I want to know why the Matrix sequels were so bad?

[FPAlpha]

Actually i found the overall story of the Matrix movies quite interesting and truly depressing for humanity... a neverending cycle of human slavery and virtual hope in the form of one saviour who turns out to be a control mechanism so that the entire system may function and go on.

However the practicality of moviemaking put a dent in it.. Matrix was a sleeper hit.. nobody had that movie on their radar except for SF fans who would have seen it anyway but i've seen it with people who are not hardcore SF fans and they were blown away and when the announcement came that there were to be sequels they immediately wanted to see them.

Matrix was a perfect mix of action, SF, pseudo-mysticism and mystery and it did some things that made it really famous (bullet time was not something new but Matrix popularized it). The sequels fell off in comparison due to their sometimes bloated and self-righteous way of storytelling. I'm just reminded of the scene with the Architect which was the epitome of pretentiousness and convoluted way of storytelling (and was hilariously parodied by MTV with Will Ferrell and Justin Timberlake).

Small sidenote:
I remember the producers stoking the flame when they promised us something new with the action scenes akin to the popularity and coolness of Bullet Time fighting but we got just more Bullet Time (and the godawful backyard brawl between Neo and the Smiths). Having seen Inception i was blown away by the fight of the one guy against the other while the whole scenery tumbled around them.. hard to explain to people who haven't seen the movie.
Those who did will know what i mean.. imagine a Matrix style fight with these kinds of visuals.

 

[Myasishchev]

^^ Sorry , first link said reincarnation....I'm not going any further.

To further explain to anyone who didn't bother clicking at all, it's a supposed "scientific proof of reincarnation."

I'm having some trouble getting how the the Matrix is supposed to be about reincarnation anyway. There's a very tenuous connection to the concept via the six or seven incarnations of "The One" and Zion, but that's like saying the fucking Flash is about reincarnation because Wally West wore the same red suit with lightning bolts on it that his uncle wore. Maybe I'm missing something.

Also, EUROPEAN (the all caps is important) philosophy has always recognized reincarnation as a metaphysical possibility; shit, even strains of specifically Judeo-Christian-Islamic philosophy recognize reincarnation to this day. But I do think the implication that no one here knows anything about EASTERN (the all caps is important!) philosophies is precious.

The biggest problem of the sequels? IMO too much damned time spent in Zion. The films just grind to a halt whenever there is a Zion scene.

This is the best single-line reason why they weren't entertaining. Even with all the nonsensical stuff happening within the Matrix, I admit that it never really lost its aesthetic appeal and most if not all of the scenes there at least had drive.

 

[stj]

Lost handled it far better. The producers actually were quoted at one point as saying "for anyone who wonders why we're not having one scene where we outline everything out, go watch the scene with the Architect in Matrix: Reloaded".

The scene with the Architect was not a bad scene. The big words apparently offended lots of people, but, hey, semiliteracy has a price. The Lost producers were not just stupid, but militant stupid!

The bottom line is that anyone who claims the first movie was great, but the stupid philosophy ruined the sequel, is ignoring the glaring fact the philosophy in the first one was much dumber, even given willing suspension of disbelief. Movies are not philosophy textbooks, so the sequel not making a deep case is neither here nor there.

It's true that the philosophy does not make the Matrix movies good, it just makes them about something. (Even though I think the philosophy is horseshit, I can see the obvious.) It's just that very few people have actually expressed a reason for disliking the sequel that makes any sense. Because Neo loses. All the new Zion characters take time away from Keanu Reeves, but everybody hates, hates, hates Keanu Reeves. So that doesn't make any sense either.

Sorry, Samuel Walters[/i], trying to defend against the not getting it charge when people are freaking out over the Architect's dialogue just doesn't fly. Bad luck for you those posts crossed.

 

[Trent Roman]

I loved the Architect scene. After seeing Reloaded in theatres, I was riding high, and the scene that stuck most with me was the Architect scene; I was tempted to see the film a second time just for that scene. The Architect's speech cast the events of the films in an entirely new light, but unlike your standard retcon it was one that made perfect sense, as though it had always been lurking at the periphery of the action. As though the 'camera' of our understanding had suddenly panned back to reveal the full scene when you didn't even know your perspective was limited, and you realize the story you've been watching means something completely different because you know understand the broader context. It is so rare that cinema is elevating that way. It was revelation done right. It was to the great shame of "Revolutions" that it flippantly dismissed the entire thing so it could go back to the same old story.

