What Is The Matrix?

[Brandon Bones]

Pleasantly surprised.  

[Leonidas]

15 hours ago, Raziel said:

  Hide contents

1. The Analyst is the new Architect.  He created the new Matrix to generate power for the machines, it just happened that his version generated more because people are continually stimulated as opposed to the Architect's version which kept people docile.

2. Smith is inherently connected to Neo because of how Neo "deleted" him from 1 and how Neo and Machina deleted him in 3.  They were always 2 sides of the same coin.  He was "free" from Matrix control and wanted to infect everything in the Trilogy.  Now he's free and again, wants to take over.

3. Smith had been stuck in the same docile loop Neo was.  When Neo was broken out, it woke up Smith.  Smith wanted to be free from the Analyst more than he wanted to kill Neo at the time.

4.  Neo hadn't fully been awakened and at his full power, plus he's human.   Smith is pure program, almost a virus, he doesn't operate within the rules of the system (shit, he took over the Bot Swarm toward the end)

5. The Analyst got slapped around by Trinity for his shit, then they left him to watch what happens because he *can't* stop them without putting his own head on the block.

6. Trinity got Neo powers from her *and* Neo getting reinserted with the Source Code when they were Project Lazarus'ed back.  They reason Neo was able to break the cycle in the Trilogy was because Trinity was the variable the Oracle stuck into the Architect's loop.  The Analyst realized this and when he built his Matrix, the source code was put in both of them, because while they're "together but not linked", it allows the Matrix to generate more power.  So when she got freed, she has the same powerset as Neo does, because the Source Code exists in her as well.  At the end, they both were flying separately.  Neo just didn't get to full power yet (Trinity got there faster).

 

I read paragraph 6 about 10 times and still don't full comprehend it, but thanks for this. Did you get all that just from watching it once? Impressive if so, for me the dialogue just washed over me and I was content just to look at the pretty lights and cgi.

[Craig H]

Not Raziel, but I only watched it once and I got all of that on just one watch. I mean, there was a whole information dump from the Analyst where he explains just about all of that. 

[tbarrie]

For those who've seen the new movie: would you recommend it for someone who didn't like the first one and hasn't seen the other sequels?

[Craig H]

32 minutes ago, tbarrie said:

For those who've seen the new movie: would you recommend it for someone who didn't like the first one and hasn't seen the other sequels?

No. 

[Craig H]

I should maybe expand on that. This is not a reboot per se. It's more of a clever continuation. But if you didn't like the first movie and never watched the sequels then this for sure isn't going to be your cup of tea. 

[A_K]

On 12/24/2021 at 4:34 PM, tbarrie said:

For those who've seen the new movie: would you recommend it for someone who didn't like the first one and hasn't seen the other sequels?

Yes. This is common denominator, generic, easily digested dirge. If you found the first 3 tenuous/humourless/overbearing you will probably love this one. There is nothing in the style or mythology or dialogue or cinematography of this film that is redolent of the trilogy, names of a handful of characters aside.

The best relevant comparison I could give is that if you watch AEW from time to time think of this as you would think of BTE/The Dark Order being an art form descended from late 90s/very early 00s pro wrestling and bingo - you’re there. 

Edited December 25, 2021 by A_K

[tbarrie]

2 hours ago, A_K said:

The best relevant comparison I could give is that if you watch AEW from time to time think of this as you would think of BTE/The Dark Order being an art form descended from late 90s/very early 00s pro wrestling and bingo - you’re there. 

Sorry, I lost track of your analogy. I love AEW but what little BTE I've seen I've found claw-your-eyes-out awful. Should I watch this film?

[HumanChessgame]

I still put on the first movie from time to time and feel it holds up. The Animatrix is also great though I haven't revisited it in quite some time. The second two I like to pretend don't exist and didn't bother trying to rewatch them. That said I thought this was a totally decent movie. Some parts of it, especially the first act revealing Neo having made up a game on his supposed delusions and the comments from the old French guy seemed like borderline fourth wall breaking and I was half expecting the characters to wink at the screen or something. The plot was fairly straightforward and everything fit together fairly well. The antagonists all made Stormtroopers and Cobra soldiers look like sharpshooters though.

3 hours ago, tbarrie said:

Sorry, I lost track of your analogy. I love AEW but what little BTE I've seen I've found claw-your-eyes-out awful. Should I watch this film?

