4/23/2024 0 Comments Matrix blue pill red pill youtube![]() In other words, the Wachowskis are responsible for helping us envision new realities, particularly as the most successful trans filmmakers in Hollywood. ![]() Keegan recently published a book called Lana and Lilly Wachowski: Sensing Transgender, which chronicles their careers as developers of a trans aesthetic that transcends conventional notions of space, time, sex, race, and the disruptions of cinema and transness in parallel. Ironically, this self-discovery narrative likewise captivates trans and genderqueer fans. This journey of self-discovery for Neo appeals to MRAs because it helped to validate their misguided fantasies about the way of the world and what they can become. Tangled up in this perspective on the film are the changes Neo undertakes after he chooses the red pill: in short, he becomes an inordinately cool killing machine, granted the ability to game the system and look badass while performing complex martial arts moves and ultimately learning that he is, literally, The One. The red pill/blue pill concept, to them, offered a way of describing the supposed secret that men are actually the ones being oppressed by women. Of course, these Matrix fans interpreted the film simplistically in the first place. ![]() And while the ideas of identity and transformation are critical components in our work, the bedrock that all ideas rest upon is love." The Guardian even directly wondered if this would "turn off men's rights advocates." ![]() "This is a cool thing, because it's an excellent reminder that art is never static. "There's a critical eye being cast back on Lana and I's work through the lens of our transness," she said. While this in itself could have confused the poor MRA fans, and more importantly recontextualized the story of The Matrix, Lilly herself invited these reappraisals during her first public appearance following her coming out when she accepted a GLAAD Media Award. Soon enough, though, Lana Wachowski told the public that she was a transgender woman, and a few years later, Lilly also came out as a trans woman. This association between The Matrix and these groups, ostensibly fans but certainly inspired by this idea of a bitter pill of truth and hidden reality, came to define the film's legacy during the later aughts. ![]() Men's rights advocates, for example, found something useful about this dichotomy, and began to identify themselves as red pillers - presenting themselves as men that have discovered the brutal truth of the genders and their expectations, the ways in which society is structured, they argue, to benefit women. On a broader scale, the fandom for the film was fiercely devoted to it, attached to the palatable and exciting version of the many ideas swirling around within it.Ĭulturally speaking, one concept really took off in a way that crystallized the complicated and confused reception to the film: Neo (Keanu Reeves) chooses the red pill, symbolizing the path of truth, and rejects the blue pill, representing the illusion of life on Earth. In 1999 and over the years since, The Matrix has been blamed for the Columbine massacre and other tragedies, propped up as a scapegoat for supposedly inspiring young people into violence through its highly stylized combat. It quickly began to seem like a condescending, insular, and aggressive space that I no longer wanted anything to do with. Soon enough, though, I started to notice that the Matrix fandom seemed to be predominantly, suffocatingly, male, particularly once I began spending more time online. The movie appealed to me as a technical marvel and because I was seduced by its ideas, its playful but sophisticated inquiries into spirituality, Marxism, technology, and postmodernism. The film was my favorite movie for years when I was a young teenager, and I rewatched it over and over. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |