Transcribed by Emily June.
[THEME MUSIC]
Missy
Hello, and welcome to Fake Geek Girls, a podcast… looking at – Jesus, a podcast- lurking… at nerdy pop culture from both a fan and critical perspective, encouraging the things we love to do better. I was distracted because I was thinking about the “Hacker voice: ‘I’m in meme'”, before we started this podcast, and then I started laughing and then my brain flew out the window, rest in peace. I’m Missy, I’m a writer, and I – you know, I gotta say, I still really didn’t like really like The Matrix, I think it’s fine. But Resurrections was my favorite one.
Merri
I’m Merri- marketer, and I made the mistake of putting a giant piece of cookie in my mouth.
Missy
I know, I was trying to stall for you. I was going on and on in hopes that you could get that cookie out of your mouth.
Merri
Ah, once again, Missy has created an art piece of this outline. And I’d like to give kudos to this beefy topic.
Missy
It is so beefy.
Merri
Especially for something you’re not really into.
Missy
Yeah, I had to cut a lot out of this one. And like, shout out to our Discord for giving us some good ideas to talk about. And then me being able to talk about like half of one of them. But still, shout out to you guys!
Merri
Thanks!
Missy
I thought you were saying the thanks was to me, and I was like, Merri you’re on the podcast, it doesn’t count.
Merri
I also don’t think I answered.
Missy
I don’t think you did either! So today, we’re talking about the last two Matrix movies. That’s The Matrix- The Matrix Revolutions and The Matrix Resurrection. So if you haven’t seen them, or if you haven’t watched them in a while. The Matrix Revolutions once again follows Neo, who is now in a coma after his sick new real-world lightning powers were revealed at the end of Reloaded. He’s not supposed to be able to do that. So he goes into a coma. He wakes up in a train station to find that Sati, a program that looks like a young girl, is being snuck out of the Matrix by her family members as she does not have a defined purpose and will therefore be deleted. Neo is captured by the Trainman- which is my favorite name – and is taken into the Merovingian – I know how to pronounce it this time! But is rescued by Seraph, Morpheus, and Trinity. Smith has gained the power of assimilation, which basically means that he takes over the bodies of other people, which he does to both Sati and the Oracle, and eventually the Bane, who’s a human in the real world. What the fuck? Bane blinds Neo in one fight scene that takes place inside of another extremely long fight scene, in which the humans of Zion defend the city from attack, which ends only when Neo jacks into the Matrix and has a final showdown with Smith – this sentence is 1000 words long – who has assimilated with every single person in the Matrix. It’s just Smiths everywhere, baby! After being beaten down, Neo wins the fight but exchanges his life for peace, and the machines leave Zion.
We watch this one – we were watching this one, and maybe like a third of the way into it I was like, “I don’t know why everybody like doesn’t like this one?”
Merri
I know right?
Missy
I thought it was really good, and then the fight scene started and didn’t stop, and I was like, “JESUS.”
Merri
This fight scene does take forever but it was like – of the movies – it was like my second favorite one. And I think it – I don’t know, maybe just because it rounded some of the story out for me so it helped me –
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
– Actually care. Also there’s more people in it that I care about –
Missy
Yeah, it was just –
Merri
I don’t know about care about but…
Missy
That fight scene was so long, it was probably the longest fight scene I’ve ever seen.
Merri
But if you like fight scenes –
Missy
If you like fight scenes, its cool but if – fuck, if you don’t, god help you because it is fully two thirds of the movie.
Merri
I think – I knew that there were some fight scenes because I had just watched these a couple months ago and I literally fast forwarded through them.
Missy
You don’t need to watch them!
Merri
I just fast forwarded through that fight scene!! Or I think I was on my phone and literally wasn’t paying attention because the fight scenes typically mean nothing, there’s no stakes in them besides who wins.
Missy
It was just – the one in Zion in particular was just – like I was watching with my husband, he’s seen it before and he’s just like, “Oh look, more sentinels. Oh, that’s a lot of sentinels… well look, more sentinels, they just keep coming… there’s just so many sentinels!!” But, you know, if you cut the fight scenes down by at least 50% I probably would have liked the third one, but I sure did tune the fuck out about halfway through because I was like, “This is still happening?”
The Matrix Resurrections, which is the new one, came out in 2021. Once again following Neo, now going by Thomas Anderson, who is now a – who now is, not is now (it’s an important designation). He now is a game developer in modern times working on The Matrix, an influential video game based on the faint memories he has of his time as Neo (or does he?) Two new characters, Bugs and Morpheus (who both is and isn’t the Morpheus we know) rescue him from the Matrix and start teaching him to become Neo again. Neo realizes that Trinity is also alive and they plan to rescue her but are thrwarted at first by the Analyst, who has been appearing as Neo’s therapist. The Analyst has learned that more energy to power the machines can be generated if they keep Neo and Trinity in proximity to one another but not in a relationship because –
Merri
Weird!
Missy
– when they get in a relationship he might…
Merri
Figure it out?
Missy
– they figure it out – I think what’s happening is he’s just like – you know the power of mutual pining? The Matrix is powered on mutual pining. The Matrix is AO3.
Merri
Oh my god!
Missy
You heard it here first.
Merri
It’s online, like AO3 is online, the Matrix is basically online…
Missy
I’m tapping my temple – you can’t see this because this is an audio medium –
Merri
The machines are just making fanfictions.
Missy
Mhmm.
Merri
Oh my god…
Missy
Oh my god, we figured it out!
Merri
Everyone’s focusing on the wrong thing! Scrap this outline!
Missy
Nobody’s talking about this!
So – I think the point that the Analyst is making is that the unfulfilled emotion or the unfulfilled yearning is what creates this abundance of energy more so than like, the mundane going about your daily tasks stuff. Neo and the Analyst eventually strike a deal – Neo will go back to his pod if he can’t convince Trinity to leave the Matrix. Neo wins, but the Analyst attempts to kill Trinity anyway, but it’s interrupted by Smith (now played by Jonathan Groff).
Merri
Oh, yeah!
Missy
I didn’t realize it was him.
Merri
Honestly, pretty good casting.
Missy
I know, I think so too. I think Jonathan – this is, listen, I don’t have any particular beef with Jonathan Groff. Like, I don’t know him. I barely am aware of him as an actor, but I will say he kind of has evil vibes.
Merri
Yeah, no.
Missy
You know? Like, he’s kind of got evil vibes. Anyway. He’s interrupted by Smith, now in the form, a new form – Jonathan Groff – and also Neo’s game developer Boss, [whispered] (he’s Todd Howard).
Trinity and Neo get cor-
Merri
– He’s who?
Missy
Todd Howard!
Merri
I don’t know who that is.
Missy
He’s the Bethesda guy!
Merri
Ohhh.
Missy
Trinity and Neo get cornered, but Trinity is able to fly – Neo is not – and saves them both. They both return to the Analyst and vow to remake the Matrix as they see fit, which is kind of a weird thing to do, in my opinion. It’s kind of a weird ending. Why wouldn’t they get rid of it?
Merri
I don’t know.
Missy
Unless –
Merri
-Some people want it?
Missy
I guess so. I don’t know! It’s weird. It was kind of a weird ending. Like, in the moment I was like, okay, and then I thought about it a little more and I was like, that’s kind of weird! Okay… sure. Whatever! But I liked Resurrections. I enjoyed it.
Merri
I thought it was a good Peter Pan story.
Missy
I liked that it was brighter.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
I could tell what was happening.
Merri
I liked that it was self aware.
Missy
I did too!
Merri
I like that it was essentially almost making fun of itself without really making fun of itself and making fun of the viewers without really like humiliating or being rude.
Missy
It was very loving!
Merri
Yeah!
Missy
I thought it was very loving.
Merri
Yeah. And I thought it was – I thought it was just a really good update for – I thought it was, you know, I thought it was good. I enjoyed it.
Missy
Yeah, I liked – you know, it wasn’t a perfect movie, and it’s still not my genre. But, I enjoyed the experience of watching this one, I would say about on par with my enjoyment of watching the first one.
Merri
I think you might have to have some idea of the commentary that has been going on through the years over the Matrix movies to truly enjoy like, the banter part where they’re like, “What is The Matrix about?”
Missy
Yeah…
Merri
Like to enjoy those things, you probably have to have some idea of like, what it’s actually referencing. So maybe if people don’t know all the discourse around these movies, it might not be as great.
Missy
I feel like – like, if my mom watched this movie, she would not be impressed.
Merri
Yeah, yeah.
Missy
I don’t know, she might! My mom’s pretty up for anything.
Merri
That’s true. But yeah, I liked how self aware it was. I liked how meta it was. It was almost just like, “Yeah, fucking lean in.”
Missy
I wanted to talk about that and post modernism and that kind of thing.
Merri
Of course you did.
Missy
But, this outline is really long. So it got cut, sorry! Instead, we’re going to talk about fatalism. Fatalism is the idea that any foretold event is inevitable and meant to occur. It’s sort of like – you can look at it as sort of a specific branch of determinism. We talked about determinism in the last episode, but interestingly, fatalism is not entirely at odds with free will, and I think that you’ll appreciate this, Merri. It’s a way of – because you know, we talked about determinism and it was kind of – when you really think about it’s kind of hard to get out of determinism. Like, you can’t really get yourself out of it. You’re like, “Well, yeah, I kind of am where I am because of everything that came before. Do I – do I really have free will then?” and it gets very upsetting and you hate it. But fatalism is not necessarily incompatible with free will. So, there’s a book called Like a Splinter in Your Mind by Matt Lawrence. Which is – a lot of times when we’re talking about, you know, different media, there will be like a philosophy and “insert media here” book that like, connects… I mean, it’s basically the kind of stuff that we do on this podcast, right? Connecting pop culture to philosophy, or whatever. This book was actually more of like, “Oh, you like The Matrix? I’m going to use The Matrix to illustrate philosophical concepts,” as opposed to, “Here’s all the philosophy in The Matrix,” which was an interesting approach. If you like that kind of thing, it was a pretty solid book. Do know, it came out in 2003. The Wachowskis were not out at this point. Wild reading articles and like, just the amount of dead naming of the Wachowskis! I – legit, I was not aware of the Wachowskis prior to them coming out, basically. And so I’m like, “Who are these people that you keep naming? I don’t know who they are.” Anyway, so just be aware of that when you – if you read this book, it feels like aggressively deadnaming, but they simply were not out at the time.
So, in this in this book, Like a Splinter in Your Mind, Lawrence uses the story of Oedipus Rex by Sophocles to explain the idea of fatalism. So, if you haven’t read Oedipus Rex – or just Oedipus – the prophecy in this play is that Oedipus will kill his father and marry his mother, right? That’s – and this is where Oedipus complex comes from. To thwart it, Oedipus’ father, the king of Thebes – I think it’s Thebes… pretty sure it’s Thebes, you think I would have looked this up and I didn’t. To thwart the prophesy, Oedipus’ father, the king, sends Oedipus away to die, but he ends up being raised by this random shepherd. Later as an adult, Oedipus unknowingly gets into a fight with his real father, the king, and knocks him out of his chariot and kills him.
Merri
It happens.
Missy
Yeah, you know, happens to the best of us. Oedipus then ends up solving the riddle of the Sphinx-
Merri
It really sounded like you said stink.