I love AEW and have never been a fan of BTE. As far as the movies go, I still enjoy the first one just as much as ever but thought the second two were horrible. That said, I thought the movie was decent but probably won't go out of my way to watch it again. It's much lighter in tone and has a pretty coherent plot.

[A_K]

9 hours ago, HumanChessgame said:

I still put on the first movie from time to time and feel it holds up. The Animatrix is also great though I haven't revisited it in quite some time. The second two I like to pretend don't exist and didn't bother trying to rewatch them.

The first movie is a masterpiece of its genre. The second is wonderful in many ways too: The Twins, the Keymaker, Seraph, Merovingian, Persephone, elaboration on Oracle + Architect - all these curious & intriguing program side-characters that complement the emphasis on human side-characters from the first. The style & design is beautifully textured and still stays fresh in the mind almost 2 decades later: the little nuggets of dialogue that in hindsight are allusions to the previous versions of the Matrix/Ones by the programs but which never beat you over the head in the process are a nice twist that reward re-watching. Its a very interesting story that progresses the lore from the first. That's to say nothing of the cinematography in the highway scene, chateau etc. The third film I remember loathing at the time: in retrospect it was a misstep for them to produce 2 + 3 in such short period. On rewatch recently however, it does give some interesting closure on numerous narrative threads, and the closure is optimistic while leaving some interesting avenues to take the lore forward. The concluding Smith/Neo battle felt like it took forever at the time, but its around 20 minutes which feels less outrageous today.

This film .. well, it was a poor decision to splice footage from the originals, because it only serves to highlight how insipid & lacking spark the world they have crafted here is. Lest I give too many spoilers, compare/contrast the style/dialogue/dip-into-the-well of mythology that surrounded the restaurant/chateau/Exiles scene in 2 with the equivalent scene of forgettable NPC characters here. None of that intrigue is present.

Then again, this film did not have the Producer, Cinematographer, Musical-Composer or Editor from the Trilogy, & only one-half of the Writer/Director team. So if you carry forth only a fraction of a great Band, is it any wonder that the music the new band produces under the same name is hollow?

Edited December 26, 2021 by A_K

[EVA]

I rewatched the original trilogy in the lead-up to the new one. The original is still a masterpiece, but I found myself appreciating the latter movies more than I remembered, deep flaws and all. In particular, I found Niobe to be a much more interesting character/performance than I gave her credit for at the time, which made me appreciate her popping up as the leader of Io more than I would have before.

Overall, I thought they did a much better job of figuring out how to move the story forward while still preserving the central conflict much better than the Star Wars sequels did, which really did make the originals feel like they were all for nothing, as Neo himself worries here. But the idea that there is value in incremental change—even if you have to fight a war for it and ultimately fall short of the ideal change you were hoping for and may never see in your lifetime—feels like an important message, very purposefully delivered.

[Raziel]

11 hours ago, A_K said:

The first movie is a masterpiece of its genre. The second is wonderful in many ways too: The Twins, the Keymaker, Seraph, Merovingian, Persephone, elaboration on Oracle + Architect - all these curious & intriguing program side-characters that complement the emphasis on human side-characters from the first. The style & design is beautifully textured and still stays fresh in the mind almost 2 decades later: the little nuggets of dialogue that in hindsight are allusions to the previous versions of the Matrix/Ones by the programs but which never beat you over the head in the process are a nice twist that reward re-watching. Its a very interesting story that progresses the lore from the first. That's to say nothing of the cinematography in the highway scene, chateau etc. The third film I remember loathing at the time: in retrospect it was a misstep for them to produce 2 + 3 in such short period. On rewatch recently however, it does give some interesting closure on numerous narrative threads, and the closure is optimistic while leaving some interesting avenues to take the lore forward. The concluding Smith/Neo battle felt like it took forever at the time, but its around 20 minutes which feels less outrageous today.

This film .. well, it was a poor decision to splice footage from the originals, because it only serves to highlight how insipid & lacking spark the world they have crafted here is. Lest I give too many spoilers, compare/contrast the style/dialogue/dip-into-the-well of mythology that surrounded the restaurant/chateau/Exiles scene in 2 with the equivalent scene of forgettable NPC characters here. None of that intrigue is present.

