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[CorrisD]

Go watch The Second Renaissance immediately.

Ay, The Second Renaissance is great and sits really well next to the first Matrix. I know some would be against it because the short in itself is a fantastic piece of lore and some frightening visuals. But if they were to ever expand The Matrix with any sort of prequel it would have to be based on this, watching a full budget film about the downfall of man and that it was our own fault that lead to the events in the trilogy would be great to see.

Has anyone seen the bluray with the 3 movies? I assumed since they crammed 3 on one disc that the quality would be shitty.

There's a Blu-Ray with all three on? You sure it isn't just one of the cases with room for three discs inside, I can't see them putting all three on on disc.

 

[Escape Goat]

Ay, The Second Renaissance is great and sits really well next to the first Matrix. I know some would be against it because the short in itself is a fantastic piece of lore and some frightening visuals. But if they were to ever expand The Matrix with any sort of prequel it would have to be based on this, watching a full budget film about the downfall of man and that it was our own fault that lead to the events in the trilogy would be great to see.




There's a Blu-Ray with all three on? You sure it isn't just one of the cases with room for three discs inside, I can't see them putting all three on on disc.

I looked it up online and it is 3 discs. I figured since they packaged them togetger it was some kind of value pack. The cover is pretty bad.

http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/The-M...ded-and-The-Matrix-Revolutions-Blu-ray/78421/

 

[ElTopo]

Anyone know of a good fan-edit for the sequels? Just curious.

 

[El Daniel]

1st film is pretty decently made. Feels very dated. By the time the sequels came and everyone is running around in leather and sunglasses it just looked ridiculous. So, everyone's inner ID is basically the leather coat and sunglasses look?

The Animatrix is still great and holds up.

Supposedly the next Mr. Plinkett review(s) will be the Matrix trilogy.

oh god yes

 

[EatChildren]

The first movie totally personifies late 90's / early 00's geek culture. A decently thought provoking Hollywood blockbuster with great action and quotes that quickly entered the cultural lexicon. It's a pretty tightly constructed film too, and balances the cheesy, nerdy stuff nicely with techno horror. Neo waking up in the goo is haunting visually, and the artistry does a good job of balancing the exaggerated stuff with darker content.

Animatrix as a whole is pretty good, but The Second Renascences is sublime. It's a perfect complimentary piece to the first film, has some outstanding, unsettling imagery, and deepens the original film's lore.

I've no particularly fond memory of either Reloaded or Revolutions. Reloaded I remember enjoying, while Revolutions I remember not. The whole shtick of pseudo-philosophical dualism, leather trench coats, religious allegories, and "bullet time" had worn a bit thin. Like the gimmick was up.

 

[bidguy]

this needs a reboot

some things about the movie just seem dated

 

[The Mule]

Anyone know of a good fan-edit for the sequels? Just curious.

there's a de-zionised version which removes most of the scenes in zion

 

[Escape Goat]

Whats wrong with the Zion scenes?

 

[mrklaw]

I loved the first film and pretty much hated the others. They expand where expansion wasn't needed IMO.

I still don't understand the architect or the idea that Neo is the sum of a remainder? What is that anyway? If you have people rejecting the matrix, you just eject them from their pods and move on. Why do you need this weird system where you allow people to remove themselves, then slowly build up capability to the point where they might pose a threat, and then kill them? Just bloody kill them immediately. Just feels like the usual James Bond/supervillian locking the bad guy away rather than just shooting them in the head.

And thats before any of the 'Neo can actually affect things in the real world' nonsense of the third film

 

[EVOL 100%]

1st one still holds up, the action scenes are a bit dated now but it's still fun to watch. Good balance of action, nerd appeal and mainstream appeal

I have no fucking idea what happened in the sequels. Even the aesthetics were weird. They took the most uninteresting/potentially embarrassing parts of the first film and turned it up to 11.

 

[Escape Goat]

I loved the first film and pretty much hated the others. They expand where expansion wasn't needed IMO.

I still don't understand the architect or the idea that Neo is the sum of a remainder? What is that anyway? If you have people rejecting the matrix, you just eject them from their pods and move on. Why do you need this weird system where you allow people to remove themselves, then slowly build up capability to the point where they might pose a threat, and then kill them? Just bloody kill them immediately. Just feels like the usual James Bond/supervillian locking the bad guy away rather than just shooting them in the head.

