Franchise Review- The Matrix

   In 1999, a revolutionary sci-fi action film captured the imaginations of millions of moviegoers and set a new standard for the genre. That movie was SUPPOSED to be "Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace". But two months earlier, "The Matrix" came in the backdoor and stole George Lucas' thunder. The legendary "SW" creator unquestionably won at the box office but when you look beyond those shallow terms, more people were raving about kung-fu battles, slow-motion gunfights, and Keanu Reeves in a long black trench coat than they were about Jar Jar Binks, Jake Lloyd, and that business about the Trade Federation. Who would have ever thunk it?

   A cult-like fan-base emerged at the dawn of the new millennium and two sequels duly followed with substantial hype in 2003. It's ironic however, that this franchise suffered a very similar fate as George's much-maligned prequels. The Wachowski brothers were pressured to expand their mythology into a trilogy not because they had enough story to fill three films, but because that's what was expected. It's par for the course. After all, it worked out nicely for "Star Wars", "Back to the Future", and "Lord of the Rings". I'm not here to beat up on the series as a whole- that's been done enough. Simply put, the public thought "The Matrix" was going to become something that it didn't end up being. Was the first movie a fluke? The failure of "Speed Racer" and "Cloud Atlas" would suggest so. Nevertheless, let's look back at the Wachowski bros' crowning achievement.

"The Matrix"(1999)
Larry and David Wachowski weren't on anybody's radar going into their career-defining classic with the 1996 flop "Bound" as their sole directorial credit. Keanu Reeves hadn't had a major hit in the five years since "Speed", and his first foray into science-fiction was 1995's "Johnny Mnuemonic". It's safe to say that expectations were non-existent. The brothers confidently combined the cyberpunk subculture with Hong Kong cinema and the dystopian future already popularized by the "Terminator" films.   After Will Smith(thankfully) passed on the lead role, Reeves put his blank slate non-acting style to good use as restless hacker 'Neo', who is drawn into a rebellion against sentient machines trying to subdue and enslave the human population in a simulated virtual reality. He learns the truth from mysterious fugitive Morpheus(Lawrence Fishburne) and leather clad warrior Trinity(Carrie Anne Moss) and his destiny as the savior of mankind is slowly revealed. I'll admit that I couldn't fully grasp all of these concepts on my first viewing. All I knew is that there was a lot of cool stuff happening. Several scenes became instantly iconic(most notably the one pictured above) in the most imitated action film since "Die Hard".

   The movies that make the largest impact tend to come out of nowhere and blindside the unsuspecting masses, and that was certainly the case here. It's easier being the underdog sometimes, but the Wachowskis found themselves in a very different position when they set out to make their hotly anticipated follow-up.

"The Matrix Reloaded"(2003)
The second installment landed the coveted mid-May slot to kick off the summer of '03(a far cry from the quiet spring release of the original four years earlier) after being filmed back-to-back with the third film which was already slated for a pre-Thanksgiving launch six months later. If you can get past Morpheus' big speech and that rave on Zion(the two worst scenes in the sequels), this is a mostly worthy continuation that more than delivers in the action department. The show-stopping highlights are Neo's scrape with a hundred or so of Hugo Weaving's oddly compelling Agent Smiths and an 11 minute freeway chase that was universally praised(the two best scenes in the sequels). For many that barely compensated for an alienating plot and too much exposition.

   I acknowledge the flaws here, but I think the pros outweigh the cons when you add it all up, and a cliffhanger ending, undoubtedly inspired by "Empire Strikes Back" and "Back to the Future Part II", had everyone primed and ready for an epic finale.

"The Matrix Revolutions"(2003)
Unfortunately, that just wasn't on the agenda. The definition of anti-climactic, "Revolutions" is closer to "Alien 3" than "Return of the Jedi". We've got a hero that's largely absent from the proceedings, a long and tedious battle with the machines, and too much time spent with minor characters that the audience never got invested in. The 'big' set-pieces such as Neo facing down another army of Agent Smiths at the conclusion is more dreary than exciting, and all that pretentious dialogue and heavy-handed religious symbolism sure doesn't help. Did I mention that Zion sucks?

   I'm more forgiving than most, because I never saw these films as the Second Coming. There are worse ways to spend two hours, but there's no getting around the fact that the Wachowskis ran out of energy and fresh ideas and failed to deliver on the lofty expectations of hardcore sci-fi fans that got all worked up in 1999. They're a notoriously demanding bunch. Just ask George Lucas.