アニマトリックス

ANIMATRIX

OVA

STATUS
COMPLETE
EPISODES
9
RELEASE
June 3, 2003
LENGTH
10 min

DESCRIPTION

Final Flight of the Osiris

The crew of the Osiris discover an army preparing to invade Zion. While one crew member races inside the Matrix to get the message to Zion, the others try desperately to buy her enough time while fighting off an onslaught of Sentinels they can't possibly defeat.

2-3. The Second Renaissance Part 1 and 2

Humans have created the ultimate AI, which is just as smart as they are. But complications arise when these robots and the humans try to exist peacefully, and eventually all-out war breaks out. The humans ultimately lose the war, and become trapped in the Matrix as seen in the live-action films.
Kid's Story

A young man discovers that his world isn't real, that it's a computer-generated fantasy land created by robots using humans for energy. He escapes with the help of the hacker Neo. Based on the Matrix trilogy.
Program

Cis and Duo engage in battle in a virtual recreation of Feudal Japan.
World Record

While running the fastest race in his life, a champion track star breaks free of his computer-generated world for a small period of time. When he goes back to the real world, he has no memories and is placed in a nursing home. Based on the Matrix trilogy.
Beyond

While looking for her lost pet, a young woman meets up with some kids in Tokyo to play in a "haunted house", which is really a glitch in their computer world. Based on the Matrix trilogy.
Detective Story

A detective named Ash is called upon by a mysterious organization to hunt down the notorious hacker Trinity.
Matriculated

A group of scientists capture a robot and place it in a surreal fantasy world. When the robot's friends come in and kill most of the scientists, however, the robot and the last scientist remaining face isolation in the computer-generated world. Based on the Matrix trilogy.

(Source: Anime News Network)

CAST

Trinity
Hiromi Tsuru
Cis
Kaho Kouda
Yoko
Rie Machi
Michael Karl Popper
Hikaru Midorikawa
Ash
Masane Tsukayama
Duo
Toshiyuki Morikawa
Dan Davis
Hiroki Touchi
Jue
Atsuko Yuya
Thadeus
Akio Ootsuka
Neo
Hiroaki Hirata
Miho
Risa Suzuki
Kaiser
Shinji Ogawa
Clarence
Mugihito

EPISODES

Dubbed

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Not available on crunchyroll

REVIEWS

iAmApiano
61/100
Worth a watch for anyone interested in The Matrix, almost 20 years later.
Episode 1: The Final Flight of the Osiris (6/10)

The sword fight at the beginning was really well done. The models and animation looked really good, especially for its time. That sexy tension between opponents is so early 2000’s, and I’m absolutely here for it. However, that was the high point. The characters looked like they'd set up residence in the uncanny valley, and the dialogue was okay. I liked the plot hook they introduced in the real world, and the action sequences where the crew shoots the Sentinels was pretty neat, but the realistic movement we saw in the opening scene disappears as soon as we enter the Matrix. The animation became devoid of momentum, which was really jarring. And on top of all that, this short story is missing a resolution. It just kind of ends, and it makes me wonder how those nine minutes could have been better spent.

Episode 2-3: The Second Renaissance Parts 1-2 (8.5/10)

This was fantastic! As soon as I realized this one was about the origin of the Matrix, I was hyped. Well, it was more about how the machines came to rule the world, but still. The animation was solid (when the shots weren’t 100% CGI), the story was good and well paced (I’m glad they took two parts to tell the story), and the dramatic irony paired with symbolic imagery was the icing on the cake (I know that sounds pretentious, but it’s true). Everyone, both human and machine, acted so realistically, it was kind of scary. I totally accept this as the canon origin story of the world of The Matrix. I loved this one; it’s going to be tough to top that.

Episode 4: Kid’s Story (7/10)

Kid’s Story is how I imagine a reboot of The Matrix would go: a high school kid feels himself slowly losing his grip on reality, until he is contacted by someone from the outside world. Agents descend on him while he’s in class one day, and he makes a daring escape by skateboarding around the school. I like the idea that the same basic thing that happened to Neo was happening to a kid, and how he handled it differently. The ending was the most interesting part, as it threw me for a loop several times. I also appreciate the wild artstyle; it added to the frantic nature of it all. I definitely wish this one were longer, but maybe it would have been too similar to the story we already know.

Episode 5: Program (8/10)

I’m disappointed that this was the shortest one of them all, because it’s also one of my favourite ones. The main character looks like a cross between Major from Ghost in the Shell and Princess Mononoke, and that’s not where the similarities end. The animation feels like it was plucked straight out of the ‘90s, back when everything was painstakingly hand-drawn, and it looks beautiful. Even the CGI animation is stylish; it matches the style well, and it never overstays its welcome. The only detractor was the English voice acting. The pacing of the dialogue was weird, and the acting was only serviceable. I’m sure the Japanese voice acting was better, and if I had that audio track on my Blu-ray, I would have definitely chosen to watch it with that instead. Nevertheless, this is definitely the one I’d most like to see more of: a movie, a show, or anything longer than the great seven minutes we got.

