This deserves a thread imo.

$22M 5-day and $12M Fri-Sun opening. Yes, I know, HBO Max, COVID, Spider-Man massively overperforming, but still, this is less than House of Gucci.

The Matrix adjusts to well over $300M, Matrix Reloaded to well over $450M, Revolutions to well over $200M. They were big films, a cultural phenomenon, and this had most of the original cast back including Keanu who has experienced a revival thanks to John Wick.

So what went wrong here?

The philosophical/meta undertones of the Matrix has never been why it's popular, that's what lost people. Most people's interest in it is more like their interest in Transformers or Fast and Furious movies, they want cool action and fight scenes in a setting where you can make any set piece happen. The trailer just didn't have any of creativity or the life of spots like like Neo flying around on a pole beating up a hundred Agent Smiths and the look of it seemed dark and grim. They would've been better off dumping the Wachowskis and giving the franchise to Matthew Vaughn or something. The lack of castmembers like Fishburne or Weaving also hurt, even Joey Pants would've given it a boost. Trinity was probably the least interesting character to bring back.

Apart from all the things mentioned... Matrix has lost its "cool" factor. Keanu is as popular as ever but this film just didn't make it as a must see event when it should've. Doesn't help that the action is not even half as good as the original, one of the best action movies of all time.

I think this is actually very straight forward combination of things.

-Spiderman beyond overwhelmed it to the point where it was a total afterthought for the under 30 crowd.
-HBO Max took much of the remaining adult crowd
-Trailer and marketing started way too late
-The marketing was surprising non-reliant on nostalgia for the most part. Much of the iconic imagery and feel from the original films wasn't clearly visible here. No Morpheus, no Agent Smith, this just looked different.

I think had those been fixed, there was a lot of potential here.

The sequels to the original ruined the memory of the franchise and this movie looked just as underwhelming off trailers, doesn't surprise me one bit reception for it was poor as well. Felt like a movie that happened just to milk harder rather than because it should've, and people aren't going to come out for those in the current climate.

It's just not hip anymore and the action scenes never looked innovative. They held onto the original too much instead of trying to create a better hook for this sequel.

The movie itself is to blame. People would've been down for a Matrix reboot but not a Matrix reboot that hates itself.

That would impact legs and not opening.

If it was a better movie the trailers and reviews would have been better. Actually better isn't even the right word. More appealing to a mass audience instead of just fans of the architect?

Why should audiences want to see a movie that doesn't want to exist?

Agreed. That's why I mentioned there needed to be a better hook which neither the movie nor trailers conveyed other than just being there after so many years.

Warner Bros dumb dumb decisions is what went wrong

No way Max is the only reason for this disastrous opening.

Well if it wasn't for WB, they could have pushed Matrix to next year, so they were forced to compete with Spider-Man. I think any potential it had was completely destroyed by it being included in the deal so they were backed into a corner. Even a push to say MLK weekend would have been enough room for it breath and potentially break out. But yeah there is plenty to pick from. The marketing was pretty atrocious, Neo looking like John Wick, the film itself being rather non event (if better than any of the sequels, which isn't saying much, that's when WB could at least still market a film)

But even putting all that aside. Its Max numbers were less than WW over a year ago of growth. But it also shows the audience isn't growing for the platform as much as they had hope as well. It did do better on HBO Max then Dune though.

I can't understate how iconic Lawrence Fishbourne was as Morpheus. This was the equivalent of doing Independence Day 2 without Will Smith. Yes Keanu is the anchor here but was so much better around Fishbourne. Feel like he read the script or saw it as a stinker and jumped ship early. Maybe he saw what we are all just finding out now.

Absolutely. Losing Fishbourne and especially Weaving. I actually think of both of their voices/ characters first when I think of the series.

I definitely needed a hook (Maybe Neo being reprogrammed as the villain? I haven't seen it yet, but I think I could have gotten around something like that, rather than seeing younger actors doing MTV impressions of two of the characters)

As far as competition goes I agree that competing with Spidey looks bad now but did anyone anticipate Spidey to break these many records? Also December can handle multiple huge grossers but Resurrections wouldn't have even reached $150m with these numbers without competition.

The sequels killed the good Will of the original. In some respects very similar to how Season 8 killed the global love for GoT.

Not sure if I agree on GOT but I see the point you were trying to make. I still feel like a flood of people will see the prequel coming out later this year. They hated season 8 but the IP is still monetizable.

The Matrix on the other hand is at least another decade away from another attempt/reboot.

No surprise here. Feels like deja vu from the Scarlett case.

https://variety.com/2022/film/news/matr ... 235173757/

I'm wondering what MATRIX RESURRECTIONS would have done had it opened in this empty September...

without hbo max, it probably still could've done 30-40m OW. But it would've bombed regardless

Funny that Constantine is getting a sequel 19 years later. It made $76m domestically. Highly possible it could beat Matrix's 4th box office.

Because The Matrix as a whole, isn't relevant to today's crows.

Period. Thats why no onw gave a fuck. Out of all the 90s requels, this is the one literally no one asked.

It could have made 60 or 70 million total instead of 38 but either way that's still pretty bad.