First off, sorry for the lateness of this email! I normally want it to be in your inbox when you awake on Sundays, and that will generally be the rule. However, I somehow did not work the Substack interface correctly, so what was supposed to be a post scheduled for 2 AM this morning became a post scheduled for 2 AM tomorrow instead. I’ll try to get that corrected next week in time for my next story to arrive. It’s called “Not Drowning But Waving”, and I’m super excited to share it with you. And now, without further ado…
Hello, and welcome to the first edition of OGWiseman Reminisces! This series will explore burning questions about sci fi stories that have meant a lot to me. Most of them will be old, and the spoilers will come fast and free. Be warned.
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I was a sophomore in high school when I went, one rainy and unassuming night in April, to see “The Matrix”. I had no idea what it was about—the internet then was something I “accessed” but not yet an obnoxiously omnipresent source of information like movie reviews, and the movie was not heavily promoted elsewhere.
(approximately what I was wearing while watching this movie)
The film was a revelation, and not just in the sense that it’s a pretty obvious Jesus parable on one level (He’s literally called “The One”, rises from the dead, etc.) It’s not that this film made me want to write science fiction or make movies. I actually wouldn’t really realize that for years after.
What “The Matrix” did was more profound—it expanded my understanding of the possibilities of human life and knowledge. It was the first time that I realized I live in a cocoon of assumptions, most of which I don’t have direct experience of and any of which might, in fact, be radically wrong.
(actual footage of me deciding to be a philosophy major after watching this movie)
Four years later, I was a sophomore in college, and I went to a midnight showing of “The Matrix: Reloaded” (Hereafter: “Reloaded”). I’m not sure I’ve ever been more excited for a film. Aaaaaand… yikes. The film made money and was decently reviewed; I got a sinking feeling in my stomach about ten minutes in, and by the end I could have cried from frustration.
Repeat viewings of both have confirmed these initial impressions.
But why?
These films featured the same characters, the same directors, the same world, AND it didn’t have to do the massive lift of setting up the entire universe of the films. Everybody saw the first one and was well aware! So what happened?
(Wachowskis in the development meeting: “It seems like people really liked how many screens there were in the first movie… maybe if there was way more?”)
The answer turns out to be a case study in the rules of sci fi.
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First Note — I’m leaving the third Matrix film, “Revelations”, out of this essay, because it’s easier to compare two films than three and because it would really just be more of the same.
Second Note — If you’re not already familiar, it might be a good idea to go back and have a look at my OGWiseman Explains from two weeks ago for some of the basic sci fi terminology I’m about to start using, but in brief:
HARD sci fi is scientifically rigorous and needs to be plausible, SOFT sci fi is not and does not, but does need to obey its own internal rules.
PERSONAL sci fi is about the journey of a central character. EPIC sci fi is about exploring a fascinating world of characters and their combined story.
NORMAL sci fi has a lot of things in common with our everyday world. WEIRD sci fi does not.
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The fundamental difference between “The Matrix” and “Reloaded” is that “The Matrix understands where it wants to land on each of these three measures, and it serves the conventions of those choices consistently. “Reloaded”… does not.
(this is appropos of nothing in the preceding paragraph, I just found it while gif-hunting and it made me laugh)
“The Matrix” is definitely soft sci fi. To recap quickly: John Anderson, a computer programmer living at the end of the 20th century, is actually living inside a computer-generated reality, which serves as a prison for the minds of the human race so that malevolent Artificial Intelligences can use our bodies as a source of power. Anderson awakens as “Neo” in approximately 2200 and joins the resistance hoping to break the computers’ control over us.
Now there are certainly attempts at explanation of a kind—The A.I. combines our body heat “with a form of fusion” to power itself—but mostly the explanations are *internal* to the story. The resistance fighters can “jack in” to the Matrix with neurological equipment that isn’t explained by broadcasting a “pirate signal” from their ships. But of course, none of this is real technology (or even close), so there’s no way they can “explain” in any detail. They just tell you about Jacking In so that when the A.I. drones threaten their ship, you understand the stakes if that Pirate Signal is disrupted.
(artist rendering of “The Matrix” screenplay blocking plot holes with cool-sounding names for things)
So except for a couple of vague nods like the fusion thing, they spend by far most of the time on internal rules: Exactly how they can and cannot bend the rules of reality, the hard limitations of fighting an “Agent” (The A.I.s anthropomorphized presence), the necessity of getting to certain “exit points” (payphones) in order to safely exit the Matrix. And they take all of this very seriously! The movie fundamentally works because they don’t violate their own rules once.
There’s another really interesting piece of this (and then I really will get to the “Reloaded” also, this won’t entirely be me gushing about this first film!), which is that at the end, “The Matrix” takes a full-on fantasy turn, after Neo has been shot and killed inside the Matrix (an ironclad death sentence outside as well), but then, after Trinity confesses her love for him, he returns to life both inside *and outside* of the Matrix.