Missy
– the riddle of the stink, the riddle of the Sphinx, and he frees – thereby freeing Thebes from the Sphinx, and Oedipus then marries the queen as a reward. Now, because it’s the queen of Thebes, that’s his mother. So none of this happens intentionally. He doesn’t intentionally murder his father, he does not intentionally murder his mother, but it happens all the same. So it may be that if this exact chain of events hadn’t been followed, such as if the king had not sent Oedipus away and had instead raised him as his son, it could be that none of this would have happened, right? We don’t know, we didn’t get to see that timeline, we only get to see the story as it plays out. It could be that the Oracle saw the only possible future because of hard determinism as in, the events were laid out ahead of time and they must be followed exactly like this. You have no free will. But there – this could also be an example of partial fatalism in which the ending is preordained. Oedipus will kill his father and marry the king. But the past there is not preordained. Right? So if cling – cling? If the King Polybus had instead imprisoned Oedipus or just raised him as his own, it may be that the end events (killing his father and marrying his mother) would still have happened but in a different fashion. So that leaves room for both free will and determinism and fate. So for example, if he had imprisoned Oedipus, maybe Oedipus breaks out of prison, not knowing his father’s there, accidentally kills him on the way out, not realizing it’s his father. And then something happens and he ends up marrying the Queen, right? That’s possible. It could be that he was raised as – he was raised under his father as normal, but something happens and his mother is kidnapped or something and he goes to rescue her, but she’s misidentified, and he ends up killing his father and marrying his mother anyway. The thing that fatalism – this idea of fatalism – is expressing is that you can have free will and that you get to make the choices, but the end point stays the same.
Merri
So it’s not the fate that happens on the way, it’s the friends you make?
Missy
Sure.
Merri
How you get there, that is your choice –
Missy
– The real – it’s the journey. It’s about the journey.
Merri
It’s about the journey and “manifesting.”
Missy
Exactly. I think this is to some extent, what the Matrix Revolutions is going for. It manages to leave space for the Oracle to exist and to be correct, and it leaves space for narrative surprise and free will, which is important to the themes of the movie. So when in the end, Agent Smith realizes he’s been compromised by taking over the Oracle and she speaks through him because he says, “Everything that has a beginning has an end Neo,” he is both quoting something that the Oracle said earlier in the film and referring to him as ‘Neo’ rather than ‘Mr. Anderson,’ which is the only time he does so. So he has already seen the future that he is going to quote unquote, win, right? He wins against Neo, he has Neo down. But still, there’s room for that surprise, that twist at the end that the Oracle then speaks through him and it is actually Neo that wins. The important events that have been foretold transpire according to the prophecy, but how you get there and what those mean, does not follow our expectations. And that’s kind of how – that’s kind of how freewill and fatalism can be compatible. And this, you know, can feel almost as limiting as hard determinism to an extent, but the scene with the Oracle and Smith in Revolutions where they’re in the kitchen, maybe doesn’t contradict that feeling of like, limitation or like, restriction of freewill, but it gives us an alternate way to think about it. Despite knowing what’s going to happen – that Smith is going to throw the cookies against the wall and have a whole fucking temper tantrum – the Oracle still makes the cookies and she sits calmly at the table knowing that Smith will not only throw the cookies, but remark upon the futility of her making the cookies knowing that they’re going to be thrown against the wall, and then he’s going to take her over. Like, she knows going into it how this is going to play out. But she doesn’t run, she doesn’t refuse to make the cookies. She chooses to make the cookies anyway, expressing her free will just as in the end Neo states that he chooses to fight.
Merri
She’s just along for the ride, trying to make it.
Missy
Yeah. Smith, at the end, hits Neo with a whole bunch of nihilism, asking why he does this, what he’s even fighting for, and then denounces things like freedom and truth and love as illusions and says that Neo is quote, “Trying desperately to justify an existence that is without meaning or purpose,” and then goes, “Why? WHY?”
Merri
That was really good! “WHY?”
Missy
[Smith voice] “Why, Mr. Anderson?”
Merri
Yeah that’s pretty good.
Missy
And Neo just gets up and goes, [Neo voice] “Because I choose to.” Side note, this ending is corny as fuck, I loved it. You know, I love that corny shit. I see it and I go “Yeah baby, I love it.” Instead of saying that, you know, instead of like defending himself by going, “No, love is real, and truth is real and freedom is real!” Neo just kind of sidesteps that entirely, much as he would sidestep a bullet, and just goes like, “I choose to. I get up because I choose to.”
Merri
It’s when you’re – it’s the parent’s answer, “Because.”
Missy
Yeah!
Merri
“Because I said so.” He does act like a child, so.
Missy
That is itself an endorsement of free will, because if he can choose to do it, he has some degree of freedom, right? But it also struck me as in line with the discussion we had about Baudrillard, in our last episode. In the last episode, I wondered if the Wachowskis might be rejecting Baudrillard’s nihilism. But this conversation at the end of Revolutions actually struck me as less of a rejection of it than I expected. In fact, to shout out Reddit user kinderdemon, once again, it feels exactly like their comment, which to remind you is, “You can fight for positive change because you hate the world as it is, not because you believe in a better one. You can ‘eat the rich’ because you are hungry, not because God or morality approves of it, and they can’t call you a bad person if you do.” So are the Wachowskis rejecting nihilism? I’m really not sure. Maybe they were initially, but the ending of Revolutions seems to maybe not embrace nihilism, but acknowledge it and look at it and choose to stay the course regardless. I don’t think that they are embracing the truest form of Baudrillardian nihilism, especially because I think that Neo really does believe in a better world, and that fighting Smith and ending the war is the morally right thing to do. Whereas I think that Baudrillard would be more like, “There is no moral right, there is only what you choose.” Though both Baudrillardian nihilism and the Wachowski films might reach similar conclusions – we fight because it’s what we choose to do – the reasons I think are different. I find that really intriguing especially because I think it makes the films less of a like, fantastic adaptation of Baudrillard and more its own unique thing.
Merri
Like in conversation with.
Missy
Yeah, it feels less like it’s trying to make a movie explaining Baudrillard, and more of a movie that is talking about Baudrillard and their own reaction to it.
Merri
I think that’s more effective in getting an audience to talk about it, too.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Because you’re not really relying on them to be like, “Alright, go read some Baudrillard.”
Missy
Yeah, it feels less like, “This one person is right,” and more like, “We all can have different means of engaging with the world.” And I think that’s really valuable. This is a quote from Like a Splinter in Your Mind by Lawrence who writes, “Neo’s response [to Smith’s question of “Why?”] is interesting, and one that Sartre himself would endorse.” We didn’t talk about Sartre. Sorry, there’s so much. Back to the quote. “He doesn’t try to refute Smith’s claims by arguing that there is such a thing as ‘objective truth’ or ‘true love,’ and he doesn’t try to deny that these are mere constructs of the human mind. Instead, he simply exerts his freedom. He gets up for more simply because he chooses to. He creates and chooses his own purposes, and in so doing, he becomes an existentialist hero.” And to me this really asserts the movies as being about free will and choice despite all the odds. As we’ll get into, they’re also about other things. But free will and choice dovetail nicely with what some of those other things are. And I was actually really impressed with the ending of that movie. I thought that was really impactful to have him not be like, “No, love is real. And I’m going to prove it!”
Merri
Yeah, I totally agree. Totally agree.
Missy
It doesn’t need proving to him. The more important thing is that he makes the choice to get up – and he does it – because free will, from the beginning, has been one of Neo’s core values.
Merri
Yeah, I like not having to explain every reason they do something.
Missy
Although it’s not like Smith’s gonna get it!
Merri
Yeah, it’s like fighting with someone who already has their mind made up.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
There’s no point.
Missy
Yeah, there’s no point in arguing with Smith about that. You’re not going to convince him that love is real.
Merri
Well, and also like it – probably his response makes someone think more than being like “No, I’m right.”
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
I don’t know, if you’re like, “Because I choose to,” or whatever, you’re like, “Well, why did he say that?” I feel like it was more opportunity for someone to really think about it.
Missy
Yeah, he’s not bound to anything. He’s not restricted by like, what’s allowed under love or justice or truth, he’s only bound to his own choices. And I think that’s a much more impactful ending than for him to go up and give Smith a hug.
Merri
I would have been down for that too –
Missy
– Defeated by the power of love –
Merri
– because I think that’s hilarious.
Missy
I think they should have kissed… with tongue.
Merri
And then I think he could have said, [Neo voice] “Why, Mr. Anderson?” And THEN it should have been, “Because I can!”
Missy
And then they made out.
Merri
Yeah, but like, their tongues are out like [tongue waggling noise].
Missy
Oh my god. We’re back to AO3. AO3 is the only real form of reality.
Merri
I gotta go find some weird Matrix.
Missy
Oh, God, I bet it’s ripe.
Merri
I bet it is.
Missy
Just a fucking orchard of fruits to pick. Do you have anything else to say about fatalism, free will, etc?
Merri
Yeah, it’s better than the other one. But it still freaks me out.
Missy
Oh, I see. I see. I see. Yeah, I think that’s fair.
Merri
It’s better. I still have some choice. But like, in the end is still the same.
Missy
I think we should all be a little freaked out by existing.
Merri
I think that’s fair.
Missy
We gotta all walk around just a lil’ freaked out all the time.
Merri
But I also think that’s why what he says works because you just gotta fucking take what you can.
Missy
You still gotta go – like you gotta go –
Merri
You gotta keep going. And, you know, take what you can.
Missy
Yeah. Let’s talk about race and the savior narrative.
Merri
This was so interesting as I read through this.
Missy
The savior narrative thing, I touched briefly on it in the last episode. There were quite a few essays and articles talking about The Matrix as a chosen one/savior/white savior narrative. And this absolutely fascinated me! I was obsessed with it. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I’m like a fucking influencer over here. It’s – pretty clearly, right? – a chosen one story, even though I do think it kind of plays with the concepts of that, because –
Merri
I agree.
Missy
There’s a bit of like, he’s only the chosen one because he chooses to be the chosen one.
With different options. Yeah, like it could – yeah, I found that like, it’s not super subversive or anything, but at least it’s not by the book.
Merri
It gives a little spice.
Missy
Yeah, like a little….
Merri
A little cayenne pepper.
Missy
Yeah. A little paprika on your – on your boiled egg.
Merri
Yeah. That sounds delicious.
Missy
So that, you know, there’s this idea of The Matrix as this white savior story. It really, really interested me because Keanu Reeves is mixed race.
Merri
You think that someone who’s like, “Hmm, Keanu doesn’t necessarily sound like a white name? Maybe I should Google this.”
Missy
Yeah. I never thought about it. Because like, I don’t know, I guess I just don’t think about people’s names.
Merri
Well, I also think he – I mean, he looks mixed race to me. So I think I feel really – like I feel really bad for him.
Missy
Yeah!
Merri
And he’s mentioned this before in interviews, right. “People forget that I’m Asian.”
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
And like, him being in that one movie.
Missy
Always Be My Maybe.
Merri
Yeah. It was really special to him. Also, he’s fucking amazing in that movie.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
So I thought – I agree. I think this is so interesting because I don’t know if it’s just ignorance or like, unconscious willful ignorance.
Missy
It’s so – it was. It’s just utterly fascinating. So Keanu Reeves is mixed race. We talked about this in the Constantine episode as well. I’m wearing my Constantine shirt today, it was coincidence.
Merri
Not planned.
Missy
It wasn’t planned! I was putting it on – I put it on, and I was like, “Oh I’m recording about a Keanu Reeves movie today.” And then I was like, “Well, I’m not taking it off.” He – Keanu Reeves – is often cast as characters whose race either isn’t mentioned or isn’t important to the story. And those characters are often read as white by viewers. But he is of Native Hawaiian and Chinese descent, as well as European. It is not Keanu Reeves’ fault that he has light skin and some more European features. Nor do I think that he’s like trying to hide his heritage in any way. Otherwise, as Merri mentioned in the last episode, he wouldn’t have been so pleased to be part of the predominantly Asian cast of Always Be My Maybe. So, as we talk about the subject, please know that any mention of Keanu Reeves having lighter skin or like quote unquote, “passing” for white are about how people read him, not about whether or not he is “allowed” to be considered a person of color, or any actions that he – that we’re not trying to project onto him that he is choosing to act, quote unquote, white in movies.