Regarding Zion, stj, I can only speak for myself, but what annoyed me about the amount of scenes in Zion--particularly in the third--hadn't to do with the absence of Neo or Reeves, but with the absence of the Matrix. The visual thill the franchise was founded upon was a world that looks like ours but where the laws of physics are, shall we say, flexible (creating a sense of freedom and potentiality). When in Zion, standard physics apply, which simply isn't as exciting (and it doesn't resemble our own, which means that even if you had the visual appeal, it would lack that element of the uncanny which underlies the Matrix and much of the superhero genre). The presence of Neo is incidental; indeed, I daresay the best (or at least, my favourite) action sequence in the sequels in the highway chase/battle in the middle of "Reloaded," from which Neo is absent entirely (for the good reason that his powerset is so high that he would have ended the scene before it began).

Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman

 

[MNM]

Meh I dont know, I enjoyed all three Matrix films (all three Pirates of the Carribean films as well while I'm at it.)

I think some people's problems with the sequels (please note people I said "some", so if your problems with the film dont fit this, feel free to understand I am not talking about you), is that they built the first one up in their minds to be some magnificent philosphical type of film, when it was nothing more than a fancy action moive. And when the sequels were more obviously fancy action films, they got annoyed.

 

[psikeyhackr]

This is the kind of "defense" of The Matrix films that I despise -- the notion that not liking the films somehow constitutes an ignorance of their intent or content. It's perfectly possible to see the attempted philosophical exploration of the movies (particularly Reloaded and Revolutions) and dismiss them as clumsily portrayed. The philosophy of The Matrix films is interesting on a surface level, but because it's diluted with plenty of mindless action (e.g. a TWENTY minute action sequence in Reloaded in which nothing but action occurs) the explorations become pointless to me.

The Matrix is not about any EUROPEAN Concept of philosophy.

That is why I provided this link:

http://reluctant-messenger.com/reincarnation-proof.htm


I knew about Gnosticism long before the movies came out.

http://atheism.about.com/library/FAQs/religion/blrel_matrix_gnos.htm

So the first movie was like a hook to drag people into the rest, but if people did not see the clues in the first and figure out what was in the rest then it made no sense.

psik

OH THANK YOU FOR HELPING EDUCATE THE IGNORANT MASSES!

Seriously. Enough with the "If they criticize The Matrix it must be because they didn't get it, and I did" crap. It's a bullshit argument. Just because one can argue that The Matrix Trilogy is "cerebral" or "philosophical" or "totally deep, man" doesn't necessarily mean that they were good movies. Or that people ought to flock to them to "figure them out."

As I said before, if I want to be both entertained and challenged, I'll look elsewhere than The Matrix Trilogy because if a film wants me to take it seriously, it's going to have to do better than a TWENTY minute continuous action-porno sequence -- which is just one example of many why, IMO, the sequels were poorly made movies.

I don't care if you regard it as a bullshit argument.

There was lots of sneaky stuff in that movie. Some of it you can hardly see unless you can stop the action and see individual frames.

On the black truck in the collision in Reloaded is the word GIDIM.

Gidim are the Sumerian equivalent of ghosts; they were the spirits of dead people living in the Underworld.

The Matrix is the only movie I have ever found interesting enough to study. If other people didn't find it interesting that is their business. So the sequels were BAD because they didn't see what was in it. Yeah, my over inflated ego is so upset about that.

I am not defending The Matrix. I am just pointing out what was in it. It is fine with me if some people don't like it. I am not making money off it either way. But the person that started the thread asked why people didn't like it. I didn't make up that famous phrase, "Ignorance is Bliss."

A ship named Nebuchadnezzar has the Greek god of dreams for a captain? Curiouser and curiouser.

http://www.teachinghearts.org/dre17hdan02.html

This really brings up the entire issue of why "good" sci-fi is in books and not so much in movies. It took 5 years for 2001: A Space Odyssey to break even. Movies are expensive so they must attract a big audience. A book can make money on a small market a movie cannot. So that determines the quality or type of material that goes into most movies. Star Wars isn't even science fiction.

