The Matrix Resurrections: Official Full Trailer
The Matrix Resurrections finally released its official trailer this month, and I’ve finally found some time between moving and getting stable internet back to sit down and unpack everything it revealed. So buckle your seatbelts, folks, because there’s a lot of exciting things that we’ve learned about Matrix 4.
The opening shot
The trailer begins with an opening shot of the top of a hill in downtown San Francisco, with a lot more vibrant hues and colors than we’re used to, considering the green tint to everything we saw in the previous Matrix trilogy. While this may seem confusing to some, it’s important to remember that at the end of The Matrix Revolutions, we see a young Sati next to the Oracle overlooking a brightly-colored sunrise, which apparently Sati created. The hues and color tone of that final scene in the matrix matches this color scheme, so it’s not exactly without precedent, despite it being definitely something new.
In the therapist’s home
We then pop into the office of a psychologist, played by Neil Patrick Harris, who is asking Neo (Thomas) about himself. We immediately see a black cat like the black cat Neo saw in The Matrix that was a deja vu, which was a glitch in the matrix and an indication that something was changed in the code of the matrix. This cat is walking across a desk with a porcelain bust of a head with different markings of the brain, and behind it are two butterflies (symbols of rebirth) in both red and blue, mirroring the red and blue pills from The Matrix as well.
The Therapist is wearing blue glasses and a blue vest, and we see yet another blue butterfly behind him.
Thomas Anderson tells the psychologist that he’s having “dreams that aren’t just dreams” and asks if he’s crazy. So clearly Neo has no memory of what he was in his past life, or who he was before he was reborn. We then see him meet Trinity, and with a handshake they seem to recognize each other, despite Trinity not recognizing him either, clearly a sign that she lost her memory as well.
Memory: A Theme for Matrix Resurrections
Earlier this year, Lana sold a prop piece from the movie set for charity, a plaque for a hovercraft with the name “Mnemosyne”, which was the greek god for memory. So clearly memory and memory loss will be a major theme in this film. This also matches similar themes of lives connected across time and generations that we saw in Sense8 and Cloud Atlas (which was directed by the Wachoskis and written by David Mitchell, the writer for the book the movie was based off of, and Tom Tykwer, who composed the musical score for Matrix Resurrections).
Blue Pills
In the next scene, we see Neo taking prescribed blue pills (which in Matrix Symbolism, a red pill was the pill to leave the matrix and wake up in the real world, whereas the blue pill was to forget and stay asleep in the matrix, symbolism present in the original Matrix film). The label on the pill bottle is Ontolofloxin, a made up drug whose name suggests an antibiotic for Ontology, or the study of existence.
Screen Zombies
We then see Neo in an elevator looking at a variety of people all staring at their screens like zombies, a subtle reflection of our current media-obsessed society.
The Oracle and Alice in Wonderland
Next we see Neo throw out his blue pills and go see who looks like a new Oracle, quite possibly a grown-up Sati played by Priyanka Chopra wearing red glasses (possibly a subtle parallel to the psychologist’s blue glasses) as she puts down the novel Alice in Wonderland. The symbolism of Alice in Wonderland was also present in the original Matrix film, with a mirror leading to a new world and references to the novel from Morpheus and Cypher. In this trailer, the song “White Rabbit” by Jefferson Airplane plays throughout, with the words “go ask Alice” when Neo meets the Oracle in the trailer.
We next see Neo standing in front of a one such a mirror, and for a split second we see a balding Neo with a face that looks eerily similar to Agent Smith from the original trilogy. We know that Hugo Weaving will not be in the film, since he confirmed he was not able to join the cast due to a scheduling conflict, but there may be references to his character using digital animation similar to what we’ve seen with recent Star Wars movies bringing back actors digitally.
A New, Younger Morpheus
We then see Yahya Abdul-Mateen II’s character looking like a young Morpheus, including bare head and round small sunglasses, offering Neo a blue and red pill once again. I personally think Yahya could do a great job as a new, younger Morpheus, but like everyone else I don’t know yet why Morpheus is young while Trinity and Neo are old(er). That must have been a very intentional decision not to invite Laurence Fishburne back, since he was such a central character in the original trilogy and he probably would have said yes if he had been asked. It’s probably due to the script instead of any bad relationships between the two, so far as I know the Wachowskis had worked very well with Fishburne during the filming of the original trilogy.
Follow the White Rabbit
Next we see Jessica Henwick’s character, with a rabbit tattoo on her shoulder similar to the girl who also had a rabbit tattoo that led Neo to meet Trinity, following the orders on his computer to “Follow the White Rabbit.” What I found interesting from Henwick’s character is that she feels similar to a new kind of “Trinity” character, but with a British accent, which makes me wonder why Lana wanted Henwick’s character to at least sound British. She then leads Neo through a door of white light, similar to the white light doors we saw from Matrix Reloaded, and the two emerge from yet another liquid mirror.
Trinity Crying Code?
A few scenes later we see Neo holding Trinity’s hand, and we suddenly see green code start streaming down the side of her face, which I am very curious to see what it was. Perhaps it’s an indication that Trinity, like Neo perhaps, only exist in the Matrix at that point in time, and don’t have physical bodies yet.
After this we see Neo and a young Morpheus fighting in a dojo, just like we saw Neo learning Kung Fu fighting Morpheus in the original Matrix film.
Next we finally see some scenes of the real world, with the red pods of humans still plugged into the matrix, and a hovercraft floating through the ruins of a church.
Matrix 1 Projection in Matrix 4??!!
Then we see something particularly meta. We see a stage with a mirror, and a surveillance booth with military soldiers, but on the wall is projected Neo entering the Matrix from the first film! So a scene from Matrix 1 will be in Matrix 4. What could this possibly mean??
And So Much More
We also see more kung fu, a train fight scene, gun shootouts, corporate offices exploding in a building that may be called Deus Ex Machina, and Neo with a shaved head and a more modern neck plug connected into the Matrix, Trinity doing a special powered shout, gravity flipping (which we saw the Merovingian’s henchmen doing in Matrix Revolutions), wall running, agents entering human bodies in the matrix and dodging bullets, Henwick and someone else breaking through glass and falling toward the street (which Trinity did also in Matrix Reloaded, yet another parallel between Trinity and Henwick), Neo fighting someone in a train station (he fought Smith in what looks like the same underground train station in Matrix 1), Neo stopping bullets like he did in Matrix Reloaded at the Chateau, and finally…Neo and Trinity holding hands jumping off a skyscraper into the air, much like we saw in March of last year when they were filming in Alameda and San Francisco. This could very well be Keanu and Carrie-Anne actually doing their own stunts here between these 2 skyscrapers in San Francisco!
Also in the end scene with the credits we see some yellow code, which we saw in Matrix Revolutions as the way Neo sees the matrix, instead of the usual green code.
Want to Join the Conversation?
So those are all the major things I found! There was so much exciting content in this trailer that could all be unpacked and discussed and analyzed, but which unfortunately there isn’t enough time or space here on this blog post. If you’d like to add any additional comments on things you saw for this trailer, feel free to add them in the comments below. You can also check out the active Matrix subreddit for more discussions, or the Cyberpunk Matrix YouTube channel and comment on my reaction to this trailer in the comments there.
