Hope is the quintessential human delusion and simultaneously the source of your greatest strength and your greatest weakness.

Rating: 8/10 (30 April 2020)

Matrix Reloaded had to try the near impossible: match the metaphorical genius that was The Matrix. I was expecting a film that was able to at least follow the narrative in a coherent and logical way: I got it. It tries to be ONLY a little bit more than what it can be, considering it is a Matrix film, full of over the top action, gothic vinyl dominatrix leather style clothing, unwavering attitudes, and messianic fanatics; it is still digestible for the person that wants to get satisfaction by having an intelligent dialogue and novel features. I got even more by getting an absolutely brilliant dialogue from the architect and a few cameos from important and interesting characters like the Oracle (Gloria Foster) and Agent Smith (Hugo Weaving).
Neo (Keanu Reeves) required a new challenge, so Agent Smith gets a reloaded version concomitantly with new abilities to challenge him. Agent Smith's changes felt a bit lazy and uncreative, but it was bearable enough to not ruin the experience. It was a bit too much watching neo move at hyper-speed and still have the scene where he fights countless Agent Smiths, no consistency. After The Matrix ended we saw a creative and powerful display of his abilities. I was legitimately waiting for that scene to end, felt forced.
We also got to know the bureaucracy of Zion and all the internal contentions to reach to optimal solutions. It was a necessary tedious feature. Morpheus was treated as a delusional fanatic by some of the top generals of Zion. Again, it was a bit inconsistent from the embrace he got by the entire population of Zion. I thought the whole debate about Neo being the one was over and done in The Matrix: unnecessary.
In Matrix Reloaded we got presented with the new antagonist in the real world when Agent Smith was able to infiltrate Zion. Bane (Ian Bliss) did not have a lot of presence in this movie, but it was a creative dramatic addition to the suspense of the film. The oracle has another stellar performance by presenting intriguing and astute dialogue that describes the nature of the Matrix. We get a lot of responses to unanswered questions that lingered like the Oracle being a program from the Machine World that is attempting to survive deletion or the function that the oracle has in the Matrix: examine human psyche. We also discover that Neo has a possibility to access the source or the machine mainframe.
The Merovingian (Lambert Wilson) is another program of causality within the Matrix. He explains the phenomenology of humans and the role of knowledge in the understanding of our perception. Delivers interesting dialogue, but felt disconnected from the rest of the plot, same with the Keymaker. Not enough time was spent describing these characters's inclusion in the film. This part of the story felt rushed and the actions scenes that succeeded were dragged too much.
The dialogue of the architect displays a highlight of an entity that creates a perfect substrate for humans to exist in the Matrix, only to recognize a monumental failure in his plan: the imperfection of humans. He demonstrates, at the end of the scenes, to be a flawed program himself by not accurately predicting the outcome of his challenge. Neo gets challenged by the architect: he has to decide between romantic love vs the survival of the species. In a symbol of hope, devotion, and rebellion, he chooses to save trinity.