The Matrix/Awesome

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • This Troper believes that the whole trilogy jumped from one Moment of Awesome to the next every few minutes.
    • For those of who actually enjoyed the sequels (we exist, believe it or not,) this statement is perfectly valid.

The Matrix

  • The prologue sequence with Trinity's escape. Absolutely the greatest introduction of a character ever.
  • Neo's escape from the cubicle room, with Morpheus almost omnisciently telling Neo the exact instant in which to perform an action.
  • Each instance where Bullet Time is used in the first movie, in particular the scene where Neo dodges the bullets on the rooftop.
  • Neo and Trinity shooting up the lobby.

Neo walks through the metal detector and it goes off.
Guard: Sir, could you please remove any metallic items you are carrying... keys, loose change...
Neo opens his trenchcoat to reveal enough guns to kill a small city.
Guard: Holy shit!

  • This Troper would argue that "Dodge this" was Trinity's true Crowning Moment. The character could not possibly do anything to come even remotely close to topping that...
    • ...until she stole the Ducati in Reloaded.
  • I've just got to give a shout out to my all time favorite character in all three Matrix films. That is Cypher, or Mr. Reagan. Especially in his speech, "Ignorance is Bliss". He just perfectly illustrates the reason for the red pill/blue pill decision. Some people just aren't ready for the Matrix, and if you act without thinking, it's hella hard to get back in. Just awesome.
  • No list of awesome moments from this film is complete without mentioning the sparring match between Morpheus and Neo in the dojo. "You think that's air you're breathing now?"
    • Even after downloading combat skills for ten hours, Neo still gets a Let's Get Dangerous moment on top of that: compare his hey-this-is-fun expression early in the first round to his fatigue at the end, then his calm focus when they cut back for the rematch.
  • The scene in the subway station where Neo decides not to run from Smith, turning and fighting him instead. And proceeds to take him down after a very nail biting fight.
  • Even Mouse gets his moment when he realizes his escape is cut off and he's doomed. What does he do? He decides to go out like a Badass. He waits until the entire SWAT team is there, hefts some heavily modified automatic shotguns, and unleashes MORE DAKKA, GUNS AKIMBO.
    • He also notably throws in a final scream for good measure.
  • No love for Tank?

"Believe it or not, you piece of shit, you're still gonna burn!"

  • For this troper, Neo's Crowning Moment came after his resurrection, when he single-handedly fought off Agent Smith, with a look on his face suggesting he was even more bored than usual.
    • To this troper his Dull Surprise actually helped the scene. It marked how Neo was now operating on a level so far above the Agents, he didn't even have to try.
  • "My name... is NEO!" was the most awesome part of the first film for this troper.
  • Trinity's helicopter is stricken. Neo picks up a rope. A rope? Is he mad -- expecting to somehow stop a falling chopper? We soon realize that Neo, in a split second, has formulated the only plan that could possibly work, counts on Trinity to come up with the same plan, and successfully executes it. He not only acts faster than us, he thinks faster than us. This is Neo's Moment of Awesome. There can be no doubt: he is The One.
    • ....This troper always just figured he actually was going to try and stop the falling chopper, I mean, hell, it's the Matrix, why not?
  • Morpheus snapping his handcuffs to majorly heroic Crowning Music of Awesome.

The Animatrix

  • The dojo sequence in Final Flight of the Osiris; for This Troper, it's one of the most erotic scenes of all times, period.
  • For This Troper, Beyond is one of the most stunning animated shorts of all time. The soundtrack alone is incredible in its own right.
    • Don't forget the gorgeous animation, which is both extremely unusual and very natural feeling when the characters are in motion.
  • A Detective Story should go here for combining two radically different genres, Film Noir and Cyberpunk, smoothly and beautifully. The ending where the detective has his gun pointed at the Agents in pure defiance of their mind control/body hopping abilities counts too.
  • Program contains one of the most sumptuously animated duels this troper has ever seen.
  • Although horrifying for some, both parts of The Second Renaissance are filled with this, but most noteworthy is the Epic Battle sequence. Rare to see that in animation nowadays.
  • World Record Begins with a narration that basically says that some people find out about the Matrix without any help due to having key senses of intuition, sensitivity, and a questioning nature, and a rare few find out through "Wholly different means." The story is about a runner who breaks the titular record for the 100 meter dash. His medal is revoked however, due to him testing positive for drugs. Undeterred, he runs another race, and, despite at one point being chased by Agents and muscles in his legs blowing out he is literally undeterred, and keeps running and beating his previous record. The biggest CMOA here is that he managed to break out of The Matrix for a few seconds, only to be plugged back in by the machines.
    • The ending might be an even bigger Moment then that. Since his muscles blew out, the final scene is of him being pushed in a wheelchair by a chatty nurse, not just paraplegic but in some kind of catatonic state, and is being monitered by one of the Agents who were watching and chasing him earlier. The Agent also mentions how his memory of the race was wiped and how "He will never run again. He will never even walk again for that matter." He all of a sudden mutters the word "Free." before getting up, walking a few steps, much to the shock of the nurse and especially the Agent. He falls back down just before it looks like he's about to leave the ground flying. This becomes even more Awesome when you remember that no other character except Neo could possibly fly (We're not counting Smith), and this guy nearly does it after getting crippled.

Other

  • The videogame Path of Neo was hyped as a playable version of the film trilogy in which certain scenes and plot points were altered for a better videogame experience; the actual plot alterations suit this concept well, even if the actual game design fell rather flat. But the Crowning Moment comes at the end, when the Wachowskis - as little 1-bit sprites in a Construct program (Larry as the pink one, naturally) - interrupt the final fight to explain that Neo's sacrifice would make for a terrible ending to a videogame, because gamers want a final boss fight, and they will therefore get one as Neo takes on "Mega Smith". The whole thing is a very thinly veiled Take That at everyone who started professing hatred for the movies as they started losing the pretense of being action flicks and became more openly cerebral, with thicker symbolism instead of direct dialogue.
Back to The Matrix
Retrieved from "https://allthetropes.org/wiki/The_Matrix/Awesome?oldid=1938016"