, and literally about The Matrix ’s legacy. The Matrix — as a piece of intellectual property — is mentioned often in this film, which might easily have been titled ‘The Matrix Rebooted’, if only the Matrix in The Matrix hadn’t already been rebooted in The Matrix Revolutions . Welcome to the metaverse! Take a red pill, or at least a Tango Ice Blast, and strap on your synthetic seatbelt.

It dives into that legacy from the off, as Jessica Henwick ’s Resistance leader, Bugs, watches someone who looks like Trinity doing what Trinity did at the beginning of that first film, while characters say the same things other characters said. Bugs — who is in awe of Neo and Trinity, and has studied them for years — has seen this before. She knows what happens. As do we.

if you’re hoping for Resurrections to change the game again you might want to temper your expectations.

In San Francisco we are reacquainted with Thomas Anderson (Reeves), now a video-game designer who wrote a trilogy of games called ‘The Matrix’ and who has Matrix action figures on his desk (literally Carrie-Anne Moss’ Trinity, guns blazing). A colleague does a Keanu/Neo impersonation: “Lots of guns.” We are shown clips from ‘The Matrix’ game, actually clips from The Matrix film. Another colleague laments that “our beloved parent company Warner Bros. is going to make a sequel to the trilogy.” In a coffee shop called Simulatte (nothing is considered too on-the-nose here — it’s a laugh), Thomas meets Tiffany (Moss), who, well, reminds him of someone. Her husband arrives — he’s called Chad, and he’s played by John Wick director Chad Stahelski, who was Reeves’ stunt double on The Matrix . This all happens.

For a good while, The Matrix Resurrections is fabulously batty. It’s cheeky and sly, comprising endless onion-layers (if the onion even exists at all, etc); it’s funny and weird and witty and mad and even, at points, quite moving. Certainly we’ve never seen anything like it, not on this scale, not in a Hollywood blockbuster, not like this.

Then the plot kicks in, and, well, so does tradition. It’s quite odd that for all the ribbing, the self-awareness, the playfulness, it gets comfortably generic, for the most part losing that sense of fun. The action scenes are fine — occasionally inspired, mostly familiar; if you’re hoping for Resurrections to change the game again you might want to temper your expectations. Some of the overtly CG stuff, aesthetic throwbacks to the less-beloved sequels, even feel like video-game cutscenes. That is unlikely to be intentionally meta. And, alas, some of the portentousness of those sequels is resurrected too. Which is a shame, when it’s front-loaded with so much delightful tomfoolery. The self-awareness diminishes exponentially.

When asked a few months ago why she wasn’t involved, Lilly Wachowski said that she just wasn’t of a mind to do a retread, to do something she’d done before. Lana felt the opposite. Their parents having just died, she found solace in bringing back to life the other couple — Neo and Trinity — that had meant so much to her. “Nothing comforts anxiety like a little nostalgia,” says the new Morpheus ( Yahya Abdul-Mateen II ) in Resurrections . And it is cheering seeing Reeves and Moss back at it again. It’s romantic and sentimental and sometimes touching. But it also feels somewhat superficial, and nothing in the film feels like it is of huge consequence: there’s little to hang on to. There is joy here, and a couple of gobsmacking ideas (one of them outstandingly morbid), but it’s a shame that, having set out a brand-new roadmap, Resurrections forgets where it’s going. And reverses.

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A keanu reeves big budget dud is coming to netflix in may.

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SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA - JULY 22: Keanu Reeves speaks onstage at Keanu Reeves "BRZRKR: The Immortal ... [+] Saga Continues" panel during 2022 Comic-Con International: San Diego at San Diego Convention Center on July 22, 2022 in San Diego, California. (Photo by Albert L. Ortega/Getty Images)

A Keanu Reeves box office disappointment from 2021 is coming to Netflix in May.

Netflix is advertising on its platform that Reeves’ fourth Matrix film — The Matrix Resurrections — will begin streaming May 1, joining the first three films in the franchise on the streamer. The timing of the debut of The Matrix Resurrections on Netflix is curious considering that Warner Bros. surprisingly announced in early April that a fifth Matrix film was in development .

Unlike the first four Matrix films, however, The Matrix 5 will not be directed by either Lana or Lilly Wachowski. Instead, Variety reported, Drew Goddard — the screenwriter behind such hits as The Martian and Cloverfield and writer-director of Bad Times at the El Royale and Cabin in the Woods — will write and direct the new Matrix installment.

