The Matrix (1999) with Emily VanDerWerff

one that is how movies work, isn't it. Wow? Well, um, okay, I I accept. I accept this call to adventure, except that you're gonna have to get kidnapped for reasons that are a little confusing to me, and the stakes are going to continue to rise from there. Sure sure, sure, Oh wait, I have one more condition. Yes, yes, I need to get a little kiss at the end. Okay. Well,

hey Jamie, it's it's a trinity now, Hi. Hi, And I just wanted to tell you that the oracle told me that I would fall in love with somebody, and that somebody would be the one that's me and it's and I'm in love with you further confirming that you're the one. So can I have a little kiss? Yeah? Here you go. Well, thank you. But that was a very smooth intro. I think my intro is going to be very somber because I feel, well, let's introduce the show and then I have to make an apology and

then I think we can get the episode started. Sure, for sure, I have a serious apology to make. So Hi, it's me Caitlin Durante. It's me Jamie loftus little tail between my legs. And this is the Pectel Cast. It is our show where we examine film through an intersectional feminist lens, using the Bectel Tests simply as a jumping off point, which of course is a media metric created by queer cartoonist Alice in Bectel, sometimes called the Bectel

Wallace Test. Uh. There are many variations on the test. This is the one that we are currently using, where two people of any marginalized gender must have names, they must speak to each other, and that conversation has to be about something other than a man. Ideally it's a meaningful conversation that is like narratively relevant. Yes, okay, Uh, do you mind if I just please, you've got the floor. I have a prepared statement really quickly. Okay, hello listeners,

this is Jamie Loftus. You might remember that almost exactly five years ago to the day, we released an episode about the movie The Matrix on this very podcast. The guest was comedian Matt donnaher lovely man, who we still have a friendship with. However, if you try to listen to this episode today, you will not be able to find it. And that is because as of December twenty I didn't actually watched The Matrix before we recorded the episode.

I was very busy that week. It was the holidays, and I was drunk at the recording off of Mike's Hard Lemonade. Off of Mike's Hard Lemonade, as was my custom at the time. I would learned years later, that's actually not adorable to do. Um. So I just wanted to uh apol. I've been receiving criticism for never having watched The Matrix when I was twenty three. For years now. It's been it's something that's uh, you know, a common criticism has been brought up to me at shows. It's

been tweeted at me repeatedly. It's on our Wikipedia page that I've never seen the Matrix. Um it took five years, but work course correcting. I'm a new person. I've been uh living, laughing, loving and learning and I really liked The Matrix and I'm excited for today's episode. So sorry one last time for not watching The Matrix five years ago. And if I could editor allies for just a second, I think it's very weird how mad everyone Wasn't me.

We didn't make any money out the podcast. Then there's people people were mad, some of them, but there are I would say, just as many people who think it's awesome that you didn't see it and still writ prepare well it would be. You could be bad now because now it's our job, but back then it was our hobby, and um yeah I was. I don't know who knows. It doesn't matter. We are doing the episode now and we have a wonderful guest, so let's get her in here. Indeed,

she is the critic at large for Vox. She's the co creator of the podcast art In. It's Emily Vanderworth. Hello, Hello, it's so good to be here. And if you're wondering who the skywriter was above your house, that said, please watch the Matrix, Jamie. That was I learned how to fly a plane just for that. You flew the plane in everything. Yes I did. It's the personal touch, it really really is, and that her me extra deeply as

a result. Yeah, well, you're also leaving out that you learned to fly the plane by just like having a training software uploaded immediately into your brain floppy disc. They plugged it into my brain and I was like, now I can fly in nineteen twenties biplane. Cool. I'm so excited for this episode, and we're so stuked that you're here to talk about the movie with us. Emily. Um, so this is this is our the So I guess

whenever we cover franchise, we're covering the first movie. This episode will be released lining up with the new Matrix movie, which I just I guess right at the top. I'm curious if if y'all think it looks any good. I can't tell. I can't tell. I think so. I think it's going to be great. Yeah, Okay, I've just had my ass handed to me. No I I am, but

I'm a Wachowski home homer. You know, I think they're great. Uh, you know, they've made a couple of movies I don't love, like I think the Third Matrix is their weakest film, but I still watch it all the time, so you know, it's I'm excited for it. I'm excited that it's very colorful from the trailers. I'm excited for Keanu Reeves to have a little rubber ducky on his head. Oh my gosh.

I well, because I've watched the trailer dozens and dozens of times, mostly because I was like, well, first, I think it's very fun and it's great, and I think it makes the movie look great. I'm excited to see it. But also I was trying to figure out a Halloween costume for this year, and I was like, m, my hair length is about the same hair length as Kanus in the trailer. Maybe I'll dress up as Kanu like from the New Matrix movie. But he doesn't have necessarily

a consistent look in the trailer. And also he like doesn't necessarily look like Neo famously looks with all of his like kind of has his like John Wick hair a little bit. Yeah, right, and then he's just wearing like scarves and like just regular clothes and like not his at least in the trailer again, like you don't see him with his like black trench coat and sunglasses all that stuff. So I just kind of picked a random look and replicated that there's like you see him

for like seventeen frames or something like that. And I was just like, well, this is this is my costume this year, so I will share that on our Instagram. But um, it was a solid costume. It was good. Thank you so much. So Emily, tell us what is

your relationship your history with the Matrix slash the whole franchise. Yeah, I saw this movie in theaters when it came out, but like very late, like after the buzz had kind of died down, because it was it was huge for a while, and I remember I was like very irritated by the marketing because I was someone who cared about that. At that time. It was like what is the Matrix? Was?

Like all the marketing was um. And so I saw it several weeks after it opened with my then girlfriend, and I remember it just it spoke to me in a way I didn't entirely comprehend, but I just I loved it. And then I watched it. You know, probably dozens of times when it was on DVD, and I saw it again a few years ago in the theater um. I think it's it's one of the most perfect movies ever made, like there's not really anything in it that

doesn't work. I kind of prefer the second one because I am a weird woman who likes imperfect babies and just like holding it up and being like, your head's a little dented, but I still love you. I think. I think the third one. I've seen this argument of the third one, in the second one should be considered one big movie, and in that case, the third one is better, but it isn't isolated thing. I do think it's The Witch House kis weakest movie, but like it

not bad. I enjoy watching it. But the second one, I think is My Dented Little Baby. I really enjoyed the second one as well. I would say I mildly enjoyed it. I far prefer the first one. I agree that it's a perfect movie, and I don't know what it says about me that I like perfect things. You know, like liking perfect things is fine, you know, it's just you know, it's it's uh, you look at that dented little baby. And you're like, no, get rid of that one, throw that one away. I am not like that. So

so yeah, that's actually a huge flow. Let the baby have a dead. Oh goodness, um, Jamie, what is your well? You you did read your prepared statement. I just I just give a really long winded I should have saved it for here. I have never seen it. I lied about it five years ago. Uh, and then I have now seen it twice and I loved it. I really like. I wish I hadn't been so glad formatively out watching it as a bit because it is such a good

movie and I've really enjoyed. Um, I don't know, I feel like but with some certain movies, you're like, I don't really want to engage with the fan culture around certain movies. But I've really enjoyed reading more about the Matrix and learning more about it. And I liked the sequel and I'm interested in what the new one is like. And I skipped the third one because I didn't have the stamina. But I yeah, the first Matrix movie, I can say with the whole heart, I loved it. What

about you? I am a long, long, long time Matrix fan. I saw the movie at a drive in movie theater when it came out. I was like thirteen percent didn't understand it all the first time I saw it, but I think on subsequent viewings I did understand. I don't know if it was because like I'm thirteen and I don't under like, I don't like this is confusing, or if it's just because I was like distracted and with

my friends. Anyway, I think I had it figured out by the second watch, and I've seen it like probably fifty times since then. I watched this movie multiple times a year. I love it. I think it's perfect, and it holds up so surprisingly well for a movie from because we've covered a lot of movies from this podcast, and I would say almost none of them hold up, but The Matrix does very much does. Yes, I'm really I mean, just one of the like hottest casts ever assembled.

Also just a gorgeous just just everyone is so incredibly beautiful of this movie. Uh, that's my contribution to the discourse today. I mean, honestly, I was going to make a joke about Joe Pantoliano, but like he's never been hotter, He's really hot. He joey pants is hot. His goatee. Even fine, I'll take it. I like, you know, the thing is with Joey Fans is goot. I like when someone makes a strong choice, and that's what Jelley Fans is doing with the goatee. I love that for him.

