Jun. 20, 2003 - 2:49 am
i've been slightly wanting to see this for a few weeks. i guess it's sort of required that you see it at some point or another if you're a really big Matrix fan. i think it's extremely difficult to give this a valid overall rating though. i mean it's composed of 9 different short films all of different calibre. some of them are awesome and some are not at all. anyway i borrowed Colin's copy and Ananda and i watched it...or at least we tried to.
all of them involve the world of the Matrix to some extent, with the exception of "Beyond" which is just idiotic. it's about some girl with a star on her face that loses her cat and finds it in a haunted house where the normal world's physics don't work correctly. and then there's "The Program" which is equally terrible as it takes place in some sort of Japanese sword fight crap under the guise of being a "training simulation."
the first one that i really enjoyed was "The Final Flight of the Osiris," which is actually a part of the back story for Enter the Matrix (the video game) and The Matrix Reloaded (2003). plus it's directed by the same guy who did the animation direction for Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001) which i adore. this short gives the short tale of how the Osiris, a human ship discovered the machines' plot to drill to Zion and then how they managed to convey the information to someone else in the Matrix. very cool idea.
"A Detective Story" was definitely interesting, but not amazing. i think if you're going to watch any of the 9 shorts in this animated collection though, you need to watch "Matriculated." it's very different, but i just watched it in awe. it's extraordinarily beautiful (being done by the creator of Aeon Flux...which i always loved) and the story is amazing as well. it's about a group of rebels who attempt to capture new models of machines and then they bring them into a Matrix simulation in order to give them a virtual red pill/blue pill choice. if they choose to see the beautiful reality that is offered by the humans, the machines sort of develop a conscience and after that point, they choose to defend humans and work alongside them. i absolutely loved it. i would give that short film a 10/10. probably the rest of The Animatrix though, you could do without. i really recommend watching "Matriculated" though.