Lana Wachowski — who directed The Matrix Resurrections — will serve on the fifth film as one of its executive producers. It’s unknown at this point if Reeves will return as the film saga’s Christ-like figure Neo.

The Matrix Resurrections was released simultaneously in theaters and on Warner Bros.' HBO Max streaming platform on December 22, 2021. The film was originally planned to be in theaters only at first, but because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the studio released its entire 2021 film slate day-and-date both in theaters and on its streaming service, which now goes by Max.

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Ultimately, The Matrix Resurrections stumbled at the box office. According to box office tracker The Numbers , the film earned a mere $40.4 million domestically and $118.7 million in theaters overseas for a combined worldwide take of $159.1 million against a $190 million production budget.

Considering that the film was released under unusual circumstances during the pandemic, however, it’s completely within reason to guess The Matrix Resurrections would have performed remarkably better under normal conditions.

Per The Numbers , The Matrix Resurrections grossed the least worldwide of all of the Matrix films. The Matrix , released in March 1999, had a worldwide tally of $465.9 million while the film’s first sequel — May 2003’s The Matrix Reloaded — became the top earner in the franchise with a global gross of $738.5 million.

The third film, The Matrix Revolutions , released in November 2003, earned far less than its predecessor, taking in only $427.3 million worldwide.

What Is ‘The Matrix Resurrections’ About?

Even though Neo seemingly dies at the end of The Matrix Revolutions , Keanu Reeves’ character mysteriously finds his way back to his original persona of Thomas Anderson in The Matrix Resurrections .

In a meta movie move, it turns out Anderson is the greatest game designer of his generation who made The Matrix trilogy of video games — and the company that produced the saga wants him to make a sequel.

However, when Anderson begins to have strange visions despite taking blue pills for his supposed mental condition to decipher what’s real and what are figments of his imagination, he faces the decision of taking a red pill to free his mind once again.

Carrie-Anne Moss — who played Neo’s companion Trinity in the first three Matrix films — returned for The Matrix Resurrections . Matrix trilogy star Laurence Fishburne decided not to return as Morpheus, however, and was replaced by Aquaman star Yahya Abdul-Mateen II.

Despite the film’s dismal box office performance, The Matrix Resurrections was given a mildly positive reception by critics and audiences on Rotten Tomatoes . The film earned a “fresh” 63% rating based on 360 reviews, while its audience score, coincidentally, was a positive 63%.

If fans don’t want to wait to stream The Matrix Resurrections for “free” on Netflix — provided they subscribe to the service — it is available for digital rental on several online platforms . It is currently streaming for free on Prime Video’s ad-supported Freevee platform, so if you’re in a rush to see it before it streams on Netflix expect the film to be interrupted several times by commercials.

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Den of Geek

Will Smith Turned Down Neo in The Matrix to Make the Worst Movie of His Career

To this day, Will Smith’s greatest regret is the movie he turned down playing Neo in The Matrix for.

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When it comes to the classics of cinema—and sometimes the dregs—it’s always fun to think about what might’ve been. Casting especially can be a strange alchemy between actor and role, and when the formula is off, it’s easy to ponder whether the spell would work at all. Can you imagine Robert Redford as Michael Corleone? What about Tom Selleck as Indiana Jones? And it’s an interesting challenge to envision what Tim Burton’s Batman might’ve been if it starred Bill Murray versus Robin Williams.

The casting of Neo in The Matrix is another legendary “what if?” in movie history. The 1999 classic, which just turned 25 years old earlier this month, is now beloved for its reinvention of Keanu Reeves. He plays Neo in the film; a former sad sack hacker who discovers he’s actually a superpowered messiah sent to free us from a digital prison. Plus, he looks pretty rad in sunglasses while performing Kung fu.

Yet a famous question recurs when we think about how The Matrix was made: What would it have been like if it starred the biggest star in the world circa 1999? What would it have been like if the movie featured Big Willie himself, Mr. Will Smith , as Neo? It’s a question that’s long haunted the actor, who time and again has grappled with why he passed on the role of Neo when the Wachowskis came to him in 1998. Instead he made a movie he publicly hates: 1999’s less-than-classic Wild Wild West .

Consider that during the premiere for Gemini Man in 2019, Smith entertained the idea of what advice he might offer his younger self if he could travel back in time. His answer was “I’d go back to the Wild Wild West [set] and I would say, ‘Asshole, why didn’t you make The Matrix ?” Smith said that as a laugh line, but in all seriousness, why didn’t he?