All right, Should I recap the story and we'll go from there. Let's do it, and Emily jump in whenever. During the recap, we're fast and loose. Here it's an open forum, okay. So we open on some images of some kind of computer code. Uh. Then we meet Trinity, who's played by Carrie and Moss. Some cops have her surrounded. Hugo Weaving in a suit. A K agent Smith is also after her. There's a fight, they chase her. She seems to be able to defy gravity during a lot

of this fighting and running away. She also takes control of the cinematography for like just a couple of seconds. So yeah, that is the opening scene is so good. It it's just yeah, immediately the style and yeah, it's amazing. I love it. Um. And then she escapes finally by answering a pay phone and seemingly disappearing, and we use the audience seeing this for the first time in or Monday whatever earlier this week. We're like, what what is

going on? Oh my gosh. Then Agent Smith mentions an informant. He's talking to his other agent friends. There are these like white guys in suits. He mentions an informant and also the next target, someone named Neo. Then we cut to Kiana Reeves, who in this world goes by Thomas Anderson. Someone has hacked into his computer and is sending him messages. There's mention of the matrix. I love hearing Kiana Reeves just read something off of the screen. It's very compelling

to me. It's very calming. I like it. Yeah, it's nice. His performance in this movie is incredible. I love him so much. Kianu is a national treasure. Okay, So the person on his computer tells Kianu to follow the White Rabbit, which ends up being a friend's tattoo, which leads him to a club where he meets Trinity face to face. She's like, I know that you're trying to figure out what the matrix is. By the way, you're in danger

and you're being watched. And then the next day at work, Kianu gets a cell phone delivered to him and then immediately receives a call from Morpheus, who gives him instructions on how to escape Agent Smith and the other agents who are after him. But Kanu is unsuccessful and he gets captured by the agents who want his help in finding Morpheus, who they see as a terrorist. I liked I liked that. Um. I felt like this movie could have come out almost whenever. But there you think about

this movie. I felt like was like the office job sequence. I was like, Oh, this is such a late nineties like gen X, I hate my job. The man is killing me. Like it feels like it was made just Mike Judge just had some office space out takes, just laying was like here you go. They just like color corrected it green and they're like, and now it's these are scenes from the Matrix. This is this is the scene with with the bug in it, right, a little

bug that goes in yes belly button. UM. When I saw this movie in nine, I saw it with my my then girlfriend, who had enormous Reese Witherspoon energy, UM, and she was so disgusted by this. She was just horrified by it and like hiding her face. And I was watching it like, yeah, this is just how life is, right, somebody just traps you and puts a bug in you, and then you have to just walk around with it

inside of you. And yeah, that was when I was like, this is one of my favorite movies ever because it's the only one that understands what it's like to have a little bug crawling around inside you. To this day, I cannot watch the bug either going into his belly button or coming back out of it. I don't know. I have like a weird of belly button thing where I just so I loved watching it. I thought how interesting. I thought it was interesting to watch. I'm stuck on

the phrase enormous Reese Witherspoon energy. That is, like you said it as immediately I was like, I know exactly what that means. Yes, yes, I I dated the girls I wanted to be at that time, but yes. This is the scene where Neo refuses to help the agents, so they bug him and then release him, and then Neo gets another call from Morpheus and Morpheus is like you're the one, and he's like, what does that mean? And then Trinity and a couple other people switch and

APOC pick Neo up. They debug him in the other scene I can't watch um and then they take him to meet more Pheus, who we see in the Flesh for the first time. He's played by Laurence Fishburne. Morpheus gives Neo the opportunity to choose between taking a blue pill and a red pill. Now, the blue pill will let Neo to continue on with his life as he's been living in and forget all about Morpheus and the Matrix,

but the red pill will give him access to the truth. Right, and nobody ever thought about that idea again, like that never came. No one has ever, No one has used that. That's fun, imature, nefarious reasons even a little bit. No, okay, So Neo takes the red pill and then Morpheus shows

him what the Matrix is. Basically, the Matrix is a computer simulation that most humans are plugged into so that they don't know what's actually happening, which is that it's two years in the future and the artificially intelligent machines grow humans like crops and use them as batteries to power They're like post apocalyptic machine world. So all the humans are plugged into this simulation, which basically simulates reality or some version of reality and that's what the matrix is.

So Morpheus and his crew unplugged Neo from the matrix. So we see him in this like pod thing that's full of who I love when he's in the goo. I'm a simple person, I like when he's in the give. This is another scene where I was like, well, this is just what life is like. Somebody unplugs you and wake up in a pile of go Like that didn't even registered for me. A how matter of factly that is presented where it's like, well, now he's in goo, and then cut to the next scene he's out of

the goo. Now, yeah, it is what it is, and yeah, so they take him out of the goo and they bring him aboard Morpheusis ship, the Nubuchadnezzer. We meet the rest of the crew, which is Cipher, that's Joey Pants, Joe Pantaliano, Mouse, Tank, and Dozer, who have all either been unplugged from the matrix or, in the case of Tank and Dozer, they were born in a human society called Zion and we're never plugged in to begin with.

So Neo learns all this stuff and has difficulty accepting the whole situation at first, but then he comes to accept it and starts learning more about the matrix, how to manipulate the laws of physics inside of it, how to do kung fu, he learns how to jump really far, things like that, and then Morpheus also explains that the agents like Agent Smith a K. Hugo Weaving, are the sentient programs that can kind of move throughout the matrix, and they're basically designed to like keep order, and they

are the main antagonistic force against the people like Morpheus and his crew while they're inside the matrix. Right. Morpheus also tells Neo about a prophecy that the oracle made about the one. Basically, someone would be able to destroy the matrix and the war against the machines and bring freedom to the humans, and as it's already been suggested, Morpheus believes Neo to be the one. Yeah, that's a really short walk. You just have to move, oh in front of an andy, Like, you don't have to do

that much work. I feel like it shouldn't have taken them that long, Right, it's true, it's written in the stars. I do appreciate that Neo is an anagram for one, not unlike my name. Caitlin Durante is an anagram for for such things as Latin dancer, U t I, nine tips, Dracula, and my favorite, Lauren D Titanic, Lauren D. I got to look this up. I'm looking myself up there. They haven't done it in a while. Wait, and I think I always get cranky when anagrams come up, because all

mines suck. But you have every all of the vowels in your dose your middle name. No, okay, yeah, mine, don't. I think that's cheating, that's yeah. But yeah, let let me let me know if either of you discover any impressive anagrams of your name. In the meantime, we learned that Cipher is a trader. He's the informant who has been working with the agents and who is going to sell out Morpheus because the agents want the access codes to the main frame of that human city Zion to

destroy the human population there. After getting a lot of Joey Pants's facial hair, I'm like, well, I don't know what I expected in regards to whether he was going to be a hero or a villain, Like, okay, right, he just looks like a like a like a sad dad who came home from his office job, and it's like, my office job is fighting the machines, and I just want to join the machine. The machines have such good

meats at their machine restaurants. He's like, I actually get along with the machine software guys much better, So I'm just gonna hang out with them. I think about this all the time. If the Matrix is real and we are all plugged into a simulation. But then we learned about how it is actually a prison for our minds

if given the opportunity to be freed from it. But then to live a life that seems very dangerous, and like the quality of living doesn't seem that great, seems cold and dark, and you have to eat like goog all the time. Like I'm like, I don't know what

I want to live in the Matrix. I did think it was interesting that the like I mean, the world is so carefully built out, and I like, we get all these like little questions that I would have as a viewer that they just like answer in text of like, you know, it's dangerous to tell people about the matrix when there a certain age, which was something that I thought of it like, oh yeah, that's like, if your brain is fully formed, do you want to learn that

everything you've ever known as a lie? Probably not. Probably not. You probably couldn't handle it. And and that's also why I like Mouse so much. I also like Mouse because he kind of looks like We'll Poulter. But also I also like us because he's like kind I mean, he's outside of the matrix, buties like the food sucks here and I want to have sex, and I'm like, yeah, i'd feel the same way. I designed a lady computer program for me to have sex with and that's cool,

little rascal, and then he like explodes to death. I know we're not bringing the sequels in, really, but the second movie suggests everyone in Zion just just fo Yeah, so maybe it was more of a personal issue for Mouse. Is he just happened to not be fucking poor Mouse? But I just that scene where he turns to Neo and he's just like, this food is bad. I'm horny,

Like I love this classic Mouse. Okay, So then Morpheus takes Neo into the Matrix to see the Oracle to hopefully confirm that Neo is in fact the one, but the Oracle tells Neo that he actually isn't the one, and it's implied that it's because he does not yet believe that he's the one. On their way back out of the matrix Um, where they like have to answer phones in specific places to get safely disconnected, agents ambush Neo Morpheus, Trinity and the rest of the crew and

they kidnapped Morpheus. So Neo Trinity and everyone else tries to get back, but Cipher is sabotaging them and he kills Apoc and Switch. And also this is shortly before this mouse gets shot by the agents and Sarah ammoniously moved because he was too horny to live that mouse he had to go. Makes me sad anytime anyone. I mean, they really do it an amazing job of building out the side characters that I'm like, oh, I think I've maybe heard this character speak three or four lines of dialogue,

but I'm still absolutely gutted when they're killed totally. So much of it is the is the visuals, Like they're such distinct looking characters, they don't blend into each other, especially for it's it's a somewhat diverse cast, so you have like a really strong feeling for who everybody is, even if you've only heard them talk two or three times, and mostly they just talked about how they were horny, right, yeah, Okay. So meanwhile, Agent Smith is trying to break Morpheus to

get access to these codes to Zion. They're basically like trying to hack his brain. And since keeping Zion safe is the most important thing that any of these characters can do, Neo, Trinity, and Tank consider pulling the plug on Morpheus so he doesn't give up these mainframe codes

to Zion. But then Neo is like, no, there's got to be another way, so he and Trinity go back into the Matrix to try to save Morpheus and fight the agents, and then what follows is a couple fight sequences where Neo is dodging bullets, Trinity is flying a helicopter. They managed to save Morpheus, so you can picture what it looks like. You've all seen because you've seen it referred to in every piece of media since then. Then Neo gets stuck in the Matrix and has to face

off one on one with Agent Smith. They fight, and then Agent Smith gets the upper hand and shoots Neo a bunch of times and he dies, but Trinity who is back in the real world on Morpheus's ship. It's like, Neo, you can't be dead because the oracle told me I would fall in love with the one, and I love you, so you're the one, and that means that you can't

be dead, and that brings Neo back to life. This is so often written off as like, you know, the obligatory, the woman falls in love with the male love interest, and I like, textually that's true, but it's such a fucking lesbian moment. It's so much. It's just so much like, oh, I know, I've known you for a couple of days, but I'm pretty sure we're going to get married, and like, you know, nine months from now they're going to break up, but right now, yes, absolutely, it's true love. I mean