The entire trilogy could be looked upon as kind of slick. If the first movie was not a financial success then the next two would not have been made. So that allowed the producers to do what they really wanted regardless of what most people like. The whole thing may have been a bait and switch and not everyone liked the switch.

psik

 

[I am not Spock]

I liked all of the Matrix movies. And the associated paraphenelia (Enter the Matrix, The Animatrix). I always liked to stand out from the crowd, and not bash something just coz its trendy to. I thought the films were both entertaining action films; and interesting and deep philosophically (shrugs)

 

[Myasishchev]

I don't care if you regard it as a bullshit argument.

There was lots of sneaky stuff in that movie. Some of it you can hardly see unless you can stop the action and see individual frames.

On the black truck in the collision in Reloaded is the word GIDIM.

Gidim are the Sumerian equivalent of ghosts; they were the spirits of dead people living in the Underworld.

So what? Analysis isn't a collection of facts; if you want to prove that the connection between a half-glimpsed truck and Sumerian mythology is interesting, you should probably mention what that's supposed to mean. Was the truck shipping ghosts or ghost product? What?

A ship named Nebuchadnezzar has the Greek god of dreams for a captain? Curiouser and curiouser.

No, it's not very curious. What's important or interesting about the juxtaposition aof a Biblical and historical figure against the name of a fictional deity from a completely unrelated religion?

The cleverest thing about the name "Morpheus" is that he wakes sleepers from their dreams instead of the other way around. Which is, I suppose, pretty clever. But if there's something clever about "Nebuchadnezzar," you sure are awfully coy about revealing it, leaving one to assume there is not in fact anything clever about it, unless one simply finds the reference clever in and of itself, which it is not.

The link explains only that some think the Book of Daniel has something relevant to say about the European Union, so I'll file that under "unhelpful."

This really brings up the entire issue of why "good" sci-fi is in books and not so much in movies. It took 5 years for 2001: A Space Odyssey to break even. Movies are expensive so they must attract a big audience. A book can make money on a small market a movie cannot. So that determines the quality or type of material that goes into most movies. Star Wars isn't even science fiction.

Nothing less improbable in Star Wars than the perpetual motion machine that justifies the Matrix. Or the assertions about climate that suggest that enough particulate matter could be suspended in the air to literally blot out the sun for decades to centuries. The Matrix is kind of stupid from a hard SF perspective.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Lost handled it far better. The producers actually were quoted at one point as saying "for anyone who wonders why we're not having one scene where we outline everything out, go watch the scene with the Architect in Matrix: Reloaded".

The scene with the Architect was not a bad scene. The big words apparently offended lots of people, but, hey, semiliteracy has a price. The Lost producers were not just stupid, but militant stupid!

There's one rule of film making. Show, don't tell. If you have to say something is what it is, you've failed. Or, at least, it puts you damn close. Worst case, keep it to a minimum. Explain what you need to explain and space it out. To do what they did isn't an issue of smart vs. stupid, it's about good film making vs. bad film making. I understood what was said in the scene, I recognized where they were going to go from there (at least, I recognized it as well as one could recognize it), but I also recognized it as terrible, terrible film making.

 

[Chick_McGeester]

I think the main reason why the sequels sucked compared to the original is that The Whackouski Bros wrote the sequels but not the original. Its common knowledge that they stole the story from a lady writer. I have no idea what her name is, but thats the reason there is such a stark difference from the first movie to the sequels...

 

[Sykonee]

Bad? I dunno about that, but I definitely lost interest in the Matrix series with the sequels. Part of the appeal of the first one was its narrow scope, in that it was mostly a story about Neo's journey; the backdrop to that (the war with the machines, Zion, etc) wasn't terribly important to his arc, only that it provided us the setting for it.

When they started blowing the scope of the movies to epic proportions, I found I didn't really care about the people of Zion and all that rot. I came back to The Matrix to watch the continuation of Neo's story, not dull Council meetings. Frankly, they should have kept the scope of the movies isolated to the actual Matrix and perhaps whatever ship Neo's gang was hanging out on, with smaller stories dealing with freeing those trapped there rather than a Super Fate Of Humanity Epic.

