While I enjoyed 1999’s The Matrix quite a bit and find it extremely re-watchable, I didn’t feel compelled to revisit that world unless something really different was done with it.

The Matrix Resurrections is the antithesis of something new — it is a reset that ends with the two lead characters very much where they were back in the original. I just don’t see the point, as there are no plans for a new Matrix trilogy, unless there are video game plans, anime, or something along those lines. Watching clips from the original movie interspersed here is cringe, and so are many of the meta jokes about sequels, reboots, and exploitation of IP. The pacing is rushed, and while CG has progressed enormously in twenty years, the special effects here don’t reflect it.

I won’t even try to get into the plot, other than to say the two main characters previously killed off are… resurrected by the AI that killed them. For reasons. But some motivations and stakes and supporting characters are different now. But kind of the same. There is a running gag of gaming developers spit-balling ideas, and The Matrix Resurrections comes across as one idea that should not even have made it through to the storyboarding phase.

It is available on HBO Max and should be released on 4K Blu-ray sometime in 2022.