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More Matrix and Philosophy: Revolutions and Reloaded Decoded (Popular Culture and Philosophy)

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Overall, my reaction to this book is mixed. It contains 16 essays, some excellent, some decent, and some poor. In my view, this book is not as good as its predecessor, The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real, and if you have not yet purchased it, you should certainly do so before buying this book. The first book (Volume 3 in Open Court's Popular Culture and Philosophy Series) is, in my estimation, the crown jewel of the series, so the expectations for this book were high. If you enjoyed that book, you will most likely enjoy this one as well, but the reasons for my less-than-wholehearted recommendation are contained in my reviews of the following chapters:
Ch. 1. The Matrix and Plato's Cave: Why the Sequels Failed, by Lou Marinoff: The essay begins by discussing how The Matrix helps philosophy instructors to introduce classical philosophical questions and ideas. He then, as the title says, discusses why the sequels failed. His overall idea is interesting, but the essay is philosophically poor. He discusses Plato and invokes certain Platonic concepts in order to make his argument, but the aspects of Plato's philosophy that he relies upon (i.e. the theory of Forms) are not taken seriously by philosophers anymore (and with very good reason). If he just wanted to use Plato in order to introduce certain ideas, he should have said so. But relying on the Platonic concepts that he invokes in order to make an argument that is supposed to be taken seriously is just bad philosophy.
Ch. 4. The Matrix is the Prozac of the People, by Martin Danahay: This essay begins with Marx's famous quote, "Religion is the opium of the people." It offers a lucid introduction to Marx's views on religion and analyzes the sequels from Marx's point of view. I found this essay to be highly enjoyable philosophically thought provoking. I especially liked how the author placed Marx's oft-misinterpreted quote in context in order to illustrate its meaning.
Ch. 6. Choice, Purpose, and Understanding: Neo, the Merovingian, and the Oracle, by Theodore Schick, Jr.: This essay has its good points, but it could have been much better. The author uses characters from the film in order to illustrate the three traditional philosophical approaches to the problem of free will and determinism: hard determinism, soft determinism, and libertarianism. The essay is interesting, and most of the philosophical points that are made are accurate. However, there are two main confusions that are likely to mislead readers: 1. The author does not make it clear that the free will/determinism debate is different from the free will/fatalism debate. In other words, the concepts of causal determinism and fate both pose a threat to the belief in free will, but they pose different threats. Novices often have trouble understanding this (I know this because I've taught about the free will issue in my class many times), so an essay aimed at them should seek to clarify this confusion. 2. The randomness introduced into the universe at the quantum level does introduce indeterminacy, but it does not introduce control. Quite the opposite: random events are uncontrolled. Unfortunately, the author makes a common undergraduate error here: attempting to draw a substantial philosophical conclusion from a very complex scientific theory without adequately explaining the details of the theory. I'm not suggesting that he should have explained the details of the theory, but his discussion of quantum mechanics and its implications is problematic and likely to mislead.
Ch. 12. Faith, Understanding, and the Hidden God of The Matrix, by William Jaworski: This essay presents a lucid account of the view that "faith consists in trusting God". It is likely to give pause to those who dismiss faith with a wave of the hand. The references to the film and the interpretations of the dialogue seem to be on the mark. The author makes it clear that the purpose of the essay is to give the reader food for thought, and thereby follows the dictum "Do not claim more than you have shown." My only complaint: the author could have gone to greater lengths to show that his conception of faith is not the only conception of faith. He claims that faith "consists in believing in something... not believing that something...". This claim is controversial, but he makes it seem as though he's offering a standard definition of the term.
Ch. 15. Pissin' Metal: Columbine, Malvo, and the Matrix of Violence, by Henry Nardone and Gregory Bassham: This is an excellent essay. It is written in a conversational style, and is funny and engaging. It discusses the research on the relationship between violence in entertainment and violent behavior, and then mentions cases in which it seems as though The Matrix may have had a profound influence on certain killers. The following questions are then raised: "Should those who can show that they have been injured by film-inspired violence be able to sue filmmakers to recover damages? Do those responsible for producing such films - and the Matrix trilogy in particular - bear any moral responsibility for the crimes of those disturbed individuals who may be inspired by the films to act violently?" The essay contains a thought provoking discussion of these questions.
Ch. 16. Reloaded Revolutions, by Slavoj Zizek: This essay is very poor. The author presents himself as arrogant and self-important, and the philosophy and the concepts employed are opaque and obscure. Early in the essay, we have the following sentence: "This search for the philosophical content of The Matrix is therefore a lure, a trap to be avoided." The author then proceeds to spend 10 pages... searching for the philosophical content of The Matrix. I don't know if I'm missing something here, but if I am, I'm sure a lot of other people are as well. When writing philosophy, it's your job to make your ideas clear so that your audience can understand your ideas and the purpose of your essay. This essay fails miserably in this respect. It is Continental Philosophy at its worst, the kind that gives good Continental Philosophy a bad name. It strikes me as an odd choice for the final essay in the book. Ch. 15 would have been an excellent note to end on.
I hope that this review has helped you to decide whether or not to purchase this book.

