Yahoo News Laurence Fishburne says The Matrix Resurrections wasn't as good (or as bad) as he thought it would be
Laurence Fishburne, one of the core stars of the Matrix films who was not called back for last year's The Matrix Resurrections, has shared his reaction to the fourth film. And he was... tepid.
"It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be," Fishburne, who played Morpheus in the original movies, told Variety on the red carpet for his new project The School for Good and Evil. His response was followed by a sly pause before he added: "And it wasn't as good as I hoped it would be."
The actor does think Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss, who returned as Neo and Trinity for Resurrections, "did their thing."
When asked if he felt like he had missed out by not being a part of the movie, Fishburne replied, "No, not really."
Everett Collection Laurence Fishburne stars as Morpheus in 'The Matrix.'
Originally released in 1999, The Matrix was the creation of filmmakers Lana and Lilly Wachowski. Resurrections, directed and co-written by Lana without her sibling, was released in theaters 18 years after 2003's The Matrix Revolutions, which many fans thought was the final installment of a trilogy.
Not many stars from the earlier films returned for the franchise's fourth affair. Jada Pinkett Smith reprised her role of Niobe, with heavy makeup and prosthetics to depict her older age. Lambert Wilson showed up briefly as the Merovingian, and filmmaker Chad Stahelski, who used to be Reeves' stunt double on the original movies, came back in the role of Chad. Beyond that, mostly new faces stepped into familiar roles. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II depicted a variation of Morpheus, while Jonathan Groff portrayed a variation of Hugo Weaving's Agent Smith.
Fishburne's Morpheus, however, was honored with a statue in the human city of IO.
Warner Bros. Pictures Yahya Abdul-Mateen II stars as a new Morpheus in 'The Matrix Resurrections.'
"It was my job not to give a literal impersonation of Laurence Fishburne's performance as Morpheus but to understand that history," Abdul-Mateen told EW of taking on the role.
"I was fortunate enough to play a character who was aware of the history of the Matrix but also growing into his own, he had a growth and a rebirth to go through for his own self," he said. "I looked at that as an opportunity to create a character with some freedom and expression and to really find out what it was that I, as Morpheus, liked about myself and what I had to contribute to the world and what I had to say in this universe."
"I have not been invited," Fishburne said while discussing The Matrix Resurrections in a New York magazine story in August 2020, adding, "I wish them well. I hope it's great."
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