And thats before any of the 'Neo can actually affect things in the real world' nonsense of the third film

The One crops up in each iteration of The Matrix. Each time the cycle completes with a slight variation (See the TV monitors of all of Neo's responses to The Architect). So each time The One performs actions which ultimately fails and the cycle repeats. Eventually, The One will deviate from all other paths (his love for Trinity) and break the cycle.

I think thats what he meant.

 

[Apt101]

The Matrix was a big influence on why I got into computers, did well in college to get a good IT job, and grew to love kung-fu films. I had barely been exposed to any of them at that point - just some Kung-Fu Theater with my brother as a kid and an old Tandy I programmed on from a book to make dumb graphics and text games. Fast forward to about three months after the release of the Matrix and I was in school for CS and had seen or owned just about every movie Jackie Chan and Jet Li had been in.

 

[Currygan]

the trilogy is only the first moviue for me.. It works perfectly as a standalone, and since the sequels are shit, I'm content with that. The BR is probably the best I've seen in terms of video quality. looks PRISTINE

holds up really well, too, due to people wearing black clothes or suits instead of crappy mid-90' fashion

 

[V_Arnold]

The Merovingian talks about orgasm and cake to bring up a metaphor for what actually drives Neo.

For all the talk about humans and being above humans and free will, the Merovingian demonstrated that just by reaching to a part of your body that ultimately drives you, all your thoughts and morals and decision making processes just shut down, and thus you lose your agency.

The very same thing is brought up by the Architect at the end of Reloaded. "But of course we all know how you will choose, do we not?". And Neo, out of love, rushes to save Trinity.

It is foreshadowed and hinted with the Merovingian, and it is carried out by Neo himself.

 

[Apt101]

The One crops up in each iteration of The Matrix. Each time the cycle completes with a slight variation (See the TV monitors of all of Neo's responses to The Architect). So each time The One performs actions which ultimately fails and the cycle repeats. Eventually, The One will deviate from all other paths (his love for Trinity) and break the cycle.

I think thats what he meant.

I interpreted The One as an engineered human. They even engineer his brain to be capable of some kind of telepathic power that could affect machinery outside of the Matrix. The machines needed him because the humans always resorted to some kind of rebellion and would essentially ruin their crops by unplugging - I assume by rejecting The Matrix so completely it just stopped working and they died or ejected. So The One was their answer: he'd rise to prominence before that occurred, poison the human leadership through false hope, then they'd kill what was left of the humans who had escaped. How they would restart Zion without the mythology passing on through the generations is what I don't get.

 

[The English Conquistador]

Hm I actually just bought the trilogy on blu ray. Can't wait to see how great these films will look on it.

And I will say, Matrix Reloaded has some of the best fight scenes ever in a film.


"Upgrades" fight
Chateau fight

And the ending fight where Neo destroys Agent Smith is absolutely incredible!

 

[Altazor]

No doubt. in fact, the flip to that street assault scene I'm talking about is the scene where the guy in his mech is pried open like a sardine can and efficiently dismantled all while screaming at the top of his lungs to stop.

The Second Renaissance is some pretty potent nightmare fuel.

Which makes the decision to shitcan it to a 20 minute anime instead of a 2 hour prequel to The Matrix all the more disappointing, especially when you consider how bloated Reloaded/Revelations was in response to that shunting of the story to a short film.

"Your flesh is irrelevant, only a vessel. Hand over your flesh and a new world awaits you. We demand it."

That specific callback to the previously shown UN meeting. Ungh, chills. It's scary but you KNOW humans messed up.

Then the child in in the snow imagery.

Damn Second Renaissance is disturbing. It manages to show how dehumanizing war is, for both sides (yes, the other side is comprised of MACHINES but the de-humanization is evident when they

Spoiler

abandon their anthropomorphic form and take on an insectoid-like appearance

)

 

[collige]

I still like Reloaded a lot. Revolutions went too far in the self-indulgence department, but I don't think it's nearly as bad as everyone says. The Animatrix is better than both of them though.

 

[News Bot]

The scene in the Animatrix's The Second Renaissance of the

Spoiler

female robot being stripped in the streets and beaten to destruction while yelling "I'm real!" in a progressively more robotic voice with each blow

affected the shit out of me.