Merri
If you think this is really interesting, I suggest anyone who thinks like this “white passing in Hollywood” should read Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo.
Missy
Yes.
Merri
She does that. Also, Halsey has this issue too, because she’s half black.
Missy
Right.
Merri
And she definitely doesn’t look it, except when she was a child. And so she gets hounded all the time for the way she does her hair and stuff like that.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
It’s very interesting.
Missy
Yeah, we don’t get to make these judgments about him whether he is choosing to not act, you know, I don’t know. I don’t know, I feel like there’s this tendency, when we talk about this kind of thing to suggest that he is choosing to downplay his heritage, which I don’t think is necessarily the case. And I certainly wouldn’t know – I don’t know him. So the questions we want to look at here are, “Is this – The Matrix – a typical savior narrative?” And if it is, what, if anything does it mean that Keanu Reeves, a mixed race man who many people misread as white, is playing that savior? Does the narrative consider him to be a white man or mixed race man? Because that does change the way that we read the story. There are quite a few issues with the white savior narrative. They are often written by white people about the exploitation of people of color or allegorical people of color, think Avatar, not the Last Airbender, and follow – and these stories often follow a white hero or heroine who transcends the racial boundary and saves the people of color, while learning something about themselves.
Merri
Like with The Help.
Missy
Yeah, you see this in stories like The Help, Freedom Writers, Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai, so on and so forth. There is very rarely any attempt to engage with racism as a process and as a systemic issue in these stories. And that is why a single person is typically able to overcome it, because racism is seen as a character flaw rather than as a systemic issue. In The Matrix, you have a man who many read as white (in another essay I’ll cite, a bit later) Neo is identified as a white man, like they refer to him as a white man.
Merri
So interesting to have put that much effort into writing the essay and not at least go and be like, I don’t know – do some – I don’t know. I guess –
Missy
– Here’s the thing. I think it’s – I don’t think it’s necessarily wrong to read NEO as a white man.
Merri
That’s fair.
Missy
Like, is Neo – maybe Neo IS a white man. Keanu Reeves is mixed race… is Neo?
Merri
Interesting!
Missy
Because there’s definitely a divide here between who Neo is and who Keanu Reeves is. And it’s like, is Neo constructed to be a white man, or is he constructed to be a mixed race man? It gets complicated too, when you look at casting, so just kind of put a pin in that.
So in The Matrix, you have a man who many read as white, being the chosen one to save humanity from enslavement, like that’s literally what’s going on. Further, the people he represents are largely – not entirely – but largely people of color. If we allow for the reading of Keanu Reeves as white rather than mixed race, he is a white Messiah figure representing people of color and saving the universe. It’s not great, right? The next couple of quotes seem to suggest that Keanu Reeves as Neo is either white or that audiences read him as white. So when we’re talking about them, keep that in mind. Reeves experiences privileges associated with having light skin and more European features, but that doesn’t mean that he isn’t mixed race. Even if he isn’t white, it’s important to note that light skinned privilege exists and it’s worth remarking on that he gets cast (and what he gets cast for) over another mixed race actor who might not have light skin or European features. We know Will Smith was up for the role and he turned it down. We’ll talk more about that later.
Merri
Love that they were just like, “Men in Black,” right?
Missy
It gets so like – this genuinely is one of the most interesting things to me, is that – is the idea of Neo as a white savior even though Will Smith was almost cast in the role, and they ended up with mixed race Keanu Reeves.
Merri
But like you said, it still makes sense if Neo –
Missy
Yeah, like is – could it be that Neo is in fact a white man? I don’t know.
Merri
Every time “white man” is said I just hear the clip everyone uses on Tik Tok and in Reels that’s from – I think it’s New Girl, that goes like, “WHITE MAN!”
Missy
So this is a quote from Back to the Future: The Humanist Matrix, which is by Laura Bartlett and Thomas B. Byers who write –
Merri
B. Byers, it’s a great name, I love that.
Missy
“It shouldn’t be noted in connection with the strong leader fantasy that the hero’s natural and supernatural superiority go along with a certain disturbing sense of elitism and droit de seigneur. The movie suggests that those who remain under control of the Matrix do so only because they have an inferior consciousness, susceptible to AI colonization and unable to recognize, as Morpheus says, “the world that has been pulled over [their] eyes.” As Morpheus explains to Neo, the “businessmen, teachers, lawyers, carpenters… the people we are trying to save… are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inert, so hopelessly dependent on the system that they will fight to protect it.” For that reason, we need not mourn the numbers of them who constitute Neo’s body count in the final action sequence. It seems clear by this point that this is no fantasy of socialist revolution (or, for that matter, of the coronation of a prince of peace), but rather something much closer to the triumph of the Ubermensch.”
So there’s a couple of things to glean here from this quote – keeping in mind that many viewers read Neo as white, Neo’s specialness that makes him The One positions him above not only the many people, many of whom are not white, who have already been woken up from The Matrix. He’s already elevated above these people, right? It also positions him above those who haven’t been woken up again, a large percentage of which are not white. Nothing in particular makes Neo more special, other than destiny or programming, depending on how you read the point in Reloaded where we find out there has been six Ones, or he is the sixth One. If we read Neo as white, as many viewers and critics did – and from my reading, this seems to be a prominent phenomenon that came mostly in the early 2000s. When you get into criticism coming later in the 2010s, there’s more acknowledgment of Keanu Reeves, or in 2020, post-2020, there’s more acknowledgement of Keanu Reeves as mixed race, and I think that may have to do just with more awareness. So if that awareness had existed in the early 2000s, when these movies were coming out, it may be that fewer people would have identified him as white. But so if we do read Neo as white, as many viewers and critics did, that’s an uncomfortable positioning of whiteness, right? It seems – it’s very kind of manifest destiny like, it is his destiny as the woke – literally woke – white person to save the world from enslavement. Bartlett and Byers also bring up the Nietzschean idea of the Ubermensch here. And we’ve talked a bit about the Ubermensch in the past – I don’t remember what fucking episode it was at this point –
Merri
We do an episode and they go straight out my brain!
Missy
While Nietzsche himself died in 1900, and therefore did not survive to see World War I, let alone the rise of the Nazi Party –
Merri
How angry do you think he would have been?
Missy
Furious! He clearly opposed German nationalism and anti-semitism within his lifetime, he would have been pissed. His sister –
Merri
– That bitch!
Missy
– who actually was part of the Nazi Party, she manipulated his work to fit her and her husband’s viewpoints, which was later adopted by the Nazis. They took the idea of the Ubermensch – which is this kind of goal for a new standard of humanity that would represent the earthly ideal, as opposed to like the ideal in heaven – and applied it to the “master race” ideal that the Nazis pushed.
Merri
I will say that probably is easy- was easy to do.
Missy
Yeah – they they seem –
Merri
– at least on a surface level.
Missy
They simply said, “Oh, the Ubermensch and master race are the same,” and just kind of dusted their hands.
Merri
Yeah. Probably didn’t get much deeper than that.
Missy
Yeah. Regardless of what Nietzsche intended – which I don’t doubt the Wachowskis are familiar with – there is an association now between the idea of the Ubermensch or the ultimate goal of humanity and the master race as defined by the Nazis. For Neo – like to the point that now some people think that Nietzsche was a Nazi but he died fully 30 years before the rise of the Nazi party –
Merri
So literally impossible.
Missy
Yeah, like he did not – the Nazi Party arose out of a lot of complicated stuff, but part of it being World War I and Nietzsche didn’t even live to World War I.
For Neo to essentially take on the role of the Ubermensch in The Matrix is again uncomfortable, especially because so many people took away from the movie that he was white or white-passing enough to be like them (them being a white audience). It defines white (or white-passing) masculinity as the ultimate goal for humanity, and this is not unusual for savior narratives or chosen one narratives to have, “Oh, weird! Another white man is the chosen one!”
Merri
Especially with like, everybody else doesn’t seem to be white, which is good. Like, that’s not necessarily bad, when your whole cast is made up of non-white people. But it is interesting. If – when it is like, the one person –
Missy
– Yeah –
Merri
And it reminds me of The Vampire Diaries and all the witches are black, except for the original witch.
Missy
Yeah. And it is – and like, I think too another reason that people might, especially in the early 2000s, be tempted to read Neo/Keanu Reeves as white is because he isn’t as visibly a person of color as the rest of the cast. And that’s worth interrogating too. Why is he not visibly a person of color? Like so much of the rest of the cast? Why is it that the two people who look the whitest are the two romantic centers of the movie?
Merri
Especially when they have no chemistry!
Missy
[Laughing] Especially when they have no chemistry!
Merri
He has more chemistry with Morpheus.
Missy
It was – I think they did a lot better in Resurrections. I was like, “Okay.”
Merri
I think so too. But I think because they gave her a backstory in which she can become much more like, not a sympathetic character but somebody I can attach emotion to?
Missy
– A single feeling!
Merri
Yeah a single feeling! I kind of felt like, it reminded me of WandaVision. But like, the ending being very different. Like a choice between being good – Trinity – and a choice between being bad – Scarlet Witch. Because like, her kids! She had kids!
Missy
Yeah –
Merri
– “I’m not a monster, I’m a mother.”
Missy
Now, a lot of – a lot of that reading of Neo as white or white-passing gets problematized when you know that Reeves is of mixed race and that the Wachowskis, two trans women who are not out at the time and who initially wanted Will Smith for the role, we’re probably not setting out to valorize white masculinity, right? Like, when you have that context, it reads differently. But you don’t get to control the message viewers take away, which in my opinion is a big part of the themes of Resurrections. It’s one of the reasons I think Resurrections was such a good addition to the story. It shows how out of control the message is. Like, the quote unquote messages of The Matrix within the world of Resurrections. How out of control those messages got because Neo was literally just telling about his life.
Merri
The guy in which everybody sees that Neo is, but not actually, he’s white isn’t he?
Missy
I wouldn’t be surprised –
Merri
I think he is!
Missy
I think you’re right! Oh my god, you’re totally right. That guy’s white. That’s so interesting.
Merri
That has to be –
Missy
-Yeah –
Merri
That has to be on purpose. Because I think with everything, being so much more like aware that he’s mixed race. Yeah. That has to be on purpose.
Missy
Yeah, I think you’re totally right.
Merri
Especially since they were hiding Neo… oh man.
Missy
Yeah!
From reading reviews and criticism from closer to the release date of the original three movies, that is what people were taking away from it – that Neo is white, that Keanu Reeves is white, and that he is playing the role of a white savior – which we know is not really what’s going on. I don’t think it’s wrong to read Neo – the character – as white. I don’t think that you would be wrong to do so. But I also think that you’re not right, either.
Merri
With the context it gets much more complicated.
Missy
Yeah. And I think it’s really complicated in a good way. And I think what you just brought up about the fact that people literally see Neo in the Matrix as a white man is like, it’s just proof of that to me. Like, he literally is white-passing in the movie because he is shown to others as a white man.
Merri
This is why like, I’m not a huge fan of these movies, but I am because this is so interesting! I’m like – that’s why I think I liked the last one so much because they’re like, “Yeah, we know it’s interesting, right? Let’s get meta about it.”
