Reviews, Reactions, Regurgitations
compiled by Kevin D. Hendricks

The Matrix has been called the Star Wars for the current age. It blasted onto the scene looking like a mere special effects vehicle in 1999, but it went way beyond the typical action flick. The web-geek hype took off and the DVD became the first to sell a million copies. In 2003 the Matrix world exploded with two sequels, beating other burgeoning franchises to the punch. As Newsweek hailed, it is the year of the Matrix.

The mind-twisting premise resonates in a materialistic, Office Space world: that the reality we know is simply a computer program designed to keep the human race pacified while we're harvested for our bio-energy by the machines we created. Whoa. Throw in some philosophy, a hero with a messiah complex, the kung-fu fighting, and special effects everyone races to imitate and you've got a cultural phenomena.

Rather than add one more voice to the echoing reviews, we decided to point to other reviews, articles and essays about the Matrix franchise in a continually replicating archive.

General Articles:

Unlocking the Matrix - Time's article that summarizes the entire freaking plot. Why not save your $7.50 and subscribe to Time instead?

'The Matrix' Reloads: Back in Black - Newsweek interviews Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Ann Moss, and Laurence Fishburne.

2003: The Year of the Matrix - Newsweek spoils Reloaded five months ahead of schedule.

Reviews:

A Future Worth Fighting For - A more intelligent review from Salon.com, which points out the racial diversity of Zion compared to the Matrix, among other things.

Best Review Yet: Sucktasia - A laugh-out-loud trashing of the movie, complete with way too many user comments. Whether you agree or not, it's worth the read. (profanity warning -- be advised)

All Things Considered gives their spin - Bob Mondello comments on the kung-fu fighting and Spam-like replication of Agent Smith.

Fresh Air's spin - David Edelstein compares Reloaded to a video game and the dialog to Deep Space Nine on a really bad day.

Corporate Mofo Reloads the Matrix - Deep analysis of the movie; in summary, if you didn't like it, it's because you're dumb. (profanity warning -- be advised)

Relevant magazine's Review - A luke warm response, with bonus comments at the end from people just as smart as you.

The New Yorker Takes a Swipe - “Matrix Reloaded is, unlike the first film, a conventional comic-book movie, in places a campy conventional comic-book movie, and in places a ludicrously campy conventional comic-book movie."

Cool, But Not Quite Superawesomecool - Very well-written review from the National Post.

What everyone else said - ChristianityToday.com gives a basic overview of what everyone else said.

Special Effects:

Matrix^2: Bullet Time Was Just the Beginning - Wired takes a look at the technical wizardry behind The Matrix Reloaded.

Religion and The Matrix:

The Gospel According to Neo - The Christian Science Monitor explores religion in the Matrix, emphasizing a correlation with Gnostic Christianity over the original recipe.

Forget Sci-Fi and Guns -- The Matrix is Really About Religion - BBC News explores the religion angle, also diving into gnosticism, but emphasizing the melting pot approach of the Wachoski brothers..

Christianity Today goes back and forth - Frederica Mathewes-Green rips on the distrust of nature and beauty in the Matrix while the co-author of the Gospel Reloaded gives a counterpoint.

God-talk and the Matrix - Terry Mattingly's religion column.

The Conservative Perspective - Focus on the Family chimes in and dutifully reports that the pissy French guy drinks wine. Won't someone please think of the children?!

Misc.

The Architect/Neo dialogue - it goes by so incoherently the first time you see the movie, it helps to read it again.

to be concluded...