I never really questioned it. I always bought it. I was just like, Yep, she loves him, and I mean, who wouldn't love Keanu Reeves when he shows up and it is all hot and amazing. Neo and Trinity are just two girls who met at a at a party at Barnard and just like hit it off, spent the next week together, and now they've been together for twenties. Thing years, similar to how Rose and Jack of Titanic Fame of the Titanic of the Titanic famously historically is

another iconic lesbian romance. Absolutely about Actually this is a total tangent. But the director of Portrait of a Lady am Fire, Sleen Shama. If I didn't interview with her box if you find it, she talks about how she modeled her movie on Titanic. Yeah, yeah, wait reference we talked on that episode on Portrait of the Medium Fire. Awesome. I like when I I just love when like quote unquote art filmmakers are like, no, of course I watch

fucking Titanic, Like I don't be ridiculous. Come on. So anyway, so Trinity professing her love to an unconscious Neo brings Neo back to life, and so then in the Matrix, he is able to finally defeat Agent Smith and proves that he is the one. And then the movie ends with Neo talking to someone on a pay phone. It seems to be that he's like talking to the Matrix itself. He hangs up the phone, Rage against the Machine starts

playing and flies away. I didn't know that the movie ended on Rage against the Machine and anytime I was watching it with Caitlin, I was like, anytime Rage Against the Machine comes on, I'm instantly like in the backseat of my uncle's car, Like it's just instantaneous. We're late to school, he's mad, he's singing the lyrics. We're fucked. I love it. I love that. I love that ending. It is also the most about the movie. It is. Yeah, it is literally just like what if we had what

if we had a nine in this movie? That and the scene where Neo has like followed the white Rabbit tattoo lady to the club and Rob Zombie is playing those are the two like, Yes, this movie is extremely from and it's it's obviously like all the tech, the cell phones and stuff is very the Nokia phone that comes out down. Yeah, every time Nokia got a shout out,

I was like, good for them, Good for them. They they don't know that they're living in the best year that they're ever going to have right now, Let's just let them have it. I feel like Matrix four should bring Nokia back, like they should just yeah they If anything could it would be the fourth Matrix movie. It will completely revitalize the Nokia brand. One of my great dreams is to interview Lana Wachowski. She's famously pressed, shot, it's never going to happen, But I would just ask

her about Nokia. I'd just be like, Heylan, Like, that's one of the things I hit Lana. I want to know how you feel about Nokia. Do you want to bring back the brand? Like? Are you concerned about their their market share? You know? I think we I think we have a lot in company. Um let's take a quick break and then we will come right back to discuss and we're back, all right, Where shall we begin, friends, where do you want to start? Well? Um, so, in in recent years, kind of in lieu of both which

Houseki is coming out as trans women. The Matrix, especially the first movie has widely been interpreted as a trans allegory, which Emily you have written about, and I was just wondering if you could speak to that more, speak to your interpretation of the film as a trans metaphor. We'll be linking to your essay. You have no pressure to completely reiterate your essay, but actually I'm just going to pull it up and read it right. Yeah, that would

actually be amazing. I mean, the basic idea of it is that if you were trans or even just like gender nonconforming, gender curious, whatever, going online was like this revolutionary new way to explore like who's your real self,

who's the person that you actually want to be? And and for many many, many many years, it's been rumored that the Witch Howskis wanted switch within the film to be a woman within the matrix and a man within reality, and Warner Brothers was like, no, and Kiana Reeves, I think actually like just confirmed that that's true, this sort

of long standing rumor. When when I wrote my piece, I had like tracked it down to a couple of people where I was like, Okay, I feel like it's probably true, but like I could never verified and like Kianu now has confirmed it. Thank you Kiana for yeah, um, but yeah it is. It is a movie about, you know, living a dual life. It is a movie about feeling like one person well you know, you're perceived as another.

And it is very much driven by um is very much driven by these ideas of duality, and like there are just like little things like when Neo finds Trinity in the club, he says something like I wasn't expecting you to be a woman, and she says most guys don't um. And at the end, when Agent Smith is you know, beating up Neo, he continues to call Neo Mr Anderson, and Neo says, my name is Neo. It's

you know, pretty classic dead naming allegory. And of course there's the famous thing of like, at the time the movie was made out, the pills that contained estrogen were read, so taking the red pill was estrogen or whatever. I think. And I say this as like the person that brought a lot of this into the mainstream by writing that essay.

I think it is a little overstated that Wachowski is like Lily Wachowski has given an interview where she was like, I was not unconsciously thinking about that at the time. Now I see how it filtered in. But like creating this idea that like everything and it is an intentional allegory, I think kind of cheapens the movie and also cheapens

trans storytelling in a lot of ways. But the thing that I think is is most trans about it is that the second that Neo learns that this one thing about his life is a lie, he becomes a communist. So um he he's just like I'm going to tear down modern society and blah blah blah blah blah. Like it is the thing I think gets lost a little bit and discussions of this film is how incredibly incredibly leftist it is, especially for and the sequels go even

further in that regard. But yeah, like I think it is inescapable that there is a huge trans allegory read of this film. I'm just always very cautious of Like, it's not the only read of this movie that is valid. Just because two trans women made it doesn't mean the only way you can interpret it is as a trans allegory. That's just one of many ratings that sits alongside others, and like that that's not me saying that to you.

That's me saying that to the internet, which is now, which is now, Like if you go on Twitter, they're like, here's this is a this is a thing. All trans people know is if you go on Twitter and you say, did you know the Matrix was a trans allegory made by two trans women and here's the reasons, you will get three thousand retweets in like an hour. Becausist people, This blows their fucking minds. They're just like, what the

matrix I've seen that movie? Am I trans now? And then hopefully that like opens a door in their brain and they think about it. But yeah, it is. It is the thing, and I worry that it's the same thing that happened with the red Pill thing, which I'm sure we're going to we'll get into where the whole thing is, like, this is what the movie is about, and like, no movie this good is about one thing. So yes, trans allegory, but don't I wouldn't just boil it down to that except on Twitter if I want

to get retweets. I mean, if you need some engagement, it's always going to be there in your back pocket,

and exactly I can. I'll take that for view. Thank thank you for for for kind of unpacking that I think that it is, like, um, it's been interesting to watch the I mean even in truly the five years that I was not watching this movie, the conversation around this movie has changed so significantly, and a lot of it is because of your work, And I think it is like fascinating how many different ways there are to look at this movie and how the leftist read really

stuck out to meet this time as well, and which makes it I think even more baffling and like awful that the red Pill discussion went the way it did because it's like, well, he's clearly being radicalized in a very particular direction. Did you watch the movie? Yeah, I remember when that piece published the Matrix piece on the twentieth anniversary of the movie, so b March nineteen. I just know when the Matrix came out. That's a thing

that I just know. Um, there were so many people who tweeted that piece out, who like very prominent names within journalism, within the media, etcetera, who were just like, I thought this movie was a conservative screen because it had been like taken over by the red Pill people, and you know, they'd seen the Matrix, but they hadn't seen it in twenty years or whatever, so it had like calcified in their mind based on who was obsessed

with it. So I do like the fact that there is this trans reading of it now because it has liberated the movie from this sort of fate it was

going to meet. That would be similar to something like fight Club, where it is now just totally defined by its bad fans, even though you know it is not necessarily the movie they're selling it as right, And I think I think it's been really cool to Um, I don't know, I'm curious of in your thoughts and this as well, Emily, how Lana and Lily Wachowski have kind of engaged with the trans reading of the movie where it feels like I like their I like their style

of like responding to stuff like this a lot, because it seems like they never bring up new reads of the movie, but it's brought to them and they're like, oh yeah, yeah, that's like that is like, UM, I

don't know. I think that that the way that they engage with fans of the Matrix is so smart because it's not like they're resisting doing so at all, but they're all also not like, I don't know, going the other way that directors do sometimes where they're over engaging and creating new cannon and I don't know, I just they're so fucking cool. It's wild. Lily, Lily Witchusky works on this really great showtime show called Work in Progress, Um,

and I got a chance to talk to her. I got a chance to talk to her a couple of years ago for that show, and I was like, how do I not just make this interview about the Matrix? Because she had the other people that work on that show with her there, so I had to also ask them questions, and I finally came up with, how is this, you know, this tiny little TV show that you make basically independently, how is that any continuum with the Matrix?

