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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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Film Credits

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.

‘The Matrix Resurrections’ Review: A Pop-Subversive Sequel Smart Enough to Realize There’s No Reason for It to Exist

In returning to a trilogy that reached its natural conclusion 18 years ago, Lana Wachowski wonders, 'What if Neo had chosen the blue pill?'

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For years, Warner Bros. has dreamed of making another “Matrix” movie, but the Wachowski siblings — architects of a cyberpunk classic whose appeal rests largely on bending rules and questioning authority — resisted the pressure, insisting they’d said everything they wanted to with the original three films. Let’s not forget: By the end of the trilogy, Trinity died, Neo sacrificed himself and the humans were freed from their virtual shackles, which means anyone hoping to continue that story had their work cut out for them.

That explains a clever moment of self-awareness early in “ The Matrix Resurrections ,” a welcome but undeniably extraneous fourth installment — more of a patch than an upgrade on the franchise that came before, reframing déjà vu not as a bug but as a feature of the brand. In said scene, employees of a San Francisco video game company sit around a corporate conference table, brainstorming how to build upon the Matrix saga. “Our beloved parent company, Warner Bros., has decided they will make a sequel to the trilogy,” one says, explaining that the studio is planning to do it “with or without” the creators.

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Well, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em, or so director Lana Wachowski seems to be telling us, slyly stepping back from the dazzling infinity mirror presented in the earlier films to reveal one more layer: the real world in which we the audience reside. Sadly, that’s about as wild and/or meta as “The Matrix Resurrections” gets, while the rest could fairly be described as more of the same: more time- and gravity-defying action, more Goth-geek fashion pointers, more “free your mind” mumbo-jumbo.

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Essentially a greatest hits concert and a cover version rolled into one (complete with flashback clips to high points from past installments), the new movie is slick but considerably less ambitious in scope than the two previous sequels. Where those films set out to break sound barriers in our brains — the way “bullet time,” the highway sequence and Neo’s final battle against an apparently infinite number of Agents Smith did — this one largely eschews innovation. Rather, “Resurrections” takes comfort in the familiar, fleshing out the emotional core of a world that always felt a little hollow.

In short, Wachowski doesn’t add much to the rich mythology she and sister Lilly have established, but she’s careful not to mess it up either.

By reviving Neo ( Keanu Reeves ), Trinity ( Carrie-Anne Moss ) and a handful of other key characters (some, like Agent Smith and Morpheus, requiring new actors to step in), “Resurrections” tethers its latest iteration to the “simulation hypothesis” — the theory, given oxygen by Elon Musk, that video game technology is advancing at such a clip that odds are good you’re already living in one. The difference, compared with “Matrix 1.0”: The “sheeple” in the movie’s brave new world have that potentially liberating information, and still they choose to sleepwalk through their lives. Just like … you?

It’s been more than two decades since “The Matrix” issued the wake-up call. So what are you doing chained to whatever career/family/hobby numbs you to what really matters? Like fanboy audiences — who passively watch heroes disrupt the system, watching, rather than participating in, social reform — the humans in this latest simulation stay blind. Neo has reverted to his Thomas Anderson identity, only now, he’s head designer for WB-owned game company Deus Machina and described as a “balding nerd,” though it’s still Keanu that audiences see, sporting rock-star bangs and a surfer-guru beard.

It would’ve been much edgier to present Reeves as an aging incel with receding hair and a dandruff-speckled turtleneck — or better yet, as a self-deprecating version of himself, like the one he played in Netflix rom-com “Always Be My Maybe.” Storytelling has evolved by quantum leaps since 1999, and as futuristic as the “Matrix” franchise once felt, it all seems rather quaint today, what with the advent of “reality TV” (consider Paris Hilton’s recent claim that she’s been playing a character all along) and such ontological series as “The Good Place” and “The OA” (the latter ended with the characters crossing into a new dimension, where they’re all actors on the show we’ve been watching). “The Matrix” may have made 1982’s “Tron” look primitive by comparison, but even that franchise has evolved, leaving this one in the dust.

That’s not to say the sequel is simply “The Matrix Recycled” — although the title is every bit as apt as the more biblical-sounding one they went with, teasing (but never directly addressing) the messianic dimension of Neo’s earlier arc. Off screen, Lana Wachowski has completely reinvented herself in the interim, sharing much of that journey via Netflix’s stunning “Sense8,” whereas Thomas Anderson is stuck back in brainwashed mode, wrestling with relatively mundane midlife-crisis questions.

Self-doubts aside, Anderson drags his feet when Morpheus (now embodied by “Candyman” star Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) kicks open a door and tries to offer him the old red-pill enlightenment. Meanwhile, his shrink (Neil Patrick Harris as the Analyst) has him on a steady prescription of blue pills. And then a spunky young cyber-anarchist named Bugs (Jessica Henwick) shows up, having narrowly escaped an obvious-trap “modal,” or training exercise, where she rescues the new-and-improved Morpheus (Abdul-Mateen is great but seems green vis-à-vis the sage and sorely missed Laurence Fishburne).