(the love of a person with perfect bone structure has well-understood regenerative capabilities, that’s just basic science)
Now that really shouldn’t work for us as audience. It’s neither scientifically plausible nor within the bounds of the movie’s internal rules.. And it’s exactly the fact that it does work in spite of this that makes this movie so amazing. But of course, that only begs the question, why does it work?
Three reasons: 1) It’s the culmination of the entire movie, so it feels very ‘earned’. 2) Every other part of the movie is totally faithful to the movie’s internal rules. This is the first and only time the story *ever* violates them. 3) Even when they do it, it’s subtle and deniable. Like he’s only dead for a few moments, and we’ve seen people get shot a lot and not die a lot in this movie, even people who weren’t Jesus metaphors, so even though we know it’s obviously Trinity’s love that saved him, part of us can also wonder if maybe he wasn’t really as dead as we thought.
In other words: We don’t quite have to process the fact that Trinity’s words outside the Matrix affecting events inside the Matrix is totally implausible and a violation of the internal rules. It happens, it seems right, the movie is over, and we’re outside with our friends talking about the wire-fu and how much leather they were all wearing. Perfection.
(you know when you think about it, the violation of our disbelief following from the confusion of interior and exterior worlds actually— oh, that’s very shiny, isn’t it)
Now consider “Reloaded”. Another quick recap: Six months after “The Matrix”, Neo and Trinity are now living in Zion, the last human city (this is in ~2200, remember), when word comes that an army of A.I. drones is tunneling towards Zion and will be there in 72 hours. Neo and the other characters (but let’s be honest, really mostly just Neo, his nickname is “The One”, not “A Whole Bunch Of Us”) have to figure out some way to stop them or humanity will be really, finally destroyed.
Which sounds great, right? So why does it suck so bad? Well…
One of the first things that happens is that the main bad guy from the first movie, Agent Smith, pops up in front of some guy we’ve never met, declares that he’s gone rogue (which it was never explained that could even happen), takes over the guy’s body in the Matrix, and then *takes control of the guy’s body out in the real world in 2200*.
No. Full Stop. At the end of the last movie, after spending two hours earning it, you gave us one miracle—Neo returned from the dead by the power of love—and we were kind enough to buy it! Now, at the beginning of this movie, after not earning it one bit, you want us to buy that a computer can hack someone’s brain well enough to control them even when they’re not connected to the computer anymore? That’s a hard sci fi move in a soft sci fi movie. Arrrrrrrrgh.
(the spoon is college me in my movie theater seat, internally bent into impossible shapes by the power of the second movie’s terribleness)
So next they go to visit The Oracle. Now in the first movie, the rules are clear: The Oracle knows everything, but she can never just tell Neo what to do. *And she never does.* That’s what makes it fun! He goes to her for answers, she toys with him, and he thinks he’s gotten an answer but we know he didn’t.
Naturally, then, in this movie, The Oracle just flat-out tells him what he has to do—Go visit “The Source”. She violates the rules *without us understanding how or why*
(me mentally composing my complaint letter to the Wachowskis halfway through watching “Reloaded”)
And it just goes on like this—Violation after violation of every internal rule that’s been set up in both movies so far, *especially* the rules that govern how the Real World and the Matrix interact. Neo eventually meets “The Architect”, who tells him that he, Neo, himself, is part of The Matrix, programmed as a sort of pressure-release valve that keeps humanity docile and asleep. It’s not explained how Neo the program exited The Matrix and went to Zion, or slept with Trinity, or anything else. Then, when Neo is back in Zion in the climax, he is able to disable A.I. drones with the power of his thoughts.
Needless to say, watching in the theater in college, was agony. I couldn’t explain then why it sucked so bad, but it was unmistakable.
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“The Matrix”, despite some unforgettable supporting characters, is a very Personal film. It’s about John Anderson, a.k.a. Neo, and the journey he goes on (Again, he’s called “The One”—A Robert Altman ensemble piece this is not). The film is mostly from his perspective, the central plot conceit revolves around him, and the only relationships we see developed deeply, he’s part of. This aspect is not complicated, it’s just well done.
(just spitballing here, Morpheus, but what if there was two? Or even more? Like are we doing the smart thing just giving ourselves a single shot at this? Could we workshop a version where there’s three, even, just for safety?)