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Back in 1998 when The Matrix was getting underway, Smith was on top of the world. For the past two consecutive summers he had back-to-back, four-quadrant blockbuster smash hits: Independence Day (1996) and Men in Black (1997).  In ‘98 he would change up the genre fare with Tony Scott’s political and prescient techno thriller, Enemy of the State . But at that time, Scott was a revered hit director who made respected high-concepts like Crimson Tide and True Romance (plus one of the biggest movie star calling cards ever, Top Gun ). Smith was also in between hit radio chart toppers like “Miami” and “Gettin’ Jiggy With It.”

By contrast, the Wachowskis were two siblings who made a high-concept thriller in Bound with such subtly placed trans metaphors that it’s unlikely three-quarters of the folks who watched the film in 1996 picked up on them. In other words, they were filmmakers a million miles away from where Smith’s mindset was in the late ‘90s, which he humorously and with heavy self-effacement recounted in the below video.

“It was a crazy time in my life,” Smith said in the 2019 YouTube video he produced for his own channel. “It was like however I threw the ball, it was going in.” He noted, too, that he initially turned down Men in Black because he didn’t want to be an “alien movie guy,” but after Steven Spielberg talked him into doing the movie, Smith became obsessed with the idea of global marketability.

“[The Wachowskis] came in and they made a pitch for The Matrix ,” Smith said. “And as it turns out, they’re geniuses! But there’s a fine line in a pitch meeting between genius and what I experienced in the meeting.” And in Smith’s humorous and perhaps slanted recollection of the Wachowskis’ pitch, they came to him and stammered and stuttered through a confusing presentation. “Imagine you could stop in the middle of the jump,” Smith said while adding a thick accent. “But then people could see around you 360 while you stopped jumping.” 

“So I made Wild Wild West ,” Smith deadpanned at the end of his story.

It’s an amusing anecdote, yet it leaves out key elements about why Wild Wild West seemed like such a safe bet. Two years prior to the Wachowskis’ pitch, Smith was initially just as lukewarm about working with director Barry Sonnenfeld on Men in Black until Spielberg stepped in. But in addition to being one of the biggest hits of his career, Men in Black remains one of Smith’s proudest efforts. And with Wild Wild West , he saw an opportunity to repeat the formula where he’d make a high-concept action/comedy/genre movie with Sonnenfeld in the director’s chair and an affable older actor to play against as a two-hander. Of course one of the first immediate red flags is that while Tommy Lee Jones was happy to be the straight man to Smith on MiB , both Smith and co-star Kevin Cline wanted to be the “funny one” in Wild Wild West . Neither succeeded.

In a more candid interview with The Hollywood Reporter in 2016, Smith was blunt about why he passed on The Matrix .

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“I had so much success that I started to taste global blood,” Smith said, “and my focus shifted from my artistry to winning. I wanted to win and be the biggest movie star, and what happened was there was a lag—around Wild Wild West time. I found myself promoting something because I wanted to win versus promoting something because I believed in it.” He even went on to suggest Wild Wild West was an entirely commercial choice because he could more clearly see how to sell it to an audience.

“Smoke and mirrors in marketing and sales is over. People are going to know really quickly and globally whether a product keeps its promises. I consider myself a marketer. My career has been strictly being able to sell my products globally, and it’s now in the hands of fans. I have to be in tune with their needs and not trick them into going to see Wild Wild West .”

Hence to this day in various interviews he’ll joke that Wild Wild West is “a thorn in my side” and he still shivers at seeing “myself in chaps.” Nonetheless in the above 2019 video, he raised one more intriguing point: if he had been cast as Neo, the studio would’ve never cast Laurence Fishburne as Morpheus.

Said Smith, “It’s not like it would’ve been like [the movie we got]. Keanu was perfect. Laurence Fishburne was perfect. If I had done it, because I’m Black, Morpheus wouldn’t have been Black, because they were looking at Val Kilmer. I was going to be Neo and Val Kilmer was going to be Morpheus. So I probably woulda messed The Matrix up!”

There is a lot to unpack there, including how a movie studio apparently felt obligated to make sure at least one of the two male leads of its high-concept sci-fi movie was white. Did they think audiences really couldn’t handle two Black men in a blockbuster that wasn’t a comedy or copaganda? (Smith was also starring in the Bad Boys movies at this time).

