A Semi-Definitive Ranking of the Fight Scenes in “The Matrix” Trilogy
I am doing a bit of research in advance of a new podcast about the Wachowskis, and as part of that, I revisited certain scenes from the sisters’ filmmaking opus, The Matrix trilogy. In the process I made a great many notes about the quality of the set pieces, particularly between The Matrix and its sequel The Matrix Reloaded. The reason for this is I, perhaps somewhat controversially, prefer the second installment to the first on the basis that it has a higher ceiling as a rollicking action movie with thrilling and creative sequences that pushed the genre further than either its predecessor or follow up The Matrix Revolutions. Necessarily, I felt I should revisit every fight scene and rank them up properly so as to steel my claim on which of the three installments’ set pieces reign supreme.
Before we start, I have a quick note in case you’re wondering where a certain scene is or why it may not have been included. For reasons of preference and ease of comparison, I’ve only included scenes which take place in The Matrix itself. Only one film, Revolutions, has significant set pieces that take place in the real world, and they’re just too fundamentally different to truly compare a mech fight to the specific balletic martial arts, unbound by gravity style that defines the franchise. Additionally some small Matrix-set action scenes may have been excluded due to not really meeting the scope or interest level to write about. So if it helps, consider this my top 14 Matrix set pieces.
14. “Upgrades”: The Matrix Reloaded
This little number near the beginning of The Matrix Reloaded is a bit too brief to be any higher on the list, but it shows how strong the average is for the franchise that such a quality piece of action storytelling can fall to the rear of the pack. In this scene, three agents accost a gathering of Zion ship crews meeting in The Matrix. Neo pops out to meet them and gives them a thorough thrashing. What’s great about the sequence is how it redefines the stakes. In the original film, every Agent was a serious threat, and now Neo can casually handle three upgraded models. It’s a perfect amuse-bouche to kickoff the trilogy’s most fight-heavy installment.
13. “It Ends Tonight”: The Matrix Revolutions
Though it may well be my most controversial pick, the final fight of the franchise is the penultimate on my list. It’s epic in scale and soundtracked by a ludicrously dramatic choral-meets-breakbeat banger called Navras. The Wachowskis had custom rain machines built to create the battle’s ideal aesthetic, and the drops were so massive both Reeves and Weaving claim they were more or less blind while filming. It is an absolute knockout by blockbuster standards, the franchise at its most Dragon Ball Z, for better or worse. It suffers in my opinion from rubbery CGI and generally feeling out of place in its own movie.
12. “Your Men Are Already Dead”: The Matrix
In terms of stills, few if any are more iconic to The Matrix franchise than Trinity’s suspended crane kick in the opening scene of the first film. This jaw-dropping visual is the introduction proper to The Matrix, both for viewers watching the film and people watching the trailer for the first time. I also like to use it as an example to illustrate what I perceive to be the intended visual aesthetic of all Matrix fight scenes — an emulation of manga imagery. What is this moment if not comic book filmmaking at its finest? This scene also comes complete with a terrific rooftop chase and one of my favorite character moments, a fearful but resolved Trinity lying at the bottom of a staircase telling herself to get up and keep moving. Elite opening scene to the film and the trilogy as a whole.
11. Trinity Escapes, Pt. II: The Matrix Reloaded
I have to admit I feel somewhat bad about these low billings for Trinity scenes, but in my defense it’s mostly a matter of form. The introductory fight scenes are generally a bit restrained relative to their counterparts, which makes them feel somewhat perfunctory. This doozy of a bookend goes hard regardless though, beginning with a motorcycle flip explosion and continuing into a beatdown and a freefall shootout with an Agent. The opening scene is a revealed to be a dream sequence, but late in the film we’re treated to a fuller version with greater context and heightened stakes as the scene is interpolated with the climax of the film and charged with dramatic irony.
10. “Lobby Shootout”: The Matrix
Arguably, I am doing this sequence a bit of a disservice by treating it as separate from its kin. This set piece rolls into two others which will appear later on this list, but generally the three work together as a sequence of Neo and Trinity attempting to save Morpheus, who previously surrendered himself to save Neo after an unfortunate sneezing-related bathroom incident. In this first segment, Neo and Trinity go absolutely ballistic on a room full of baddies with an entire armory of rifles and pistols. It’s the biggest, baddest setpiece of the first Matrix, which may leave you curious why it’s so low. The reason for me is two-fold. On one hand, while the choreography is insane, I find the gun-heavy sequences to be a bit less engaging than the matrial arts heavy sequences. This is the biggest gun battle that takes place inside The Matrix, and it’s amazing, but just less my speed than other variants of fights. With that said, moments like Neo’s automatic rifle cartwheel are positively breathtaking, so it’s basically impossible not to get pulled into the kinetic action at least a little bit.
9. “Club Hel”: The Matrix Revolutions
If you wanted to summarize the biggest issue with The Matrix Revolutions in a single sentence, it’d be: there’s not enough Matrix. The bulk of the third film takes place inside the real world, either in Zion or in one of those cool hoverpad ships. I think it’s unfairly maligned, but it’s easy to understand the frustration when the cyberpunk kung fu franchise goes full mech anime. This club sequence at the beginning of the movie though, with it’s BDSM-meets-Blade aesthetic, I would offer, kind of… goes really hard? It’s brief like the other opening set pieces, but it’s super stylish and plays with physics in ways that are really fun. It’s a pity they don’t lead to many cool ideas later in the movie, but it’s still a fun scene set in a place which shows The Matrix itself almost in a state of moral decay, signifying the end is indeed nigh.
