The worst degeneration of a potentially great saga in film history

Rating: 3/10 (6 November 2003)

5 things seriously wrong with Revolutions (& Reloaded) (SPOILERS!)
1. BANE What the hell was the point of that? First, in Reloaded they feature the completely unprecedented act of having a machine intelligence take over a human brain (How the fvck?), and for what purpose? Absolutely none. This stupid sidetrack did absolutely nothing to advance the main plot except create a little bit of tension for Neo and Trin. Clumsy, and just typical of the shoddy plot machinations in these 2 films.
2. THE DIALOGUE. Oh my god, how many times must we hear a spurious variant of "I/we can do it because I believe/have to". Utterly trite and the worst of Hollywood tradition. While the first film teetered tentatively on the brink of awkward cliche, but with more than enough charisma and vision to hold it back, these two dived in head-first and relished in it. Ughhh.
3. THE RULES. The first film kept you guessing, surmising, speculating intently, but ultimately forming a nice cohesive 'theory' of how the Matrix worked. These two bent, broke, and mercilessly plundered all such boundaries to the point where you could not possibly give a sh1t about anything that happened as there could always be some new piece of bollocks they could throw at you to explain away any stupid-ass situation in which the characters might find themselves. About 1/2way into Revolutions I gave up trying to make any sense of 'the rules' as I concluded that there weren't any, just whatever fatuous whim meandered the weak plot loosely in the direction in which it was supposed to head.
4. THE ACTION vs THE EXPOSITION. The first film was a seamless blend of exciting, mind-bending ideas, seamlessly intertwined with some of the most spectacular action ever seen. It rates among my top films for clever, entertaining exposition. There is a LOT of gobbledy-gook explained in the first film, but it is so exciting and breathtakingly revealed that you lap it up. The next 2 films just turn that around so that the distinction between the exposition and the action is so jarring it is painful. Reloaded consisted entirely of pointless fight scenes (Neo engaging in fisticuffs with a couple of nobody agents, Neo vs Seraph) with no real drama in them, awkwardly intercut with a lot of talky bollocks, shot with all the flair of a soap opera. Revolutions, while being slightly better in this regard, still relied on a hell of a lot of really, really contrived crap to create any sense of drama in the scenes (see BANE, above).
5. A BETRAYAL OF THE FIRST FILM. This is what disappoints me the most. After all, if I didn't really like the first one, I wouldn't give a rat's ass whether these 2 were any good or not. Seeing Neo fly off into the blue, to the perfectly synced Rage Against The Machine, I was filled with such a great sense of wonder and excitement for where this story could go. As it turned out, I would rather have not found out. Some have maintained that the W's conceived this as a trilogy from the outset, but there's just no way I can believe that. The sequel stories are so forced and contrived they feel like they're made by some hack studio keen to quickly cash in on the success and the 'cool bits' of the first. There is no way on earth any major studio would have funded these shockingly written scripts if they weren't standing on the shoulders of a giant. Honestly, these scripts feel like first drafts. I think what annoys me the most is that these could have been good films. There's a lot of spectacular, beautiful stuff in there with some great, exciting ideas, but no focus. Why, oh why, couldn't they have just worked a little bit harder (OK, a lot harder) and nailed the script? 'Cos they knew they'd make a fortune regardless? Sad, but probably true.