Speaking of green, the phosphorescent glow that defined the trilogy (extrapolated from old-school CRT monitors) has been all but banished here. Yes, a stream of green glyphs spells out the opening titles, and the human survivors of Zion (many played by members of the “Sense8” cast) search for signs of Neo and Trinity on outdated screens. But compared with the grim and grimy “real world” spared from a Sentinel attack in “Revolutions,” the dimension where Anderson reunites with Trinity — now married with kids and going by the name Tiffany (but still played by Moss) — is rich in color and detail. Strange then that it should look so cheap, conspicuously lacking a striking visual signature.

Far removed from the shadowy film-noir vibe of the original, it’s easy to imagine humans being seduced by such a setting, especially when presented in the magic-hour glow of recent Marvel movies — and against which the grungy post-apocalyptic realm of spaceships and people pods seems less appealing than ever. That has always been the trouble with the “Matrix” movies: They insist that waking life is far worse than the illusion, asking us to care about the fate of a garbage dump where brain-jacked humans serve as an energy source for the Machines.

Of course we’d rather spend time in San Francisco — or Berlin, where shooting shifted. These days, instead of battling actor Hugo Weaving’s square-jawed man in black (the original Agent Smith appears only in flashback), Anderson works for a snappily dressed human Ken doll also named Smith (Jonathan Groff, whose good looks reinforce the notion that everything got a major aesthetic upgrade). Once Neo starts to question his reality, it’s Smith he must face off against, again. The subsequent showdown feels overly choreographed, stuck in late-20th-century Hong Kong mode, versus the brute-force fighting style we’ve since seen in Bond movies. Even Neo’s ability to stop bullets and blast energy waves from his hands pales against so many of the superhero abilities to which we’ve been desensitized.

The great irony of “The Matrix Resurrections” is that a property that was once so appealing for being cutting-edge is now being mined for its nostalgia value — what a screenwriter friend of mine has dubbed “CuisinArt,” wherein studios are forgoing fresh ideas in order to rehash everything audiences love about the past.

Lana Wachowski has said she agreed to make a “Matrix” sequel after her parents died, taking comfort in being reconnected with fictional family Neo and Trinity. Many viewers will agree, even if it would have made more sense to reboot with an all-new cast of characters. But in a world where “Space Jam” can hack into the “Matrix” IP, this far-from-radical add-on seems distractingly preoccupied with justifying its own existence, rather than seeking a way to take fans to the next level.

Reviewed at Imax, Los Angeles, Dec. 14, 2021. MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 148 MIN.

• Production: A Warner Bros. Pictures release, presented in association with Village Roadshow Pictures, Venus Castina Prods. Producers: James McTeigue, Lana Wachowski, Grant Hill. Executive producers: Garrett Grant, Terry Needham, Michael Salven, Karin Wachowski, Jesse Ehrman, Bruce Berman.
• Crew: Director: Lana Wachowski. Screenplay: Lana Wachowski & David Mitchell & Aleksandar Hemon, based on characters created by the Wachowskis. Camera: Daniele Massaccesi, John Toll. Editor: Joseph Jett Sally. Music: Johnny Klimek & Tom Tykwer.
• With: Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Jonathan Groff, Jessica Henwick, Neil Patrick Harris, Jada Pinkett Smith, Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Christina Ricci, Lambert Wilson.

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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 First Reviews: Packed with Nostalgia but Exciting in New Ways

Critics say the sequel focuses on a few core elements and touches on what made the original so spectacular, even if it could never match the first film's impact..

TAGGED AS: Action , blockbuster , Film , films , movie , movies , Sci-Fi , science fiction

Whoa! Neo is back in the first Matrix movie in 18 years, and it just might be the best sequel yet. The first reviews of The Matrix Resurrections are mostly favorable, acknowledging that it’s less interested in innovation than emphasizing what truly works in the franchise: the romance.

Yes, Trinity ( Carrie Anne-Moss ) is back as well, and her chemistry with Keanu Reeves as Neo is said to be one of the highlights of this meta-nostalgic revival. Whether he rest — from its philosophical themes to its action scenes — is serviceable or satisfying is still up for debate.

Here’s what critics are saying about The Matrix Resurrections :

How does it compare to the original?

It’s constantly engaging, thoughtful, and challenging in all of the best ways the original Matrix ever was. – Sean Mulvihill, FanboyNation

As excitingly fresh and ambitious as The Matrix was in its approach to cyberpunk cinema in 1999, The Matrix Resurrections is just as devoted to its bold and disruptive vision in 2021. – Jacob Oller, Paste Magazine

The Matrix Resurrections goes back to the integral source code that made the original so captivating. – Julian Roman, MovieWeb

This is a resurrection of the excitement and sense of wonder we felt when we watched the first Matrix . – Sherin Nicole, idobi.com

Where the original film was explosively innovatory, this is just another piece of IP, an algorithm of unoriginality. – Peter Bradshaw, Guardian

What about the two previous sequels?