But ultimately Smith is right, if he was the star, it would’ve had a knock-on effect. Perhaps Kilmer really would have played Morpheus. Plus at that stage in his career, Smith, the self-described marketer, would have likely wanted input in how Neo was written and depicted, which if it was anything like his persona in Men in Black and Wild Wild West (or I, Robot a few years later) would have made The Matrix an incredibly different movie.

Still, it’s sometimes amusing to imagine what that movie might’ve been…

David Crow | @DCrowsNest

David Crow is the movies editor at Den of Geek. He has long been proud of his geek credentials. Raised on cinema classics that ranged from…

Screen Rant

The matrix 5 confirms the harsh truth of matrix resurrection's meta jokes.

The Matrix 5 is moving ahead, and the sequel's existence pays off a spiky meta joke about Warner Bros found in The Matrix Resurrections.

• The Matrix 5 confirms a new direction with writer/director Drew Goddard taking over from the Wachowskis, possibly leading to a soft reboot.
• The Matrix Resurrections' meta gags about Hollywood demanding sequels now seem more grimly prophetic with the upcoming release of The Matrix 5.
• Goddard's The Matrix 5 has the potential to continue the franchise's meta-commentary elements and poke fun at its own existence, following in the footsteps of the original film's meta-textual humor.

The Matrix 5 feels like Resurrections meta gags about Hollywood are coming true. The original Matrix was an epoch-shifting moment in blockbuster filmmaking, with its unique mixture of philosophy, martial arts and cyberpunk. Its influence spread quickly, with the likes of Shrek or Scary Movie soon parodying it. The subsequent Matrix movie franchise did not receive the same level of acclaim, with critics and audiences alike finding them by turn baffling, stilted and way too focused on spectacle over story.

The Matrix Resurrections ' ending may have suggested another story involving Keanu Reeves' Neo and Carrie-Anne Moss' Trinity, but that (likely) won't come to pass now. Instead, The Matrix 5 has been confirmed with writer/director Drew Goddard taking the reins from the Wachowskis . It's currently unknown if familiar faces like Reeves or Moss will have any involvement, but given the critical and commercial reception that greeted Resurrections , a soft reboot is probably the direction the next chapter will go in.

Are Keanu Reeves' Neo & Carrie-Anne Moss' Trinity Returning For Matrix 5?

Matrix resurrection's meta jokes about hollywood are more grim after matrix 5, the divisive fourth movie essentially predicted the matrix 5, the matrix resurrections.

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Set sixty years after The Matrix Revolutions, The Matrix Resurrections is a sci-fi action movie that sees the return of Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne moss nearly twenty years after the release of the previous film. Neo has become a game developer who struggles to grasp reality, and his concerns are validated when a new visage of Morpheus arrives to free him from his prison - a newly created Matrix. Learning that Trinity is alive and being held prisoner, Neo will join a new rebel force to save her and confront a new, dangerous foe known as the Analyst.

There's a fourth wall-smashing moment in The Matrix Resurrections where Neo meets up with Jonathan Groff's Smith. In this version of reality, Neo believes he is a computer programmer who once designed a trilogy of Matrix video games, while Smith is his business partner. During their meeting, Smith underlines their " parent company " Warner Bros has demanded another sequel, and is prepared to make it without them. This was a thinly veiled gag about Lana Wachowski finally agreeing to make another Matrix when she learned Warner Bros would make one with or without her involvement.

It's a deliciously spiky gag, but one that underlines the sole reason The Matrix Resurrections came to exist - after the directors had always claimed the story ended with Revolutions - was due to studio demand. Wachowski thus made a deeply meta installment that almost felt like a parody of the franchise, to the delight of some and deep frustration of others. This Resurrections scene feels all the more pertinent now The Matrix 5 is happening without either of the original filmmakers directing it.

Again, the plot of the fifth movie is under wraps, but after decades of disappointing sequels, WB will want their new Matrix to be a crowdpleaser. This isn't necessarily the worst idea, since it felt like Resurrections was intentionally subverting audience expectations in a way that was designed to irritate. The humor was goofy, the action was underwhelming and while it was nice to have an expensive blockbuster that felt so personal to its director, it wasn't the franchise comeback audiences wanted.

Matrix 5 Could Continue The Franchise's Meta-Commentary On Sequels & Reboots

The fifth movie doesn't have to fully remove the matrix's meta-humor.