Missy
Yeah. So this is a quote from Wake Up, Neo: White Identity, Hegemony, And Consciousness in ‘The Matrix,’ which is by Ricky Lee Allen, who writes, “By depicting the Oracle as a Black woman, the Wachowskis imply through imagery that the root of wisdom, both past and present, is African and female in origin. Also, it coincides with more recent trends in radical philosophy that contend that a systematic search for knowledge should begin with the wisdom of poor women of color since they have the most experience with navigating multiple forms of oppression. The Oracle is particularly sagacious when it comes to questions of identity. On the wall of her kitchen, dhe has a plaque written in Latin that says “know thyself.” This is an allusion to the identity development process that Neo is going through. The Oracle’s words and demeanor make it seem as though she is very experienced when it comes to developing a positive sense of self. Her social location as an African American woman gives the scene legitimacy.” And this is a quote from Freire inside of this quote, “Who are better prepared than the oppressed to understand the terrible significance of an oppressive society? Who suffer the effects of oppression more than the oppressed? Who can better understand the necessity of liberation?” And then back to Alan here, “In contrast to the Oracle, Neo, as a middle-class white man, struggles throughout the film in his quest to “know thyself.” Neo’s struggle is understandable since he has not experienced the dehumanization of racial oppression, save for his trouble with the corporate culture of Metacortex.”
Merri
So interesting.
Missy
So interesting. Note that Alan here does in fact cite Neo as being white. I – it’s just so interesting – like Neo’s struggle is understandable since he has not experienced the dehumanization of Rachel – racial – Rachel oppression?
Merri
Rachel’s oppression! Fuck you Rachel!
Missy
[Laughing] Neo’s struggle is understandable since he has not experienced the dehumanization of racial oppression. However, he’s mixed race, like Keanu Reeves is mixed race, and therefore, in our general understanding Neo is mixed race. But IS Neo mixed race?
Merri
Well, and also when these movies came out, obviously, Keanu Reeves wasn’t out there being like, “Yo, I’m not white, I’m mixed race.” But at the same time, could he have said that?
Missy
Yeah. Does he HAVE to?
Merri
Does he HAVE to? How is that going to affect his career? How’s it going to affect like, his quote unquote, legitimacy of being a specific race?
Missy
Which was already – like people I think by the time the Matrix sequels were coming out, people were already like, deciding they didn’t like Keanu Reeves anymore.
Merri
Yeah, he had a resurgence.
Missy
Yeah. Which I think was like – it had something – did it have something to do with overcorrection for how he was criticized?
Merri
I think so.
Missy
I can’t remember. I don’t know the whole story.
Merri
But I’m glad he’s back.
Missy
Yeah, I think he’s – he’s a lot of fun.
Merri
He is, and I think he speaks interestingly.
Missy
It’s true. Another issue with the white savior narrative is that while it may include characters of color, they’re usually only helpers, assistance, obstacles, or victims for the white savior to save. We can see that this is true in The Matrix, right? The story is on the surface about an exceptional white man, quote, unquote, flanked by a Black man and a white woman, aided by people of color whose main storylines are about the success of that white quote, unquote, man. Quote, unquote, white, quote, unquote, man. If you read Neo as white, that becomes the story of all of the diverse cast propping up a white man who was nonetheless praised for being exceptional, not great. This essay, and some others we’ll get into, isn’t saying that that’s necessarily a bad thing. Allen argues that rather than elevating the white protagonist, this honors the knowledge and wisdom of Black women as well as the contributions of Morpheus as a Black man. Which, I don’t know, I think the casting and characterization of the Oracle are deliberate. But I have seen my fair share of white women leaning on black women to save us all and provide free education without putting in the work themselves.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
If this cause is so noble, if the wisdom of Black women is so treasured, then why not have the protagonist be a Black woman? You know?
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Like, you know.
Merri
I think it was – I totally think it was deliberate to do most of the cast as non-white people because you just didn’t see that. And in 2000, you just didn’t see that.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
And so it does make it like – it just only adds that layer of Keanu Reeves being mixed race and Neo being white and like everything that goes on there.
Missy
Something is certainly being communicated there. And I don’t think that we need the Wachowskis to comment on it for us to glean something interesting.
Merri
And I wonder if this is their way of talking about the trans experience, but using – not talking about it, but using –
Missy
There’s a lot of that, we’ll get into that section –
Merri
But using ways that people can attach to and be like, “Oh, yeah, I learned about like oppression in school.”
Missy
Right.
Merri
And using that to… not promote, to like, express their frustration.
Missy
Yeah, I think that the Wachowskis – and we talked about this in the Sense8 episode – their stories are often about this kind of radical compassion for difference and the strength that our differences imbue us with like, in a positive way, but, there is an issue with a sort of flattening of experience that the Wachowskis repeatedly do.
Merri
Well, and I also think there’s – I don’t know if there IS – but I think it’s definitely up for discussion of like, is using the Black experience or person of color experience of being oppressed, and using that as a white woman, okay? Especially when one of them has dreads? Like –
Missy
Yeah…
Merri
Like, are you – I wouldn’t say fetishizing, that’s not the word that I would use – but something similar of using their oppression as a way to benefit themselves.
Missy
Right. I think that the – it gets really complicated because like Black trans women exist, trans women of color exist. And so why not talk about that experience, as opposed to trying to map racism specifically onto the experience of gender, when in fact, there are intersections there. And that does shape things. When you try to flatten experience into one thing you end up accidentally implying that Black trans people don’t exist.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
And they do, in fact, and they have a unique life experience that is informed by both their race and their gender.
Merri
I think it would be also interesting – obviously, we can’t do it here, we have so much – but to do a deep dive into how race was handled around this time.
Missy
Right.
Merri
And if that affected it as well.
Missy
Yeah, I imagine some of – thinking like A Splinter in Your Mind, Lawrence notes that there was some people found the the predominantly – the cast being predominantly people of color unbelievable.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
There was pushback on it, because it was just like, that’s too many.
Merri
That’s too many?
Missy
That’s too many. And we’ll get into that very shortly about the reason that they might have chosen to do that. But first-
Merri
I think that Fast and Furious does this, probably a little bit better than them.
Missy
Yeah. This is a quote Wake Up, Neo: White Identity, Hegemony, And Consciousness in ‘The Matrix,’ by Ricky Lee Allen, who writes, “For whites to be anti-racist, they must learn to move other whites toward anti-racist and anti-whiteness ideologies. But what we get in The Matrix is the message that the best way to transform whiteness is to move beyond it. In fact, there’s an element of nihilism in the Wachowskis’ solution to whiteness. It seems that they are suggesting that the best way to overcome an oppressive society built on oppressive that rules is to simply ignore the rules.” And this is now the third Wachowski-helmed thing that we have talked about (they didn’t direct V for Vendetta, but I really think you can feel their impact all over it) and I think this is an unfortunate running theme of their work. I think that racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry are baked into the Matrix that Neo is attempting to free people from, right? He’s literally attempting to free people from the 1999 world that (assuming you were alive in 1999) that you – that we inhabited. But it is still Neo freeing them and unlearning it. And, within the context of The Matrix, unlearning that is really as simple as taking a pill and unplugging yourself. It is not actually that simple in real life.
Merri
If only.
Missy
Yeah, the Wachowskis often seem to be operating from a post-racial perspective, meaning that their stories tend to suggest that racism is a thing of the past, unless it is concentrated in a few bad people.
Merri
That feels very Wachowski to me.
Missy
Yeah!
Merri
Like that feels SO Wachowski to me.
Missy
Right. This allows people to absolve themselves from responsibility in perpetuating or benefiting from racism without questioning it. You also see this in ideas about colorblindness, something we’ll get into as well, which suggests that not seeing race is tantamount to race being something only bad people see. In fact, ignoring the realities of race and our culture can be just as damaging as being actively racist. We don’t need to deny that race exists to end racism. We need to understand what racism is, what purposes it serves, and how it impacts people.
Merri
There’s a really good conversation about this on Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.
Missy
I’m glad.
Merri
It was really good! It was really good especially because like I said, these are rich women and this new woman, she’s Asian, and she’s much younger, and she’s just like – she looks at the one girl and goes, “Tell me you’re that girl who doesn’t see race.” It was really good. And then they’re having a conversation later and Kathy Hilton’s like, “I don’t see race, Michael Jackson told me the same thing,” because she knew Michael Jackson because these are white rich women! And it was very – it was a really good conversation.
Missy
Oh my god. So, as we’ve discussed, despite the potential reading of Neo as a white savior, this is a series with a very diverse cast. Even aside from the main cast, most of the population of Zion seems to be people of color, which is really interesting. On the one hand, I think the Wachowskis are depicting this idealized post-racial dream, where whiteness is no longer dominant. In Like a Splinter in Your Mind, Matt Lorenz proposes an interesting theory for why Zion has such a high percentage of people of color, which is, and this is a quote, “It may be predominantly racial minorities who freed themselves from the Matrix. As Morpheus indicates, most people aren’t ready to be unplugged. They are dependent upon the system and it will be those who are most dissatisfied with the system. The victims of racism may therefore be among the most likely people to welcome a way out.”
Merri
This is really interesting when you put this up against the real world people who red pill themselves being all fucking white men.
Missy
Yeah! I find this really – this a really compelling theory because when you think about it, who is more likely to see through the – like to see the constructiveness of ideals in our society, and its people who are impacted by them. And I think in 19 – not 1993 – in 2003, it was probably easier to talk about visual signifiers like race, as opposed to gender signifiers, which would – if you look at how people wrote about the Wachowskis coming out, I mean, I can’t remember exactly when… I think Lana came out first.
Merri
I think I was –
Missy
And it was nasty!
Merri
I think it’s 2016 when the second sister came out –
Missy
Lilly, yeah. And the things that people wrote about Lana, like, nasty, nasty, nasty.
Merri
I can only imagine.
Missy
It’s – it was awful! And so I think that it was probably easier to talk about the constructiveness of reality by talking about something with a visual signifier like race as opposed to gender, which is not necessarily visual, and which is complex. And I think in, you know, in 2003, it was kind of agreed upon – “racism bad.”
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
But we weren’t quite – I mean, it was also “misogyny bad” but we – I don’t think we had reached the point where we were –
Merri
I think the –
Missy
– capable of talking in the mainstream about being trans, you know?
Merri
I think this was like the height of – or like the end of an era where like, talk shows brought on racist people and BIPOC people to talk to each other. And so I think it was probably a perfect situation where like, “Yeah, this is – we can use this as a way to connect and make people understand.”
Missy
Yeah. I don’t know whether this idea of like, it was easy – it was easier to wake, you know, marginalized people up from the Matrix simply because they were more aware of the constructiveness of society. I don’t know whether that was intentional. It may very well have been.
Merri
I feel like it was.
Missy
Yeah, like –
Merri
I feel like it was –
Missy
I can’t say it was or wasn’t, but I feel like I would believe it if they were like, “Yeah, that was intentional.”
Merri
Just with the intentionality of like, they clearly went out to cast this of mostly non-white people. And like, all the other stuff involved that we’ve talked about it really I’d be like, 85% sure.
Missy
Yeah. But it does – regardless of whether or not it was intentional – it lines up nicely with what other more modern critics have said about The Matrix. When you look at the film through a more modern lens – one that acknowledges the Wachowskis as trans women, and that acknowledged Keanu Reeves as a mixed race actor (Lawrence does not, the book came out before the sisters came out). When you keep those things in mind, it becomes a lot easier to get on board with this reading, because instead of a white man leading the world out of enslavement, you have a mixed race man written by two women who understand that the reality we’ve constructed for ourselves is not necessarily “real,” being the hero. That makes a lot more sense to me.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
The Wachowskis are not always good with race, so I don’t want to give them a ton of credit for something they may not have intended. But reading work by later critics looking at the series retrospectively, I saw a lot more praising the film for its diverse cast and a lot less decrying it as white saviorism. This is a quote from The Hidden Gems of ‘The Matrix’ Are Its Black Characters, which is by Kristen Corry who writes, “As a writer who writes about race, though, I couldn’t help noticing that some of the film’s most compelling and foundational characters were Black – even without a leading character in Will Smith, who famously turned down the role of Neo. Morpheus and the Oracle (Gloria Foster), a woman who uses her clairvoyant powers to help the insurgency, aren’t just integral to the plot; both intellectually and in the tactical sense, they’re characters who hold the keys to dismantling an oppressive system, which suggested to me that race was another through-line worth unpacking in the film. After all, the predicament humanity is up against could easily be seen as a metaphor for slavery.” She’s not wrong!
