[staticman2]

That's an interpretation of the Matrix some blogger made up. As far as I can tell the directors never said the pills represent estradiol.

It strikes me as a real stretch. The effect of taking the red pill is like an LSD trip.

[cestith]

Say what you want about the actual pills, but the film is canonically a trans metaphor. https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-53692435

LSD by the way does not wake you up from hallucinations. It causes them. Are you referring to psychedelics raising one's sense of connection to the world around them?

[staticman2]

I'd say your interpretation of that quote is wrong. She says the original idea was a trans metaphor not the movie she actually made. She even says the world was not ready for that, i.e. it's not the movie she made. Also I would expect the films to be a metaphor for several things, otherwise all that stuff about free will and predetermination is a huge waste of time.

I don't know if you've seen the fourth movie but it basically makes fun of attempts to interpret the Matrix as a metaphor like this, with a trans metaphor being one of several interpretations of the Matrix Trilogy pitched by the wacky Warner Brothers marketing department. This is not played as a serious interpretation. It seems awfully reductive to say the movies just mean that one specific thing. (Incidently in the video game Matrix Path of Neo the Wackowskys break the fourth wall and discuss the theme of choice versus fate.)

LSD causing hallucinations is the mainstream interpretation of reality. The characters in The Matrix believe the things they see after they take drugs are real things, and the things that they see without drugs are the fake things. But the things they see on the drug visually resembles a bad acid trip.