One thing that should be noted is that Goddard is a great screenwriter and director, and by all accounts has a cool idea in mind for the series. Considering the lore surrounding the Matrix is so dense, it might be refreshing to see it rendered onscreen by a new director. Goddard is also a writer who brings a meta quality to his work , which can be seen in his script for The Martian and especially in his horror comedy The Cabin in the Woods .

The story being in the hands of a new director and creative team is bound to be made fun of somewhere during the movie, with The Matrix Rebooted feeling like a very ripe title.

The original Matrix may have had a serious tone, but meta-textual humor was always part of its DNA. With that in mind, Goddard's The Matrix 5 can still retain the franchise's meta-commentary elements, and even poke fun at its own existence . The story being in the hands of a new director and creative team is bound to be made fun of somewhere during the movie, with The Matrix Rebooted feeling like a very ripe title. It almost certainly won't have the sharp edge of Resurrections meta-humor, but it no doubt be in the mix somewhere.

Goddard began his career writing for shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel and Alias .

How Matrix 5 Can Overcome The Franchise's Own Criticisms & Succeed

The matrix is too rich a universe to leave unexplored.

If Neo and Trinity's story truly is complete, a fifth installment has a relatively clean slate to dive into new areas of the franchise.

Arguably the best Matrix offshoot is the 2003 anime anthology The Animatrix . This consisted of nine short films from different directors that explored different elements of the Matrix itself. Not every Animatrix segment was great, but they showed just how flexible the concept could be. If Neo and Trinity's story truly is complete, a fifth installment has a relatively clean slate to dive into new areas of the franchise.

After Resurrections ' lackluster action sequences it would be nice if The Matrix 5 had some quality setpieces too, while telling told a more human story like the original film. Part of the reason the original worked was that audiences were learning about the world at the same time as Neo was, but once he became "The One," that more grounded element was lost in later movies. The Matrix 5 might be an obvious case of a studio pushing for another sequel, but it can still learn from the mistakes of the past while moving the saga in a new direction.

The Matrix 5

The Matrix 5 is a possible upcoming release and would be the fifth film the Matrix Franchise. There has been no word from creators about a fifth film but many have noted that the recent fourth release left things "open."

The Matrix 5 Cannot Replace Keanu Reeves And Carrie-Anne Moss (& Resurrections Proves It)

• It's hard to imagine a Matrix film without Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss, as they've shaped the narrative since the beginning.
• The upcoming Matrix 5 will be directed by Drew Goddard, signaling a potentially radical departure from previous installments.
• Replacing iconic characters in The Matrix Resurrections was divisive, so removing Neo and Trinity in Matrix 5 could worsen the problem.

News that The Matrix 5 is in development raises several issues around the franchise's future story, but whatever direction the movie takes, it's almost impossible for the film to replace Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss . Ever since the original Matrix , Reeves and Moss have played a pivotal role. As Neo and Trinity, the pair have arguably been the most important forces shaping the narrative, with their combined presence only growing as the story has progressed. While the two actors' age makes their ongoing place in the saga uncertain, The Matrix Resurrections provided a clear warning about the consequences of replacing them altogether.

Although the details of The Matrix 5 's story are unknown at this stage, it's already clear that the movie will be very different from the franchise's four previous installments. The film will be the first in the series not to have the involvement of either of the Wachowski sisters, with The Cabin in the Woods and Bad Times at the El Royale writer/director Drew Goddard taking over directorial duties. This approach suggests a potentially radical new direction for The Matrix series. However, if The Matrix 5 serves as a true sequel to Resurrections , the franchise has already shown that replacing Reeves and Moss is a bad idea.

The Matrix Resurrections' Character Replacements Didn't Work

One of the most controversial aspects of The Matrix Resurrections was the decision to replace iconic franchise characters with new actors. Although recurring figures like Morpheus and Agent Smith made a return alongside Neo and Trinity, original cast members Laurence Fishburne and Hugo Weaving did not feature . Instead, the pair were replaced by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Jonathan Groff respectively, with the original actors only appearing via the use of archival footage.

Within the context of the story, the decision to use different actors for existing characters made some narrative sense. However, given Smith and Morpheus' enduring legacy and Weaving and Fishburne's celebrated performances, the change ended up being an unwelcome distraction. For all the merits of Groff and Abdul-Mateen's performances, it became inevitable that fans and critics would contrast them with what came before . As a result, Weaving and Fishburne's absence left a glaring void in the movie that detracted from the somewhat revisionist story, inviting unhelpful comparisons instead of enjoyment on the movie's own terms.

