Not surprised. The Movie was an utter trash cash grab hollywood sellout "look how meta and cool I am" let's shit on the original. If you liked it I'd love to know why?
Do you have links to those essays? I would love to
The new sequel did a really good job of adding nuance and deepening the themes already present in the trilogy. Specifically the way systems define our reality as a means of control. It did so while tying in really well with the first films world-building, expanding on more nuanced understanding of AI/programs that the sequels started to explore.
The film did take some time to reclaim its narrative, but I think it did so in a way that most fans can appreciate.
I believe that it's an achievement for the film to garner this much discussion. If anything, the film predicts it.
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I think people have fallen into two camps, and it depends how you saw the first film. I loved Matrix, not for the wire-fu, gunplay and special effects, but for all the subtext and "simulacra and simulation" of it all. It was film that very cleverly pulled together a lot concepts that had been done in 90s cinema about depersonification, reality and identity and presented them in an incredibly unique way.
If you liked Matrix for the wire-fu gunplay, Resurrections isn't your film, it does spend most of its time "shitting on the original" but that was the point. It's a deconstruction of "genre cinema" rebooting/remaking their successes to re-engage and revive a franchise.
Maybe they’ll even give it a positive review and good word of mouth to completely negate the director’s intention to undermine Warner Bros.
At least the movie says it right up front with the dialogue between Neo and Smith, "This is a total sellout and nobody wants to do it but parent company wants some money."
The only thing missing was the two of them looking directly at the audience behind the fourth wall in awkward synchronized silence.
That said, Art that wishes itself never born is not art I care to watch.