Being a majorly fanatical fan of anything connected with The Matrix, I was also somewhat disappointed at first with the two sequels. So, with some interest, I approached "More Matrix and Philosophy" wondering what the contributors were going to say about these two movies.

First up, as others have mentioned, I would also reiterate that one should read "The Matrix and Philosophy" before approaching this book. Some contributors make reference to that book, and use it as a spring board for some further development of ideas. Also, on one occassion, a contributor in "More Matrix" takes a mild stab at a contributor in the first volume.

In this current volume, one is taken through 4 Scenes, which have 16 essays categorised across them. Some who contributed to the last book are back again. The essays cover a very interesting range of ideas, and have a lot of diversity among them. These include essays on faith, nihilism, God, Islamic cosmology, the Vedanta of Hinduism, race, determinism and choice, and a lot more besides. The range of topics is impressive, and kept me hooked right through the book.

For those frustrated by the first volume's repeated flogging of Plato's "cave analogy", you will be gratified to know that it is only mentioned a couple of times, and not really discussed in any detail outside the first chapter.

In general, I found that the contributors made an excellent survey of the movies, and also brought out some very interesting issues. I didn't find that I disliked any of the essays, though on some points I disagreed with them. In general, the contributions were interesting, well-written, at times humorous, and easily understood.

In this follow-up volume, I think that the book defies Lou Marinoff's idea that sequels are generally bound to fail, ("Why the Sequels Failed", in this book). I found it to be in some ways more interesting than the first volume, and wider in the various aspects that it discussed.

If you have read and enjoyed The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real (Popular Culture and Philosophy), then I really recommend this book to you. It is another book that you don't need to worry about meaty words with, and it is accessible to everyone. In short, it is a great book.

[...]

MORE MATRIX AND PHILOSOPHY: REVOLUTIONS AND RELOADED DECODED. If like me you worship The Matrix Trilogy and like me you thought philosophy classes in college were the melted cheese on your favourite hamburger... this book is for you. And be aware that this title is the follow up to the equally good book called THE MATRIX AND PHILOSOPHY: WELCOME TO THE DESERT OF THE REAL both edited by William Irwin.

This book, like the rest of this ever growing collection "Popular Culture and Philosophy" series is a compilation of various essays about the subject matter, exploring the philosophy of The Matrix films under 4 different categories, called scenes. The first scene discusses the Suck-Fest or Success of the sequels, followed with Scene Two in which Freedom and Reality are discussed. Scene Three applies to the religious aspects of the films, including Vedanta, Islam, Christianity, faith and messianic symbolism. While Scene Four delves into the social political aspects of the trilogy, including race and violence.

So the book is 216 pages long, so with 16 essays, an intro and an epilogue, it doesn't leave much room to go hardcore with all the varying aspects of the Matrix Films. But what I love about this series is that they give you enough information to want to pursue it even more. So far I've read 3 books from this series.

* Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy: Fear and Trembling in Sunnydale
* The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real
* More Matrix and Philosophy: Revolutions and Reloaded Decoded


All three were quite fascinating and gripping books to read. The newbie philosophy amateur will be very comfortable reading about philosophy especially when they refer to popular culture icons such as Neo and Morpheus or Buffy. The writers, for the most part, make their arguments accessible to the novice and still grasp onto more advanced ideas which the novice could easily look up on the web or by reading other books, the many books mentioned by the essayists. And thankfully they, with the exception of Sphincter-boy Slavoj Zizek, make you like philosophy and get you interested to just how deep the rabbit hole does go.

Speaking of Sphincter-Boy, I'll dedicate a paragraph to him but mostly to the editor... Slavoj Zizek wrote the final essay of this book and just slaps the Matrix Fans around like we are all idiots.