It’s better than the sequels . – Ian Sandwell, Digital Spy

Resurrections is easily better than the last two installments . – Kirsten Acuna, Insider

Will satisfy fans and critics in a way  Matrix Reloaded  and  Revolutions  didn’t . – Patricia Puentes, Ask

If you’re in the much smaller club that believes the sequels were under-appreciated examples of brainy myth-making, it’s possible  Resurrections  will break your heart . – John DeFore, Hollywood Reporter

(Photo by Warner Bros. Pictures)

Does it have its own identity?

It’s great to see this new film establish a visual fluency all its own amidst the wafts of nostalgia . – Courtney Howard, Fresh Fiction

What you get that’s new this time around is the overall look of the movie… Resurrections  feels much warmer, with plenty of oranges and reds interspersed, that make the eventual heart of the film beat that much stronger . – Germain Lussier, io9.com

Through its clever flashbacks and callbacks,  The Matrix Resurrections  takes moments that are very familiar and makes them entirely new . – Sean Mulvihill, FanboyNation

It’s not servicing fans. It’s in service of itself… There is value in looking back as long as that experience moves you forward . – Jacob Oller, Paste Magazine

Even though  The Matrix Resurrections  is a nostalgia-filled homage that wouldn’t work without the franchise’s three previous movies, this new installment still manages to be fresh and original in its own way . – Patricia Puentes, Ask

The movie is in love with the previous movies, but in a sort of defiant way. Lana seems to be saying, “Oh, you liked the previous movies? HERE THEN, HAVE THEM!”  – Tom Santilli, Movie Show Plus

This one largely eschews innovation. Rather, Resurrections takes comfort in the familiar . – Peter Debruge, Variety

Does it have something important to say?

Without being dogmatic or contrived, the writers pack a lot into their characters’ conversations… about free will, how a story never ends, the limits of reality . – Patricia Puentes, Ask

The plot, slight as it is, creates a frame on which Wachowski can hang a lot of indignation . – Hope Madden, MaddWolf

You get a real sense that Lana has something very important to say, and she’s pissed off about it . – Tom Santilli, Movie Show Plus

You begin to wonder if this movie is about anything or if it’ll just be two-plus hours of Wachowski trolling . – Robert Daniels, The Playlist

Is it self-aware?

The Matrix Resurrection s is well-aware that it has a lot to prove and its level of meta might be too much for some. I dug it, though . – Germain Lussier, io9.com

This tongue-in-cheek approach adds a dose of levity to a franchise that had previously been consumed by darkness . – Julian Roman, MovieWeb

Not since Mary Martin’s Peter Pan implored a generation of young Americans to clap for a near-death Tinkerbell has there been a production with quite this level of fourth-wall-breaking earnestness . – Keith Uhlich, Slant Magazine

To some, the over-referencing and meta nature will be seen as a double-edged sword… The Matrix Resurrections  forces the audience to question the entire purpose of the franchise . – Sheraz Farooqi, Cinema Debate

How is the action?

The action sequences are reliably captivating and despite the film’s meandering plot, combination of tones, and heady sci-fi, it clips along as an entertaining spectacle . – Drew Gregory, Autostraddle

The Matrix Resurrections sticks with slick wirework, wicked martial arts choreography, and ferocious gunplay. Action junkies will get a fix and a half here . – Julian Roman, MovieWeb

The action doesn’t entirely live up to the originals, but how could it? – Hope Madden, MaddWolf

The choreography is still strong overall, but can’t help but miss that original feel . – Sheraz Farooqi, Cinema Debate

There’s probably more action here than in the original film. But many of the scenes, though large in scale and scope, feel redundant . – Kirsten Acuna, Insider

The absence of fight choreographer Yuen Woo-ping is deeply felt whenever Resurrections goes in for close hand-to-hand combat — moments that recall the cut-to-shreds chaos cinema of Jerry Bruckheimer and Tony Scott . – Keith Uhlich, Slant Magazine

The filmmaking isn’t as clear or exciting, not as innovative as it once was; too many cuts mired in a darkness . – Jacob Oller, Paste Magazine

What about the romance?

Resurrections is a love story at its core… This time you feel two old lovers and friends reuniting after years apart, and it just works . – Hannah Lodge, Screen Rex

Compared to the relatively sexless blockbusters we’re used to, it’s refreshing to see [Neo and Trinity’s] romance front and center . – Ian Sandwell, Digital Spy

The Matrix Resurrections  is primarily focused on the bond between Neo and Trinity, which serves as the emotional core of the film and forces the audience to reexamine the original trilogy in that same light . – Sheraz Farooqi, Cinema Debate

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 . – David Ehrlich, IndieWire

Do Reeves and Moss still have chemistry?