Removing Neo And Trinity From The Matrix 5 Would Make Resurrections' Problems Worse

The character replacements in The Matrix Resurrections weren't the only problem with the movie. The film's meta-story elements and critical self-commentary proved divisive with both audiences and critics – exemplified by Resurrections ' mixed scores on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes . However, the distraction caused by replacing iconic and familiar figures in the franchise with a range of new faces meant that other issues with the film were compounded. For viewers already skeptical of the bold story, a radical reappraisal of popular preexisting characters became just another problematic element within the film.

The Matrix Resurrections currently holds an aggregate 63% on Rotten Tomatoes.

It follows that if replacing Morpheus and Smith in the film was, at best, divisive, swapping out the franchise's two main characters in a similar way would only exacerbate the problem. Whether The Matrix 5 keeps Neo and Trinity as part of the story but changes the actors (as Resurrections did with Fishburne and Weaving) or replaces the pair altogether with characters who fulfill a similar function, audiences will inevitably compare whatever comes next to Reeves and Moss . Given how distracting Morpheus and Smith's character changes were in Resurrections , such an approach would be even more unwelcome in The Matrix 5 .

Why The Matrix 5 Is Happening Just 3 Years After Resurrections' Failure

The matrix 5 without neo and trinity would ruin resurrections' ending.

Not only would a Matrix 5 movie without Neo and Trinity repeat Resurrections ' mistakes, but it would also risk ruining the film's potentially significant ending. After a final confrontation with Neil Patrick Harris' Analyst , Neo and Trinity discover they have the power to completely reshape the Matrix as they see fit – fulfilling the prophecy Morpheus made about The One way back in the series' first installment . As a result, the story is now perfectly set up to see how the pair set out to remake the world, how their relationship with the Machines might change, and whether or not there is hope for humanity beyond the virtual prison of the Matrix itself.

Following The Matrix Resurrections ' ending , Neo and Trinity are at the heart of all these questions. Whatever the audience's reaction to the film's bold new storyline, there's no denying that this conclusion sets up multiple intriguing mysteries for The Matrix 5 to answer. However, it's difficult to see how any of these questions will be addressed if Neo and Trinity are not involved in the story. Since the pair have been clearly established as the de facto rulers of the Matrix, forgetting about them altogether would completely undermine Resurrections . Including them in the next chapter is therefore an unavoidable limitation on The Matrix 5 's story.

Only One Matrix 5 Story Can Avoid Neo And Trinity

The Matrix Resurrections ' ending made it clear that any Matrix story set chronologically after the fourth film needs to resolve the new issues around Neo and Trinity. However, while any film telling the next chapter in the story needs Reeves and Moss to succeed, it's possible that a prequel film could avoid using the characters and the actors . The Matrix franchise has already teased the existence of earlier versions of the interactive simulation, where Neo's forebears struggled against humanity's Machine oppressors. A story along these lines, therefore, could avoid The Matrix 5 's otherwise awkward Neo and Trinity problem.

There are problems with pursuing a Matrix prequel instead of a more traditional follow-up. For one thing, such a story wouldn't resolve any of the new issues thrown up by Ressurections ' ending and would still leave audiences wondering what Neo and Trinity's new version of the Matrix might look like. However, if Drew Goddard feels that The Matrix 5 needs to move beyond Neo and Trinity, setting the new movie in the series' past might be the best way to avoid the most awkward issues thrown up by the pair's absence.

The Matrix 5

Director Drew Goddard

Distributor(s) Warner Bros. Pictures

Genres Sci-Fi, Action, Adventure

Franchise(s) The Matrix

How to Watch The Matrix Movies in Order (and Where to Watch Them)

Samuel J Harries

Official JustWatch writer

In this guide, we’ll show you how to watch The Matrix franchise in order and show you where you can watch them on popular streaming services in the United States. We’ll also let you know if there are options to stream The Matrix movies legally for free.

In 1999, The Matrix became an overnight sensation when the directorial duo Lana and Lilly Wachowski unveiled their kung fu science fiction classic to the world. Starring Keanu Reeves as Neo, Carrie-Anne Moss as Trinity and Laurence Fishburne as Morpheus, this groundbreaking movie grossed $460 million worldwide at the box office on a $63 million budget. This marked the beginning of an ongoing blockbuster franchise that is still beloved by fans today.