I had a unique opportunity of sitting close to the ideal spectator of the film -- namely an idiot.
-- Slavoj Zizek (More Matrix and Philosophy: Revolutions and Reloaded Decoded (paperback), Reloaded Revolutions, p.199)


Not only does he begin by insulting the fans of the series, but also the readers of this very book. I didn't purchase this book to get called an idiot. Not only that but he lacks to make the effort to write a new essay, since this paragraph can be found in his other essay, the first paragraph of The Matrix: Or, The Two Sides of Perversion (The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real (Paperback) p.240). I often complain that philosophers can hardly come up with original thought because they to often cite material over and over again written by other, perhaps greater philosophers. But to plagiarise one's own writing is an act of laziness unfitting of a writer and or a philosopher.

So I ask William Irwin, why Mr. Irwin, why, why, why, why did you allow him to write the final essay again? The final essay that was like having to pull out just before orgasm. Just completely ruined the entire satisfaction I was having reading this book. And just like the first book, I was robbed of my Jouissance, to use a word that Zizek abused during his mockery. After reading his essay, I was frustrated. I was made to feel like an imbecile for appreciating The Matrix trilogy, I was made to feel like a cretin for enjoying and reading the very books you exquisitely edited. Also to add that whenever someone denigrates readers, especially on philosophy which many don't want to read, it won't attract the lay-people to this type of critical thought, because no one likes to feel like an idiot.

One thing is for sure, I won't be picking up books by Zizek anytime soon. I don't give my hard-earned money to get treated like a dick by some would be philosopher who can't even address an issue without referring to its supporters as idiots.

"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it."
-Aristotle



Despite getting an Intellectual Bobbit Job at the end I give this book a 4 outta 5

...after, of course, you see it for yourself.

The second book on the subject compiled by William Irwin, More Matrix & Philosophy is more carefully crafted, passionate and brilliant writings on The Matrix trilogy and the films' place in both popular culture and philosophical debate.

Irwin brings together an array of different -- and often conflicting -- voices in both this volume and the original book. You won't agree with all of the writer's opinions, but they'll all make you think.

And of course, inspired thought is what The Matrix trilogoy is all about, to those of us who know the films contain more than slick action sequences and cool costumes.

Irwin's newest book is further proof that we are not alone. We, The Matrixheads, are not the only ones lying awake at night thinking of these films' broader implications, and here are sixteen essays that prove it.

Go ahead, read the book. But I warn you: all Irwin offers is the truth. All 16 versions of it. Can you handle it, a bit further down the rabbit hole?

This book provides a balanced look at the Matrix trilogy. All of the authors are clearly fans of the matrix but some are pretty critical of the sequels. How could they not be? Most of the essays though are pretty positive. Irwin's essay "The Matrix of Control" captures the underlying philosophy and attraction of the films better than anything else I've read. Actually makes sense of the long speaches by the Merovingian and the Architect. Shick's essay on the Merovingian and free will also makes a lot of sense. The section on global philosophy with essays on Hindu and Muslim philosophy are excellent. Yeah the Zizek essay is annoying and I didn't agree with some of the others, but if you liked The Matrix and Philosophy you'll defintiely like More Matrix.

I don't much like the idea of starting up a one-on-one exchange in the Amazon book reviews, but I'm troubled enough by Richard D. Erlich's review of More Matrix and Philosophy to risk it. I'd like to see the full academic review that he refers to - his general tone reflects that he is a thoughtful and careful reader, and his giving the collection 4.5 stars suggests that he found a lot to appreciate about the collection. In the part that he has quoted as part of his review here, however, he focuses on only one excerpt from one essay - written by Slavoj Zizek, one of Europe's leading public intellectuals - and from that accuses Zizek of anti-Semitism and editor William Irwin of carelessness.

I readily admit that, out of context, the Zizek quote sounds disturbing. His claim that Agent Smith is a "proto-Jew" has uncomfortable echoes, echoes that Erlich traces effectively. But are those uncomfortable echoes "anti-Semitism" in their own right? I don't think so.

To begin with, Zizek attributes such thinking to the Wachowski Brothers rather than claiming it as his own. He criticizes them for what he sees as a shortcoming in the film, for its falling into an old and predictable pattern. He applauds the film's reimagining of the struggle against fascism as a struggle against the forces of the Matrix, but he is disappointed that, in the end, the showdown is simply a reenactment of Christ's Passion. In that light, he argues, a Neo-Passion requires a Neo- (or "Proto-") villain, one that, like the Pharisees as they are depicted in the New Testament, recognizes the import of the savior's struggle but nevertheless rejects the savior in favor of an apparently discredited alternative set of belief's. Zizek argues that it is the Wachowskis who invite the comparison of Smith to a Jew; he himself does not propose the claim.

