20 facts you might not know about 'The Matrix: Resurrections'

The Wachowskis said they were done with the world of The Matrix after their third film in the original trilogy. However, it’s hard to say goodbye to a moneymaking franchise. As such, Warner Bros. was purportedly working on a fourth film, but with Zak Penn writing the treatment. They also planned for Michael B. Jordan to be the new star. That didn’t end up happening.

Lana and Lily had largely worked hand-in-hand in their careers, but it seems like Lily has perhaps stepped away from the entertainment industry. In addition to Lana working on the end of their TV show Sense8 without Lily, only Lana worked on The Matrix: Resurrections, co-writing the film with David Mitchell and Aleksander Hemon while directing solo.

Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss returned as Neo and Trinity, respectively. In addition, Morpheus and Agent Smith are back. However, instead of being played by Laurence Fishburne and Hugo Weaving, they were played by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Jonathan Groff. Fishburne has said he was not asked to return as Morpheus.

Lana’s parents died, which obviously took quite a toll on her. Around this time, she began thinking about Neo and Trinity and the world of The Matrix. She has said that having these characters back in her life again was very comforting, inspiring her to begin working on The Matrix: Resurrections.

You know how it goes. You are plugging along in your career, and then you get the opportunity to audition for two massive blockbusters. That’s the situation Fenwick found herself in. Both The Matrix: Resurrections and Shang-Chi offered her a chance to audition. Ultimately, Fenwick took a chance on The Matrix, and she ended up with the key role of Bugs.

Parts of Resurrections were filmed in San Francisco, and at the same time, Venom: Let There Be Carnage happened to be filming. This bit of kismet led Venom  star Tom Hardy to do an uncredited cameo in The Matrix.

Chad, the husband of Trinity’s alter-ego of Tiffany in the Matrix (it’s not always easy to parse the world of these films), is played by Chad Stahelski. He and this series go way back. Stahelski was Reeves’ stunt double on the original Matrix. Since then, the two have worked together quite a bit. Stahelski is the director of the John Wick franchise.

During a time when a lot of films were shot in Australia, The Matrix: Resurrections actually eschewed Australia, even though the first three movies were filmed there. They filmed in San Francisco, as previously mentioned, and Germany and Chicago. While filming in San Fran, the working title “Project Ice Cream” was used to keep things under wraps.

Big movies have second-unit directors to handle much of the filming, so the director doesn’t have to be there all the time. Often these units handle action scenes and things of that ilk. Not for this movie. Wachowski did not use the second unit on the action scenes in Resurrections, directing them herself instead.

Filming of Resurrections was paused in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As things lingered on, Wachowski reportedly thought about dropping the film and letting it be unfinished and unreleased. However, she was talked out of that by the cast and crew. Filming picked back up that August.

Initially, the plan was for The Matrix: Resurrections to be released on May 21, 2021, which was also supposed to be the same day that John Wick: Chapter 4 was released. Neither film would come out that day. John Wick has been delayed all the way to March 2023. Meanwhile, Resurrections was bumped back to April 1, 2022, before moving to December 21, 2021.

When Resurrections was released in theaters, it was released on HBO Max for streaming the same day for a 30-day simultaneous run. This was due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the Matrix sequel would also become the final Warner Bros. movie to get a simultaneous release in theaters and on HBO Max, bringing the end to an era nobody really wanted.

Chopra Jones joined the cast as Sati in this film, but she wasn’t given a chance to ease into the movie. When she arrived in Germany to begin filming, Wachowski wanted to use the real sunset. To make that happen, Chopra Jones had to recite all of her dialogue in the film in one session. It took 45 minutes and reportedly left her exhausted.

In one scene in the movie, you can see a sign for a store called “Corky’s Massage Spa & Salon.” Corky is the name of Gina Gershon’s character in Bound, the 1996 film that marked the Wachowskis' debut and served as the calling card that helped get them the chance to make the Matrix.

The Wachowskis had The Matrix all figured out when they were making it. In fact, they had created a 600-page, shot-by-shot storyboard of the entire film before it was even purchased. Lana took a different approach to Resurrections. The filming was looser, and Wachowski took suggestions from the cast and crew to help create the movie's direction and scenes.

In the original trilogy, Don Davis handled the composing, while Bill Pope served as the cinematographer. Neither of them worked on this film. Johnny Klimek and Tom Tykwer did the score, while John Toll was the original director of photography before leaving the project due to a death in the family. They may have been new to The Matrix, but they weren’t new to the world of the Wachowskis. Toll directed 24 episodes of Sense8, while Klimek and Tykwer had both worked on Cloud Atlas.

One of the big moments in the original Matrix is when Neo sees the same cat twice and calls it déjà vu. This is, of course, a glitch in the Matrix. In Resurrections, the Analyst has a cat that is, fittingly enough for this film series, named Déjà Vu.

When we see Thomas Anderson (Neo)’s reflection in a mirror, we see how he looks in the Matrix. The person playing Anderson’s reflection is Steven Roy. Given the connection between Trinity and Neo, Roy was an intelligent choice. In real life, he’s married to Moss.

While The Matrix was a harbinger of the changes coming to the world of special effects, there’s something to be said for real-deal stunt work. The tandem jump from a skyscraper that Neo and Trinity perform in Resurrections is an example. They jumped off the 44 Montgomery Street Building in San Francisco, and little to no CGI was used. Reeves and Moss climbed up to the rooftop, more than 40 stories into the air, and jumped with cables attached to their bodies. They reportedly did that one stunt nearly 20 times over two days.

Right now, there are no plans to follow up this sequel with another one. While producer James McTeigue has said the door isn’t closed, it doesn’t seem very likely. After all, it took almost 20 years for this movie to get made, and only one Wachowski was involved. This return to the Matrix was unexpected, so things could change, but this likely will be the last film in this series.