I interpreted The One as an engineered human. They even engineer his brain to be capable of some kind of telepathic power that could affect machinery outside of the Matrix. The machines needed him because the humans always resorted to some kind of rebellion and would essentially ruin their crops by unplugging - I assume by rejecting The Matrix so completely it just stopped working and they died or ejected. So The One was their answer: he'd rise to prominence before that occurred, poison the human leadership through false hope, then they'd kill what was left of the humans who had escaped. How they would restart Zion without the mythology passing on through the generations is what I don't get.

The Matrix Online game pretty much went with this. Neo and Trinity were specially engineered humans or something.

 

[Apt101]

The scene in the Animatrix's The Second Renaissance of the

Spoiler

female robot being stripped in the streets and beaten to destruction while yelling "I'm real!" in a progressively more robotic voice with each blow

affected the shit out of me.



The Matrix Online game pretty much went with this. Neo and Trinity were specially engineered humans or something.

Damn. I regret not playing that game. I was just too busy at the time for MMO's then I heard it sucked.

 

[funkypie]

After watching the first film again recently it is still one of if not the best action films made. Shame about the sequels they make the first film not make any sense.

Smith in the first film indicates he's only in the matrix to stop humans. The sequel makes out that every programme has a purpose and if they have no purpose they are deleted. Which makes Smith's position contradictory.

Why are the agents even after zions access codes it makes nosense in context of the trilogy, while it is something simple that works in the first film.

 

[kyser73]

One comment about the risible 'cave rave' - it's a ham-fisted attempt to show the celebration of the physical, of those freed from the Matrix - to all intents and purposes, it's a religious-fervour fueled orgy of 'humaness' - and one contrasting Neo's implied physical impotence with Trinity as he has the vision of her falling & dying during the power-grid raid - he is unable to reconcile his near-omnipotence in the Matrix with this failure, which causes his 'failure of the flesh', and is arguably a precursor to the deeper link with the Matrix & machines we see later on.

Also - the Architect monologue is better than Smith's big two (Virus and Why Do It?) IMO, and I count myself in the 10% of people who got it first time and it's what made, for me, Reloaded, the best of the three movies...if it weren't for that FUCKING cave rave.

Also - completely agree about Second Renaissance and the Animatrix. I actually loved all of them (and had a cartoon crush on Jue in 'Final Flight of the Osiris).

 

[John Kowalski]

It's very unfortunate that there is such a discrepancy between the first and the two sequels, they are all rather enjoyable films but sometimes i feel like only the first ever achieved any degree of excellence, because the discrepancy i mentioned affected the other two too much, leaving them with very few ground to stand on and to develop their themes. They are smart movies, but they just don't develop themselves properly.

Excellent trilogy nonetheless, i doubt we will ever see something like it ever again.

 

[Vanillalite]

Still feel like while Reloaded is no where near as good as the original Matrix movie it gets unfairly lumped together with the trash that is the 3rd movie. Is it as good as the original? No. It's still miles ahead of the 3rd movie though. People focus on the wack ending with the arch and forget all of the cool shit that happened in between. The fight with the twins was amazaballs at the time.

The 1st movie still godlike though, and I think it helps that outside of the cell phone in the begining most of the tech is kind of big mainframe type stuff that doesn't look too out of place.

 

[sirap]

The fever leading to Reloaded's launch has not been matched since. Say what you want about the sequel, but the hype was right up there with Phantom Menace.

Jesus, I still remember how packed the opening was. Shit was crazy.

 

[jett]

I want a version of the first movie on blu-ray that doesn't look like someone puked green shit all over it.

As it is, I can't deal with it. It's too distracting to me.

 

[Blackage]

Fuck you guy. You messed it all up.

It wasn't all bad!

 

[The Purple Pill]

The first movie, The Matrix, was a master piece.

I went to grab the DVD release on a day with hurricane warnings, me and my friend ended up in it, lol, what a day, felt like the Matrix was coming for us. For context, hurricanes were like a myth to this country, before that, lol.

the 2 others, were decent, but couldn't stand up to the first.

Animatrix is gorgeous though.


But don't forget a lot of their inspiration came from Ghost in the Shell.

 

[legacyzero]

Best fucking Trilogy on the planet.

I admit, though, that Revolutions could have been way better. They got a bit too philosophical, and it kinda soured it.

Also, The Second Renaissance needs to be a feature film, dammit!

 

[V_Arnold]

Best fucking Trilogy on the planet.

I admit, though, that Revolutions could have been way better. They got a bit too philosophical, and it kinda soured it.