Then again, this film did not have the Producer, Cinematographer, Musical-Composer or Editor from the Trilogy, & only one-half of the Writer/Director team. So if you carry forth only a fraction of a great Band, is it any wonder that the music the new band produces under the same name is hollow?

I feel like you missed exactly how clear Lana Wachowski made it that she didn't want to make this movie in the first 30 minutes and how it was pretry much all a satire of reboots/revivals.

[EVA]

Of all of the fair criticisms you could make of this movie, “hollow” is definitely not one of them. It has a great, big heart and a lot to say.

[A_K]

2 hours ago, Raziel said:

I feel like you missed exactly how clear Lana Wachowski made it that she didn't want to make this movie in the first 30 minutes and how it was pretry much all a satire of reboots/revivals.

Don't worry, the painfully on-the-nose corporate patriarchy strong-arming the disenfranchised creator into making an unnecessary sequel to save an ailing studio wasn't quite lost on me, nor were the painfully on-the-nose suits brainstorming about how the key to The Matrix is totally 'bullet time'. Yes, wonderfully incisive commentary on how the  Man has appropriated the property and reduced swelling sentiment to mere action flic. Thankfully if she really intended to weaponize her discontent, it has also carried over into a similar Box Office performance as have mired other creations over the past decade-and-then-some, so perhaps she need not worry about other sequels being made. An auteur sinking their own ship. Very meta. Bravo.

A film that didn't want to be made, or a film with a great big heart. Which is it? It certainly makes a lot of noise, but it has nothing interesting or new to say. It is a shame to see genius become mediocrity, but as I explained this is not really a Matrix film so far as only a small fraction of the genius minds that conceived of the trilogy are present .. and the characters that carry forward are the flimsiest of caricature (comparing Niobe's presentation in the Trilogy to this, I'm not sure even the word 'caricature' does it justice here). So "action - reaction; cause - and effect", this is the legacy created.

Edited December 27, 2021 by A_K

[NoFistsJustFlips]

So take this opinion with a grain of salt. I literally only watched the original trilogy for the first time a few weeks ago. So I lack the context of seeing them in the time they were made. I thought the first one was okay and the sequels were hot wet trash.

As for this new movie, I thought it was okay. In line with how I felt about the original. I think my main dislike of the franchise is once they get to the real world. I just don't like the aesthetic or the story beats of the real world. I love the aesthetic and story beats of being inside the matrix tho. Which is probably why I hate the two sequels so much, since the majority of the real story happens in / around Zion. For this one, I thought it was real clever to have his matrix program be him being the designer of a matrix sim game. Unfortunately when he breaks free of the matrix I just lose interest.

I also just think the story crux of machines need to use humans for energy is just... dumb. Especially since, if I understood the scene correctly, in the 3rd movie when they fly above the clouds it's beautiful with the sun shining. I took that to mean everyone thinking the sun had burnt out was mislead. And the machines were doing this not for energy but because they wanted to keep the humans enslaved. So why now in the 4th movie do the machines still need humans for power? Also humans are inefficient as fuck as power conductors. Let's get some thermodynamics programming into these machines lol.

Matrix 1 | 2.5 stars

Matrix 2 | 1 star

Matrix 3 | 1 star

Matrix 4 | 2 stars

[John from Cincinnati]

39 minutes ago, A_K said:

this is not really a Matrix film so far as only a small fraction of the genius minds that conceived of the trilogy are present .. and the characters that carry forward are the flimsiest of caricature 

This is a fun game. I wonder how long it’s been since there was a real James Bond movie. Also, no Burton means Batman Forever isn’t really a Batman movie. 

Jurassic Park 3 isn’t really a Jurassic Park movie! 

[EVA]

1 hour ago, NoFistsJustFlips said:

I think my main dislike of the franchise is once they get to the real world. I just don't like the aesthetic or the story beats of the real world. I love the aesthetic and story beats of being inside the matrix tho. Which is probably why I hate the two sequels so much, since the majority of the real story happens in / around Zion.
 

FWIW this was a common complaint about the sequels at the time of their release. Zion was pretty thin as a location and a cast of characters, and my rewatch didn’t change my thinking on that. But there were some things I felt warmer to. Mainly the cave rave/sex scene, which felt indulgent and interminable at the time, but now, in the year our Lord 2021, when characters in blockbuster movies have been turned into sexless automatons, it felt like a breath of fresh air to see humans behaving like humans.

