How the Matrix movies ended, and left room for The Matrix Resurrections

We’re hours away from the release of Lana Wachowski’s The Matrix IV The aka Resurrections by The MatrixThe movie “The Reintroduced” (Keanurees, Trinity Moss), is a film about Neo (Keanu Weeves), a psychically gifted freedom fighter and his loving lover. Trailers for the film echo events of 1999 original, with shots of Neo walking through the rippling reflection of a mirror, sparring with Yahya Abdul-Mateen II’s Morpheus-like character in a dojo, and pills — lots and lots of blue pills. We won’t say much more of how it all lines up with the original Matrix movies, but we will say: It can’t hurt to know what happened in the original Matrix movies.

Somehow, it’s been nearly 18 years since the release of The Matrix RevolutionsThe third movie in the Matrix Trilogy is titled. A lot has happened since then both on and off screen. If you are having trouble remembering what happened at its end, this film will help. RevolutionsThe eagerly awaited release Resurrections by The Matrix This seems to be a crucial time to look back. Wachowski seems to remix and/or fold over the mythology in new and fascinating ways in the series’ new sequel, making the complicated lore more relevant.

2003’s The Matrix Revolutions ended with Neo traveling to the Machine City alongside Trinity in Niobe’s (Jada Pinkett Smith) hovercraft ship the Logos in attempt to broker a truce with the machine leader and end the war. Neo and Trinity, on their way to the city are stopped by Bane. Bane was an agent Smith-assimilated human resistance fighter. Reloaded: The Matrix. Neo takes on Bane but is eventually blinded when he touches a power cable. Despite this, Neo discovers he has the ability to see the machine source code in the real world, enabling him to “see” and ultimately defeat Bane. As the Logos makes its approach to the Machine City, the ship is bombarded by the city’s defenses. However, the Logos is able to reach the city but Trinity is killed upon reaching it. Neo then has to go on his own. Neo meets the machine leader and offers a truce to humans and machines, on condition that they defeat their mutual enemy Agent Smith. Smith is an immediate threat both to the Matrix, and the Real World.

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Agent Smith is defeated by Neo, but it’s unclear what his fate will be. We see Neo’s body being carried on a barge that hovers above the Machine City. The Sentinels, the human-hunting killing machines who were ordered by the machine leader to stop attacking the human city of Zion per the conditions of Neo’s truce, are seen retreating from Zion after Smith’s defeat. The Matrix is then seen rebooting itself in the wake of Neo’s destruction of Agent Smith.

In the final scene of the film, The Architect (Helmut Bakaitis) meets with the Oracle (Mary Alice) in a park, telling her that she “played a dangerous game” by introducing the variable of Trinity into this latest incarnation of the cyclically recurring system of the Matrix and planning for this outcome. The Architect explained this to Neo at the end. Reloaded: The Matrix, there have been a total of six different iterations of the Matrix created to imprison humanity and assimilate the human race’s impulse for resistance into the self-perpetuating cycle of its existence, wiping out all humans freed from the Matrix between iterations before creating a new generation of resistance fighters led by a different “One.” What separates Neo from all previous Ones is that his love of humanity, which was a constant across all his predecessors, was instead focused on one person in particular: Trinity. Neo had the drive to end the Matrix cycle and put her priorities at the beginning of her own life. Reloaded: The Matrix.

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In the end, the Architect and the Oracle agree that any human who wishes to leave The Matrix would now have the opportunity to do so, and that the truce will last, “as long as it can.” The Oracle is approached by Seraph (Collin Chou), her bodyguard, and Sati (Tanveer K. Atwal), a young self-aware program whom the Oracle adopted earlier in the film as a ward. When Sati asks if Neo will ever be seen again, the Oracle replies, “I suspect so. Someday.”

The trailers reveal that the movie is set after the events described in the book. The Matrix Revolutions, given the disparity between Neo’s appearance in that film and his appearance in the upcoming installment. Neo was being taken by machines to the Machine City’s heart when we last saw him. The trailer shows him in action. It is possible that he might still be alive, or that the Matrix took care of Neo. The last scene with The Architect, the Oracle suggests that there will be a continuation to the Matrix.

Warner Bros. Pictures

Trinity was also seen dying during the events in The Matrix RevolutionsWachowski has many options to choose from in the sequel. Jessica Henwick plays new characters (Love and Monsters() and Yahya Abul-Mateen II. The ending The Matrix Revolutions suggest that many humans would continue to thrive and survive in the real world for years to come after the machine’s attack.

It is important to play a vital role Revolutions plays in understanding Resurrections by The MatrixIt is up to those who experience it in theaters or on HBO Max Dec. 22. We suggest that you watch all three Matrix movies, which are currently streaming on HBO Max.