How a 1999 Keanu Reeves movie anticipated (almost) everything about the way we live.
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This series originally ran in 2019.
We are republishing it asThe Matrix Resurrectionhits theaters and HBO Max.
as if its something everyone should know,The Matrixis omnipresent.
Its not that the film was prescient.
It didnt anticipate our world.
But it anticipated and probably created a new way of viewing that world.
for its era and, even more, for ours.
We live, today, in the anti-reality worldThe Matrixbuilt.
Read more by Mark Harrishere.
Only through the red pill can you see the world for what it really is, and finally!
Read more by Max Readhere.
Here are the more prominent and stranger ones.
Brown Pill
Anti-materialist more concerned with personal enlightenment than with the Illuminati.
White Pill
Ignorant of politics and global conspiracies.
Hates reading and just wants to get laid.
Indigo Pill
Supporter of the Illuminati (or possible member).
Thinks people need to be controlled.
Iron Pill
Into bodybuilding, the neo-Paleo diet, and the alt-right.
Claims to have supernatural powers.
Black Pill
More nihilistic red pill, too dejected to even learn pickup-artist techniques.
(Her sister Lilly followed suit in 2016.)
The agents are transphobia.
And then theres the red pill itself, less a metaphor for hormone therapy than a literal hormone.
Welcome to the desert of the real, Morpheus intones after Neo takes it.
Read more from Andrea Long Chuhere.
Read an interview with Bostromhere.
Is The Mandela Effect proof that whoever is in charge of our simulation is changing the past?
Hereare 15 plausible and not-so-plausible reasons people think we live in a simulation.
Most of What Elon Musk Thinks
Is Elon Musk the real-life Neo?
A former Tesla execsayshes the One: WatchThe Matrix.
He sees these zeroes and ones.
The Rise of Superhero Movies
It was obvious even in 1999 thatThe Matrixhad reinfused action movies with swagger.
This world conditioned us to believe in a fistfight between Tom Hiddleston and the Hulk.
Read more by Adam Sternberghhere.
The Worldand Matt Damons peripatetic amnesiac inThe Bourne Identityand its sequels.
Read more by Angelica Jade Bastienhere.
The Appeal of Donald Trump (at Least to Alex Jones)
Is Donald Trump the real-life Neo?
Nowadays, hes best known for directing the John Wick films, also starring Reeves.
Read an interview with Stahelskihere.
Here was proof that we could no longer trust our brains to process visual stimuli.
The last time I saw bullet time, it was used on the E!
Networks Golden Globes red-carpet show to give audiences a better view of the fashion and celebrities on display.
It helped us get comfortable with no longer trusting our own brains.
Read more by David Edelsteinhere.
Movies still relentlessly chase the high of that notorious sequence, withcan-you-top-this?massacres in every proudly disreputableDeadpoolorKick-AssorEqualizer.
Read more by Alan Scherstuhlhere.
Ten years later, describing life after his second term, Obamasaid, Everything moves in slow motion.
(Bella Hadid Looks Like She Stepped Out ofThe Matrix, read aDaily Mailheadlinefrom March 2018.)
Read more by Emilia Petrarcahere.
When most people first sawThe Matrix, they probably identified with Neo or Trinity.
Lately, I find myself identifying more with the villain, Cypher.
Its called digital rain.
Max Read
18.
EDM
The Matrixs soundtrack featuring Rammstein and Rob Zombie failed to anticipate the bursting of the late-90s nu-metal bubble.
Craig Jenkins
19.
Soylent
In 2019, climate change threatens to decimate agriculture.
Alan Sytsma
… Plus the One ThingThe MatrixGot Wrong:
Where Are the Wachowskis?
Read more by Emily Yoshidahere.