Again, “Reloaded” really loses sight of what it’s trying to do here. The film wants to become more Epic. It’s no longer just Neo vs. The Computers. Agent Smith now no longer works for the A.I.s and has his own agenda. As they seek The Source, Neo and his companions visit The Merovingian (think he’s maybe not an important character based on how I was able to describe the entire plot of the movie and discuss it for two dozen paragraphs without so much as mentioning his name?) and The Keymaker (ditto). They fight The Twins (see?). They visit the Oracle again, and then Neo ends up talking to The Architect, who has a completely separate agenda. Plus of course, there are other characters in Zion, other ship captains, a whole host of meaty, developed characters, all with the Wachowskis (awesomely) colorblind casting.
(remember these two? yeah, me either, really, not sure what their deal is)
And this Epic thing they’re trying could totally work! You could have this movie be “Neo tours the Matrix”, and just think big and move fast and have a big battle at the end where they all fight, I’d sure as shootin’ pay my fifteen bucks.
They resolutely do not do that. Instead, they try to keep a bunch of stuff in there that’s unmistakably Personal. There are these long, extended love scenes between Neo and Trinity, there is tons of heart-wrenching background about vulnerable characters and how strongly Neo feels about helping them. And it’s all just so boring because nothing else about the movie is Personal! It’s not really about Neo anymore, except for these grindingly emotion-demanding parts that are shoe-horned into a movie that would be much better if it was 45 minutes shorter. Oi Gevault.
(not clear on what the rules are with this Keymaker guy, maybe he could make a key that opens a doorway into a better movie?)
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The last of our relevant sci fi axes is Normal vs Weird, and here again, “Reloaded” takes what “The Matrix” did and doesn’t just miss the mark but gets it somehow ‘not even wrong’ by pushing in both directions at once.
“The Matrix”s single most outstanding feature is its ability to combine these two categories, a synthesis it achieves as well as any movie ever made, give or take. It starts out with Mr. Anderson, a software programmer who is under direct pressure to be more Normal. His bosses demand better attendance and threaten his job if he can’t fit in.
(the idea that bosses are evil computer programs designed to keep us in prison is the single most believable thing about this film franchise)
Meanwhile, although we’re getting hints that something is Weird, to a first approximation we are in the normal, everyday world. Neo eats, he sleeps, he works, he sees friends. He wonders about something called The Matrix, but nobody else around him seems aware of it.
Then, when he awakes in 2200, the entire message is “What you thought is Normal, isn’t.” He’s finding out the world he lived in doesn’t exist. However, as he’s finding that out, we’re realizing that life on the ship he’s awoken on, in the Real World, is actually super Normal! His shipmates, eat, sleep, squabble, screw around, and in general do exactly the things that you’d expect bored, restless people to do. It’s super relatable!
(the universal face of “I’m about to start complaining about this food”)
Then the movie becomes a whole story about how Normal, human things are in fact miracles. Love and friendship and courage are still, in this Weird world, the important things. Plus, we keep going back inside The Matrix and it seems Normal! They spend time doing things like riding in cars and talking about noodle shops Neo went to.
So how does “Reloaded” screw this up? Well, really it’s that it doesn’t appear to make any distinction at all between the two things. It’s hard to know where to start because it’s really just up and down the line, small choices that add up to a movie that, far from being both Normal and Weird as its predecessor accomplished, is… basically neither?
The Keymaker and The Merovingian and all the rest aren’t interested in anything human, or basic, or relatable. Nobody has ordinary problems. Nobody is small enough in ambition to evoke a laugh of recognition. Heck, even the people of Zion aren’t that way! The small, vulnerable ones are all terrified bummers, and the ship’s captains and things all seem like they’re auditioning for the part of “Super Badass Hero”.
(he might as well be screaming “I AM A CHARACTER IN A MOVIE!!!”)
Then also: In “The Matrix”, The worlds inside and outside the Matrix are sharply delineated. Inside starts out Normal and gets very Weird, while the Outside starts out Weird and then we find out how Normal it is. Smart, simple, clean writing. But in “Reloaded”, the world Inside is thoroughly Weird without really being that new or captivating, while the world Outside starts getting very Weird as Agent Smith takes over people’s bodies and Neo develops actual psionic powers. Say it with me now… yikes.
Honestly, this could go on. At some point, someone should write a book-length biographical study of how two amazing directors completely lost their touch in such immediate and dramatic fashion. (After these two turds, the Wachowskis went on to make other such execrable fare as “Jupiter Ascending”, a movie so bad it managed to make Mila Kunis unlikeable.)
(me in the theater at Jupiter Ascending, not invested in it being good and ready to revel in how much these filmmakers suck now)
What it goes to show is that no story idea is so great that it can be great without understanding itself. Just like people! :)
Postscript: They’re releasing a fourth Matrix movie this year. Call me a sucker, but I’m hopeful. Sometimes things really do work out.
Thanks so much for reading! Look for my next original story next Sunday, this one entitled “Not Drowning But Waving”, and I’m really excited to share it with you. Have a great week!