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Comment by GMoromisato | Hacker News Reader

I really feel for the Wachoskis. They couldn't not do a sequel, but they had nowhere to go--The Matrix was already perfect.

They couldn't recapture the key reveal of the Matrix. It would be like doing a sequel to "The Sixth Sense"--tag line: "He's Still Dead". And without that, it's just another action movie except "bullet time" is no longer innovative.

Their solution was to go deeper into the mythology and the larger world, but that was never going to be as fresh as the original.

I would have done a time-jump and have Neo be the mentor figure to a new Neo (a Neo-Neo). They'd still be fighting the Architect (and maybe Smith) and they'd still explore the larger world of Zion + Machine City, but the key reveal would be that Neo himself is just a program (like the Oracle).

But what do I know? I'm just a simple programmer.

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> I really feel for the Wachoskis. They couldn't not do a sequel, but they had nowhere to go--The Matrix was already perfect.

I remember that at the time of the (non-existent ;-) ) sequels, being disappointed with these "sequels", fans wrote summaries of screenplays how a (good) sequel to Matrix might look like.

Basically all of them were much better than the official sequel attempt (because such fans really cared), and I bet if I had been looking much more deeply into these fan-fiction sequels, I could have found one that was as exceptional as the original Matrix.

Lesson learned: scripts for sequels of movies that have a strong fan-base should be written by people who really care about the franchise (and have good ideas).

"Lesson learned: scripts for sequels of movies that have a strong fan-base should be written by people who really care about the franchise (and have good ideas)."

As the originators of the Matrix franchise, the Wachowskis certainly fit that description.

Except that there is something called "Intellectual Property" and "copyright" that makes any attempt to use fan fiction a libility and open to endless litigation.

J. Michael Straczynski (of _Babylon V_ fame, and many others) immediately blocks anyone who tries to ptch him ideas, and he's not the only one:

https://www.syfy.com/syfy-wire/j-michael-straczynski-would-l...

But as a franchise owner, you can have a look into such fan(fiction) forums to recognize writing talents who do care about the franchise and which you might want to hire to work on a screenplay for a sequel.

Yeah, if you 1) trust that they actually know how to write a screenplay (a very different skill from writing a novel) and 2) believe they won't sue you for stealing their idea.

That's a problem with fanfic in general. People who would have written fanfic ten or fifteen years ago are writing stuff like litrpg's now; you can steal the general concept as long as you don't rip off the details. And it's a big enough world that you can practice your writing and actually become decent at it before you try to take on a big work. If you compare early drafts of, say, Dungeon Crawler Carl to the latest books in the series? You can see the skill improvement.

Why can't you buy the idea from whatever forum poster?

I get aredox' point that copyright at least makes some things more complicated.

See for example the drama around Darkover fanfiction ([1], [2]):

Quote from [1]:

"For many years, Bradley actively encouraged Darkover fan fiction. She encouraged submissions from unpublished authors and reprinted some of it in commercial Darkover anthologies. This ended after a dispute with a fan over an unpublished Darkover novel of Bradley's that had similarities to one of the fan's stories. As a result, the novel remained unpublished and Bradley demanded the cessation of all Darkover fan fiction."

---

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Zimmer_Bra...

[2] https://journal.transformativeworks.org/index.php/twc/articl...

Because you have to find and pay everyone who had the same idea.

The alternatve is to do "cleanroom writing": you don't interact, therefore if you write something similar, you can argue you independently invented it.

I had the same problem in a scientific research lab where collaboration with another lab runs the risk of not being able to patent an idea, because if the other team had the same idea or anything close enough to it, we couldn't claim to be the inventors.

It's not that you have to pay everyone with the same idea, it's that it opens you up to claims you copied fanfiction writers you never copied.

If I somehow recreated Lord of the Rings from scratch, without having known about Lord of the Rings, it wouldn't be copyright infringement because I never copied Lord of the Rings.

The issue is nobody would ever believe me when I said I coincidentally recreated Lord of the Rings from scratch. The court would conclude I copied Tolkien's books without permission.

If you admit to reading fanfiction, it reduces your credibility when you claim you independently came up with the same ideas as fanfiction authors.

This increases your litigation risk, but there's no black or white rule that you need to pay every fanfiction author or anything like that.

> If I somehow recreated Lord of the Rings from scratch, without having known about Lord of the Rings, it wouldn't be copyright infringement because I never copied Lord of the Rings.

> The issue is nobody would ever believe me when I said I coincidentally recreated Lord of the Rings from scratch.

What do you mean? They believed Terry Goodkind; why not you?

> I bet if I had been looking much more deeply into these fan-fiction sequels, I could have found one that was as exceptional as the original Matrix.

> Lesson learned: scripts for sequels of movies that have a strong fan-base should be written by people who really care about the franchise (and have good ideas).

It seems like the lesson there is "if you make 2000 independent attempts at something, you'll probably get a better best result than if you make 1".

Perhaps it exposed how much of the Matrix was really iterated from Ghost in the Machine, Metropolis, Dark City, Strange Days, John Woo action scenes, etc.

It's a talent to recognize good ideas and combine them into a new and fresh story. It's another to tell an original story.

I thought the "real" world could have been another simulation after Neo "used the force" in the squiddies in the tunnels - when he then passes out and ends up mentally in the train station thing.

Idea being that even those who thought they'd escaped, were still actually within the Matrix.

(And Inception hadn't been made back then)

That would have been a way better explanation than what we got. In fact, I don't think I ever understood how Neo could control the machines in the real world.

I like introducing the uncertainty of what is or is not real (like Inception). That could turn it into a paranoid thriller like some Philip K. Dick stories.