When Reeves and Moss are on screen together their unmistakable chemistry rekindles hot enough to warm a city . – Robert Daniels, The Playlist

Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss are electric together on screen… Spectacular . – Julian Roman, MovieWeb

The audience can’t help but swoon anytime they’re on screen together. – Germain Lussier, io9.com

There’s never a moment where you doubt their starry-eyed fondness for each other. – Keith Uhlich, Slant Magazine

So it’s great to have Moss back as Trinity?

Carrie-Anne Moss is still a force of nature. – Hope Madden, MaddWolf

She’s excellent. Badass, striking and with an underlying yearning she’s able to nearly beam at you. – Jacob Oller, Paste Magazine

It’s a pleasure to see Moss return, but a shame to see her given so little interesting to do . – Peter Bradshaw, Guardian

Carrie-Ann Moss’ screen time is comparable to Zendaya’s in WB’s Dune … which is a shame because the duo’s scenes are easily the film’s best . – Kirsten Acuna, Insider

Are there any standouts among the new cast?

As much as we’d have loved to see Laurence Fishburne back as Morpheus, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II is a superb replacement . – Ian Sandwell, Digital Spy

It’s Jessica Henwick who threatens to run away with the entire show. She is a revelation, imbuing her character with warmth, strength and assured intelligence . – Courtney Howard, Fresh Fiction

Jessica Henwick’s Bugs is the single most electric addition to the franchise since the original . – David Ehrlich, IndieWire

How is the pacing?

The film’s pacing makes sense because it mirrors the first film like poetry… It feels like the movie wraps just as it finally ramps up and gets going . – Kirsten Acuna, Insider

It’s too long, but all of them are . – Hope Madden, MaddWolf

Will we want to see it more than once?

This is, even more than the first three movies, a film built for repeat viewing . – Germain Lussier, io9.com

I’m excited to see what unfolds in second and third viewings of  Resurrections . – Hannah Lodge, Screen Rex

Will it make us want more Matrix movies?

As much as the movie is self-aware of its status as a legacyquel, it definitely sets the pieces on the board for this to act as a soft reboot for further movies . – Ian Sandwell, Digital Spy

If this is the start of a new trilogy, you can count me in . – Sean Mulvihill, FanboyNation

There’s nothing here to inspire hope that, should Warners or whomever insist on more sequels, they’d be worth seeing . – John DeFore, Hollywood Reporter

The Matrix Resurrections is in theaters on December 24, 2021.

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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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• What even is The Matrix ? Lana Wachowski and her stars address decades of theories

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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.

• Lana Wachowski
• David Mitchell
• Aleksandar Hemon
• Keanu Reeves
• Carrie-Anne Moss
• Yahya Abdul-Mateen II
• 5.7K User reviews
• 370 Critic reviews
• 63 Metascore
• 6 wins & 37 nominations total

Top cast 98

• The Analyst

• Gwyn de Vere

• The Merovingian

• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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Did you know

• 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

User reviews 5.7K

• collectorofsorts
• Dec 21, 2021
• How long is The Matrix Resurrections? Powered by Alexa
• December 22, 2021 (United States)
• United States
• Official Site
• Project Ice Cream
• Berlin, Germany
• Warner Bros.
• Village Roadshow Pictures
• Venus Castina Productions
• See more company credits at IMDbPro
• $190,000,000 (estimated)
• $37,686,805
• $10,749,011
• Dec 26, 2021
• $157,386,805

Technical specs

• Runtime 2 hours 28 minutes
• Dolby Atmos
• Dolby Surround 7.1

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'Rebel Moon' Director’s Cut Review: Somehow, Zack Snyder’s Netflix Movies Got Worse

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

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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.

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’ review: a nostalgia-heavy red pill of a blockbuster

The grand return of the 'Matrix' franchise is about as complex and convoluted as you'd expect

N o-one called anything a “cultural reset” when The Matrix was released in 1999, but that’s what the Wachowskis’ mind-bending movie was. The chilling idea that humans could be imprisoned inside a virtual reality world (“the Matrix”) chimed with the times – the internet was still a relative novelty back then – and its breathtaking fight scenes proved super-influential. Soon after, every Hollywood blockbuster seemed to be ripping off The Matrix ‘s “bullet-time” visual effects.

Since then, The Matrix has become a byword for Y2K nostalgia – just ask Charli XCX and Troye Sivan , who paid homage to the film in their ‘1999’ music video – without ever losing its visionary intrigue. Last year, Lilly Wachowski confirmed a fan theory that escaping the Matrix is essentially an allegory for the trans experience. So, in a way, it’s surprising the franchise hasn’t been revived sooner – especially since the original trilogy ended in 2003 with a disappointing final instalment.