Honestly, one of the things that surprised and kind of disappointed me the most about Resurrections was that it was romantic, yes, but not really sexual at all, in the way the originals were. All our BDSM clubs have been replaced with coffee shops!

Edited December 27, 2021 by EVA

[John from Cincinnati]

So many moments in those movies feel like insane choices that no studio today would allow in big blockbuster sequels to a rapturously received original movie. The Architect? The train business? The cake?!!! The big battle in the third movie was still lifeless to me on my last rewatch, but the second is largely very entertaining to me. I’m so happy those weird misshapen movies exist like that. What strange cultural objects to ponder. I’ll have what she’s having. 

[EVA]

On 12/26/2021 at 3:29 PM, Raziel said:

I feel like you missed exactly how clear Lana Wachowski made it that she didn't want to make this movie in the first 30 minutes and how it was pretry much all a satire of reboots/revivals.

 

On 12/26/2021 at 5:52 PM, A_K said:

A film that didn't want to be made, or a film with a great big heart. Which is it?

So, I wanted to return to this conversation, now that I’ve had some more time to sit with the film.

I feel like the narrative around this film has been greatly oversimplified to something like, “Wachowski didn’t want to do it but felt like she had to, so she turned it into a piss take on reboot culture.” But, really, that premise is only partially correct, and the result was definitely not strictly a satire of reboot culture. It’s true that the Wachowskis spent a decade avoiding making another Matrix film, and it’s true that there was external pressure from the studio to either make something or having someone else take over for them. And, yes, the film in general and the first 30 minutes, especially, has a lot of fun at the expense of the current climate in Hollywood. But that’s just the jumping off point for what the film is really saying.

If it was only a satire or a polemic, it really would be a much more hollow endeavor.  If I can jump completely up my own ass for a moment and quote my man Donald Barthelme, “Anathematization of the world is not an adequate response to the world.”

And the film explicitly states this position in the Merovingian scene! He is a character who represents the past, old culture, traditional ideas of art, etc. When he shows up, looking like a hobo, howling about how art was better back in the day, how everything used to be “original,” how social media has ruined everything, he is the stand-in for a lot of artists (not to mention a lot of people who think they’re the heroes in our current online discourse about Hollywood)…And the film treats him as an object of ridicule. A punchline. A once powerful character is now an ineffectual joke. The film is literally saying that lamenting what was and hurling invectives and mockery at the present accomplishes nothing. Merv couldn’t adapt to this new version of Holly…err, the Matrix, and now he’s irrelevant. Barely a sideshow to the actual conflict.

Resurrections succeeds because it takes the next step beyond cynicism—it offers a path forward. Like all the Matrix movies, it’s about a *lot* of things all at once, but at it’s core, this is a deeply hopeful film that suggests that, no matter how dire things seem right now now, art can still win against corporate greed. It has before and will again. But you have to fight. Lana found her reason to fight again (she found re-connecting with the Neo/Trinity relationship to be a useful way to cope with her grief from her parents’ deaths). That’s the big, beating heart at the center of all this. Neo and Trinity’s story in the film is Lana’s story with the film. She’s found the power to express herself in this new Hollywood, just as Neo and Trinity did in the new Matrix. And clearly she’s ready to go a few rounds more.

Edited December 28, 2021 by EVA

[Bustronaut]

That deserves more than a trophy emote

[TheVileOne]

8 hours ago, EVA said:

 

So, I wanted to return to this conversation, now that I’ve had some more time to sit with the film.

I feel like the narrative around this film has been greatly oversimplified to something like, “Wachowski didn’t want to do it but felt like she had to, so she turned it into a piss take on reboot culture.” But, really, that premise is only partially correct, and the result was definitely not strictly a satire of reboot culture. It’s true that the Wachowskis spent a decade avoiding making another Matrix film, and it’s true that there was external pressure from the studio to either make something or having someone else take over for them. And, yes, the film in general and the first 30 minutes, especially, has a lot of fun at the expense of the current climate in Hollywood. But that’s just the jumping off point for what the film is really saying.

If it was only a satire or a polemic, it really would be a much more hollow endeavor.  If I can jump completely up my own ass for a moment and quote my man Donald Barthelme, “Anathematization of the world is not an adequate response to the world.”