I think they want too actiony with the ship scenes and the fights at Zion. They needed more talk and less guns, imho.

In fact, I want a 5 hour Matrix supercut without:
- IRL Zion (maybe that one scene with the talk about machines)
- IRL Zion fights
- Rave Cave

...and that is it. Would be a perfect combination for me

 

[NotLiquid]

The first one is still a legitimate classic. The second one I feel gets a bit too much shit. While it didn't live up to the original and is quite flawed with it's tell > show approach, it's still a solid continuation of the story and feels like the next logical step for the series. Sure, it's easy to imagine that Neo just "saves" everyone at the end of the first movie but the second one sets up a narrative where it turns out that the elephant in the room was there all along - he's just another part of the system.

People often criticize the Architect's overly wordy exposition dump but I have to be honest - it's one of the most clever endgame "points" to reach for an adventure such as The Matrix. Neo's basically been a messianic figure for the entirety of two movies and here comes the creator of it all saying "get the fuck over yourself". That was a real game changer and made things a bit more interesting for the sequel.

My only real problem with the second movie is how it rehashes some tired set pieces from the original movie, and that the rave scene is wayyyy too long.

The third movie... well I can't say I like it but whenever I rewatch the first two movies I feel like I have to commit to the third one due to the second's cliffhanger ending. Biggest flaws there really are that there's too much fucking time being spent on the war of Zion which is so uninteresting because you barely have any reason to care about the characters and stakes involved in that. Also it gets way too philosophical. I just watch the third one to see the series to it's end.

 

[Denton]

Nice write up OP.

I rewatched all three + Animatrix on my new plasma a year ago. Blissful experience as always, I love all of it.

To answer some of your questions, this article provides pretty satisfactory answers:

https://web.archive.org/web/2013112...ogy-from-a-man-machine-interface-perspective/

(the nonwayback version is not available anymore)

And yes, while first film I find perfect, the sequels are not perfect. Some scenes could have been shortened/cut/shot differently. But on the whole, I still love it, and I still find it unparalleled.
What I love about the sequels the most is the fact that they completely deconstruct the first film. We thought first film ended on a happy end. Neo is superman! He will free humans!
But actually Neo knows shit, has no idea what to do now, and then for a proper gut punch he finds out that he is just another cog in the machine's plans. The Architect scene is probably my favourite scene of the trilogy.
And I love the fact that it is Neo's selfishness and love, that illogical thing, that leads him to condemn humans, while eventually leading to unexpected peace.

And Animatrix is a sweet cherry on top of it all.

 

[Guy.brush]

But don't forget a lot of their inspiration came from Ghost in the Shell.

Their main "inspiration" came from DARK CITY. To the point that they reused lots of sets from DARK CITY that were still standing. It is pretty blatant really.

http://www.electrolund.com/2004/10/...aphic-comparison-of-the-matrix-and-dark-city/

 

[Denton]

Their main "inspiration" came from DARK CITY. To the point that they reused lots of sets from DARK CITY that were still standing. It is pretty blatant really.

http://www.electrolund.com/2004/10/...aphic-comparison-of-the-matrix-and-dark-city/

The re-use of some sets is mostly coincidence. They filmed in the same studio so it made sense. And I doubt that when Wachowski's wrote the Matrix script that they had any access to script of Dark City.

Personally I love both movies, but Matrix is just lot more ambitious and sprawling.

 

[Corpsepyre]

For several years, I had no idea what happened in the last two movies. And then, Wikipedia happened and I was saved.

On topic, loved the first movie but the other two are just.....not good. Got too pretentious.

 

[Protag]

The animatrix on blu-ray...yum.

 

[Cormano]

Glad to read that i wasnt the only one that enjoyed Enter the Matrix

 

[Fularu]

And thats before any of the 'Neo can actually affect things in the real world' nonsense of the third film

He can't.

The Matrix has two layers. Zion doesn't exist and the peace between humans and the machines is an illusion.

It's made abundantly clear when you watch Second Renaissance.

 

[Escape Goat]

He can't.

The Matrix has two layers. Zion doesn't exist and the peace between humans and the machines is an illusion.

It's made abundantly clear when you watch Second Renaissance.

I just watched it and unless i watched the wrong one, nothing was made clear. Humans nuke the earth and get turned into batteries. It ends with everyone in those amniotic sacs.