Directed solely by Lana Wachowski – Lilly isn’t involved this time – The Matrix Resurrections is meta, self-referential and filled with in-jokes. Though Neo (Keanu Reeves) and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) were seemingly killed in 2003’s The Matrix Revolutions , it’s surely no spoiler to confirm that we find them both alive and well (ish). Now going by his original name, Thomas A. Anderson, Neo is introduced here as the famous inventor of a ground-breaking video game called… The Matrix .

Thomas seems catatonic (a Reeves specialty) and experiences dark visions that hint at a different life, but his creepy therapist (Neil Patrick Harris) prescribes him blue pills to suppress them. Equally unaware of her past, Trinity is “Tiffany”, a mother-of-three he meets at his local coffee shop. It’s a place punningly called “Simulatte” because, well, this is that kind of film.

Anyway, as anyone with even a vague awareness of The Matrix will know, Thomas aka Neo’s blue pills are designed to keep him living ignorantly inside the Matrix instead of confronting the ugly truth about the sentient machines controlling humanity. He’s forced out of his torpor when he’s ambushed at work by his stylish old mentor Morpheus (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, taking over from Laurence Fishburne for reasons the film just about explains). Having joined forces with the plucky Bugs (Jessica Henwick), a cyber freedom fighter on a mission to reawaken the legendary Neo, Morpheus offers Thomas the infamous red pill that will let him see things as they really are.

Resurrections ’ plot developments are as complex and convoluted as you’d expect from The Matrix , so Wachowski over-compensates by loading the dialogue with clumsy exposition and signposting self-referential moments with archive footage from the original trilogy. Because of this, Resurrections can feel like a concentration test even when it gets gripping. Still, the inventive fight scenes are definitely bracing if you’ve seen one too many toothless superhero movies, and there are some memorable performances. Jada Pinkett Smith poignantly reprises her role as Niobe, while Jonathan Groff gleefully succeeds Hugo Weaving as Neo’s scheming rival Agent Smith.

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Along the way, Wachowski weaves in some timely ideas about human nature and complacency, and the fundamental importance of love. This doesn’t lead the film to an entirely satisfying climax, but it definitely gets you thinking. Call it the red pill of pandemic-era blockbusters. Maybe.

• Director: Lana Wachowski
• Starring: Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II
• Release date: December 22
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The Matrix Resurrections Review: Plugged in again and loving it

In Hollywood, everything old is eventually new again — even The Matrix .

Plugging in again

Through the looking glass, he still knows kung fu, the future is female.

More than two decades after Keanu Reeves’ aimless hacker Neo took the red pill, woke up in a tub of goo, and kicked off a war against Earth’s machine overlords that would last through two sequels and countless spinoff projects, The Matrix Resurrections hopes to live up to its title by reviving the seminal, multimedia cyberpunk franchise. The film brings back Reeves as humanity’s savior, Neo, who now finds himself plugged back in to the machines’ titular simulation along with his one true love, Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), despite both characters’ supposed demise at the end of 2003’s The Matrix Revolutions .

If you’re wondering how they got there, you’re not alone. Set 20 years after the events of Revolutions , the film has a new group of hackers discover Neo and Trinity within The Matrix (which is apparently still a thing), initiating a chain of events that draws heavily from the original trilogy while establishing a new status quo in the franchise’s universe. And despite a generous recycling of old concepts and themes, The Matrix Resurrections delivers a satisfying new chapter in the franchise fueled by its leads’ chemistry and charisma, and supported by the franchise’s signature blend of high-level visual effects and action choreography.

Along with bringing Reeves and Moss back in front of the camera,  The Matrix Resurrections also brings back franchise co-creator Lana Wachowski behind the camera as director and co-writer. She joins other returning members of the cast and crew from the original trilogy in a film that, as its title suggests, is more revival than reboot, bringing the characters, themes, and mythology forward into a new story built on the foundation of the original trilogy.

In  Resurrections , Neo — or in this case, Thomas Anderson — finds himself living a life less adventurous as the designer of a wildly popular game franchise titled (wait for it …) The Matrix . His new reality suggests that the events of the original trilogy were actually the plot of a game he designed , and he pays a therapist (Neil Patrick Harris) to assure him that he is not, in fact, the savior of humanity. He also swallows a never-ending supply of blue pills to keep his daily existence safe, stable, and predictable.

Meanwhile, Trinity — now Tiffany — is a married mother of two kids who enjoys spending time in coffee shops and working on her motorcycle. It’s all very domestic, really, and the duo appear to have no recollection of their past experiences. However, everything changes when Neo encounters a familiar figure from his past who offers him a chance to dispel the illusion and see reality for what it really is.