 

[Greylock Crescent]

I don't care if you regard it as a bullshit argument.

There was lots of sneaky stuff in that movie. Some of it you can hardly see unless you can stop the action and see individual frames.

On the black truck in the collision in Reloaded is the word GIDIM.

Gidim are the Sumerian equivalent of ghosts; they were the spirits of dead people living in the Underworld.

The Matrix is the only movie I have ever found interesting enough to study. If other people didn't find it interesting that is their business. So the sequels were BAD because they didn't see what was in it. Yeah, my over inflated ego is so upset about that.

I am not defending The Matrix. I am just pointing out what was in it. It is fine with me if some people don't like it. I am not making money off it either way. But the person that started the thread asked why people didn't like it. I didn't make up that famous phrase, "Ignorance is Bliss."

A ship named Nebuchadnezzar has the Greek god of dreams for a captain? Curiouser and curiouser.

http://www.teachinghearts.org/dre17hdan02.html

This really brings up the entire issue of why "good" sci-fi is in books and not so much in movies. It took 5 years for 2001: A Space Odyssey to break even. Movies are expensive so they must attract a big audience. A book can make money on a small market a movie cannot. So that determines the quality or type of material that goes into most movies. Star Wars isn't even science fiction.

The entire trilogy could be looked upon as kind of slick. If the first movie was not a financial success then the next two would not have been made. So that allowed the producers to do what they really wanted regardless of what most people like. The whole thing may have been a bait and switch and not everyone liked the switch.

psik

None of this demonstrates that the Matrix films were good films. Sure, the Wachowski Bros. may have done the equivalent of throwing philosophical spaghetti against the cinematic screen, tossing in as many different references as possible to see what stuck in the heads of movie-goers, but they sure didn't cook up very good sequel films -- even if one goes the extraordinary step and consider Reloaded and Revolutions to be one double-length movie. Fact is, the sequels are examples of careless cinema with some truly engaging moments swallowed up by excess. I don't bother freeze-framing the last moments of the chase scene because, by the time the action-wanking is over, I've lost all respect for Reloaded as a film. You want to keep pointing to the pasta on the walls, be my guest. You find meaning in the patterns the pasta makes? Eat till your brain and soul are content. Just don't resort to the bullshit notion that a criticism of The Matrix films means someone else hasn't seen the pasta. Some of us have looked into the pot and realized there's just too much damn salt for our tastes.

 

[Neroon]

For some reason I now want spaghetti and meatballs for lunch.......

 

[The Lensman]

I don't care if you regard it as a bullshit argument.

There was lots of sneaky stuff in that movie. Some of it you can hardly see unless you can stop the action and see individual frames.

On the black truck in the collision in Reloaded is the word GIDIM.

Gidim are the Sumerian equivalent of ghosts; they were the spirits of dead people living in the Underworld.

The Matrix is the only movie I have ever found interesting enough to study. If other people didn't find it interesting that is their business. So the sequels were BAD because they didn't see what was in it. Yeah, my over inflated ego is so upset about that.

I am not defending The Matrix. I am just pointing out what was in it. It is fine with me if some people don't like it. I am not making money off it either way. But the person that started the thread asked why people didn't like it. I didn't make up that famous phrase, "Ignorance is Bliss."

A ship named Nebuchadnezzar has the Greek god of dreams for a captain? Curiouser and curiouser.

http://www.teachinghearts.org/dre17hdan02.html

This really brings up the entire issue of why "good" sci-fi is in books and not so much in movies. It took 5 years for 2001: A Space Odyssey to break even. Movies are expensive so they must attract a big audience. A book can make money on a small market a movie cannot. So that determines the quality or type of material that goes into most movies. Star Wars isn't even science fiction.