The Matrix franchise now includes a trilogy ( The Matrix , The Matrix Reloaded , The Matrix Revolutions ), an anthology of anime short films ( The Animatrix ) and a soft meta-reboot ( The Matrix Resurrections ). There are also tentative plans for an upcoming fifth installment by Warner Bros. Whether you’re watching The Matrix for the first time or rewatching the classic sci-fi franchise, this guide shows you where to watch them all online and the different viewing orders (release vs chronological).

How to watch The Matrix movies in order

If you only want to watch The Matrix feature-length movies, you can watch them chronologically in exactly the same way they were released.

The Matrix (1999)

The Matrix Reloaded (2003)

The Matrix Revolutions (2003)

The Matrix: Resurrections (2021)

This is a great viewing order if you are new to the franchise and want to enjoy the main storyline without getting overwhelmed by the franchise’s expanded universe of short films and canonical video games. However, the Wachowskis and Warner Bros. have always been ambitious when expanding The Matrix as a multimedia franchise. They have released several canonical stories in video games (Enter the Matrix, The Matrix Online and Path of Neo) and The Animatrix. In particular, The Animatrix offers some of the franchise’s best storylines that you won’t want to miss. So, if you’re ready to ‘take the red pill’ and go deeper, here’s how to watch the franchise in its entirety.

How to watch entire The Matrix franchise in chronological order

While watching the Matrix movies in order isn’t too complicated, this becomes more difficult if you want to watch the entire story unfold in every movie, short film and video game. Technically, The Matrix video games Enter the Matrix, The Path of Neo and The Matrix Online are all canonical, so we’ve included these in our complete Matrix timeline. Similarly, the short films included in The Animatrix anthology take place at various times throughout the story.

The Animatrix: The Second Renaissance, Part I and II

The Animatrix: A Detective Story

The Animatrix: Kid's Story

The Animatrix: Final Flight of the Osiris

Enter the Matrix – Video game

The Matrix Reloaded

The matrix revolutions.

The Matrix: Path of Neo – Video game

The Matrix Online: The Matrix Online – Video game

The Animatrix: Beyond

The Matrix: Resurrections

The Animatrix: World Record – Exact timeframe unknown

The Animatrix: Matriculated – Exact timeframe unknown

The Animatrix: Program – Exact timeframe unknown

The Animatrix: The Second Renaissance, Part I and II takes place during the human/machine war in the mid-21st century. According to Morpheus’ estimations, everything from The Animatrix: A Detective Story until The Animatrix: Beyond then takes place circa 2199. The Matrix: Resurrections picks up the story 18 years later. Three Animatrix shorts have no discernable timeframe, so the best option is to watch those last.

The Matrix documentaries

The Matrix Revisited (2001)

Another important release for Matrix completists is The Matrix Revisited. This 2001 documentary shows the making of the first movie in 1999, revealing how many of the stunts were performed and explaining the movie’s revolutionary CGI techniques.

Where can I watch The Matrix movies in release order?

Below you can find the latest streaming information for every Matrix movie. You can check each movie’s availability on streaming services and find out if they are available online.

Set in the 22nd century, The Matrix tells the story of a computer hacker who joins a group of underground insurgents fighting the vast and powerful computers who now rule the earth.

Six months after the events depicted in The Matrix, Neo has proved to be a good omen for the free humans, as more and more humans are being freed from the matrix and brought to Zion, the one and only stronghold of the Resistance. Neo himself has discovered his superpowers including super speed, ability to see the codes of the things inside the matrix and a certain degree of pre-cognition. But a nasty piece of news hits the human resistance: 250,000 machine sentinels are digging to Zion and would reach them in 72 hours. As Zion prepares for the ultimate war, Neo, Morpheus and Trinity are advised by the Oracle to find the Keymaker who would help them reach the Source. Meanwhile Neo's recurrent dreams depicting Trinity's death have got him worried and as if it was not enough, Agent Smith has somehow escaped deletion, has become more powerful than before and has fixed Neo as his next target.

The Animatrix

Straight from the creators of the groundbreaking Matrix trilogy, this collection of short animated films from the world's leading anime directors fuses computer graphics and Japanese anime to provide the background of the Matrix universe and the conflict between man and machines. The shorts include Final Flight of the Osiris, The Second Renaissance, Kid's Story, Program, World Record, Beyond, A Detective Story and Matriculated.

The human city of Zion defends itself against the massive invasion of the machines as Neo fights to end the war at another front while also opposing the rogue Agent Smith.