And the film explicitly states this position in the Merovingian scene! He is a character who represents the past, old culture, traditional ideas of art, etc. When he shows up, looking like a hobo, howling about how art was better back in the day, how everything used to be “original,” how social media has ruined everything, he is the stand-in for a lot of artists (not to mention a lot of people who think they’re the heroes in our current online discourse about Hollywood)…And the film treats him as an object of ridicule. A punchline. A once powerful character is now an ineffectual joke. The film is literally saying that lamenting what was and hurling invectives and mockery at the present accomplishes nothing. Merv couldn’t adapt to this new version of Holly…err, the Matrix, and now he’s irrelevant. Barely a sideshow to the actual conflict.

Resurrections succeeds because it takes the next step beyond cynicism—it offers a path forward. Like all the Matrix movies, it’s about a *lot* of things all at once, but at it’s core, this is a deeply hopeful film that suggests that, no matter how dire things seem right now now, art can still win against corporate greed. It has before and will again. But you have to fight. Lana found her reason to fight again (she found re-connecting with the Neo/Trinity relationship to be a useful way to cope with her grief from her parents’ deaths). That’s the big, beating heart at the center of all this. Neo and Trinity’s story in the film is Lana’s story with the film. She’s found the power to express herself in this new Hollywood, just as Neo and Trinity did in the new Matrix. And clearly she’s ready to go a few rounds more.

Yeah but even Merovingian's appearance in the movie seems like nothing but pointless fan service to me, as does the inclusion of Smith. 

The action also looked very bad and poorly edited, unlike the trilogy. It looked uninspired. 

[J.T.]

I found Matrix;  Resurrections to be a perfectly fine movie.  I think I would've bought the idea of Neo and Trinity being cloned rather than the machines putting them back together, though.

The savage criticism of social media and alternative facts was spot on.

Edited January 1, 2022 by J.T.

[Ace]

On 12/23/2021 at 10:39 AM, Raziel said:

  Hide contents

1. The Analyst is the new Architect.  He created the new Matrix to generate power for the machines, it just happened that his version generated more because people are continually stimulated as opposed to the Architect's version which kept people docile.

2. Smith is inherently connected to Neo because of how Neo "deleted" him from 1 and how Neo and Machina deleted him in 3.  They were always 2 sides of the same coin.  He was "free" from Matrix control and wanted to infect everything in the Trilogy.  Now he's free and again, wants to take over.

3. Smith had been stuck in the same docile loop Neo was.  When Neo was broken out, it woke up Smith.  Smith wanted to be free from the Analyst more than he wanted to kill Neo at the time.

4.  Neo hadn't fully been awakened and at his full power, plus he's human.   Smith is pure program, almost a virus, he doesn't operate within the rules of the system (shit, he took over the Bot Swarm toward the end)

5. The Analyst got slapped around by Trinity for his shit, then they left him to watch what happens because he *can't* stop them without putting his own head on the block.

6. Trinity got Neo powers from her *and* Neo getting reinserted with the Source Code when they were Project Lazarus'ed back.  They reason Neo was able to break the cycle in the Trilogy was because Trinity was the variable the Oracle stuck into the Architect's loop.  The Analyst realized this and when he built his Matrix, the source code was put in both of them, because while they're "together but not linked", it allows the Matrix to generate more power.  So when she got freed, she has the same powerset as Neo does, because the Source Code exists in her as well.  At the end, they both were flying separately.  Neo just didn't get to full power yet (Trinity got there faster).

 

Some further elaboration for #6 

Spoiler

Trinity got the powers because she's the One of the 7th Matrix, as Neo was the One of the 6th. 

 

[AxB]

So, you ever see someone post a whole dissertation on twitter? Yeah? How about THREE dissertations, one for each movie?

[J.T.]

1 hour ago, AxB said:

So, you ever see someone post a whole dissertation on twitter? Yeah? How about THREE dissertations, one for each movie?

I thought the part of Ressurections where the dev team for the game went on a tirade of philosophical tangents and pontifications made fun of this sort of thing?  Skewering people (like me) who might be assigning meaning to things in the movie that the Wachowskis might have solely intended as entertainment.

Edited January 5, 2022 by J.T.