what about the fourth with the gender bend twist? I guess the meme is older than the fourth movie, but I rarely see it even get mentioned let alone memefied. I guess less people would know tetralogy instead of trilogy, at least, I had to look up what a series of 4 would be.
The first film was groundbreaking. It matched "Star Wars" and "Lord of the Rings" in terms of its cultural penetration. Unfortunately the series failed to live past that strong debut. The second and third films were a total letdown, and The Animatrix only appealed to a niche audience and was itself a mixed bag.
The surprising and unsolicited fourth film had some promise in the first third of the film - I loved how it subverted expectations and was a meta deconstruction of the series itself. After the provocative and almost blasphemous setup, the film quickly devolved into poor action, weird pacing, and overall bad plot and character arcs. In a word, it felt senile. (The action shouldn't have been that bad with Keanu helming John Wick. It was just laziness.) The denouement was just same-y slop we see in every other dialed in action movie. Such a letdown for such a shocking cold open.
If you haven't seen the fourth film, it's a bit of a mind fuck. But turn it off the minute the reveal is over. That part is a treat, but it isn't worth your time otherwise.
>The first film was groundbreaking. It matched "Star Wars" and "Lord of the Rings" in terms of its cultural penetration. Unfortunately the series failed to live past that strong debut. The second and third films were a total letdown, and The Animatrix only appealed to a niche audience and was itself a mixed bag.
I dunno, I feel like people had erased the entire film up to the lobby scene. It has frontloaded pacing issues. The sequels were 100% studio, but they were solid films in their own right.
> over-explaining removing mystery and undermining your world building.
This! Spending too long in a fictional universe waters it down. The trimmings of imagination are best when used sparingly. If you reveal too much, the magic ceases to work.
The second/third ones never really captured the magic of the first - part of that is because of the refreshing world building.
The rest of the trilogy felt... a bit self-indulgent for lack of a better description. Everything from the "When Harry Met Sally scene" with the drink to the interminably long fight scene with every possible "martial arts" weapon - I found myself rolling my eyes even as a teenager.
I haven't seen the most recent one. Like Star Wars, I sort of lost interest with the whole franchise.
I feel like hardly anyone even know that a fourth exists, let alone seen it. Didn't it come out during COVID? I watched it because I had a home cinema at the time. The thing I hated the most was how it looked more like a YouTube video than a movie. Something just wasn't right and made it feel very much like fanfiction. I've completely forgotten the story but remember it was unsurprising given the more recent developments of the Wachowskis.
> I've completely forgotten the story but remember it was unsurprising given the more recent developments of the Wachowskis.
I think you mean recent developments at WB. The movie was a self-parody, describing in painful detail the demands from the studio for a sequel Matrix movi- er, "game", even when the creator was so over it.
Eh... I feel like they have aged better over time than a lot of 'trilogies'. They do not measure up to the original but they aren't truly terrible, at least if you're looking at them from a more philosophical standpoint.
I thought Reloaded was amazing at the time (I was a teenager). I saw it three times in the cinema. I was so excited for Revolutions. Had all these theories about what the architect said, why did the kid give him a spoon etc, are they still in another level of the Matrix? Then when it came out I saw it once and pretty much never talked about the Matrix again. Massive let down.
Sorry, they are as canon as the phantom menace even if you don’t like them (neither do I for that matter but hey, if these creators wanted to wreck their legacy who are we to stop them).
Return of the Jedi (6) was perfectly fine. More like 7 which was ok as a nostalgic cameo vehicle, but resulted in throwing away the Rogue Squadron arc which should have always remained canon.
But not like that hadn't happened before. Anyone remember Splinter of the Mind's Eye, the original sequel to Star Wars?