And her answer was basically just like, I'm always trying to talk about the same things and it doesn't matter the size of the story. And I was like, thank you, Lily Witchowski, that's a great answer to that question, so amazing. Yeah, I just to kind of go back to the idea that a piece of media like this, especially because the director's intent was not specifically at the time to make

this trans allegory. Because they're both trans women, it stands to reason that they might have written certain just little details or themes or something like that into the story kind of unconsciously, almost or subconsciously, but as you stated, because it wasn't like deliberately created as this specific allegory from a very intentional place. Because there are some movies

that are like, whatever, what's his fate? Darren Aronofsky being like, yeah, mother exclamation point is that you've got like charts behind them. He's like, the allegory is very precise. You're like yeah, and then you watch the movie and you're like, what do you even what are you trying to say here? But like, the thing with a lot of metaphor and allegory found in art and in narratives is that it wasn't necessarily intentional, um, which does mean that it is

open to interpretation. And I think that's just like a really cool thing about this movie and about the franchise, and not only that the movie explores all these like philosophical things. I remember I took a class as a freshman in college and wrote a paper about the matrix. So I'm sure you can imagine how brilliant of a piece of writing that was. But it was a class called like Philosophy, Art and Film, and you had to like watch a movie and then take like a philosopher's

philosophy and then apply it to the movie. So I don't even know what philosophy I was trying to like attach to the matrix, but I remember I was I was like, oh my god, I'm so freaking deep right now, I'm so about this movie is about choice and it's about duality, and it's about fate or what if there's not fate, and like just like all this stuff, and I don't know, I feel like this movie is just so rich in that way that it is open to a lot of interpretations and a lot of analysis from

many different perspectives. So our eighteen year old self sort of totally vibe that's what you're saying. Just just talks talks the matrix and be like, you know what's kind of about every philosophy, right, That's like part of what makes this movie so cool and why I feel like there there are so many different lenses to view with its like there is a trans allegory in here. There is a like leftist radicalization in there, and it's because it's so unique to who these filmmakers are. So it's like,

of course all this stuff is showing up. And I like, I mean, there are two of the most distinct filmmakers in the entire world, like and and I really like, I mean just truly, as a new convert to the matrix fandom, I was so blown away and impressed with how many I mean you said now Aronofsky is stuck in my mind because this is what I struggle with with him in certain cases, as like, you know, the Waaskis are able to take so much complicated stuff and

make it fun and engaging to watch and it's moving the story, where like other filmmakers are like really getting bogged down and trying to let you know that they've read a book and you're like it's fine, Like I believe you, but I'm so bored and I don't know. They're just they're so fucking smart. Um, you know, I think, um, this is the famously a movie, Um that it blends

a whole bunch of influences. You know, it blends in anime, at blends in also known as kung fu movies, It blends in like like there's a lot of James Cameron in this movie, which I don't know that I every time I rewatched him, Like this is like this is very on a line with like Aliens or True Lies

or some of those movies. And I think that people miss how many like intellectual influences are also in there, and like so like the trance stuff is in there, the pilosophy stuff is in there, but also just like they clearly had read a lot of you know, Gnome Chompski and stuff that just gets dropped in there. But it's all in the package of this huge, big budget action movie that totally works as an action movie. You can detach from all of that and still enjoy this.

It's and I think that's why it's so perfect is because it works on like sixteen levels at once. I read on our favorite scholarly journal Wikipedia that the Lilian Lana Wichowski required the cast to be able to explain what the Matrix is and they made them read and I'm not going to pronounce this correctly, but simulacra and simulation from French philosopher Jean bald God Jean or something.

I do not speak French, but um yeah, the Witch House kis were like, Kianu Reeves, We're going to require that you understand a lot of heavy philosophy to be able to be in this movie. I love that. And now, just like knowing what sort of person Kianu rees is, at least in the public facing way, you're just like,

he was so down for that. I don't know. There we talked about this in the Matrix episode that no longer exists, but I used to work at a bookstore as my first I worked at book Soup in l A and that was my first job when I moved here. And Kianu Reeves would come every Wednesday night on his motorcycle and get a new book and Sudoku puzzles and he's a he's a bookhead. I think it's so cool

that that they gave him homework. I also just like, as someone who does not have the confidence to give someone homework, I love that the witch House skis were like, Yeah, you're gonna need to get a library card and really put in some hours because the test is on Monday. Before I would agree to come on the show, I required you both to read Jock Alldy yards uh similar cromin Simulation. So I'd like to leave like a ten minute discussion of that right now. And what your thoughts were? Yes, yeah,

so I thought it was really good. I liked it. What's your favorite plot twist? I thought it was a derivative if you're asking me. I liked when Simulacra and Simulation met for the first time. I thought it was so I love when they kiss at the end. So romantic, I know. And you're like, Simulation loved Simulacra so much the whole time, and Simulacra had no idea, but then when they heard it, they were It was just I

thought it was beautiful. Another iconic lesbian romance exactly. I did think it was a little weird when it was revealed that they were the same person, but that's also iconic lesbian cinema. So yeah, I I you know, I liked the duality. I liked the tone, I liked the ideas, and I loved reading the index. Also, we're all we're all going to have somebody with high as skywriter above our houses to say reads Simulation, you assholes reads I

dare you? Oh my gosh, I yeah, I just god, I love I mean, there is a part of that anecdote that makes me feel like I'm being like I was like, oh yeah, this is this is kind of just a simulation of being in the d s A where everyone's like, have you read this book, and you're like, I haven't. I just want everyone to have health insurance. I'm sorry. The thing that this is this is A

tweeted about this several times. The thing that like like most makes me stand out at like when I hang out with with other leftists, is like, I have super normy pop culture days. I'm yeah, well you know, I like, you know, these extremely mainstream HBO shows and they're like, what about this? And I don't know. That's fine too. You want to talk about six USh and everybody, right right, I know, it's just I, um the leftist. I mean,

I love him to death. And make room for us basic gals because we have something to bring to the table too. Yeah, you want to listen to Taylor Swift together. You want to recruit people into the movement, you gotta be able to talk about what happened on Succession last week. Sorry, um, let's take another quick break and then we will come back for more discussion, and we're back. One last comment

on the homework section. I just like that that section ends with Carrie and Moss commented that she had difficulty with this process. Kotu was like, yes, more books, and She's like, I did not sign up for this. I thought I was going to be wearing a jacket and fighting. I mean, I don't know how much of her fighting in the movie is like stunt people, but it seems like a lot of the actors were like trained in martial arts and doing a lot of their own stunts

and fight choreography, which is very impressed by. So she was probably just busy learning like martial arts, and she didn't have time to read a book, much like us. I remember Laurence Fishburne was on Hannibal and Um I talked to Brian Fuller a lot around that show, and he was like, sometime between season one and season two, Lawrence fishburn came to him and was like, listen, Briant, I have all this kung fu training from the Matrix.

Can I get in a fight? And like, there's an amazing fight in season two that was inspired entirely by him being like, Brian Fuller, I know how to fight, Please let me fight. So, yeah, they did a lot of their own stuff. Yeah, that's so cool. I guess if I knew how to do kung fu, I would just try to work it into whatever I did for the rest of my life. Also, that's so cool. Really hard to do in an audio medium, is the thing.

But yeah, I would definitely try and work. At end of season three of Our yeah, I mean just just again leak leak the zoom call, you know, our hair looks great. We have kung fu skills to show off. What are we doing? I wanted to talk about the film itself, the narrative, the characters, because I think we've got an interesting cast of characters here, and I think one of the reasons the movie holds up as well as it does. I think one of the reasons that I was so attached to it as a young person

is like the badassary of Trinity. And this was like the bulk of our conversation on the again first version of this episode that no longer exists. But um, the tapes we should we should drop. We still have the audio file in our Google drive. We should drop a little because that was fun for our listeners to go back and be like, wow, Jamie didn't make a definitive statement the whole I am interesting. So yeah, maybe on our Patreon will like leak a couple of minutes or something.

Shame anyways, But um, I feel almost like simple being like, yeah, Trinity is so cool and badass, and like watching her fight competently and like know how to hack, and like, no, she's just she's equipped with with a lot of skills. But I never felt that she fell into like the Merry Sue type. I like it's implied that she's had extensive training to Like, the more you get to know her character, it's like, you know, how why why she can do what she does? Write different characters, and it's

often like the villains are constantly underestimating her. Also where there's like the movie opens on that sequence where there's like a cop who's like, oh, we can handle one little girl, and then Agent Smith, who know who Trinity is and like understands the extent of her capabilities, is like, no, Lieutenant, your men are already dead. And that was an amazing Hugo Weaving impression. Thank you so much. That was good. That was good. How did those gorgeous lips just like,

just like Mr Hugo does Hugo Leaving weavings. Lips are so distracting in this movie, And I like in a good way, but I was just like, I just wasn't

expecting those beautiful lips out that whole time. Wow, there's a part at the very end it's like the final battle between him and Neo, and again he's constantly calling Neo Mr Anderson throughout the whole movie, and his voice gets really gravelly at one point, and he's just like Mr Randerson, It's incredible, and then like Neo Neo kind of like flexes and like you see dust come off of his shirt and then he just like starts to

be Agent Smith's ass uh, it's so good anyway. My point is people people are often underestimating trinity, which is something that many women can identify with. Um, even Neo, like you mentioned Emily Um, there's that scene where he's like, oh, you're the Trinity who cracked the I R S D base and she's like, yes, but that was a long time ago. I'm humble. And then he's like, oh, I just thought you were a guy, and she's like most

guys do. Um. I don't know, just like those little nuggets in there, they're kind of like not like throwaway moments really, but just like little details that I found made that character just like especially relatable and and I like that it's like they're not I don't know. There are certain movies where it's like those moments come off as extremely over the top, and like I feel like we've talked about a lot of action movies where there's like the like you're a googoogo girl, like in the

middle of a scene. But it's just like, even though that moment happens, it's just a natural part of the scene, and it's not like the reaction from Neo isn't like I found out that like a woman is an incredible hacker and I'm upset about it. He's just like, Oh, I guess my assumption was wrong. And then the scene continues and it's like, Oh, I didn't realize that. What a relief that is to watch someone react like that.