The entire trilogy could be looked upon as kind of slick. If the first movie was not a financial success then the next two would not have been made. So that allowed the producers to do what they really wanted regardless of what most people like. The whole thing may have been a bait and switch and not everyone liked the switch.

psik

None of this demonstrates that the Matrix films were good films. Sure, the Wachowski Bros. may have done the equivalent of throwing philosophical spaghetti against the cinematic screen, tossing in as many different references as possible to see what stuck in the heads of movie-goers, but they sure didn't cook up very good sequel films -- even if one goes the extraordinary step and consider Reloaded and Revolutions to be one double-length movie. Fact is, the sequels are examples of careless cinema with some truly engaging moments swallowed up by excess. I don't bother freeze-framing the last moments of the chase scene because, by the time the action-wanking is over, I've lost all respect for Reloaded as a film. You want to keep pointing to the pasta on the walls, be my guest. You find meaning in the patterns the pasta makes? Eat till your brain and soul are content. Just don't resort to the bullshit notion that a criticism of The Matrix films means someone else hasn't seen the pasta. Some of us have looked into the pot and realized there's just too much damn salt for our tastes.

Yep, exactly. It's not that deep, any more than Inception was. Over Christmas I had two people tell me they didn't understand Inception and I was like "What's NOT to understand? It's an incredibly simplistic story with a slightly more complex structure when you get to the heist."

There is nothing deep about that sequence or the whole "Maybe HE was in the dream the whole time (doesn't it blow your miiiiind?) thing. Yeah, it's a neat concept, but nothing I haven't seen before.

The Matrix films are the same way. Simple bullshit and yeah, we got it. Plus, as others have said, they didn't follow up on some of the implications of what the Architect said. He makes it fairly clear that the "real" world is just another level of the computer program and the third movie doesn't follow up on this. In the third, the "real" world is exactly that.

And the ever bloated fight scenes were horrible parodies of what they were in The Matrix. There's this goofy tecno music that precedes just about every fight in the sequels....and as soon as that started in the second, and especially in the third flick, I was all like .

A classic example of taking something cool in the first film and doing too much of it in sequels. As I said, it became a parody.....20 minute fight scenes? Really?

I found them annoying halfway through "Reloaded" and found them annoying and dull in "Revolution".

I prefer Dark City to The Matrix anyway.

 

[Klaus]

What we all need to get past at times is the fact that just because we think something is profound doesn't mean that everyone - or anyone -- else will think so too. That doesn't mean it's not profound to you, which is in the end all that matters, from the Force and IDIC to your favorite movies and music to Genesis and the Ainulindalë. It happens to all of us eventually lol... one needs to remind oneself to have the psychological security to like what you like and not get twitchy about whether anyone else does.

As my t-shirt from the Onion says: "I appreciate the Muppets on a much deeper level than you".

 

[Trent Roman]

There's one rule of film making. Show, don't tell.

Generally true, but there's also a long dramatic tradition of speech-making, monologues and soliloquies going back to the earliest playwrights. They provide the opportunity for the writers to demonstrate their rhetorical skill which dialogue does not. The Architect's speech is just such a tour de force, a moment that is supposed to be a pause in the action while the audience is immersed into his worldview.

Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman

 

[RoJoHen]

I appreciated the attempt to make the movies profound and philosophical, but I don't think they were particularly successful. Yes, I "got it." I know what they were trying to do, and it was neat the first time I watched the movie.

However, when I try to rewatch them (even the first one), I'm too bored to care. These movies have the most wooden characters I've ever seen. They were tolerable in the theater because I could be distracted by the spectacle of it all. However, much like "Avatar," the story and characters left much to be desired.

 

[Silvercrest]

As my t-shirt from the Onion says: "I appreciate the Muppets on a much deeper level than you".

Whaaat? How can The Onion make fun of the Muppets? There are some incredible portrayals there. Kermit, the showman constantly on the edge of a nervous breakdown, struggling mightily to make his show a success. Fozzie, struggling mightily to become a successful comedian. Miss Piggy, who feels a love for Kermit that can never be returned. Gonzo, who feels a love for her that can never be returned.

I challenge anyone to say that isn't some deep material!




Okay, maybe I don't.

 

[Cyke101]

I liked the second movie, but I'm wondering if it would have been better received in hindsight had the third movie been, y'know, good.

 

[RoJoHen]

I liked the second movie, but I'm wondering if it would have been better received in hindsight had the third movie been, y'know, good.

Perhaps.

It was coming out around that time when movies were having those two-part sequels (LOTR, Pirates of the Caribbean, etc), so it's easy to understand why one would view "Reloaded" and "Revolutions" as two halves of the same film.