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
The white characters in these movies – white again, in air quotes – the white characters in these movies are two things: dull or evil, right? Resurrections goes a long way toward making Neo and Trinity into interesting characters rather than just archetypes. But still, the most compelling people in the story to me were Morpheus, Oracle, Sati, and so on.
Merri
I love Sati.
Missy
They were vastly more interesting. I don’t know that we can necessarily give the Wachowskis credit for writing bland, white protagonists and interesting characters of color as a statement. Although to be fair, they did do the exact same thing in Sense8.
Merri
Maybe they’re focusing so much on trying to do right that they just –
Missy
I don’t know, I don’t know what’s going on there! But it is interesting, right? That this seems to be a through-line in their work. This is another quote from that same essay, The Hidden Gems of ‘The Matrix’ Are Its Black Characters by Kristin Corry, “While some academics have painted Neo as a traditional white savior, that reading undermines Morpheus’s role as one of the chief architects of the opposition movement. True, he’s decided that Neo holds the power to unlock a better world, one that allows us to escape the way we’ve been quote unquote, “programmed” – but who better to do that than a person who looks like Keanu Reeves, a man who reaps the benefits of being a white-passing male? As James Baldwin once wrote in a 1962 piece for The New Yorker, ‘The power of the white world is threatened whenever a Black man refuses to accept the white world’s definitions.’ That sounds a lot like the plot of The Matrix to me.”
This is just – it’s so interesting to me. I love the idea that Neo, by virtue of being played by Keanu Reeves, is embodying this resistance and rejection of the whiteness being placed upon him. Whether or not that’s intentional is irrelevant, we can reject the author’s intent when we like an interpretation as much as we can when we don’t like it, right? A lot of times when we say “death of the author,” it has to do with like, “Oh, I don’t care what the author says because I don’t like that interpretation.” But we can also do it when we like the interpretation. Because what is literally happening is that a mixed-race man who benefits from white privilege is being “deprogrammed” by a black man. Morpheus, as Baldwin puts it, rejects the white world’s definitions first and eventually through, you know, his teaching Neo does as well. Neo rejects his upbringing, and you could even argue that he rejects his whiteness. I love this interpretation for many reasons. One being that I think it actually ages better than the white savior narrative. When I look at the white savior narrative – when I look at the idea of The Matrix as a white savior narrative – now I cringe a little because I’m like, but he’s – like, that is –
Merri
It feels bad!
Missy
That’s doing a disservice to Keanu Reeves, who is mixed race. Now, if you want to argue that Neo was white and Keanu Reeves is mixed race, now, that is a compelling argument. I don’t know that it’s correct, right?
Merri
But it’s worth talking about.
Missy
But it is worth asking. Like, is Neo white, played by a mixed race actor? That’s interesting.
Merri
Well, in the last one, kinda.
Missy
Yeah. But I think that I think that as you said, resurrection is kind of really puts a stamp on that of saying like, this was intentional.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Because he is – like, the Neo that everybody else sees is white. But the actual Neo is not. Yeah, that is so interesting. I’m so glad you brought that up, because I did not think about that while watching it. Excellent point, Merri.
Merri
I feel good. I feel smart.
Missy
It’s not a perfect answer, because my biggest question becomes, “what would the movies be like if his being mixed race were emphasized rather than unremarked upon?” Although Choi in that early scene does seem to heavily suggest that Keanu – or that Neo is white as opposed to just pale when he says, “You’re looking whiter than usual.”
Merri
Which makes sense.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Cause that’s how they see him.
Missy
Yeah. But that’s not how they saw him in the original Matrix.
Merri
Oh, that’s true, yeah.
Missy
I’m not sure that the Wachowskis are the best choice for that story. But I also think it would have been – it would have resisted some of the more frustrating readings of the movie, right? But I think that this kind of like – again, I think that the fact that the version of him that everybody else sees is white, like really –
Merri
– Hammers it home?
Missy
It really puts that white savior reading – puts it into question, and I love that! I don’t know how successful – like, I don’t think it was successful all the way back in 2001 to 2003, right? Because it seemed that like a lot of people were reading it as a white savior narrative. Yeah. So interesting to read that. And I’m glad that this has now been complicated by Resurrections. Do you have anything else –
Merri
I think Resurrections was good!
Missy
I know! Resurrections was good, actually!
Merri
I feel like – I wonder if we didn’t do this podcast, if you would have enjoyed it as much as you did.
Missy
I thought, well, I thought at least like the first 45 minutes or so of it were super fun. I really liked that.
Merri
I did too. And I love that they changed it into a video game.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
And I just… yeah, I think the best thing that I didn’t notice was the “simu-latte.”
Missy
[Laughing] “Simu-latte.”
Merri
Can’t believe I did notice that.
Missy
Do you have anything else to say about race in The Matrix? I mean, there’s a lot more to say.
Merri
No, there’s a lot to say! But it was really interesting. It was such an interesting thing to think about.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
And it feels very Wachowski.
Missy
It does, it does.
Merri
Like watching Sense8!
Missy
Like I said, I don’t really like these movies, I don’t really like watching them, but you come away with so much to chew on. And I have mad respect for them for that. Like, even they’re flawed at times, right? There’s lots of things that you can point to as being, you know, problematic or out of touch or – like, totally – but at the same time these movies really make you think and I really appreciate that.
Merri
Yeah, I think there’s a clear love for philosophy –
Missy
Yes!
Merri
So.
Missy
Let’s talk about gender!
Merri
I’m ready!
Missy
And The Matrix as a trans narrative.
Merri
I think everyone’s ready.
Missy
I think everybody’s ready for this, right?
Merri
Everyone’s been waiting.
Missy
Yeah, but first, we’re going to talk about Taoism. So, I’m not an expert. And most of the things we talked about here on Fake Geek Girls, I don’t know shit about shit. Unless it’s Shrek.
Merri
That’s not true.
Missy
Unless it’s Shrek, then I know a lot. But I do want to emphasize that I know very little about Taoism and I’m pulling this from Matt Lawrence’s book, I encourage you to look up Taoism on your own and learn more about it or read about it more in depth in Lawrence’s book, Splinter in Your Mind. The reason I wanted to talk about it here is specifically because of – well, first of all, there’s a lot of references to Western philosophy, philosophy throughout The Matrix, right? There’s a lot – in the world, we focus a lot on Western philosophy, but there are schools of philosophy from everywhere, all over the place. The West does not have a monopoly on philosophy. Laurence cites Taoism, a belief system from ancient China, in the section on race and gender as an influence and that’s why I wanted to talk about it here, because I found this really compelling. There’s a lot more to Taoism than we will discuss here, which is discussed in the chapter, I’m just running out of space. We’re an hour and four minutes into this outline, and I –
Merri
We’re halfway through!
Missy
So there’s a lot more to Taoism than just this but we’re gonna focus in on one very specific thing to give us an introduction to how ideas about gender that we often think of as opposing are actually harmonious before we start talking about the seriousness of trans narrative. So again, this movie is heavily influenced by a wide variety of philosophies and most of them that we’ve discussed so far have been Western, but I think that Taoism also plays a role here. I think that Taoism is maybe not as – certainly not as explicitly referenced as Baudrillard. But I think that Taoism is not irrelevant to the events of The Matrix.
Merri
I’m gonna name my child, my eventual child Baudrillard.
Missy
You want your child to get fucking bullied?
Merri
We’ll teach them to fight!
Missy
My fighter child, Baudrillard. In Taoism –
Merri
It’s better than Ratthew!
Missy
No! Ratthew Baudrillard!
Merri
Bob is very much for Ratthew. I hate you. Anytime we talk about names he’s like, “No, it’s Ratthew.”
Missy
Ratthew. In Taoism, life is an endless interaction between the opposing and complimentary forces called yin-yang. You’ve probably heard of this before. Yin is – I certainly had a lot of pants with little embroidered piece signs and yin-yang symbols when I was a child.
Merri
Or like the Ying Yang Twins.
Missy
Of course, how could I forget the Ying Yang Twins. In Taoism, there’s a lot of qualities associated with yin and yang energy. Yin is receptive, yang is active.
Merri
I’d like you to know that it’s “Ying” with a G for the Ying Yang Twins – I did not – I was curious if it was “yin yang.”
Missy
Right, it’s different. Yin is soft, yang is hard, yin is female, yang is male, yin is emotion, yang is reason, etc. The symbol itself is a circle that seems to be swirling in two sort of teardrop-shaped halves, one black and one white, each with a circle of the other inside of it.
Merri
Avatar the Last Airbender does this as well with the fish.
Missy
Yes, they have the fish. The shape itself is balanced and in harmony with itself, one side creates the other just as much as it exists itself, right? It’s it’s a complete hole that is created by the other half of it, which honestly is in line with some Western philosophy talking about like, words only exists to define themselves in opposition to other things. That’s – we’ve talked about that before.
Merri
It gets hard.
Missy
Some people view the association between receptivity, softness, and femaleness as sexist, which – it’s hard to say I disagree with that, but I’m also not sure it’s fair to disagree.
Merri
I feel like that’s like a very much a 2015 feeling.
Missy
Yeah, the thing is that these qualities, receptiveness, passiveness, etc, are not inherently bad qualities, but in our culture, they are seen as inferior, right? I’m not informed enough about Ancient China to say what these associations meant to them. But I also think it’s worth asking whether it’s a bad thing to have all those concepts entangled when the yin-yang idea is the necessity of balance, right? I don’t feel comfortable saying it’s sexist because I feel like that is reductive, or it is not looking at the complete picture of what is being communicated through the idea of yin and yang. Interestingly, Lawrence identifies Neo as being more aligned with yin energy than yang energy. Smith would be the opposing yang energy. Neo is more emotive, softer, and receptive. Smith is none of those things, right? And anytime Neo gained strength, Smith gained strength in opposition. He learned something, the other one learned something, until they build and build and build and they are like –
Merri
A bridge.
Missy
A bridge. Exactly. Everybody remembers that part.
Merri
Yeah. They literally turn into bridges.
Missy
Yeah, it’s it’s super weird.
Merri
It’s the Matrix. You can do whatever you want.
Missy
This embodying of the more feminine energy is one of the many ways that the film explores the spaces between binaries. Again, interesting in light of Keanu Reeves being mixed race, right? Yes, Neo is a man, but in embodying a more feminine energy, even in comparison to Trinity much of the time, there is something different going on with Neo than with many other similar archetypal characters. Neo comes into the story not knowing anything. He is constantly – he’s initially shown up by Trinity, who’s much more powerful than him.
Merri
He’s just a sweet child, with nothing in between.
Missy
He’s a sweet little babe. Despite the seeming “post-racial” society of Zion (it’s a complex topic, but maybe something we can theorize as being possible in this world, right? The idea of it as truly post-racial. Even though many inhabitants would have grown up in the very not post-racial society of 1999 – they wouldn’t even have the excuse of voting for Obama, the way that people now try to identify the world was post racial). So despite that seeming post-racial society, there is still sexism in the real world of the Matrix, right? The characterization of the woman in red as being like, ready for you basically.
Merri
She’s ready for you.
Missy
She’s ready for you.
Merri
She’s RED-y for you.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Ha ha ha.
Missy
You have – there’s more gender equality in terms of leadership and that kind of thing. But the way that characters talk about women is still – still reflects some of the sexism that we would see in our own world, whereas that doesn’t seem to be true of race. And that’s very interesting. And this is a quote from Lawrence, “The fact that Zion has been much more successful overcoming racism than sexism may indicate that the Wachowskis believe that sexism presents the bigger challenge. While both racism and sexism are pervasive in contemporary society, most people do seem to be more open to race-blindness than sex-blindness. Many already regard race-blindness as the ultimate ideal. This, of course, is not to say that they’re without Rachel – racial, what is up with me saying Rachel??