The sympathy of that moment in that scene is with Trinity, and that's why it works because you're like, you're like, oh, she's been underestimated. That fucking sucks because I already know she can kick people in the face, you know or whatever. You mentioning how how much hacking is in this movie

reminds me. This is other influence in the film that's totally been forgotten, which is mid nineties movies about the Internet that trying to like personify like this is just Sonder blocks the Net, but like a little bit better, you know, Yeah, the net. We should cover the net. We should cover the net. We've covered hack. I'll come on to talk about the net anytime, please come back

into the net. Oh my god. Um. There's another small moment that's like again very fleeting, but just like relatable and and I really appreciated it where Neo has taken the red pill. They're kind of like preparing him to be unplugged from the matrix and like Trinity is hooking him up to a bunch of like apparatus and Neo is just like, you did all this to Trinity and

she was just like mm hmmm. So like it was just like a nice moment where he like recognizes that she probably put in all of this effort and like did all this work and like set up this whole thing, especially now that he knows that she's the one who, like how's all these amazing like hacking and computer skills. And then she's just like uh huh, yeah I did that, like very matter of fact ye, And he's just like cool.

And because like so many movies, like you said, Jamie, there would be if we saw a woman like doing something impressive, or we saw like you know, kicking or hacking or something, the guys would be like what boner right, right, yeah, and then they'd like instantly fall in love with her, and they were like jaws would drop and they just like wouldn't know how to turn into that corny cartoon wolf right, and they just wouldn't know how to comprehend that,

like a woman is capable of something, especially something that they assume would be something that only a man could do. So yeah, just these like little moments that we like learn things about her character, we learn about her abilities, and it's just presented a very matter of factly and in a way that like Neo immediately accepts and there is I think, um, some of those moments where people are like, whoa Trinity, you can do things? Um, they

feel so much like studio notes. They feel so much like somebody at the exact level was like, well, if she's with all these computers, someone has to note that she did that, and that's unusual because she's a girl, And so they put that in the script and like

most directors would make a big moment of that. But like the Witch, how skis, even if they were not aware of their transness at the time, their sympathies are always with Trinity because they are in fact women, uh, And like that makes those moments play because you're not like sitting there and being like, oh my god, this is so condescending because it's it is like a thing that would have been condescending in any other movie with the exact same dialogue. It's just like how they wait

that scene. I was. I was. I was kind of challenged by a lot of moments in the movie for that exact reason, where it's like on paper, if you hear like a similar thing with with Joey Pants, when you find out that Joey Pants has been lusting after Trinity was. At first, it being my first time encountering this plot point, I was like, Oh cool, we're adding in a spiteful ex boyfriend character to the one woman we're going to get to know during this movie, Like

where is this gonna go? But the way I don't know. I generally felt like the way that that storyline play out. I just feel like almost any other director would have implied that Trinity had somehow brought this upon herself, that she could have handled rejecting Joey Pants in a different way that would have prevented this outcome. But this movie

doesn't go for that at all. It presents the spiteful Joey Pants ex boyfriend, of which there are unfortunately many in the world, and does not blame the woman who is being raged at for what is happening, which again is just like I feel like that just wasn't happening a lot in movies at that time, and I was I ended up being kind of pleasantly surprised by I mean, and again, it's like, that's scraps, but it it. I was surprised that was how that story kind of played out.

What if every shitty, spiteful ex boyfriend turned into a clone of Joe Pantoliano, like Agent Smith overtaking someone in the matrix. Now that's a movie, I hope. I hope

that's Resurrections that they just had start showing it. I did want to talk a little bit about the romantic subplot between Trinity and Neo, because that's the one aspect of this movie where I get a little I don't know, I mean yeah, entering it in, I feel like it stood out to me a little bit more because I didn't have any nostalgia for the movie, and also because we recently covered speed in this movie, which ends with Kanu getting a little a little slurp at the end

a plot resolving slurp if you will. Yeah, my main gripes, I don't even hate that it's there. You know, movies be movies, and movies have hetero romantic subplots in them often, but I don't there there are heterosexual I know. Is

that's still a thing. God, I'm actually writing standout material about this as we speak, But um my gripes with it are that Neo being brought back to life by like Trinity's love and kiss to me that almost read is like because it's a it's a surprise kiss of Trinity kissing Neo while he's unconscious, like the prince in snow White bringing back to life, like that whole fairytale thing. It's like why you're like, don't don't kiss an unconscious

person they cannot consent and stop showing that in movies. Also, um my other question I'm interested to hear people's thoughts about this, is so the oracle prophesied that or does that a word prophecied? Made a prophecy, she did a prophecy. She did she did a prophecy that Trinity would fall in love and that that man would be the one. And then that ends up being true. My question is, does it feel like that kind of removes agency from Trinity or is that not how prophecies work? No, I do,

I mean, I don't know. I My feeling on that was like, if we're I, Trinity receiving my prophecy, of which you seem to only get one, I would be sort of let down that the prophecy seemed to have actually not that much to do with me, and more like a second prophecy for a different person. Like I do think that there's like that trope that you see a million times of like a woman's love will you know,

it's like Helen of troy Ship. You know, a woman's love will resolve the plot or the war, whatever it is, that's definitely present here. I don't know, I mean in terms of agency, I guess I hadn't really considered that, But I think that that's where of a testament to Like, it feels so clear in the plot that Trinity and and EEO should be together that if I felt like there wasn't chemistry between those characters, um and that I wanted them to kiss so badly, maybe maybe that would

have told me. I don't know that it does then I mean when you think about the prophecy that Morpheus received, which was you're going to find the one. Neo's prophecy is you are the one as long as you believe that you're the one, and once you believe that you're the one, then you're the one. Those are prophecies that have to do with them, right. And then Trinity's prophecy is You're going to fall in love with a man,

which feels it feels like a very gendered choice. But again, I don't even hate that the love stories there, but it does, know, I mean, I like the love story. I do think that the two sequels really do a lot to further sell it. And I'm always like reading who those two characters become back onto the first movie, but I remember I was very much like, yeah, I don't know this love story. I I think they have

good chemistry, but I'm not sure it was needed. But like Matrix Reloaded especially has some great stuff for those two characters to sort of bounce off of each other. But yeah, like if it wasn't for their chemistry, I don't think it would work. Fortunately they have amazing chemistry. Yeah, yeah, I do. I do feel like there are there are some kind of and Emily, once you brought up studio notes, now I can't stop thinking of, like, well, at what

you know? I now I want to blame everything I didn't love about the movie on studio notes, but who knows. I do feel like it would have been just as easy and it wouldn't have impacted the story for them to not get together in that way and be like a team. And I think that that would have been just as strong a choice and would have worked completely fine,

and the love story didn't have to be there. I didn't hate that it was there, but I felt like, yeah, my my main thing was like we especially because the movie starts with just a long introduction to how fucking cool and capable and brilliant Trinity is for her to get uh message like that from the oracle and then just have it bear out and not have Trinity, I mean she it's I thought it was interesting because in the movie she seems kind of annoyed that that is

what she was told, or like very conflicted of like that's what I have to learn, like because it just we know, like we've seen how much she can do. It doesn't quite make sense that her fate would be

so limited in the way that it's presented. There's a great piece on the sadly defunct website that dissolved by um Tasha Robinson about this very thing about how many movies have a basically a trinity character who's badass and capable and can do anything, and then her story ends up being but also she falls in love with the guy, and the Matrix actually does a pretty good job with that idea, and it's sort of the innovator of that trope, which is I think why in some ways it gets

away with it. But then by the time she wrote it in, it's just like everywhere and it's not doing anything. It's just like sitting there taking up space and having the illusion of strong women characters while never actually having to create a strong women character. They're creating the trappings of one without actually having to make a full character. By the way, do you think people go to the

oracle and get just like really boring prophecies? Do you think the oracles ever just like Jamie, you've seen the most beautiful duck you'll ever see already, Like, do you think that ever just comes up? And then I would just walk into traffic afterwards, I'd be like, well, thanks a lot, I hope so I well, we'll get to the oracle, whole, whole whole discussion to be had there. I God, that's my that's my worst fear is to encounter someone who's just like, yeah, your best days are

very much behind you, so just write it out. But yeah, I mean, Jamie you pointed out the movie opens with this, like the whole sequence showcasing Trinity and her skills. Like for this action movie to open on an action set piece, which is not uncommon for an action movie, but for that action set piece to center around a woman and a woman who's not even the protagonist, because you would expect that from something like Laura Croft tomb Raider or

something like that. But we get this whole set piece where we see a woman fighting and kicking ass, and she doesn't even end up being the protagonist of the narrative. I think is like, I don't know where else I've

ever seen that. I don't think really anywhere. Yeah, I think just to kind of jump back to how yeah, before this, and especially like action movies and action franchises, the one woman character who we get to know pretty well, would be framed only as the romantic interest who maybe gets like dragged along for the ride, but isn't participating in an any of the action or the plot herself, and it's just kind of like present for the man

to eventually kiss at the end. Whereas this movie, and I'm sure you know there are other examples before this, but like I feel like this is one of the ones that like kind of popularized or like actually gave the woman more agency, more to do, more skills, and actually allowed her to participate in the plot in more meaningful ways, but still couldn't quite stick the landing on given her the full story. Right, there's there's really before this movie. There is. If you're a woman in a movie,

you are just an incredible badass. Woman in an action movie,

you're just an incredible badass. Usually there's not a man around, like the kind of the one exception I'm thinking of right now is um Linda Hamilton's and Terminator to but even like in the first Terminator, she falls in love with this guy and has sex with him, you know whatever, or you are the love interest, you know um, So this is the first movie that tries to blend those two but it is very much like at the end they have to pick one of those two corridors and

they pick the wrong one. To my mind, it's messy and it's and it's like we're it's not even like we're suggesting that women who can execute perfect fight choreography and hack a computer don't deserve love if they want love or and they want a relationship, But it's like more the way that it's executed and how what we're told in the first half of the movie is what makes her special, isn't what makes her special or relevant to the plot by the end, And that is like

