The Matrix Revolutions seemed like a definitive conclusion to the movie franchise for a lot of fans back when it came out in 2003, so it’s hardly surprising that a lot of us find ourselves wondering how Lana Wachowski has managed to come up with a fourth installment, and one that’ll be worthy of The Matrix legacy.
Indeed, The Matrix Resurrections, bringing back Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss in their respective roles as Neo and Trinity, will serve both as a sequel to Revolutions and a soft reboot for the narrative as a whole. One such implication is Neo once again living his blissful and elusive life in the Matrix, with a different version of Morpheus offering him the red pill to open his mind to the simulation.
But as pointed out earlier, approaching any cinematic work that has already stood the test of time is risky and controversial, to say the least. And based on what the cast recently revealed to EW in an exclusive profile, this sentiment echoed through the entire production team.
Even director Lana Wachowski thought Resurrections was a leap of faith, though Keanu had more confidence in what they were working on, and said that he had “a lot of faith in that leap.”
Still, the question of why this sequel exists in the first place is an important one, but Resurrections will tackle this with a meta explanation, one for the in-universe characters and one for Wachowski and the team itself. According to the EW:
[Neo’s new] life now includes Bugs (Star Wars: The Force Awakens‘ Jessica Henwick), a blue-haired gunslinger with a white rabbit tattoo. When she crosses Neo’s path, we get more clues about just why Lana felt so compelled to return to The Matrix. (There’s also a quite meta treatment of that very question in the film.) “Art is a mirror,” Wachowski writes. “Most will prefer to gaze at the surface but there will be people like me who enjoy what lies behind the looking glass. I made this movie for them.”
The Matrix Resurrections will come out in theaters on Dec. 22.