Merri
Rachel’s just a racist.
Missy
Sorry, Rachel!
This, of course, is not to say that they are without racial prejudices, but ideologically a rapidly growing number of people see race-blindness as the promise of the future. In contrast, the dominant ideology of sex and gender does not regard sex-blindness as ideal, for today, or for the future. Many people think that a person’s biological sex should matter, perhaps not for basic rights and liberties, but for a wide variety of personal and social decisions.”
Merri
I thought that was such an interesting point.
Missy
Yeah. And I found this really compelling, especially because I think that Lawrence is onto something here. And he doesn’t even know that the Wachowskis are trans.
Merri
Yeah, that’s so interesting.
Missy
That’s one of those things where like, I think – the movie becomes smarter with more and more distance from it.
Merri
Yeah. Which is very interesting.
Missy
Yeah. Lawrence brings up the argument that the “Ideal of Difference,” which is present in our world, and seemingly in Zion, furthers the oppression of women. Sex-blindness would not do that, as it would understand (stemming from Judith Butler), that gender is a construction. Gender represents another system of control that limits our freedom. Laurence also raises the point that even the construction of our language points to the importance of gender in our society. We refer to people as he or she, rather than (typically) with a genderless pronoun, meaning we are constantly inundated with gender as difference and gender as a thing that that matters to us, right? There are languages where pronouns to refer to people are not gendered. But in our language, we use he or she to immediately identify as somebody belonging to one of two binary category.
Merri
And if people can’t, they freak out!
Missy
Yes!
Merri
They freak out!!!!
Missy
They treat grammar as if it is a real thing, and not a thing we have invented to explain our experience of the world.
Merri
I was once – I used to work in the construction industry. And I was at like a – I don’t know – some talk where they talked about like HR stuff for construction industries, and somebody had asked, “What happens if we don’t have a bathroom?” So essentially – the bathroom issue, and not knowing what to – the pronouns, and everyone was just kind of like stuttering over themselves and they were like, self destructing. And I raised my hand, and I’m like, “You can just use they…”
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Instead of just like that – and everyone just was like, “Huh??”
Missy
That just shows how important the gender binary is to our – not just our language, to our perception of the world, people tend to short circuit when you present them with an alternative.
Merri
They die.
Missy
Yeah, they just –
Merri
– They just keel over.
Missy
Yeah, it just goes to show that language is as important in our concept of the world. So it’s interesting that the Wachowskis create a world that seems race-blind (there does not appear to be racism and in Zion at all), but not sex-blind, right? It does seem as though we are still aware of gender as being this very important thing that we must identify correctly. And the associations with gender are still the same as they were in the Matrix, even though they are just as constructed as a concept of racism. There are a couple of interpretations here, right? That the Wachowskis think we’ll never escape the ideal of difference with regard to gender, right? That’s one. That they didn’t think about gender at all, or that they think gender-based ideology is more difficult to overcome than race-based ideology. The first two seem unlikely to me, although it is possible that being inundated with gender-based discrimination daily in our world, they forgot to strip it out.
But I don’t think debating over whether sexism or racism is more ingrained in our culture is a productive exercise. They are both bad and some people experience more than one of them. But it was interesting to read this in light of the Wachowskis being trans, and in light of some of the evidence that we will discuss later. Why does sexism persist in Zion? I don’t know that we have an answer. Can it ever be eradicated? I would be surprised if the Wachowskis did not think it could be eradicated, but as closeted trans women, I wonder if they were suggesting something about the amount of time it will take to get there. Just to be clear, I don’t agree with them that racism is easier to eradicate than sexism. This is just what I’m gathering from the movies. That’s not – I’m not super in agreement there. Especially because of the role that white women play in perpetuating racism and benefiting from racism.
So this is a quote from Mastering the Real: Trinity as the “Real” Hero of “The Matrix” by G. Christopher Williams. This was, again, written before Resurrections. “One of the more important of these opposition’s in the film is male and female.” And – this is Melissa here – the idea of them as oppositions is where I want to tie back into Taoism. Like, is it opposite, or is it balanced? “One of the more important of these oppositions in the film is male and female. Ironically, The Matrix, a film that seems to contain so many elements traditionally thought to be appealing to men (with its emphasis on action and special effects) uses predominantly feminine narratives to drive its plot. The mythic structures that are draws on tend to be narratives centralized around female protagonists, like Alice of ‘Alice in Wonderland’ and ‘Through the Looking Glass’, Snow White, or Sleeping Beauty. At the same time, these feminine narratives are often inverted in unexpected ways that tend to drive the film’s Baudrillardian themes.” Baudrillardan, not Baudrillardian, I apologize. “In part it is the the film’s focus on feminine narratives that leads me to believe that Trinity, not Neo (whom most would identify as the hero of the Matrix) is the film’s hero. Her very name suggests an inversion of basic cultural assumptions and expectations. Trinity takes her name from a God most decidedly masculine. This play on expectation is explicit in Neo’s observation on first meeting her in the flesh (as opposed to hearing of her by name only in hacker culture and lore): ‘I just thought… you were a guy.’ And the irony is acknowledged most clearly in Trinity’s simple but biting answer: ‘Most guys do.'” I think calling Trinity the real hero of The Matrix (until Resurrections) is a bit of a stretch. But given that we now know the Wachowskis are trans and that the idea of the structures in our culture being something you can transcend, I think there’s something to this.
Merri
I agree. And I think it’s really interesting to put this whole idea into something that does feel very, quote unquote, masculine.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Because especially when we’re talking about Yin and Yang and one being more feminine. And it kind of feels like – The Matrix kind of feels like that. What you just said, “I just thought you were a guy…. Most men do.” That’s so interesting.
Missy
Yeah, like it’s really clever.
Merri
I thought The Matrix was for dudes… well most dudes do think that!
Missy
Yeah! It’s legitimately so interesting.
Merri
I guess the Wachowskis are smarter than I gave them credit for.
Missy
Carrie-Anne Moss (who plays Trinity) is obviously very beautiful, but she isn’t beautiful in the way that say, Monica Bellucci (who plays Persephone) is beautiful. Different kinds of beautiful, right? When you put the sunglasses and trenchcoat on Carrie-Anne Moss, she and Keanu Reeves do not look that dissimilar right? They look pretty similar. Masculinity and femininity, two values that our culture takes very seriously, are questioned in the way that the movie presents them. You can almost look at Trinity in the Matrix, with the sunglasses in trench coat, and look at Neo in the sunglasses and trench coat, and think about them in terms of the yin-yang, right? The idea of, both are balanced, both contain parts of the other, they’re two parts of a whole, rather than being two individuals.
Merri
Just like the force!
Missy
Just like the force. There is a playfulness here about the idea of gender, that you know, because our culture takes gender very seriously. There’s this playfulness about gender in this film that I think can fly under the radar for viewers who aren’t looking for it. This playfulness is in line with trans readings of the film, as it deals with the fact that these categories of male and female, masculine and feminine are not hard and fast borders, right? There’s one of the characters, Switch, who appears in the first movie, was originally – well first of all, the name’s Switch. It was funny –
Merri
I never thought about that!
Missy
It was funny because I was reading an essay and it was like, “Well Switch is obviously meant to be bisexual,” and I was like, “Hmm, interesting.” But in actuality, the original proposal was that Switch would be played by a person of one gender in the real world and a different gender in the Matrix. That was shut down by the studio and they were not able to do it. So instead, they chose an androgynous – more androgynous-looking actress who dresses, I think, more like in sort of gender-fucky ways in the Matrix.
Merri
“Gender-fucky” is great.
Missy
She appears in a flesh colored shirt with a white blazer over the top of it so that it looks as if she is bare-chested, but she isn’t. There’s a lot of playfulness in that character, and just the idea that the character is named Switch is itself quite funny. One of the most playful ways this shows up that people have pointed out is that in the last few frames of the original Matrix, the camera zooms in on the words “System Failure,” like this is the last shot of the movie. And the camera zooms right between the letters ‘M’ and ‘F’ as Neo says that boundaries and borders are not real.
Merri
This is when they’re like, “You know, we’re just gonna fucking hand it to you.”
Missy
Like straight up, it zooms in between the ‘M’ and ‘F’ as Neo is like, “Borders and boundaries, they’re not real folks!” He does not say that exactly.
Merri
But he might as well!
Missy
So, it’s just – it’s super playful and fun. And you know, it’s one of those things, I don’t know if that’s exactly what the Wachowskis intended. But it could be! The evidence is there!
Merri
This feels like an undercover movie, you know what I mean? It feels like a dude, quote, unquote, movie, but it’s so not!
Missy
Yeah!
Merri
It feels almost like an inside joke, now.
Missy
It really feels as if they were winking the entire time at you and it’s so funny. So, while the idea of yin and yang and male and female can be looked at as restrictive or as boxing you in, it’s also possible to see them as something that we all share and embody at once. Balance exists within us, and that balance is also an opportunity to explore the spaces between what we see as rigid categories, right? Because when you look at the yin and yang symbol, it’s not like – again, it is not hard boundaries there. Each contain the other and each is formed by the presence of the other. And we can see that as like, “Oh, I have to be yin or yang, but yin also contains yang, yang also contains yin, and, you know, the whole is constructed out of these – you can look at them as oppositions or you can look at them as harmonious. And I thought that was really interesting and expressed in such an interesting fashion in the movie.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
This is a quote from How The Matrix universalized a trans experience — and helped me accept my own by Emily [St. John], who writes, “The plot of The Matrix mirrors the online gender experimentation of the early digital era, when some unsuspecting egg-” if you’re not familiar, egg is a term for a person who is trans but who has not yet acknowledged it to themselves.
Merri
Egg.
Missy
“The plot of The Matrix mirrors the online gender experimentation of the early digital era, when some unsuspecting egg might log into a chat room as a woman and discover how much better it feels to embody that version of themselves. And discover,” oh, sorry, went back on that a little bit, “embody that version of themselves. Inhabit that experimental space long enough, and you might eventually find yourself breaking through the shell containing the hermetically sealed worlds you thought you lived into some other reality entirely. That reality might reduce everything else in your life to rubble, but getting to experience it is worth the fallout… The characters [of The Matrix] reject the names they were born with – in Neo’s case, Thomas Anderson – in favor of their chosen names. Their wardrobe grows increasingly androgynous and leather-bound. The entire movie is about transcending the limitations of the physical form to explore what the mind is capable of. Bodies are, at best, a suggestion. Your brain is what really matters.”
So when you look at this movie with transness in mind, it all slots into place, right? This isn’t incompatible with the things we talked about in our first episode – Baudrillard’s Simulacra and Simulation, which I wrote wrong, for example – because all of this is intertwined. Gender is one of the many myths that our culture sees as truth, right? We assume that gender is “real,” and “tangible,” and “embodied” when in fact, it is performative, it is constructed, it is just comprised of signs rather than as, like anything real.
Merri
There’s a really good – in Congress, I don’t know what it was for, but I think they were talking to a teacher, and they asked the teacher, what is a woman? And she’s like, “I can’t – I’m a woman.” She’s like, “That’s the only way I can answer it.”
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
“I’m a woman.”
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Like, how do you say what a woman is?
Missy
Right.
Merri
You can’t.
Missy
You can’t do it. Gender is one of the many myths that our culture sees as truth. A way of explaining, for example, our differing bodies and what those bodies mean. In actuality, gender is as much a story as anything else, right? Our body has no inherent meaning. And that’s not a bad thing. It is not a bad thing for gender to be disconnected or disentangled from the experience of the body. Of course, that’s personal, right? Some people feel very rooted in their body as it is. Some people can want to change their body to to better match their perception of their self. That’s all okay. The point of this is that gender itself does not stem inherently from what the configuration of your body is. And the connection to the internet that [St. John] brings up here really interested me because it’s not something I’ve thought about at all. But it makes a lot of sense! What better place to experiment with identity that feels better to you than the one you were assigned at birth than a place where your body is not present to be judged and assigned value by others, right?