I don't know if that all like played in and she wants a boyfriend. Amazing, great love that, but yeah, I don't know. Definitely a little bit messy, but still I mean I keep every time I like Peel, the need to qualify it at every turn as like, but it's doing way better than any other movie was doing at this time, like by quite a bit. So I feel like, yeah, that's there's a lot of product of its time. Zenous to that choice along the lines of

this being a product of its time. This is a movie from as we've stated at nine nine is just clogged with movies that are about, well, we've reached the end of history capitalism one and everything's great. Why do I feel hollow inside? And like there's like five or six that come out in even more if you include

two thousand. But the Matrix is the one that's held up best to my mind because it has this larger critique of everything feels empty because you have been misled by corporations and governments and all these systems to think that you do not have any actual human connection. And the truth is you should have human connection. You should move to a city at the center of the earth and just funck everyone you see, Like that is the

message of these movies. But like you know, you compare it to something like American Beauty, which one best picture that year, And it's just that that vision of like what it means to be alive is like so shallow, and this movie's vision of what it means to be alive is so rich and fascinating and weird and complicated. And um, I think that is to the credit of the Witch, how skis whatever stumbles they may have made along the way. Sure, I totally yeah. I just love Trinity,

and I also love how there. I don't know the way that the characters are presented in this movie. I know it's just like a part of the aesthetic of this world as it is. But the women in this world are not aggressively sexualized. You know. Everyone is basically wearing the same exact outfit. Everyone has a variation on the same exact haircut, and then everyone has the jawline to pull off that haircut. And don't don't get us wrong, Trinity is very sexy. But yes, I agree everyone sexually

everyone's sexually am sexy, but yeah, not overtly sexualized. Yeah, it's kind know that it is kind of that nineties Internet aesthetic where it's like, well, online everyone's the same. Everyone just kind of looks the same, has the same vibe on the Internet, no one knows you're a dog whatever that cartoon was at the time. Like, um, and I when I've watched the trailer for this there's a

lot more less homogeneity, you know, within that world. And I think it's because now we understand the Internet can be as terrible as real life too, if not worse. I wanted to uh, we even talked too much about Morpheus, yet I wanted to talk about Morpheus a little bit.

I mean, first of all, because he's amazing, he's great, um, But there was as I was going back to it, so I was doing the always interesting but sometimes unpleasant task of going back to the original round of criticism for this movie in the late nineties, going into kind of like movie blogs of the early two thousands, and there was, I think, especially in the earlier years of this movie, a fair amount of criticism around mystical black

character tropes used in the writing of Morpheus's character as

well as the oracle. UM. So I kind of wanted to uh open the floor on on that topic to I mean, the criticism that I was seeing and we can um link this in the description as well, is that and we've discussed this, I mean we we just discussed this on the show in our full Court Miracle episode or that troupe couldn't be more different movies, but the trope is at play to varying degrees in both of these movies that are made by and you know,

made and written by white filmmakers, in which essentially black character appears as this mystical fairy godmother plot advancement character for the chosen white protagonist, whether that be Neo or the kid in Full Court Miracle. You know, it just it just all depends um. And I mean I I think that it's absolutely a valid criticism of the way that those characters are written. Not the worst example, but

um certainly is present. I think Originally, I mean, the term was originally used by Spike Lee in two thousand and one, and I have an old Salon article up here which really takes me back. But the character is being cited. When this term was first coined. Was Kuba Gooding Jr. In What Dreams May Come, which is a movie I haven't seen that's about a spirit guide helping

Robin Williams rescue his wife from hell. Question mark um will Smith in the Legend of Bagger vans Uh Laurence Fishburne in The Matrix, which is described as in this as obi Wana. Kiana Reeves is Luke Skywalker, and Michael Clarke Duncan in The Green Mile, in which he plays a man on death Row who has healing powers and heels white characters. Do you want to know the Supper

Eyes twist of What Dreams May Come? What Cooper Gooding Jr. Is playing Robin williams son in disguise to like lead him through the afterlife, because if it was his actual son, Robin Williams wouldn't like go along with it. I don't know, it's very weird. I have never heard of this movie, and but um, yeah, so I did. I did want to, you know, just bring that criticism up, because it's uh, something that comes up quite a bit in movies still.

But I think in a high density of movies of this kind of stretch of years in the late nineties into their early two thousands, sure it does. One thing I like about the casting of the fourth movie is it seems, yes, they have abdual Matine playing who is obviously the Morpheus character. Um, but they have a bunch of other actors of color and different roles that look like they're going to be all kind of over the map,

and I think that will help with this issue. I do think I think that like this is obviously a valid and important criticism of the film. I do think that there is the thing of you know, they get considered a lot of different actors for the role of Morpheus. They settled on Ward's fishburn, should they when they settled on him, did they settle on him because they had certain you know, racist stereotypical ideas that you know, we're in their heads already, you know, we can't know that.

But I do think once you've cast a black actor in a role like this, you do have sort of the burden of going back over the script and being like, Okay, are there ways we can complicate this? Are other ways we can make it more interesting? That said, I think that Morpheus is nowhere near Kuba cutting juniors. Like he's a fully realized human being, and like, sometimes the tropes are bad because they we just lean on the tropes, and sometimes the tropes exist because we need certain tropes

to tell us worries. We're not saying we need this one. But Morpheus is a fully realized human being, and I think that keeps him from falling into the worst examples of this. The thing that and again it's like we're we're three white women here, and I want to be clear, extremely white. When I said big Greece witherspin energy, I was describing myself. Uh, but but I did, I mean the only thing that this is even like pushing back

at all. But like Will Smith almost played Neo is another thing that I kind of took into consideration when I was just kind of going through this criticism is I think that I totally agree with the Emily where it is on the filmmakers once they've made their casting decisions to consider, you know, whether intended or not, what might be coming across, and and take that into consideration with how characters are presented and how their their storylines unfold.

But it does seem like the cast I mean, reading about the casting process for The Matrix outside of this discussion is just very interesting. Will Smith has made so many YouTube videos about how he almost took his part. He's still mad about it. There's one in particular that like involves some animation and he like it's so funny. He's spending money telling people that he was almost in the Matrix, Like it's funny, it's amazing. So I I

think that you know, where the casting dead land. It's a valid criticism and and you know, I think we're being made now, Like if this movie was coming out now, it would be something that would be taken into account carefully because Spike Lee made this criticism of all of these movies. So yeah, and I definitely think the Oracle does fall a bit more into that trope, for I mean,

because we know nothing about her. She's in one scene, and everything we know about her is that she seems to have these like kind of otherworldly clairvoyant capabilities that no one else has. So yeah, she is presented as this very like mystical figure. I love that performer though. Gloria Foster so good and so there's something so warm about her and like I wish we'd gotten ten million

more performances from her. She's so good. Yeah, she's also in the Matrix Reloaded, and then I believe that actor died before they shot Revolutions, but the character is still there and they actually comment on like why she looks different because she gets a different actor gets cast to play the Oracle in Matrix Revolutions. But um, yeah, that actor was incredible and like funny too in a movie that doesn't have a ton of like very light calming scenes.

It's just I don't know, And and the set design, the kitchen, the green kitchen that she's in is so I don't know. She's she's good, she's very good, but I do think also cleanly falls into that chap. Yeah, I just saw that Will Smith turned this movie down to do Wild Wild West. Yeah, yes, isn't it. So that's why he's so bad about it and he'll never get over it is because he didn't just turn it down to do a different good movie. He turned it

down to do because of my favorite bad movies. Yeah, we'll send you the link to the video where he like lays out the whole story. It's very funny. He was just kind of like a skeptical of the script, I think, And he also didn't I think he didn't want to be typecast as like the sci fi action guy because he had already been in Men in Black and Independence Day. So yeah, it's well, well, we'll share the link to everybody of that video, but it'll make sense on paper. But then when you know that he

turned down the Matrix, that is funny. And I think it would have I mean, I wouldn't trade Keian you as Neo for for anyone, but I do I do like to think of like Will Smith and Laurence Fishburne would have been I mean, it would have been very different, but it would have been cool. It would have been good. Well, that's the thing. It wouldn't have been Laurence Fishburne. They had Val Kilmer in mind to play Morpheus, had it been Will Smith got cast. I have to go back

and watch Will Smith's cursed YouTube video about this. I forgot about that. But even though these tropes are present in this movie, I would say that this is a surprisingly diverse cast for a late a late nineties action movie.