If that premise sounds familiar, it’s because Resurrections makes a concerted effort to follow the formula of the first film closely, recycling lines of dialogue and even musical cues (Rage Against The Machine, anyone?) from 1999’s The Matrix at various points. It’s all intentional, though, as the film cleverly turns its reverence for the past into a plot point in Neo’s latest adventure.

In Neo’s new reality, his life is defined by the success of the game franchise he designed. Everywhere he goes, he’s surrounded by images from the past. A bust of Agent Smith (Hugo Weaving) sits in a corner of the game studio, for example, while advertisements featuring Neo, Trinity, and iconic scenes from their adventures pop up here and there. It all serves as a reminder that even in this reality, Neo can’t escape The Matrix. When Thomas is tasked with creating a fourth installment of his game franchise — a series he thought he was done with — the line between reality and simulation gets exponentially fuzzier, not just for him, but for the film’s audience, too.

This self-aware aspect of Resurrections could have easily slipped into unintentional parody, but Reeves plays it with the perfect balance of cautious skepticism and recognition that something is very, very wrong in his life.

The Matrix Resurrections (2021)

Taking the red pill was a decision that changed Neo’s destiny in the original trilogy, and in  Resurrections , we get a glimpse of what his life might have been like if he took a different path. In the absence of that (literally) game-changing choice, Neo is far from a resolute, confident figure always thinking several moves ahead, and instead, we get a paranoid, introverted game designer and a fascinating “what if?” scenario.

The meta elements of Resurrections ‘ premise also offer plenty of opportunities for humor, and the film delivers on those moments without getting lost in self-promotion. A scene featuring Thomas’ fellow designers arguing about the real meanings of The Matrix games offers a wonderfully self-aware encapsulation of 20 years of conversations regarding the franchise’s philosophical themes, while the iconic “bullet-time” filming technique the 1999 film introduced is put to creative (and somewhat mocking) use at another point in the film.

And yet, despite all of the dissection and deconstruction of the original trilogy that occurs throughout Resurrections ‘ first act, it all ends up feeling like an endearing tribute instead of a roast, thanks to the smart ways all of this self-reflection is handled by the film’s cast and creative team.

It’s not all self-referential moments in  Resurrections , though. As fans might expect, there’s no shortage of action and explosions, too.

Wachowski and the franchise’s creative team have always done spectacle well, and Resurrections continues that trend with some truly impressive choreography that channels the physics-defying tone of the original trilogy’s fight sequences. Despite how crazy things can get in the world of The Matrix, there are rules to the virtual world they inhabit, and Resurrections does a nice job of simultaneously abiding by those rules and pushing the boundaries of what characters are capable of within it.

The film also is served well by two decades’ worth of evolution in visual effects techniques. Resurrections looks as cutting-edge now as  The Matrix did back in 1999, and the film puts all of that modern, VFX power to good use in both its large set pieces and some smaller elements that would have been impossible to pull off 20 years ago — including the presence of a featured character composed entirely of metal beads who emotes and interacts with the human characters.

Still, packing in all of that action comes at a price, and Resurrections gets a bit lost in the mayhem around the film’s midpoint, drawing out one of its most explosive sequences longer than necessary as it reels off explosion after explosion without any forward movement in the plot. The film’s decision to tread water and bask in its own spectacle a little too long feels like a rare miss in an otherwise well-paced story, but it eventually gets back on track and finds its groove again as it enters the final arc.

Although it’s easy to celebrate  Resurrections as another example of Reeves’ resurgence in Hollywood , the fourth installment of The Matrix franchise wouldn’t be nearly as rewarding without Moss’ impressive performance alongside — and in some cases, in front of — her franchise co-star.

Not only is the chemistry between Neo and Trinity just as good (if not better) in  Resurrections than it was in prior films, the veteran actors bring a depth to the roles this time around that wasn’t nearly as evident in the original trilogy. In the world of The Matrix, Neo and Trinity have seen it all at this point, experienced the full spectrum of emotions and even died and been reborn, and the ways they move, talk, and otherwise interact with each other in  Resurrections reflect that sense of familiarity and comfort with their roles in the story playing out around them.

More so than in any previous film, Moss is every bit the action hero Reeves is in Resurrections . Not only does the film leave the door open for future adventures, it makes abundantly clear that The Matrix isn’t a one-man show anymore. Given the wider range of storytelling opportunities that creates, it feels like a brilliant pivot for the franchise to make if it hopes to build on this revival.

Walking the line between following the formula of a successful, franchise-spawning film and recreating that film wholesale isn’t easy (just look at the polarizing response to Star Wars: The Force Awakens , for example), and Resurrections deserves praise for its careful, thoughtful approach to reviving the franchise. Finding the right measures of inspiration and imitation often means the difference between success or failure with revival projects like this, and  Resurrections keeps that balance by distilling the most iconic, rewarding elements of the franchise instead of simply duplicating them.