8. “Send Backup”: The Matrix
In this third portion of the Freeing Morpheus sequence of the original film, Neo and Trinity take a helicopter with a minigun and blow the hell out of some Agents while Morpheus summons the will to snap his handcuffs in right the hell in half. It ends with a helicopter crashing into a building in the most reality-warping Matrix-y way possible. Damn straight.
7. “Burly Brawl”: The Matrix Reloaded
In an ideal world, this would be a top 3 Matrix fight scene. Reloaded presents the creative idea that Smith, having been freed from being an Agent by Neo has taken on the viral property of being able to copy himself at will over other humanoids in The Matrix. This is a talent which comes to define the second and third films, but this terrific scene is where it is first introduced. The scenery chewing by Weaving to open the scene is a major highlight and what follows is a really electric fight between Neo and about eight Smiths. It’s very cool and totally captures the ethos of the sequel, but it’s let down by its own scale. Regrettably, this scene is badly impacted by dated visual effects and doesn’t make the top selection because of that issue. Had the scene been trimmed, I think it’d be a classic. Instead it’s just very good.
6. “Dodge This”: The Matrix
Though it’s a fair bit shorter than the “Lobby Shootout” and “Send Backup” scenes, this one is elevated over its brethren by virtue of housing to of the most iconic moments in the franchise basically back to back. The first is Neo’s bullet time limbo, wherein he arches backwards in slow motion to dodge oncoming fire. The second is Carrie Anne Moss’ career best line reading, probably. The Matrix, good film, one might say.
5. “My Name Is Neo”: The Matrix
And here we have our heavy hitters, starting with what may be the pound-for-pound best damn fight scene in the original film. After saving Morpheus, Trinity exits The Matrix while Neo is stranded in a subway station with his dead-naming nemesis, Agent Smith. Faced with an opportunity to escape, Neo chooses to fight, and the result is damn glorious. The scene begins with a Sergio Leone-style standoff, complete with newspaper tumbleweeds. It involves a shoot out, a multi-phase fist fight and my man flexing the dust off his arms. The only reason this hefty and satisfying showdown doesn’t rank higher for me is it isn’t conclusive. Neo does run away by the end, and the conflict is settled elsewhere, but not before dropping his best line.
4. “I’ll Handle Them”: The Matrix Reloaded
After showing us an upgraded version of his bullet stop trick, Neo has an eight-way melee showdown with the henchmen of the Merovingian. It’s exactly the kind of preposterous combat sequence The Matrix Reloaded thrives on, stylish, excessive and completely badass. One great thing about this to me is the clear Wuxia influence on the fight and film as a whole. One year after The Matrix hit cinemas, Ang Lee dropped Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, a film which crushed in the States in part due to the success of The Matrix. It’s so amazing then to have a sequel that in turn acknowledges that inspiration and builds off it in a way that fits the essential DNA of the trilogy.
3. “You Could’ve Just Asked”: The Matrix Reloaded
If placing the series’ final fight in twelfth somehow wasn’t my most controversial selection, this assuredly is. This is a small-scale fight that only lasts a couple of minutes between two adversaries that are on the same side. So how does it end up this high? Easy, it’s the best fight scene in the franchise. I feel that this fight, which is really one of the first proper set pieces in Reloaded has the best hand to hand combat, straight up. Every time I watch the movie, I’m dazzled all over again by the tremendous choreography and how Reeves and Collin Chou bring it to life. Seraph is a badly underused character, and I think this short fight proves that in spades. One other note, just like the previous scene I love the clear Wuxia and martial arts film inspiration here. In this installment, Neo no longer fights with firearms. Having ascended from mere mortal to The One means he lets his martial arts chops do the talking, and this scene is really the tone-setter for that transition. The relative lack of Matrix-style physics really enhances the sensation that you’re watching two of the very best fighters in this fictional world test their mettle against one another. I only wish there were more just like it.
2. “I Know Kung Fu”: The Matrix
One thing these films, particularly The Matrix, do not often get credit for is how well they exposit. This is a high concept scifi film that requires a good deal of explanation, but the Wachowskis are able to dress those moments up very well and have the aid of a never better Lawrence Fishburne to make them pop. And as proof this is all true, at the tail end of a lot of info dumping is my favorite scene of the first film — another info dump. If Morpheus explaining the rules of The Matrix to Neo feel like a video game cutscene come to life, this fight simulation is the sisters creating a cinematic tutorial. And wow, is it amazing. We and the crew of the Nebuchadnezzar are treated to a sparring session between the sage captain of the crew and the wunderkind-cum-Übermensch in training. It’s a terrific fight scene that comes complete with some characterizing hand gestures (which get a great reprise in the aforementioned subway scene), development for Neo who is learning his way around these new mechanics, and a truly genius performance from Fishburne. Throughout the fight he’s both taunting and teaching Neo and audiences more about this world. The line, “Do you think that’s air your breathing now?” is one of my very favorites in the whole franchise. As it falls out of Morpheus’ mouth it feels like cool as ice action hero sloganeering, but under the hood it’s a powerful reminder of exactly what The Matrix is and how Neo will come to function within it.
1. “The Freeway”: The Matrix Reloaded
If you thought this list could end with any other scene, you must not know me very well. Let me be blunt, if Mad Max: Fury Road did not exist, this sequence would be, in my eyes, the single greatest achievement in the history of action filmmaking. That’s… a lot, but so is this freeway scene. So legendary is the production of the scene that you can read whole articles about the cost the construction of the mile and a half stretch of highway that was built specifically for the scene. It’s vehicular mayhem that was contemporaneously the most audacious thing that had ever been attempted in the medium. It also involves my guy Morpheus taking out two ghost dudes by slicing their Escalade with a katana and then blowing it to high hell with an uzi.
Long live Bill Pope. Blessings upon the Wachowski sisters. I’m out.