Episode 6: World Record (5/10)

At first, I thought this one leaned into a more abstract form of storytelling, but that’s not the case. It’s just the unfortunate tale of someone who accidentally “woke up”, and the Agents stopping him. There’s no real building of tension (although, I thought it was cool how he managed to outrun the Agents), and the conclusion, while making narrative sense, isn’t very satisfying. Plus, the way they animated slow-motion running made it look very stilted. It’s not the best one of the bunch, but I guess it wasn’t that bad.

Episode 7: Beyond (6.5/10)

I liked the animation in this one as well, adopting a sort of Science Saru “cel shaded rotoscope-esque” style, and I enjoyed the idea that a haunted house is actually a bunch of glitches in the Matrix. That’s probably my favourite original idea in this anthology, in fact. Unfortunately, like many of these shorts, there’s little to no catharsis at the end, but the small moments where we see people play around in the glitches was pretty fun and cool to see. Also, I like that they called exterminators to get rid of the “bugs”. Clever.

Episode 8: Detective Story (7/10)

All these shorts have their own art style, each one noticeably different from the others, but this one really sets itself apart. Detective Story feels like it’s been ripped straight from a black-and-white Dick Tracy comic book, and the tone feels about the same as a typical, well, detective story. It’s a cool idea to get the Agents to hire a private investigator to find Trinity, presumably before the events of the first Matrix movie, and how it capitalizes on the Alice in Wonderland imagery we’ve seen in said movie. Unfortunately for our hard-boiled detective, it probably doesn’t end well for him, but the ending is slightly ambiguous about it, so who can say?

Episode 9: Matriculated (7/10)

Is this what it feels like to do drugs? If it is, I can understand what inspired some of the visuals.

The hook for this one took a while to happen, and it had the luxury of time to set itself up (being the longest of these shorts by a wide margin). Matriculated does a lot of showing with very little telling, but that’s not a bad thing. It doesn’t feel the need to hold your hand, especially if you know enough about the world of The Matrix. It’s a pretty simple but ingenious premise: what if, in order to help the machines understand humans, we built a Matrix for them? Seeing the machine learn how to be human is kind of touching, and it unravels slowly and methodically until it culminates into something the humans didn’t at all expect. It’s pretty, and even though it takes its sweet time to get going, it’s certainly a cool trip.

It's tough to give a general consensus for all nine of these short films, but if you're interested in anything related to The Matrix, this is definitely worth a watch. If you're mostly just interested in anime in general, I'd just recommend you watch The Second Renaissance, Program, Detective Story, and Matriculated. But that's just my opinion.
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MegaTheRealOne
75/100
If The Matrix Was Made for Weebs
(Originally Reviewed on Letterboxd)

As a kid, I too enjoyed fucking with the laws of physics with my friends, and boy, we would get into SO much trouble in the process of doing so. Those were good times.... nowadays, you would be shot in the street if you were to even acknowledge any glitch that happens around you.

Saying that the original Matrix was a fantastic film that definitely earns its place in film history would be an understatement, especially with how much it has been talked about over the years, but it is just THAT good of a film, and watching it for the first time made me realize how good it really was. It wasn't anything too creative by today's standards in terms of the story, and the acting and writing leaved a lot to be desired, but it was all still carried heavily by the way this story was told to the audience, the great characters we follow throughout the whole thing, the incredible action sequences that have become so iconic after the film's release, and the effects that, while looking dated by today's standards, look incredible for a film released in 1999, and must've looked amazing to viewers watching it on the big screen back then. Not only that, but the film was incredibly successful too, which led to Warner Bros. and The Wachowskis naturally wanting to continue raking in that cash, to the point where 2003 was a HUGE year for The Matrix in general, getting three whole movies in that one year alone, along with several other pieces of media just to make sure they can get as much of this franchise out there that they can. Out of the three films that were released that year though, the one that I wanted to check out more then any of the others was undeniably the most unique film in the entire series, and one that most general audiences probably don't know about, The Animatrix.

Unlike the original Matrix movie and the ones that came after it, which were these big blockbuster action and effect focused events that were meant to pull in audiences everywhere with the crazy shit that it does, this movie was a bit of a different story when it came to what it did for the franchise. Rather then being one big standalone film to add right alongside the other movies in this franchise, this is actually an anthology film that consists of 9 different animated shorts, all being animated by a bunch of different Japanese animation studios and all focusing on smaller stories that tie into and expand the universe of The Matrix. I always love it whenever a series like this expands into other mediums like this, allowing for many different ways to tell stories in this universe and get people interested in it through different means, and seeing as there are 9 shorts here rather then it just being one continuous story, it does offer plenty of variety for viewers to where they will most likely always find something to love about the film over others. And thankfully, that was the case with me, because as a whole, I found this collection of short films to be pretty damn good, doing a great job at further expanding The Matrix universe and delivering some wonderfully animated shorts on top of that to enjoy that cover many different animation styles, even if not all of it is as solid as it could be.