Whether Neo and Trinity’s triumphant return ultimately ends up capturing lightning in a bottle again remains to be seen, but regardless, The Matrix Resurrections offers a great example of how to do right by an iconic franchise with a revival that delivers in substance, spectacle, and a genuine awareness about what made the original trilogy so special.

Directed by Lana Wachowski, The Matrix Resurrections will premiere in theaters December 22 and on the HBO Max streaming service.

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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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The Matrix Resurrections review: Has the new Matrix movie been worth the wait?

It's time to head back in.

The Oracle knew better though, telling Sati that she suspected Neo would be back – and you should always trust the Oracle. Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss are back as their iconic characters in the eagerly-anticipated The Matrix Resurrections , solely directed by Lana Wachowski as Lilly needed time away from the industry .

In a world that has become increasingly dominated by franchises, reboots and legacyquels, it felt almost inevitable that we'd get another Matrix movie. It felt equally inevitable that when it happened, the new Matrix movie wouldn't be unaware of society's obsession with familiarity and it wouldn't be your average sequel.

For better and for worse, this has turned out to be the case as The Matrix Resurrections makes bold and mind-bending swings to tell what is, at its heart, that purest of things: a love story. This is a Matrix movie though, so simple isn't really on the table and endless debates among fans are to be expected.

But if all you want to know is whether it's any good, then rest assured, it's better than the sequels. If you want to delve deeper to follow the white rabbit though, we've got some more spoiler-free thoughts for you ahead.

Even with a full range of trailers and TV spots , it's impressive how little we know about The Matrix Resurrections , which makes a plot summary tricky. What we do know is that, somehow, Neo (Reeves) and Trinity (Moss) are back alive and Morpheus (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) has a new look.

For whatever reason, Neo is back to being Thomas Anderson and has no idea what he went through. He doesn't even fully remember Trinity, but there is at least a flicker of recognition when they see each other. (These mysteries are all explained during the movie and not in a "somehow he returned" Rise of Skywalker way, so fear not.)

Bugs (Jessica Henwick) is the new white rabbit that Thomas just has to follow to learn the truth – should he choose to do so, of course. That's probably as deep into the plot as we can go without wading into spoiler territory as even where we first reunite with Neo is a surprise.

We hear you, it does sound awfully familiar, as though the new movie is just a retread.

And it actually is... until it very much isn't.

Lana Wachowski is fully aware of the comparisons and delights in offering meta-commentaries to the trends of reboots, legacyquels and more. It's not exactly subtle and could prove too on-the-nose for some, but it turns out to be a crucial part of the plot rather than a winking in-joke.

It helps that the meta commentary and the numerous callbacks and nods to the entire trilogy are often very funny, one of the most unexpected things in the new movie. Whether you end up liking The Matrix Resurrections or not, this isn't a sequel that's been casually thrown together to deliver more of the same.

There is a downside to this self-aware mocking, though, that becomes apparent in the movie's second half. It starts to feel as though the movie wants to have its cake and eat it too, as the familiarity starts to become stale rather than innovatively self-aware. You can't really mock sequels for doing more of the same... and then continue to do more of the same yourself.

This is especially apparent in the weakest aspect of the movie which, surprisingly, turns out to be the action scenes. There are familiar set-ups, including Neo taking on a huge army of people, but the execution is nowhere near on the same level as in the trilogy.

For a series that defined action scenes as we know them, it's hugely disappointing. Too many of the fight sequences are choppily edited and filmed in close-up, instead of making the choreography the star. When the set pieces get bigger than one-on-one combat, there's nothing here that we haven't seen in numerous blockbusters in recent years.

If it's all some extremely meta commentary that uniformity has become king in modern blockbusters then fair play to Lana. Yet while even the divisive sequels delivered something new, there's nothing of the sort to be found here.

One element of the sequels that is on display here though is the clunky exposition and overuse of techno-babble. After a magnificent first half, all momentum is lost when the explanations start coming and the final act is being set up. It's not confusing as such, but it's definitely convoluted and when it's delivered in big chunks, you'll need rewatches to fully understand.

As in the original trilogy though, the sincerity of the cast sells the outlandish concepts. Keanu Reeves is every bit as good as he was before as Neo and has lost none of the chemistry he shared with the equally-great Carrie-Anne Moss as Trinity.

She's underused compared to Reeves, but their love story still holds an emotional power almost two decades later. It's an unashamedly romantic movie as their connection provides the key to the majority of the plot. Compared to the relatively sexless blockbusters we're used to, it's refreshing to see their romance front and centre.

As much as we'd have loved to see Laurence Fishburne back as Morpheus, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II is a superb replacement. There's a narrative reason behind the 'new' Morpheus and the actor balances reverence to the established character with his own fresh take on the performance.