And I think it gets even more diverse as the movies go on, because in the two sequels a ton of new characters are introduced, maybe even too many, I would argue, but most of them are people of color, especially the characters who are like fighting for the resistance, like who are like inhabitants of Zion, are like mostly people of color. Do you think it bugs Will Smith?

Because Jada Pinkett Smith is in the two sequels and like she just holds it over him all that time, as I did consider that guy and have they we know that they have some some issues that they need to work out in public. They have to uh there. I just wanted to Sorry. I know we're having every and extremely academic discuss I just wanted to go through the other casting stuff because I always forget how kind

of wild it was. Um so yeah, Will Smith said, I would rather do Wild Wild West, one of the taking one of the biggest els in all of casting history. Nicholas Cage turned it down due to family obligations. Who knows what that means. Uh. Leonardo DiCaprio originally accepted the part, but then said that he did too many visual effects in Titanic and he didn't want to do it anymore. Then the studio was like Keanu Reeves who got the role over Johnny Depp, who I guess is who the

witch how skis wanted for this role. And then there was a side quest where they sent the screenplay to Sandra Bullock and we're going to rewrite Neo to be a woman, which I guess didn't happen, but I was like, oh, that's interest think, there's just really the net. It would just have been the net. It could have been the net. I yeah, so you know, that's a lot of information

all at once. I would have loved Neo as a woman, especially because we talked about this a lot, where there are a Brazilian Chosen One narratives as movies and very few of them are about a woman, so that would have been very cool. But at the same time. I love Kano as Neo, I know, and and for Trinity. Sorry, it's just it's really interesting. Janet Jackson was considered for Trinity, and Samahak and Jada Pinkett Smith were also considered, and

then um didn't do it, but then Jada came in later. Anyways, Janet Jackson is such a fucking good movie actress and she's only made just a handful of films and she's just really good. Come on, Janet, I want to like, I want Hollywood to cast Janet more often or I don't know, I don't know. It sounds like she was pretty bummed about not getting to do the main tricks. Yeah, but yeah again. American action franchises have usually a pretty

big problem with casting mostly white actors. But again, the matrix, even the first movie is doing better than most. Between the protagonist Neo played by Kiana Reeves, who is coded white I think a lot of times in in movies, UM he is of European, Chinese, and Polynesian ancestry, so

he's multiracial. So between Kanu Lawrence Fishburne as Morpheus, the actors who play Tank and Dozer, the actor who plays Apoc Julian Arjanga is Maori again just a more diverse cast than most action movies of this time, and more representative of what a futuristic leftist society would look like.

So it makes narrative sense and world building sends in a way that a lot of movies ignore is true and like this is this has nothing to do with the film's racial diversity, but I think in terms of gender presentation diversity, obviously this movie is very androgynous across

the board. But belindam glorious, which the character who was originally sort of intended is translate there, nobody was nobody was styled like that in an action movie at the time, Like she's just so there's just such an an androgynous, nonconforming energy just sort of pouring off of her totally. And I really, I mean, I just and this is

kind of just like a compliment to the movie. But the way that the crew of the ship, which I'm not going to try to say because I'm not going to say it right, but the way that the crew works together, I just I just really like how they interact with each other. Where like you were saying earlier in this episode, only like everyone has a distinct personality even when you don't hear them speak very much. Everyone

knows what their role is. But I just I don't know the way that the movie is written and they're used so thoughtfully to like, oh, this person is talking behind Morpheus is back a little bit, or like the way that Trinity clearly has this deep respect for Morpheus but is sometimes like, well he's wrong about that though, like he's wrong and he is being shortsighted, and just like I don't know, I really love when there's a group of characters who clearly hold a lot of love

and respect for each other, but also we are constantly talking about each other um in a way that is just like very effortless, and in this completely bizarro world, feels like real and like actual dynamics that you would see in a group of friends who you know, the fate of the world is not hinged on. Is it fair to say that part of the trans allegory is that like this group of people is like each other's

chosen family. Yeah, that's I think that that is very um there is a queerness to it that is very I think interesting and I don't know how intentional, but definitely subconsciously intentional, intentional. I'm thinking about how they're making so many TV shows set in like movie universes now, and like a show just sort of set on any given ship in the Matrix universe where they're just like hanging out and complaining about each other and occasionally fighting

spider robots. Brad. I'd watch that, I would watch. That would be incredible. Yeah. The one thing I didn't watch in preparation for this was Animatrix, which I haven't seen at all, and I've heard it's good and I think I just need to sit down and commit to it. But it's really hard to see now. I think it's on HBO Max. It's on HBO Max. Okay, so I just for a long time it was hard to see. Yeah, it seems to be accessible now, so I'm going to

go check it out. But um oh, I was going to say, going back to the discussion of gender expression and presentation of certain characters, Trinity's character design and aesthetic is also what you would expect as the main female character in an action movie who also plays the role of the love interest of the male hero. Her clothes and haircut are I would say pretty gender neutral. You know, she doesn't have this long flowing hair that's completely impractical

to fight bad guys with. And she's not like made up in a bunch of makeup the way that, again, a lot of women would be in an action franchise, because the function that a lot of women serve in an action franchise is to like be eye candy for what the studios assume is going to be a mostly hetero male audience. But they don't stylize Trinity that way, and it wouldn't make sense that she would like be all made up when she's like flying around in the Nebuchadnezzar.

But they also don't make her up that way when she's like in the Matrix either, which I thought was interesting and cool. They in fact even make her a little less glamorous in the sequels, like if that's an all, Like I love how stripped down the visuals of this just just constantly are in terms of not trying to

make anyone movie pretty. There of course incredibly attractive, but they don't like overstate that attractiveness, right yeah, I mean, And again it's just like the Wakis are so confident when they make a choice, they make it so hard that it's like, yeah, we're just gonna let the hot people be hot and not you know, they're all going to wear the same outfit. We don't need to embellish it. Like we're just gonna let the jawlines do what they do and fall where they may, and it's going to

be sexy because it is. Like I was just thinking about the bullet time thing where the camera swings all the way around. I like the other early major use of this technology was for a gap commercial like really that came out at the holiday as. Yeah, it was like they were doing a swing dance or something. Oh yeah,

I remember that. I cannot remember if the gap ad predates the Matrix or the Matrix predates the gap at because I don't think that bullet time was invented for the Matrix, but I think it was like a thing that they pulled in that other people had also come up with. But I would not be surprised if it would be great if the gap AD came first and like everyone in the Matrix was like we missed it by like two months, um, But I do think the Matrix came first, So I would love sitting in a

movie theater. Here's someone lean over and be like, they're just ripping off that gap commercial. I saw so derivative of that gap commercial. Unbelievable. UM. I wanted to really quickly touch on just because and we can kind of blow through this, but because the red pill discussion snowballed out in the way that it did, I just wanted

to quickly touch on not even UM. I mean, I'm assuming if you listen to the show, you're aware of the wild misinterpretation that the term red pill had taken, where it's intended to be some reveal of a great truth and then was co opted by right wing weirdos who were like, yeah, and the truth is that straight white guys are oppressed, and you're like, that's not the one that was being referred to. UM. But I did

just want to um quickly. It seems like the Wachowski's, I mean, the Witchowskis have responded to this, but I think the best exchange was from Lily Wichowski back in May, because that's when Elon Musk tweeted take the red Pill, and then Ivanka Trump retweeted it saying taken, and then Lily Wachowski replied by saying funk both of you, which I think is really all you need to know. That's

that that's the story, and that show an icon. I remember I covered the early days of gamer Gate, which is the reactionary movement that basically folved into the Trump campaign UM, and they were all talking about the red Pill, and I was like, I feel like you haven't actually watched the Matrix, and like at the time, I was like, this will dispel this if I just I'm like, no, the Matrix is a very different theme, but it didn't work for some reason. To this day, the gap ad

does predate the mat I can't believe it. Okay, I don't like the Matrix anymore. Derivative. The tech that made up bullet time has been around since like the dawn of cinema. People have been like, if we put a bunch of cameras around something in film it from all those angles, then we can But like computers were required to like actually simulate moving around, and the gap AD just like got there first. But the term bullet time specifically was coined for the Matrix. So God, I want

to see that gap commercial now. I don't think I've ever seen it. Yeah, I mean i'd have to link it in the description. I say that five hundred times an episode, and then I have to go find it. And it's awful. I'm posting. I'm posting the bullet time at in chat. Thank you so much. Okay, thank you. Um. Does anyone have anything else they would like to talk about in regards to the Matrix? That's all I had, I believe. Yeah. I just wanted to state that I

have found my anagram and it's a Warden fever filmy. Wow, that's really okay. Get the merch. Get the merch going amazing. Mine I couldn't find my mine all suck. I don't know what's wrong. My I got the wrong letters. Jamie. Just come up with the hacker name for yourself, and then I know. I used to do a whole show about hackers, but I didn't know what I was talking about, so I've had to stop doing the show. But maybe that name will be more in agrammable. It's true, it's

just a thought. I'll work on it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um. We've had this conversation before on the other Matrix episode that has been lost to time, about whether or not this movie passes the Bechdel test. Yeah, and I feel I don't remember what we concluded, and I did not remember to pay attention to whether or not it passes when I was watching it this time around. I think it's a barely pass situation due to a quick exchange that Trinity and Switch have in the car when Neo's

