The Animatrix

The Animatrix is a collection of nine shorts that further expands the world and mythology of the Matrix universe.  It was released in 2003 along with Reloaded and Revolutions, takes place at various points in the timeline and involves a few established characters but primarily brand new ones.  The Wachowskis produced and wrote some of the films but directed none.  This is of note because they retained full control over the three main pictures so to see someone else’s take on the material yields gnarly results.

Before I get into the mini reviews I wanna make a brief blanket statement on the nine.  First of all the animation is absolutely stunning.  Some have the traditional anime look, some have a more charcoal sketchbook kinda thing going on, they’re all a little different and amazing to view.  I believe they each have some sort of CGI augmentation, you know like how Disney started to incorporate into their animated features particularly with layering and backgrounds in the late 80’s and 90’s.  The voice acting is top notch.  A couple of folks reprised their roles from the films like Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Ann Moss.  The sound design in general is really neat with plenty to absorb, particularly in Matriculated.  So these are expertly executed pieces with a lot of attention to detail.

(The order of the shorts could be different depending on where and how you saw them (The Matrix website, as a collection in theaters, on DVD, etc.  Final Flight of the Osiris was screened with Reloaded and Dreamcatcher apparently).  Anyway, this is the sequence I caught them)

 

1. The Second Renaissance Part I and II.  These are the two most important of the bunch.  They chronicle the entire backstory of The Matrix including man’s fraught relationship with artificial intelligence machines, their falling out, the machines erection of their own city, the war and the creation of the Matrix itself.

This is a fucking brutally recounted story.  The overall tone is depressing as shit with humans and robots treating each other horribly, hellbent on mercilessly obliterating one another.  And on top of that it’s graphic with face smashing, limb ripping and even android executions that’ll make you squirm.  I guess that’s a testament to how effectively the artists brought the story to life.

If you’re super into The Matrix then this is required reading to get a better understanding of how shit began.  Seeing this makes the movies a lot heavier (that sorta goes for all of these actually).  I mean it’s the same exact backstory as The Terminator but hey, stealing from the best ain’t so bad.

Also, the machine city, 01 (Zero-One), is located in the middle east somewhere so technically the entire Matrix trilogy takes place there.

 

2. Program.  Two humans, Cis and Duo, are sparring inside a training program set to feudal Japan times.  After a few mins of swiping at each other Duo tells Cis that he’s decided to get reinserted into the Matrix and he wants her to join him.  She can’t believe this and turns down the offer.  Duo won’t take no for an answer though and realizes he must kill her so she won’t tattle.  The catch is Duo’s blocked the signal so no one can see what they’re doing on the outside trapping Cis.  Now the fight is life and death for real.

Such a cool simple idea that fits nicely within the universe.  Sure it’s Cypher’s (Joe Pantoliano (Risky Business)) plan from the original picture but this is stylized to the extreme and so awesome looking.  The Japanese aesthetic is gorgeous with the ornate costumes, fancy weapon moves, high flying action and powerful dramatic tension.  It’s seriously badass.

This one’s my favorite short.  The Second Renaissance is good knowledge-wise for filling in everything pre-Matrix but Program is pure fun.

 

3. Kid’s Story.  A high school teen realizes something’s not quite right with the world and agents catch on to him.  He races through his school on skateboard to make a daring escape.

According to the internet this is supposed to be the same Kid from Reloaded and Revolutions that pesters Neo all the time about wanting to join the Nebuchadnezzar crew and he eventually jumps into one of those machine gun wielding robot suits to help save the citizens of Zion.  Yea, I know we really needed his backstory.  It’s just ok.

 

4. World Record.  An Olympic runner attempts to break the short distance record but ends up going so fast he wakes himself up from the Matrix.  The concept that someone can break free from the Matrix unaided is explored a few times in these films.  It’s sort of an interesting idea, especially this one that proposes a human being’s brain can work so fast or hard or whatever that the Matrix can’t keep up and they wake up for a moment totally confused and freaked out.  With this glimpse of the truth comes consequences though.  He doesn’t know what to believe anymore crippling him inside the computer generated world.

 

5. Beyond.  Yoko goes looking for her cat and stumbles across an abandoned building in the city.  Gravity, shadows and time all act funny.  In reality it’s a damaged part of the Matrix that’s glitching out.  I like this idea, it makes sense.  This is in the same vein as saying déjà vu is really the Matrix making a physical change to your surroundings.  It’s an effort to explain weird real world stuff.  In this case a broken piece of the Matrix is supposedly what paranormal phenomena is.

 

6. A Detective Story.  Film noir type deal where a gumshoe is hired to find the mysterious Trinity.  I want to like this one more but it’s just kinda there.  It’s not much of a surprise when Trinity is found and agents show up guns blazing.  This one doesn’t offer any new backstory or insight into the inner workings of the Matrix.  Nor does it mess around with how a unique concept would play out in this universe.  A bit of a bummer.

 

7. Matriculated.  A squad of human soldiers lures in a robot hunter to destroy it for the purpose of rebuilding and reprogramming it.  But when I say reprogramming I mean they try to convince the machine to turn rogue and fight for the humans.  They achieve this through a complicated process of plugging the robot into a special rehabilitation program along with five or six humans.  They run through several cycles of playfully tormenting the thing and then showing mercy.  That’s the best way I can describe it.  I don’t really know what the fuck they’re doing or how they think this recalibrates the coding.

If you do drugs though this is the guy to watch.  The second half is one trippy motherfucker that’s a stream of consciousness situation.  Shapes, rooms, objects and bright ass everchanging colors bleed into each other like a kaleidoscope on lots of very strong steroids.

While this was cool to see once I don’t know if I could do it again.  It’s not only the overwhelming zaniness of the ridiculous visuals but the movie also gets really sad towards the end.

 

8. Final Flight of the Osiris.  A fill in the gap story about how the humans discover the machines are digging into the earth to wage an attack on Zion.  Of all the shorts this feels the most like it’s a deleted scene from one of the main films, Reloaded to be specific.  Plus it’s the only one that’s completely CGI animated making it more in line with the look of the live action ones. 

It’s possible you could’ve seen this before Reloaded which wouldn’t have made any damn sense to you if it was your first time.  I think this is a weaker entry largely because it’s more information that isn’t crucial to understanding the events in the series.  The opening sword fight training program was done much better in Program and the battle with the flying tentacle machine creatures is the kind of stuff in the Matrix films I don’t care for all that much.  On the bright side the CGI animation hasn’t aged too badly.

So I would definitely recommend The Animatrix if you’re still hankering for more and/or want to take a deeper dive into the universe.  It’s a nice companion piece that gets a lot of mileage out of a number of what-if scenarios.  It wouldn’t have been a satisfying sequel/prequel mashup if this were released instead of Reloaded and Revolutions so this addendum packaging of little stories is the perfect sidebar.