Merri
They must have been so mad when the online people co-opted “Red Pill.” They must have been like, “All our work for nothing.”
Missy
Really, really that when they responded – when Lilly responded to Elon Musk and Ivanka Trump on Twitter and said, “Fuck you both.”
Merri
That’s the vibe.
Missy
Yeah.
This is a quote from The Matrix As a Transgender Metaphor by Adam Pillfold-Bagwell, “Aside from never being explicitly described as such, Neo is practically an archetypal trans woman. Every day he puts on a suit and tie and goes to work, but no matter how hard he tries he can’t fit in. He has friends in the counter culture but he doesn’t really connect with them either, and when they go out he stands in a corner staring at beautiful women. Something is always off, always wrong. A splinter in his mind, as Morpheus puts it.” I think it is easy for viewers to read these events – like these things that are literally happening in the movie, right? As emblematic of the same kind of disenchantment and ennui that’s present in films like Fight Club, although Fight Club was written by a gay man, right? Like, it’s not as simple as we want it to be. And I think –
Merri
There is a really good scene where it looks like Fight Club at the end. I can’t remember where it is. Like, “Oh, that looks just like the ending of Fight Club.”
Missy
Yeah, I think it’s really easy to read it as just disenchantment and ennui, right, which results directly from capitalism and pressures to conform to certain masculine expectations.
Merri
Can you explain what ennui means?
Missy
Ennui is like that sense of like, existential boredom and dissatisfaction.
Merri
Ah, okay.
Missy
But when looking at The Matrix is a trans narrative, there’s an additional layer of distance to Neo that could very well stem from being trans, Right? This is a quote from that same essay, The Matrix As a Transgender Metaphor by Adam Pillfold-Bagwell. “Morpheus wakes him from his dream with a red pill very reminiscent of spiro – spironolactone,” I’m so sorry if I said that wrong, “the most common testosterone suppressant used by trans women, which typically comes as a sunburnt red tablet.” Just as an aside, I don’t know this for sure. But some of the essays I read contradicted what pill this would be referencing here. This pill in particular, which now is very common, is no longer red, which we’ll talk about later. But the pill, as I understand, the pill that was commonly given to trans women at the time was in fact red. “After literally rebuilding his body, Morpheus apologizes to Neo for the stress he’s going through, telling him they have a rule against freeing people from the Matrix after a certain age. Along with Cypher’s insistence in the film’s opening that their attempt to free Neo will kill him, this is a reference to the toxic narrative among trans people, formed by gender-normative society’s continuous pressure to conform to its standards, that you will never be able to truly be the gender you identify with, if you transition after puberty.”
Merri
That’s interesting.
Missy
I really don’t have much to add to this. I just think this is all really compelling evidence toward a trans reading that I totally missed, right?
Merri
Didn’t they originally reject the idea that it was a trans –
Missy
I am not sure. I know that Lilly has since – she did an interview that I linked in the last episode where she talked about some of the ways that there are – it’s not a trans narrative entirely, which we’ll get to, I think that’s really important.
Merri
It was their actual life.
Missy
Yeah they were certainly gesturing towards their experiences and throwing in these things that were definitely intended to reflect the trans experience.
Merri
Because it was their life.
Missy
Because it’s their life, right? In the same way that in Resurrections – that’s just Neo’s life that he’s recreated and everybody’s sitting around interpreting it in all these different ways. And he’s like, this is my life.
Merri
I sure do –
Missy
That’s what happened –
Merri
– love the Wachowski biopic.
Missy
Again, it doesn’t matter. Oh, there’s – so there’s this level of subtlety here that I think can easily fly under the radar to cis viewers, but to trans viewers, they may be able to see this and be like, “Yeah, I get that.” Not even just in a ha ha funny way, but they may find themselves – find it resonating with them in a way that cis viewers are just sitting there like, [mindblown dude-bro voice] “Oh, red pill, cool.”
Merri
“Just like Alice in Wonderland.”
Missy
It doesn’t matter if it was intentional, although the Wachowskis were trans before they were out. They were aware of this. The evidence is there and it makes for this very compelling reading. This is a quote from What We Can Learn About Gender From The Matrix by Andrea Long Chu, who writes, “But let’s face it: Allegorically is the least interesting way to read anything. Nothing brings a question like an answer; the world is weirder than that. Consider, for instance, that the most common form of orally administered prescription estrogen today is probably the beveled, flat-faced two milligram estradiol pill.” – est – estradiol. I’m so sorry, I cannot pronounce medications!
Anyway, “Consider, for instance, that the most common form of orally administered prescription estrogen today is probably the beveled, flat-faced two milligram estradiol pill supplied by the Israeli pharmaceutical company Teva.” ‘Teeva?’ ‘Tehva?’ I don’t know. “It is, as it happens, blue…. to exit the Matrix is not to know the truth but to discover the poverty of knowledge. ‘Welcome to the desert of the real,’ Morpheus intones after Neo takes the red pill. There’s a reason the real is a desert. What good is the truth if nothing grows there? The notion that gender was socially constructed, instead of biological fact, was intended to free people like me from our assigned sexes. It did this, perhaps, but only at the cost of the very categories into which we sought entry. As a good feminist, I know there’s no such thing as a woman. As a woman, I resent this.”
I love this essay, because it grapples with some of the difficulty of having your mind openened to this kind of thinking in a way that’s more interesting than, “I want to eat steak again!” a la Cypher. In fact, it is very hard to resist conditioning, right? Conditioning affects us all. Regardless of your gender, your race, we are all impacted by it. That’s why things like internalized racism, homophobia, misogyny, etc, exists – we’re all inundated with the same cultural programming, right? And even when we acknowledge that it is programming, it is still hard to disentangle it from your sense of self. Sometimes it makes us very uncomfortable to do that. Things in a movie are as simple as taking a pill and understanding the world better. In real life, we have to grapple with not having adequate language to match up with our experiences. The category of woman is real in that it has meaning and value to people who call themselves woman, but it is also not real in that it is something experienced, felt, and created rather than something that can be verified through our senses. Nobody likes to be told that their identity is not real, right? It’s like nobody likes to have that rug pulled out from under them. I can’t speak for what this author is taking away from the many essays about The Matrix as a trans allegory, but one thing I think is important to keep in mind as we talk about this is that nobody is obligated to embrace or like The Matrix simply because it can be read that way. If this movie makes a trans person feel alienated or uncomfortable with what it’s saying about categories that carry a lot of meaning for those individuals, such as gender, that’s okay.
Merri
It’s valid.
Missy
Yeah, they do not have to be like, “Well, I have to like it.” You can dislike, you know, you can dislike this movie for its portrayal of gender, you can dislike the story or its aesthetics, you can dislike Keanu Reeves, there’s literally no reason you have to be invested in the story, even if you are trans. And I think that’s something that is important to remember. Because I think there’s this tendency of like – I’ll use the example of cis people talking to trans people here, but like – I know people – people being like – going to trans people and being like, “Oh, you’re trans? You must have loved the Matrix.” [Laughing ] Like – it’s just – they don’t have to, you know? In the same way of like, I’m trying to think of an example. I guess a big one right now, “Oh, you’re gay? Have you watched Heartstoppers?” Like, come on.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
There’s no, there’s no obligation. So like, I – again, I don’t want to make claims about what this author is feeling while talking about The Matrix. But it is uncomfortable to be confronted with this knowledge and it is totally okay for anybody to watch The Matrix and be like, “I don’t feel comfortable with what that had to say about gender,” or, “I don’t feel comfortable with that.” It’s, I mean, it’s different coming from a cis person being like, “Actually, it’s fucked up that people can be a different gender.” That’s –
Merri
– That’s a whole different thing.
Missy
That’s a whole different thing! But like, it’s okay to disagree. Even if you feel like you should agree, you know, it’s okay. It’s okay to –
Merri
And same the other way. Some people like – what, Sleepaway Camp? Some people find that good – not good, but like, themselves in there.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Even if it’s like, really problematic.
Missy
Yeah. And that’s okay. Like it is not – you are not obligated to feel one way or another about media that is like, quote unquote, about you, you know? This is a quote from Is The Matrix a trans film? Revisiting the Wachowskis through a trans lens by Naja Later, who writes, “The matrix proposes that your self image is separate from your physical body; that everyone raised in an oppressive system will violently defend that system unless they’re ready to rip themselves free of it; that we all fall in our first jump, but with love and belief from others we can become ourselves; that our duty is to free others after that and to break the entire system so it cannot be rebuilt. Yes, gender is one of those systems, but films like Cloud Atlas and Jupiter Ascending are more concerned with the exploitation of proletariat bodies to feed a surface of luxury: these themes have more to say about capitalism than a reading that treats gender subtexts like crossword clues.”
Merri
Can you explain to me what “proletariat bodies” means?
Missy
Proletariat is like the working class.
Merri
Okay, okay, I was looking at it in a different way like, a “proletariat body” being something physical.
Missy
Oh, so “the exploitation of proletariat bodies.” Basically – I haven’t watched Cloud Atlas, and I watched Jupiter Ascending like 10,000 years ago. But basically what the author is saying here is that the Wachowskis’ films are often about the dismantling of systems. And because the Wachowskis are trans, we look at their movies, and we want to see transness and gender everywhere. But there is in fact, more going on. And in Cloud Atlas and Jupiter Ascending, it is more about the exploitation of the working class and their bodies specifically, rather than just gender. I really liked this article, because while it celebrates a lot of the beauty that The Matrix is suggesting, and its pushed back against the systems that hold us captive. It’s also a great reminder that trans people are more than just trans, right? Trans is a separate prefix, or – it’s not even, I would say it’s more of an adjective, right? Describing people. It’s not even a prefix.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
That tells us that trans people are people, right? It’s an adjective describing the type of people.
Merri
It only adds to the layer of like, why it’s so just vicious for politicians and stuff to be like, “Don’t teach transness in schools,” because it’s just even more dehumanizing.
Missy
Exactly. When we look at movies like The Matrix, there is more to unearth there than just the Wachowskis’ transness. Like the rest of us, they carry thoughts and biases that go beyond their gender, and it does them and their films a disservice to only see gender where there are, in fact, a bunch of meanings and layers to see. This is especially true when talking about the Wachowskis, who really do tell these wonderful, imaginative stories, but have a real problem with interrogating race and colonialism in those same stories. We can’t assume that they know what they’re doing in every sphere, just because they are trans. And we can’t assume that everything they’re doing comes back to gender just because they are trans.
Merri
That’s like the “perfect oppressed person” or the “perfect trans person”, the “perfect gay person,” and like, they can do no wrong, it’s dangerous.
Missy
Right. The Wachowskis are people, and they are as flawed and complex as the rest of us. And the art that they create, I’m sure is as much about gender as it is about all of these other things that interest them, the exploitation of the working class, this utopian vision they have of a post-racial society, just like, art, they like that. Compassion, they like that – all of these things are folded together. And most of them are in conversation with one another, but we don’t need to boil every single thing they say down to gender, and only gender, when in fact, we can talk a lot broader because they’re capable of caring about those things, too.
Merri
They didn’t talk about gender so much before they came out. So, like –
Missy
Well, they – I mean –
Merri
– I mean, but like in interviews and stuff.
Missy
In interviews they didn’t, but they did in their work.
Merri
Yes, they did in their work, but interviews not so much.
Missy
I don’t know, I’m not familiar with their – I think was their first film, Bound, but I know they struggled. They were not out at the time. They struggled with getting it entered into a lesbian film festival.
Merri
Hmm.
