Thank goodness today's over, and I made it through everything I had to (writing a review paper on a linguistics paper, then revising a german essay, then trying to finish h 161 reading, then coming up with an outline for my h 97 paper). 'Course, I probably wouldn't have had to do so much in so little time if I hadn't gone to the Matrix:Reloaded last night... but I couldn't resist the free ticket to a movie I've been waiting to see for a while.

My take on the movie? I'm impressed. Occasionally I found myself thinking, "Ah, yet another fight scene." At times it was a tad formulaic - explanation of background, fight scene, repeat. Not that this is a bad thing, just something I noticed.
The beginning I found a little slow. Not sure why, but it just didn't flow as well to me. Maybe it's because I wasn't so awed by the exterior of the ships... though the mainframe Zion computer was pretty darn cool. :) Manipulating data in realspace looks awesome.
What I really enjoyed about the movie was the character development. We finally see another side of Neo and Trinity, as well as Morpheus, the Oracle... the characters in this movie just seem more human, more fleshed out. They aren't your cardboard cutout archetype figures anymore. I've already heard a few complaining about the amount of skin shown in the montage switching between the Zion population and Trinity and Neo - honestly, I've seen worse in German films. It served a good purpose in emphasizing an extremely important characteristic of humans which distinguishes from machines: the expression of emotion. Viewed this way, and considering that love later determines the fate of Neo and (supposedly) of Zion, it's not just another gratuitous sex scene. It serves a purpose, and does an excellent job of it.

Speaking of Trinity, the more I see of her, the more I like her. She's a warrior, a fighter to the core, but there's now the element of tenderness, of vulnerability. She's emotionally strong, faithful to her friends, and willing to put her life on the line to save those she loves. And there's that slight sarcastic edge to her, her strong will, the jealousy she displays, which makes her real in my eyes. She has foibles, she's not perfect... I can understand her. I didn't find myself questioning her actions - everything she did made sense to me.

Aight, that's enough for tonight. Time to go do something useful instead of sitting here..