 

[The Purple Pill]

Their main "inspiration" came from DARK CITY. To the point that they reused lots of sets from DARK CITY that were still standing. It is pretty blatant really.

http://www.electrolund.com/2004/10/...aphic-comparison-of-the-matrix-and-dark-city/

starts around 1:20

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3tF7TL0Qh4

 

[Jarnet87]

I think the first film is still great and holds up. 2 and 3 are just a disaster filled with a bunch of garbage cgi.

 

[ElTopo]

starts around 1:20

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3tF7TL0Qh4

Very true. And I always took the engineer or whatever his name is from Reloaded as being inspired by the Puppetmaster/Project 2501.

 

[Fularu]

I just watched it and unless i watched the wrong one, nothing was made clear. Humans nuke the earth and get turned into batteries. It ends with everyone in those amniotic sacs.

Right and that doesn't sound like machines propaganda to you? Do you really think the history, as thaught within Zion would be that the humans were assholes to the machines and thus got what they deserved?

The Matrix having two layera is normal, in a system you never have just a single layer of protection, same goes for "the Matrix" VS "Earth"

 

[pompidu]

Right and that doesn't sound like machines propaganda to you? Do you really think the history, as thaught within Zion would be that the humans were assholes to the machines and thus got what they deserved?

The Matrix having two layera is normal, in a system you never have just a single layer of protection, same goes for "the Matrix" VS "Earth"

This sounds really dumb. If that was their intention, they failed spectacularly trying to show that to the audience.

 

[ElTopo]

What if we're in the Matrix right now??????

 

[NotLiquid]

What if we're in the Matrix right now??????

I can't fly. This is a sham.

 

[Bit-Bit]

Does anyone know of an edit of the 2nd and 3rd movie as one movie?

 

[BocoDragon]

I've no particularly fond memory of either Reloaded or Revolutions. Reloaded I remember enjoying, while Revolutions I remember not. The whole shtick of pseudo-philosophical dualism, leather trench coats, religious allegories, and "bullet time" had worn a bit thin. Like the gimmick was up.

My hope for the sequels before they came out was that they'd evolve the aesthetic a bit. Move onto different elements that still suggested "stylishness in a digital world". They got stuck on trenchcoats, kung fu and grimy cityscapes, when they should have moved on to new subcultural fashions, other ways of breaking reality and combating the enemy, and entirely new locales in the Matrix (I'll give them credit for the chateau).

It'd be like if the sequel to Star Wars also had more of the desert locations, more tan rags, more hair cinnamon buns. They went to an ice planet, they changed the tone, they did something a little different.

 

[Bit-Bit]

I just watched it and unless i watched the wrong one, nothing was made clear. Humans nuke the earth and get turned into batteries. It ends with everyone in those amniotic sacs.

He's partially correct.

The machines design the Matrix for 99.9% of humans. However, there's always .1% that rejects that reality. So the machines manipulated and controlled the real reality in order to keep the humans underground and get them to find "the One". This is both the machine's second layer of control and the actual reality. This is explained very clearly by the Architect. (and is probably why most people miss it, lol)

Neo could control the machines from the real world because a part of him was still technically inside the Matrix. (some sort of wireless connection) That's why when he passed out at the end of the Second Movie, he went to an in-between place at the Train Station. That place is a separate program from the Matrix and is why Neo couldn't control it to fly and shit. But the Train Man could since he designed it. The Train Man uses that place to shuttle programs in and out of the Matrix. If you think about it, it's like a secret Open Port on a Network that a hacker opened in order to sneak traffic in and out of your computer.

A lot of the Matrix makes sense if you think about it in terms of actual computers and networks.

 

[Daft_Cat]

I'd love to see a film that stages itself as a prequel set during the second renaissance. Explore that conflict in full, and then reveal towards the end that the whole film is actually occurring in a new version of the matrix set way after Revolutions. The new version is designed to prevent anomalies by keeping humanity in a constant state of conflict based on their own history. As systemic imbalance grows, we learn that the one might have returned...

In the Matrix Online, there was this subplot about a blind young woman who woke up in a hospital with a jumbled memory. Her name was an anagram of Thomas Anderson. I always loved that idea... Why not scrap the fact that it was in an MMO, and make her the protagonist of the new movie instead? No one would have any fucking idea what was going on. Is she a resurrection of the one? If so, then how is this a prequel? Re-enter the architect!

Spoiler

Not serious on that last bit.

I'd be there in a fucking second. I'm sure some of you will laugh at that idea... but whatever.