Missy
Because – I haven’t seen it, so I could be wrong about the details here. But I think the film is a romance, a lesbian romance, but they couldn’t get it entered because they were not perceived as women. So there was like – they were still talking about gender, but not being read as talking about gender. When you look at their – when you look at their films now and you know that they’re trans women, you’re like, “Oh, you were – it was there all along.” But they were also talking about lots of other stuff. It’s not fair to pigeonhole them into only talking about gender when they have a lot to say about other things too. And as readers, we’re missing – as viewers, as readers, readers in the like, text sense, like, anything is a text. We’re doing ourselves and we’re doing the Wachowskis a disservice if when we look at it, all we see is gender. This is a quote from Why ‘The Matrix’ is a trans allegory by A. Martinez in an interview with Emily [St. John] – I now realize I said her name wrong through the rest of the episode. I’m sorry, I left out the ‘R.’
So in this interview, [St. John] says, “I think that the main thing that the fourth film is about, without spoiling it, is about the idea that these binaries that we’ve built our lives upon are often not as cut and dry as we’d like to think. And that goes beyond gender. There’s all kinds of binaries we built within our lives. You know, good-evil is a very obvious one. I do find interesting – early in this movie, there are characters talking about ways you can sort of interpret what’s happening within the idea of “The Matrix,” and there are people who bring up trans identities. And, like, the idea is sort of within this sequence that you can’t actually boil any of this down to one thing, and I sort of appreciated that. As a movie critic who enjoys the trans themes of these films, but also doesn’t want them to be about just that, I appreciated that Lana Wachowski dropped that in there.”
I loved this about Resurrections. It’s an extremely meta movie in about 100 different ways. But the scene where all the developers argue over what the game is really about is so interesting. In actuality, right, the game is about Neo’s experiences as he experienced them. That’s what it’s about. It’s not – he’s not telling a story about transness, or about capitalism –
Merri
Listen, Neo’s the One, he’s not the intellectual.
Missy
He’s just telling a story that is either reflective of his real experiences or of his psychosis. But all he is doing is telling that story. It is not, to him, necessarily an invention. But everybody brings something to the table, in this case, literally, like, they’re literally all bringing something to the table. They’re literally talking at tables. As part of their interpretation of this seminal work in games, nobody is necessarily wrong. Note that Neo, the author, just sits there and lets them draw interpretations from what is, to him, either his psychosis or his real life, depending on how he’s feeling about it at the moment. He just sits there. And there’s evidence for all of those interpretations, right?
Merri
And none of them ask him.
Missy
Nobody asks him, everybody just sits there and theorizes, and he’s – he seems content, he seems a little baffled by it, but content with that, right? He’s not like, “No, you’re wrong.” It’s not about that. Because in fact, it kind of is about all of those things, right? Of course, you can have a poor reading of a text. Like if I watched The Matrix, and I mean, honestly, if I watched The Matrix and came away with it being about male supremacy, and how women are evil and run the world, I did a poor reading of The Matrix. A lot of people did that, but whatever. I guess they didn’t really do that, they really just use the red pill as a metaphor, but whatever. It is telling to me – I mean, there’s so much about Resurrections that’s really meta. The fact that it’s like, “If you don’t make this movie, we’re gonna make it without you!” Literally invoking Warner Brothers, like –
Merri
Literally just playing scenes.
Missy
Yeah, just – it’s hysterical. But you have Neo there while everybody else makes interpretations of his work, just sitting there, kind of taking it all in. To him, it’s just the story that he told, or it is just his life. And he is not the one – He is the One – He’s not the one to make claims about what it was about. It’s not up to him. It’s the interpretations of all these other people.
Merri
He’s like, “Death of the author, guys.”
Missy
Yeah, he’s literally, death of the author, there. Well, he’s not dead. I think part of the reason –
Merri
The Matrix of the author.
Missy
The Matrix of the author. I think that part of the reason I wasn’t super into The Matrix is that – one of the major ones is that I watched it long after it came out. And by that point, it had already been referenced to death. I mean, I’d seen Shrek, what more did I need to see? I was also a teenager who didn’t understand it. But I was also bored of it by the time I got there, because I was like, “Oh, yeah, the bullet time. Ooh.” But seeing Resurrections at least closer to the time when it came out was a lot of fun. It also didn’t make as much of a splash, so it wasn’t quoted and reenacted to death by the time I saw it.
Merri
Well, you can’t – you can’t quote it, because it’s just coding –
Missy
It’s coding itself. It’s a fucking sim – is it a fucking simulacra of the Matrix? The Matrix Resurrections is a simulacra of The Matrix?
Merri
Don’t start this, it’ll become inception!! Oh, my God, don’t start – and you know, they did that on purpose.
Missy
You’re gonna lay awake at night tonight going, “Is it? Oh, god, oh, god, Baudrillard!”
Merri
It has to be a simulation. But then I’m like, there was a game though, right?
Missy
What do you mean?
Merri
Matrix game?
Missy
Yes. But it was not called just “The Matrix. There was Enter the Matrix and there was a Matrix Online.
Merri
If I’m not gonna dig much more deeper into it, I would say simulation. But I don’t know. Because it’s so self referential.
Missy
So interesting. So, I ended up really liking Resurrections. And I would say it’s either my favorite or it’s tied with the first one for my favorite. Even though it had a just a serious, mushy middle problem. Like, I was re-reading the plot to write the summary for this and I was like, “I forgot about all that,” because it was kind of dull. But when it was good, it was really good.
Merri
The beginning was great.
Missy
The beginning was excellent. Like, I loved it. And I really, really liked the ending of Resurrections as a sort of cap on the conversations these movies are having about gender, specifically. Because – and we’ve probably talked about this on this very podcast in a way that I would no longer talk about it. Because we started this podcast a long-ass time ago, you guys.
Merri
2014. 2015.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
So eight years.
Missy
Our opinions shift and change over time.
Merri
Like, between one episode.
Missy
Yeah, we’re always changing our ideas, that’s the beauty of being human, right? We don’t have to believe the same things that we believed even 10 minutes ago, right, we can change our minds
Merri
Because we gain more knowledge.
Missy
Exactly. So there is this thing called “Trinity Syndrome.” That was a big – along with the Bechdel test, the Mako Mori test, etc. That was like, way back when we started this podcast. There was this kind of like a series of litmus tests that you would apply to media to see whether it could be quote, unquote, feminist or not, or whether you could even like it, I think, was how a lot of people were using it. One of them – one of those ways that people were talking about was Trinity Syndrome, which is like the idea that, despite the fact that a female character is more capable, smarter, stronger, etc, she only becomes an aide to this male character who is not as good as she is.
Merri
Like Leia.
Missy
Yeah. Wildstyle in The Lego Movie was another one. But it was named after Trinity, who is more capable for the majority of the movie than Neo, but Neo is the hero of the story. So the ending of Resurrections also feels meta to me in that it feels a bit like an overcorrection to criticisms of Trinity Syndrome, right? You know, maybe, but it also feels like the natural arc of a story about choice and freewill and beating the system by two imaginative trans women. Even if Lily wasn’t involved in the sequel, which she wasn’t. It felt like – as much as it was, I felt – a bit of an overcorrection it felt a little – a lil’ cheesy.
Merri
I’d rather go that way than just not do it.
Missy
Yeah, I liked it! It’s okay for things to be a lil’ cheesy. I think that the Wachowskis as directors are a lil’ cheesy, you know?
Merri
Yeah, that’s what they do.
Missy
Yeah. And I like that!
Merri
It feels Wachowski!
Missy
I like that about it. And I feel like, I’m glad that – we haven’t, we were just talking about this with regard to Fire Island, we have not left the litmus test approach to media criticism behind, but –
Merri
It’s a bad thing.
Missy
It’s bad. I think that it’s great for starting a conversation but you can’t end there, you got to have some nuance. So, I don’t know, I’m very happy that that was the ending of Resurrections. And I liked that it did instill this, like, kind of counterbalance to the endings of the previous movies. And I am, like – it is a bit meta to almost on page address Trinity Syndrome by having Trinity be the more capable one. But again, it feels natural to me –
Merri
Well and also it does, because she – I mean, there’s evidence. You could go back and trace – like, she is the more capable one.
Missy
Yeah, for sure. For sure. It just so happens that Neo, for whatever reason, is able to manipulate the code initially better than she is.
Merri
Because he’s a hacker and she’s not?
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
I guess?
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
[Hacker voice] I’m in.
Missy
I don’t know. It feels like a joyful overcorrection, right? It doesn’t –
Merri
Yeah –
Missy
What were we talking about recently where it was like… it was Twilight, it was Eclipse with the – it felt like she was preemptively addressing criticisms. This doesn’t feel like that. This feels like, “Hey, you’re kind of right. And we’re going to answer it in a way that feels as joyful as possible.” And that’s how the ending of Resurrections feels to me, the fact that it’s Trinity in the end who can fly and who carries me Neo.
Merri
She’s the Peter Pan.
Missy
Yes.
Merri
And Neo is Wendy.
Missy
It’s – I think it’s – I think it’s so joyful and fun. And that is that is my opinion, so joyful and fun. I liked it, overall. I’m glad we did these episodes, even though I’m not the biggest Matrix fan –
Merri
But it was so interesting! I feel like it’s the same thing with with Twilight, but it’s much more happy.
Missy
Yeah, I don’t – I don’t hate this as much as Twilight. Or The Vampire Diaries… Jesus.
Merri
But the conversation is good!
Missy
Yeah, that’s true. Do you have anything else to say about The Matrix before we wave goodbye to it forever?
Merri
No.
Missy
Me neither.
Merri
It was really good.
Missy
I do, actually. There’s a lot that we didn’t get to talk about.
Merri
I really did – I love the conversation about the – a white man.
Missy
Yeah. I hope that I can hold on to that Baudrillard stuff. I hope that it’s – I hope –
Merri
You should write it down and like, notecard it.
Missy
Yeah, I hope it’s fixed in there. But I don’t know. We’ll find out.
Merri
I don’t hold on to most – I’ll remember, like, the ideas, but I don’t remember who said them.
Missy
That’s fair. That’s fair.
Merri
I don’t know who said ’em!
Missy
Yeah. So, that’s it for this episode. You can find us online at fakegeekgirlscast.com, which has – “cahm?”
Merri
“Cahm?”
Missy
“C-A-H-M?” No, it’s “C-O-M.” It’s a regular website. Fakegeekgirlscast.com, which has all of our past episodes, a link to our Patreon where, for a small donation per month, you can get cool rewards. I also want to give an extra special giant thank you to Emily June. Emily June, thank you.
Merri
Thank you.
Missy
I’m not gonna say what for yet because we don’t have anything – we don’t have anything to show for it. We might by the time this episode comes out, but as a recording, I don’t have anything to show for it. Emily June is helping me with a very, very, very big and important project. So shout out to Emily June. Thank you.
Merri
Thank you.
Missy
Also, if you like this and you want to talk with other people who like this, consider joining our Discord. All you have to do is send me an email at contact@fakegirlscast.com. That’s it. I’ll send you a link. It’s very fun. We talk about all kinds of stuff. We’re talking about the Barbie movie, we’re talking about Barbies.
Yeah.
Our favorite Barbies. Pet pictures. It’s all there. Everything you need. Next time it’s Pushing Daisies. I started rewatching it and it’s just utter joy. I love Pushing Daisies, so much. Lee Pace is so handsome and he’s so tall. And those are the – the facts are these. The facts are these. He’s so handsome and he’s so tall. After that we’re gonna be doing What We Do In The Shadows. I’m very excited. Even if I have to talk about vampires some more, but What We Do In The Shadows is really good. So, I’m ready. And that’s it.
Merri
All right, catch you on the flip side of the Matrix. Whoaoooo!
Missy
Whoaoooo!
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