The Matrix Trilogy
The Matrix was a revolutionary breakthrough for the action movie genre. The amazing special effects were like nothing ever seen before. Just about every action flick that has come out since the breakthrough of The Matrix has some form of effects rip off or another from it. The movie was great. Besides the fact that Keanue Reeves can't act and that there were some pretty lame punch lines in it, The Matrix was awesome. It set up the story that "the one" or Neo has the power to change parts of the matrix and will undoubtingly free humanity from the machines. Truthfully speaking, this movie did not need to be a trilogy. The first film was complete on its own. Enter the Matrix hype. The second film, Reloaded, veers the story off on a tangent. Now, the last human city, Zion, is in danger of being destroyed. No longer is the film about freeing all of the minds to win the war against the machines, but about saving Zion from destruction. Enter the random techno dance party, ritual sex, and introduce a whole new string of characters (remember most of the characters from the first film were killed off), and we've got another sequel that ruins the first movie. Don't get me wrong, Reloaded was tolerable and had some pretty nifty fight scenes in it. But the story made no sense and didn't follow through with the first. Why is there a techno dance party in it? Then the highway scene, cool as it may be, just has random cars being thrown into the air. Neo fights the matrix version of Multiple Man (marvel universe talk here) and then flys away when he doesn't want to fight anymore. The dialogue is very redundant and doesn't really answer the questions it asks. "What am I suppoed to do? Why am I here? Where am I supposed to go?" "You know what you are supposed to do. You know why you are here. You know where you have to go." The characters end up going from one location to another for no real reason at all. It doesn't paint a very clear picture and the redundancy of the conversations (mainly between Neo and the Oracle) make me want to stab myself with a ball point pen. The film leaves off in a cliffhanger (apparently Reloaded and Revolutions are one long movie rather than sequels) with Neo in a coma and Mr. Smith free from the Matrix in a human body. The third film, Revolutions, is just an absolute monstrocity. I got so sick of hearing the catch phrase, "Everything that has a beginning, has an end" that I nearly killed myself when I actually saw that the movie didn't end. It didn't end! Nothing has ended! The machines still enslave the minds of people. They didn't free all the minds. That was the whole point behind the first one. Supposedly the machines and humans learn to live together in peace even though the machines could easily crush the humans and enslave them now that Neo (the only one that could fight them) has died. It doesn't make any sense. And the worst part is when the Oracle is asked, "How long do you really think this peace will last?" she answers in her usual way (without answering the question) "As long as it has to." What the hell does that mean? What is the point of the Oracle character? She never answers anyone's questions and she just talks in riddles. If you ask me, she doesn't know squat. Everything about this third installment is horrible and disappointing. The only other thing I will mention is that the characters don't even spend any of the screen time inside of the matrix. Instead they are all running around doing different things that don't really sovle or end anything. You've got all the people in Zion shooting at machines in their Exosuits (think Exosquad) and then Neo and Trinity off in machine city flying around. The superman fight between Neo and Mr. Smith to end the war looks like a computer animation and nothing else. Take my advice, watch the first one and pretend the two sequels were never made.
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