Out of all of the shorts here that the film gives us to watch, my personal favorites out of the bunch had to be "The Second Renaissance", Parts 1 and 2, "Beyond", and "A Detective Story", all of which I liked for many different reasons. For starters, The Second Renaissance I loved a lot primarily due to how it properly expanded The Matrix universe in such a big way, detailing what this world was like before it all went to shit, how it all went to shit, and what could potentially happen in this universe leading down the road as a result of what the people in this world had done to it beforehand. It is a little generic in terms of plot, but like with the original Matrix movie, it does a great job at telling this story, both in terms of the visuals that are show and the animation in general, that you can't help but get sucked into it regardless. Then there's A Detective Story, which I love purely based on the visuals alone over anything else. The art style is done entirely in the style of an old detective comic, and it works wonderfully for giving the proper vibe that a story like this needs, while also not removing itself from what it needs to be, especially with how the story does involve Trinity, which was nice to see. And then there was Beyond, which is probably my favorite short out of the bunch, primarily because it doesn't feel like it's part of The Matrix at all.... I know that sounds weird, but hear me out on this for a second. The short consists of this girl trying to find her cat to try to feed it, and she ends up finding this group of kids playing around in this area where there's a glitch in The Matrix, allowing them to fuck with the laws of physics and have a good time in general before the authorities come and ruin it all for them. Yeah, there are obvious sequences put in there to remind you that this is still part of The Matrix universe, but if you were to watch it completely on its own without even knowing it was part of this series, you could still enjoy it all the same, and there is a lot to love about it too. The animation, the simple yet enjoyable characters, the charming voice acting, all of it works perfectly in harmony together to make such a wonderful short in general.

As for the rest of the shorts though, I wouldn't say any of them are bad at all, but they don't necessarily ever reach the same heights as those last four that I previously mentioned. First off, there is "Program", a short that consists of these two fighting each other in a samurai duel in a simulation, with one of them trying to convince the other to go back to The Matrix with them. It's a fine enough short, with some great animation and sweet action on top of that, but it doesn't really do that much or feel that impactful to make me really remember it alongside the others. The same can also be said about "World Record", which is very interesting to watch play out, seeing how one can break out of The Matrix like this, but aside from that one concept, everything else about it from the visuals to the general plot doesn't really do that much to win me over. And then there's "Matriculated", which is just..... weird, man. It starts off pretty basic and has some pretty cool moments, but then it devolves into this simulation sequence which takes up most of the short, and while it is all very visually impressive for the time and has a lot of neat moments, it feels like it is banking off of those weird elements and visuals more so then actually telling a proper story, which works well enough for a short, but I dunno.... didn't really feel all that memorable to me.

But then we get to what I would consider to be the two worst shorts of the entire film, which, I must reiterate, are not bad by any means, but they just don't quite reach the same level of quality as that of the previous shorts I just mentioned. First off, there's "Final Flight of the Osiris", which has many different things holding it back from being great, what with its lackluster and generic story compared to everything else, alongside its HIDEOUS animation that does look pretty good for the time, but nowadays, it just looks like a cutscene that would play out in a game on my PS2, and not in a good way. Although, that in itself may have been intentional, as apparently this short is meant to be the prologue for the video game Enter the Matrix, which was also released in 2003, which is a neat little bonus for those that did play that game, but on its own, it just seems pretty generic for the most part, and nothing that is worth remembering happens in it to make me like it anymore then I already do. It also doesn't help that this film STARTS with this short, which I guess makes sense, as they want to save the best stuff for later, but still, weird way to start things out.

And then there's "Kid's Story", which again, isn't a bad short at all, but it is one that is pretty generic and "whatever" amidst all the others. It pretty much just consists of this random kid who gets in contact with a hacker that will take him out of The Matrix, similarly to that of what Neo went through in the original movie, and of course, Agent Smith and his guys go after him, to where he tries to escape from them. On one hand, I do really like the visuals of this short, as it is all done with rotoscoped animation, which looks wonderful for the time it came out and makes this one of the most distinctive looking shorts of the bunch, but on the other hand, it's just not a very exciting short in general. It just mainly consists of this kid running away from the authorities through his school..... whoopee. Nothing that interesting happens beyond that, and again, it all just feels very similar to that of what happened in the original Matrix film to a degree, but just in rotoscoped animation. Not much more to say about it.

Overall though, despite how some of the shorts don't match up the quality of the others in this film, this is still a really good collection of animated shorts that we have here that fit wonderfully right alongside the original Matrix film, and it is one that I really enjoyed all the way through, what with how it expands the universe of The Matrix just enough to give people a better understanding of what happened and what's currently happening in this universe, while being supported with some simple, yet very enjoyable stories and fantastic animation that can be seen throughout most of the whole thing. I would definitely recommend it for those who loved the original Matrix film, as well as those who are a big fan of more niche projects like this that are meant to be part of a much bigger franchise, because while it may not even come close to the level of quality as the original film in several aspects, it is still a really nice bonus add-on to this franchise that I'm sure anyone would be able to enjoy, whether or not they are watching the whole thing or even just a few specific shorts out of the bunch. Before I go though, I do wanna quickly mention that I found out one of the shorts in this film, Matriculated, was half animated by DNA Productions..... you know, the guys that made Jimmy Neutron?......... that was a very weird fact for me to learn today.
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