The Matrix Resurrections

Plagued by strange memories, Neo's life takes an unexpected turn when he finds himself back inside the Matrix.

Fred Schepisi Sets Israeli Thriller ‘The Dimona Affair’ as Next Directorial Project (EXCLUSIVE)

By K.J. Yossman

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Fred Schepisi is set to direct Israel-based thriller “The Dimona Affair,” Variety has learned exclusively.

The project is based on the story of a whistleblower who claimed Israel was building a nuclear weapons program. (The country has always denied it has nuclear weapons).

Popular on Variety

The director is best known for 1993 pic “Six Degrees of Separation” featuring Will Smith, Stockard Channing and Donald Sutherland and for 2011’s “The Eye of the Storm” with Charlotte Rampling and Geoffrey Rush. He also directed HBO limited series “Empire Falls,” starring Ed Harris, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Helen Hunt, in 2005.

Variety hears that Gary Dartnall (“The Tale of Sweeney Todd”) and Grant Hill (“The Matrix Resurrections”) are on board to produce the project while Dennis Davidson is executive producer.

Schepisi, Rosmarin and Davidson declined to comment.

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Here’s Everything Coming to Netflix in May 2024

By Emma Specter

May is just around the corner, and with it comes with a whole new crop of TV shows and movies hitting Netflix. There’s plenty of good stuff headed our way next month, from the first part of Season 3 of Bridgerton to a brand-new, multi-episode John Mulaney special, and it’s all guaranteed to make you want to curl up on the couch for hours, nice spring weather be damned. Below, see everything that’s due to hit the streaming service this coming month:

Deaw Special: Super Soft Power

Down The Rabbit Hole

Frankly Speaking

Heeramandi: The Diamond Bazaar

Airport ’77

Airport 1975

The Best Man Holiday

Blue Mountain State: Season 1

Blue Mountain State: Season 2

Blue Mountain State: Season 3

Blue Mountain State: The Rise of Thadland

Eat Pray Love

The Edge of Seventeen

The Equalizer

The Gentlemen

Hellboy (2019)

Jumanji (1995)

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa

The Matrix Resurrections

Mortal Kombat (2021)

Mr. & Mrs. Smith

The Nutty Professor

The Nutty Professor II: The Klumps

Outlander: Season 6

Patriots Day

Public Enemies

Shrek Forever After

Starship Troopers

The Wedding Planner

White House Down

Woody Woodpecker

The Young Victoria

A Man in Full

Beautiful Rebel

Secrets of the Neanderthals

John Mulaney Presents: Everybody’s In L.A

Selling the OC: Season 3

The Unbroken Voice: Season 2

The Atypical Family

Katt Williams: Woke Foke

The Peanut Butter Falcon

Roast of Tom Brady

30 for 30: Broke

30 for 30: Deion’s Double Play

30 for 30: The Two Escobars

Reba: Seasons 1-6

Super Rich in Korea

The Final: Attack on Wembley

The Guardian of the Monarchs

Mother of The Bride

Sing Street

Thank You, Next

Blood of Zeus: Season 2

Cooking Up Murder: Uncovering the Story of César Román

Living with Leopards

Pokémon Horizons: The Series Part 2

The Ultimatum: South Africa

Mark Twain Prize Award: Kevin Hart

Archer: Seasons 1-13

Princess Power: Season 3

Married at First Sight: Season 15

Ashley Madison: Sex, Lies & Scandal

The Clovehitch Killer

Bridgerton: Season 3 Part 1

By Alexandra Macon

By Talia Abbas

By Leah Faye Cooper

Maestro in Blue: Season 2

Thelma the Unicorn

A Simple Favor

Golden Kamuy

The Parisian Agency: Exclusive Properties: Season 4

Rachel Feinstein: Big Guy

Wildfire: Seasons 1-4

Act Your Age: Season 1

Toughest Forces on Earth

El vendedor de ilusiones: El caso Generación Zoe

Franco Escamilla: Ladies’ Man

Garouden: The Way of the Lone Wolf

In Good Hands 2

Butterfly in the Sky: The Story of Reading Rainbow

Jurassic World: Chaos Theory

Mulligan: Part 2

My Oni Girl

Colors of Evil: Red

Dancing for the Devil: The 7M TikTok Cult

Patrick Melrose

A Part of You

Chola Chabuca

How to Ruin Love: The Proposal

Raising Voices

Get updates on the Met Gala

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