got the bug all scooting around in his guts. It's possible that he's the subtext of that conversation. But I'm inclined to just want to give this movie anything we can. But I didn't know that they have like one or two exchanges they are just between the two of them that I believe are about the bug. They're about the bug, but the bug is in Neo, so I don't know about it. I mean, we've all got a bug inside of us somewhere, so technically that's true, the Bug and

the Bug famously genderless, genderless icon the Bug, the Bug. Yeah, And then I remember talking about how there's a conversation where when Cipher is sabotaging them and when he kills Switch and Apoc, he's talking to Trinity and he's like, if there's anything terribly important you have to say to Switch, say it now. And then before Trinity can say anything to switch and then maybe pass the Bechdel test. Uh, cipher kills switch. So he really doesn't want women to

talk to each other. Yeah, that's why he's not an ally, not because he's murdering people. Now, technically, you're right, this movie does barely pass because the bug is genderless. But when you consider that Neo and Trinity are both trans lesbians, then it passes so much flying colors. Let's go with that. I just I just want to give this movie nice. Thanks, Jamie. I'm so glad you like it. I was not sure if you would because I know you're famously not an

action movie fan. But it's not just an action movie. There's so much coming with so much more, and they have a little horny Will Poulter character. I'm like, you know what, I like the movie. It's good. No, I really loved it. There is this on the website that exists in service of the Bechtel test, which is I think wrong quite a bit of the time. But spectel test dot com there is such an extensive conversation arguing about whether this movie passes the Bechtel test. No one

seems to agree. I just pulled it up and people do talk about that scene in the car, and people are arguing about what we were just talking about of like, well the bug in the which, honestly, if you have to get I feel like our rule of thumb is like, if you have to get that far in the weeds about it, it probably doesn't test the Recktel test if you have to like split hairs like that. But I think under Emily's qualification it does pass, and let's not

worry about it. I'll just go on that site and I'll be like, no, listen, everyone in this movie is a trans lesbian. Passes every test. The whole movie passes. Yeah. Also, as we always say that, you know, the Bechtel test is not the end all be all for anything. It's just a jumping off point. What is the end all be all is the nipple scale? Yes, which is our

metric zero. Really appreciated your visceral reaction of hear us out. Technically, this movie has obviously I know what we're going to do here, but this I was just thinking about how this movie has a whole bunch of other nipples on your back, Like those are just kind of got some back nipples. They've got back nipples. You've got armed nipples, You've got the back of the head nipple. There's a

lot um wowskis. Know what we wanted. It's nipples and it's like hard plastic black Witchy saw Joel Schumacher nipples and we're like, we could, we can do more wreaking to Okay, So zero to five nipples based on how the movie fares examining it through an intersectional feminist lens, Gosh, me loving this movie so deeply might cloud my judgment a bit here, But I love that there are multiple different reads of this movie, one of them being this

really interesting trans allegory. I love that this is a major franchise directed by trans women, which hopefully paves the way for there to be more transvisibility on screen of actual trans people and not just it all being a metaphor that features all siss people. You know that that's like the goal that we're aiming for, right, is just like more visibility and hopefully things don't have to be coded and um steeped in metaphor and and things like that.

But it was nine to Trinity being a character who I always loved and admired, and that was so Cool and I love just everything about the damn movie. I'm going to give it four nipples plus maybe also a half nipple on top of that. Is that too much? Yeah? We we do give halves and sometimes even quarter nipples. Get into the decimals if you need to. You know, it's point three through three repeating, um, whatever it needs to be. I mean maybe I'm being too generous, but again,

I love this movie. I think it holds up and I'm gonna go out four and a half nipples done, love, Who are you giving your nipples too? I'm going to give one to Keanu Reeves, who is the best man alive. I'm going to give one to Gloria Foster, who plays the Cool. I'll give one nipple to Blenda McClory, who plays Switch. I'll give one nipple to Laurence Fishburn. And I'll give my half nipple to the little Black Cat, who we see twice in the deja vu scene, Little Flee.

He's just like my cat. Yeah, so for and half nipples boom. I'm going to go for and half as well, mostly because I'm like, I like this movie so much. What a what a long standing edging experience of saying I was going to watch this movie, never doing it, lying out my ass and then learning that I loved it and I'm excited to watch it again, and I'm excited to watch the new one too, Jimmie, let's go together.

We should. Oh yeah, let's go because I know it's it's coming out on HBO Max, but it seems like something that you should see. I would love to, so yeah, I I'll echo what you're saying there, Caitlin. There are certainly like dated elements to certain things of the plot, but you know, it's as far as movies from this year goes. I mean, what more can you ask for? And it's also just I don't know, it's like such a movie. Does that make sense? You know, it's such

a movie movie. And I was just interested in every second and everyone was so unique, even though they all kind of like look the same, but that also they didn't and there was a lot of diversity, and they're like, I just it's so fun. I'm excited to watch this movie again and not have to take notes this time. It's going to be fun. Yeah. Uh so, I'm gonna give it for and a half nipples. I'll give one to Trinity. I'll give one to the Oracle. I'm gonna

give one to Mouse. Sorry, uh loved mouse, loved mouse. I think we really should have paused more to he was he wanted to cheeseburg and he was horny. Love him. I'll give half a nipple to Hugo Weaving's lips, and I'll give my last nipple to the witch House key sisters.

I'm how about you. Well, listen it sounds you know if I come back on here and do the net, and I'm like, if I give the Matrix anything less than five, I'm going to feel like I'm insulting it when I come on here and do the net and I'm like, I don't know, like two and a half, you know, Like, so I'm giving it. I'm giving it to full five. I'm giving it to full five. I think, especially for its era, it is groundbreaking and impressive and that it mostly holds up today. And you can like

quibble with some of the casting choices. You can quibble with, like it's presentation of transness, etcetera, but like it still holds up in a way that like most other action movies of this era, don't like you think about this came out to say, just a couple of months before UM Star Wars Episode one, and you're just like, those are those movies are from different planets entirely. So I'm going to give a nipple to carry In Moss because she's she's the best. I'll give one to Kianu. Kiano deserves.

He only has one nipple right now. He needs to needs to nipples. Yeah, that's good for him. Uh you know what I got. I gotta give one to the Witch House Ki sisters, who are just the best and some of my favorite filmmakers of all time. And you know, I just want to hang out with them so they seem so cool. I want to um give a nipple to Bill Pope's cinematography, which is legitimately groundbreaking, change the world,

et cetera. I'm gonna give a I'm going to split my last nipple one into I'm sorry, I'm breaking the roles to get a half nipple to the Bug because we love the book. I'm going to give my other half nipple to producer Joel Silver, not because I actually like, I'm like, oh wow, great Joel Silver, though he did get this movie made when like a lot of producers

wouldn't have. But because I like the image of someone like knocking on his door in the middle of the night and he comes and looks down and there's just half a nipple laying on his doorstep. I think I just like that image. So Joel Silver, you get half a nipple. I bet he appreciates it. But yeah, he first made a view it as a threat, but then once he gave him the context he needed, I think he'd come around. He'd be so happy. It's like that part in the Matrix when like Neo is rejecting this

whole thing and he's like, I don't believe it. Let me out here, and then he barfs all over the floor and then he collapsed his face first into his own barf. But then like in the next scene, he's like, Okay, I guess it's fine. Perfect the agreeable guy that Emily. Thank you so much for joining us and for being here. Come back for the net, come back for anything you thank you, thank you. I'd love to come back. I had a blast. Good. Where can people check out your writing?

Follow you on social media? Plug anything you want to plug. I'm on Twitter at twitter dot com, slash Emily V d w um, I get up to all sorts of nonsense. They're actually less because I've mostly locked out of Twitter, but I do tweet every song for the best look at me and yeah, my writing appears vox dot com. I also have a newsletter where I just write some of my weirder ideas. That's Emily vdW dot letter, Drop

dot com. I co create Right Show, Run et cetera, occasionally play a whale in the scripted fiction podcast Arden. It is about two women who solve Colt cases and try not to fall in love. Um. It is a comedy, but it's also about my weird drauma. Um so that hooray uh and you can I. I published a book a couple of years ago that I still bring up with Monsters of the Week, complete critical companion to the X Files. You could find it in at various booksellers. Amazing,

Thank you so much for coming yet. Truly, you're one of my favorite writers in the world, and I'm so glad that you could be here with us. Thank you so much. I love this show, and um, I'm glad that I could make it and talk about nipples. So amazing come back for the net. I would love to um. You can follow us on Twitter and Instagram. At spectel cast. You can subscribe to our Patreon a k A Matreon

at patreon dot com, slash pecktel Cast. You get to bonus episodes every month, plus access to the entire back catalog of over one hundred bonus episodes. And that's all for five dollars a month. We're doing some cursed holiday favorites this month, surprise, and you can get speaking of holidays if you're capitalism NG, you can go to t public dot com slash the pytel cast and pick up some merch or not. We won't know, and it's up to you. And and what's a good way to end

this episode? Um? What is? What is neo? Okay? Neo? At the very end, he's just like, Okay, oh, I know you're out there and I'm going to show these people what you don't want them to see. And then he hangs up the phone and it's likely do they're turn Can you add in the rage against the machine at the end of this episode? Yes? How many seconds can you get away with of like an audio clip before you get sued for copyright stuff? We'll tie, We'll take it off Mike who knows uh all right? Click click on