The same goes for Jonathan Groff as a version of another classic character (if you've seen the trailer, you'll know) who's no less menacing and engaging. With brand-new roles, Jessica Henwick and Neil Patrick Harris are superb as Bugs and the mysterious Analyst. They make them instantly feel as though they're characters we've known for years.

It's a shame that the rest of the supporting cast, including Jada Pinkett Smith's returning Niobe and Priyanka Chopra Jonas's Sati, are underdeveloped by comparison. However, the main cast members are so strong that you don't really notice, and there's the potential sequel for them to be explored more.

Because that's the thing. As much as the movie is self-aware of its status as a legacyquel, it definitely sets the pieces on the board for this to act as a soft reboot for further movies. It's another aspect that makes you think it wants to joke about the current marketplace as well as become part of it too.

Don't get us wrong: we'd be happy to see it happen. While The Matrix Resurrections ends up being a mixed bag, it's still a unique mixed bag of ideas and creative expression that you can never accuse of being dull. We'd take that any day over a cookie-cutter blockbuster or, even worse, a generic Matrix movie.

The Matrix Resurrections is out now in cinemas and is also available to watch on HBO Max in the US.

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Movies Editor, Digital Spy  Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor.  Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies , attending genre festivals around the world.   After moving to Digital Spy , initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.  

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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 .

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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 : August 1, 2024

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.

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The Matrix Resurrections Review: Hey, It's a Lot Better Than Revolutions, and Here's Why

Keanu Reeves helps the series go back to what it did better

Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss, The Matrix Resurrections

"Are you the one who hacked my modal?" 

Only Keanu Reeves can make a line like that work. And The Matrix Resurrections is brimming with all the dorky cybersquawk you love from the original. Race with Neo and Morpheus (and a new pal, Octocles!) though the dangerous Fetus Fields to rescue Trinity ( Carrie-Anne Moss ) from Anomalium! You can either throw up your hands and say, "What?" or you can plug in and enjoy the ride.  

There's a good chance that your opinion of the Matrix trilogy mirrors mine, and goes like this: The 1999 original is one of those locked-in classics where everything hums, and feels more perfect each time you see it. The Matrix Reloaded bit off more than it could chew, but still has its share of extraordinary action sequences. But The Matrix Revolutions is an absolute catastrophe, a lumbering bore bogged down in pseudo-intellectual gobbledygook and endless CG fight scenes in which characters you don't care about fight dull robots. 

If so, well, I have some good news. To get the most out of The Matrix Resurrections , it's worth rewatching the original three again on HBO Max. And when you do, the rotten taste in your mouth from Revolutions will make the latest picture seem all the more better. Everybody wins! 

Luckily, even if you come the the new chapter with only vague memories, it's still an entertaining movie. Yes, it's still crammed with half-baked ideas that no amount of good-willed rationalizations can explain. But it's also got a sense of fun, wit, and adventure. It knows that an action movie can still be mind-expanding without ignoring its principle goal: to be entertaining. 

There is a lot that's crammed into Resurrections'  running time, and to summarize it all would be impossible. The key framing is that when we meet Neo again, he's back as office drone Thomas Anderson, only it is "now," not 1999. Turns out he's a game designer, slugging away on a new product called Binary, but he'll forever be known for his groundbreaking Matrix trilogy. And those games are what we in the audience remember as the movies. 

His corporate overloads Warner Bros. intend to make an additional entry to the series whether he is involved or not (as was the case with actual Matrix co-creator Lana Wachowski ) so he decides to get involved. That's when his already tenuous sense grip on reality begins to weaken. 

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Of course, he's actually living in fiction, and the real world, like last time, is one of hovering ships battling malevolent machines and computer programs. Anderson/Neo dips in and out of realities, and realizes that he'll only win the day by tapping into the power that is true love. Neo needs his Trinity, and we need to see them zip around a dark city on a motorcycle (in cool outfits with sunglasses, naturally.) 

These are incredibly broad strokes, and within each scene (when there isn't a chase or martial arts battle) there's still plenty of mind-scrambling talk about causality, theology, individualism, and all that other weird Matrix -y stuff. Since the original trilogy was released, the creators have since come out as transgender, and there is much in here about rejecting social constructs in the quest to present publicly in one's true form that will likely resonate with that audience. (Much of this has been coded in the text since the beginning, but it is more explicit now.)  

While there's plenty to chew on in Resurrections , it still doesn't measure up against the first Matrix as a movie. In that picture, every frame really does look like like a comic book panel, and there's never a dull moment. That's not the case here. There's a dojo fight with the reborn Morpheus ( Yahya Abdul-Mateen II ) that just collapses when compared with the original opposite Laurence Fishburne . It simply doesn't snap together the same way.  

Still, considering how poorly this project could have been (it's only got one Wachowski sibling involved) I think most will be pleased with the result. It's good to plug in again.  

TV Guide rating: 3.5/5

The Matrix Resurrections premieres Wednesday on HBO Max and in theaters.