I think the most coherent answer is that it was simply a throwback to 20th century science fiction, in which psychic powers were commonly treated as "real in the future". The Matrix in particular borrowed a lot from anime and eastern mysticism, so a break from strict materialism isn't too out of place. It's just part of the style of this kind of media.

(Psychics in sci-fi: Foundation, Ringworld, Akira and about a million other animes, The Demolished Man, The Stars My Destination, Dune, loads of Phillip K Dick, Starship Troopers,... If you read a lot of 20th century sci-fi it comes up A LOT.)

My head canon was essentially that the nutrient connectors in the back of people's necks also had a weak wireless near range communication port to the computers wireless net. Why, because sometimes malfunctions and accidents can happen and people get detached and they need to be findable.

The Oracle had realized years before that this could be used to relay shutdown commands to nearby machines because relatively lax security on this port and had built in the capability into "the one" as a failsafe.

It is even possible that she modified Neo/Neo's implants in order to have this ability.

> In fact, I don't think I ever understood how Neo could control the machines in the real world.

In fairness to the Wachowskis, they do literally explain this in the movie, in literal dialog, in the third Matrix film.

---

Neo: "Tell me how I stopped four Sentinels by thinking it"

Oracle: "The power of the One extends beyond this world. It reaches from here (i.e., the digital matrix) all the way back to where it came from (i.e., in the real world).

Neo: "Where?"

Oracle: "The Source. That's what you felt when you touched those Sentinels"

The sentinels are networked (in the real world) and Neo has god-like access (superuser). Superuser works inside the matrix, but it also works on anything connected to the Matrix or networked to the matrix (like the Sentinels are, like most of the machines are).

---

Most people just tune out the dialogue about philosophy in these films, and then complain that nothing was explained. (when like, most of it was explained, folks just got bored and stopped listening)

That's fine in Matrix 1, because Matrix 1 works as a film even if you ignore the philosophy dialogue. Matrix 2, 3, and 4 are pretty good too, but they only work if you are also paying attention to all the philosophy dialog.

Indeed. He was able to see Smith even though he was blind. That right there had me instantly thinking "Holy shit, they're still inside!" I was hoping for a bigger reveal or twist but ... nothing.

My head cannon when I watched it for first time, it's the Neo bend reality abilities in the Matrix are really the matrix simulation, reflecting some kind of SPI habitability that he have in the real world but never know how to use. However, your idea sounds better, but would make it like another "Level 13" or "Existence"

I really want to know what the story behind this detail is. It never got resolved but it led you in a very specific direction, and if the answer truly is "they're still inside" then all of the rest is inside too.

That was my thought at the time. Or maybe even that the real world we actually live in is a simulation, and that by learning to control one, Neo learned to control the other.

I wanted the Merovingian’s gang to be another group of humans with a different perspective on self-actualization. That could’ve been a cool third movie.

I like that!

I stand by the fact that a skilled editor cutting like hell across movies 2 and 3 to a singular sequel could save that story

The problem is that 2 and 3 both fail to capitalize on their more interesting elements. Everything with Smith could've been so much more then what we got (seriously, an AI which probably has never left the Matrix gets downloaded into a real human body and this has...no serious ramifications or crisis for it's identity? Just do the "sees itself as Hugo Weaving thing" and let Hugo Weaving do that on camera because he absolutely could've).

A similar feat to The Phantom Edit:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Phantom_Edit

There are numerous, I just read an article recently(than I can't locate now) where a guy watched and reviewed about 6 fan edits. There's gotta be one out there for ya.

They could have done a prequel: where did the Oracle come from, the existing crew of morpheus, trinity, etc.

There is the Animatrix.... Specifically it has a history reel like that.

I did not entirely hate the sequels, but I feel like the Animatrix was better and kind of flies under the radar.

They could have gone back to something not unlike what happened with power wrangling at OpenAI where OpenAI goes on later to build the machines that take over. In this world it is not LLMs but maybe more robotic like intellegence. Robot assistants. Kind of completely different. Maybe someone there sees the future and tries to prevent it but just narrowly fails. While not that fun it would be nice to see the Matrix situation explained how it got to that.

>I really feel for the Wachoskis. They couldn't not do a sequel, but they had nowhere to go--The Matrix was already perfect.

That is why the 4th is the best of the three sequels, it is specifically about this. Although I agree it still can't match the first movie.

The 4th is a disgrace. It completely defiles the legacy of the Matrix.

I've never seen more people leave a cinema before.

I wish I'd left too.

People were disappointed because they wanted just another rehash of The Matrix, but why do that when The Matrix already exists? The more interesting idea is to explore why people wanted another rehash of The Matrix, so the movie is about that instead.

I disagree. Nothing of value could be added through the contemporary lens. So leave it at that, no need for a new cash grab. It's not like Warner Bros is poor anyway..

I find this mindset funny because the movie is about this exact idea so by saying this idea has no value you are criticizing your own opinion.

They could've made a generic meta movie about that topic, there was absolutely no reason whatsoever to defile the legacy of the Matrix.

You sound like you're one of the Wachowski's ? I've seen you in berghain ;)

The first act of the latest (fourth) movie was actually brilliant. I could watch a whole movie about Neo doubting the reality, his paranoia and his sessions with psychiatrist, etc (no Hugo Weaving is a downer, though). But once they logged off the matrix, it all kinda fell apart.

I would have Christopher Nolan paint the world as seen from Agent Smith point of view.

> It would be like doing a sequel to "The Sixth Sense"--tag line: "He's Still Dead"

What's this?

If you have not seen The Sixth Sense yet, I envy you! Try to do so before you get any spoilers.

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