The Matrix Resurrections could more appropriately be titled The Matrix Rehash but the producers of this fine mess don’t want you to think that way hence they used a euphemism. The entire film is so nauseatingly self-referential that there’s no real film. When we aren’t viewing flashbacks (and by flashbacks I mean actual footage from previous films, most notably the first Matrix from 1999), we are seeing recreations of scenes or set pieces from the first film done in an entirely new setting but with similar context.
To its partial credit, this film does try, at least initially, to not fall into the lazy repetitiousness of a late realized sequel that feels two decades too late and just as unnecessary as the ones that came before it. The attempt to simultaneously deconstruct and rebuild the first film’s legacy in front of us by proposing that the initial trilogy was just a revolutionary game in the world of the Matrix and Neo (now going by his original name of Thomas Anderson) was its creator, is very interesting, at times amusing even. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a mainstream film know what it’s about and play it back to us with such clarity and zest.
There is a certain irony in this approach, however, knowing well that Warner Brothers has tried rather unsuccessfully to revive and amalgamate all its franchises in recent films such as Space Jam: A New Legacy and Ready Player One, both shamelessly devised to monetize on nostalgia and blatantly benefit from an audience that might be sympathetic to such an attempt. No other studio in recent memory has been so hell-bent on making sure you, the paying, gullible audience, know who they are, what they represent, and how rich their back catalog of films are.
With so much footage from the original trilogy reused here, repetitiously ad nauseam, I’m not even sure if we should even consider Resurrections an actual, complete film. It’s so ludicrously convinced of its own bloated myth that it simply can’t break free from it. And just like the film, Neo is almost always annoyingly surrounded by fanboys – characters in the film who are so in awe of being in his company that they’re constantly and forever gushing and mouthing superfluous platitudes. It’s distractingly self-aware and self-obsessed. Talking and over-explaining everything – tiny but noticeable problems that started with the first sequel, permeate the script here as well with long stretches of over expository dialogues. The year’s surprise hit Free Guy already trampled over all the things that Resurrections so reveres including hero-worshipping and retribution for everything digital. This was achieved thanks to an attitude of reconciliatory valor and the acceptance of self, which felt both fresh and modern.
There’s no easy way to say it – just take the blue pill.
Rating: 