There's more, though, as Zizek explains throughout his essay - and as he demonstrates in much of his other work with which I am familiar. He is interested in what he here calls "jouissance," the play of ideas as resistance within the larger system of capitalist and post-modern concepts that contains each of us. (I'd offer as a personal criticism of Zizek that I find that such a concept gives him a long leash when it comes to doubling back upon, and even contradicting, his own arguments.) Take a look at the beginning of his essay for the boldest way it plays out here. His opening sentence is "There is something inherently stupid and naïve in taking the philosophical underpinning of the Matrix trilogy seriously and discussing its implications." Of course, barring a few early qualifications, Zizek proceeds to do just what he calls stupid and naïve: he takes the philosophy of the Matrix seriously.

Such an approach does not excuse him from the blame of occasionally thoughtless word choices, but it certainly makes the work of editing him all the more challenging. He is not writing a straightforward philosophical argument - he is, instead, performing one. Things mean what he says they mean, and he challenges himself to write subtly enough that he can transmit his varying tones to a diverse readership. Erlich has raised a troubling and reasonable way of misreading Zizek. While I wish Zizek had used different words, I cannot credit him with showing any clear anti-Semitism here, and I certainly cannot blame William Irwin for failing to anticipate how such a quote would look outside the context of the essay and outside the context of the book as a whole.

I myself have contributed to a couple of the early collections in the Philosophy and Popular Culture series, and I know Bill Irwin well and very much admire him. I have also known anti-Semitism firsthand, so I am sympathetic to what it means when Jews are vilified. I was thrilled for Bill and for the series as a whole when he was able to attract a thinker of Zizek's stature for the project; it underscores his and our ambition to raise as many thoughtful and provocative responses to a particular popular work as possible.

I hope that Erlich's focussed concern here won't detract from what I regard as a very successful collection. I encourage readers to take a look at the opening set of essays, Lou Marinoff and Irwin's own in particular, for the way they apply philosophy to determine the failure (or success) of the Matrix sequels.

I am glad that Erlich has brought such attention to this book, but I wish he had more fully acknowledged and explored the context of Zizek's remark.

I have wanted this book for the longest time and was immediately glad that it was available and at an affordable price. I am one of the few people who actually enjoyed the Matrix 2&3, so having someone prove that there was actually some merit to the movies is very rewarding.

The book itself was again very affordable and wrapped for protection very effectively.

I am working on my Ph.D. in Applied Management and Decision Sciences. Of course, I must do general course work in philosophy, psychology etc. My area of expertise is copyright infringment - movie piracy. This book has will be very beneficial in my course work. I only hope my finished work will be as good as this!

I don't understand why you would write a book about a movie and spend the first few essays trashing it! It's stupid. Who stands in the book store and says "Hey, I want to read a book about how much some idiot doesn't like a movie!"?

Basically, there are terrible essays by some Marxist (they tend to not be palatable anyways), some looney anti-violence in media people that want to blame the Wachowskis for every nut job that doesn't have a grip on the difference between fiction and reality (despite the fact that the last two movies show the ultimate ineffacacy of violence as a problem solver, with the trilogy ending with a laying down of the sword), some lame Platonic explination of why sequels suck (the gist is, when things are copied, things get better or worse. Oh my god, what incredible non-obvious insight!), and the completely arrogant Zizek, who LITERALLY cut and pastes two paragraphs from his previously published essay. And who I honestly believes trashes the movies simply because they are not created by such pretentious academics as himself. Obviously, these films haven't redefined the philosophical landscape, but they have brought interest and illustration of many interesting philosophical ideas to many people. Perhaps that is beneath Mr. Zizek, but isn't that the whole point of fiction in the first place? To inspire and encourage? These films also present a synthesis of the best worldview that two well educated people have come up with. Yes, these films are complicated and seemingly contradictory. But guess what, so are the answers to life!

Nevertheless, there are some really good essays in the book. The Neitzchean interpretation essay is amazing, the essay on Baudrillard is very good, as well as the essay on Socrates.

My advice: buy the excellent book by Matt Lawrence first, and save yourself having to wade through the self-important pretentious babblings of pseudo-intellectuals to find the few people who really took the time to understand these movies.

I've written an academic review of MORE MATRIX AND PHILOSOPHY, and it might be unethical to cover on line what is scheduled to be published in that review. Here, though, I'd like to stress a point I couldn't get into much in a brief academic review.

Slavoj Zizek's "Reloaded Revolutions" essay in MORE MATRIX is, in one part, let's say for now, troublesome, problematic. I'll quote the whole passage, and readers may find stronger words later. Certainly, though, there's a problem here with the editing of the essay. Minimally it's a problem with editing. Here's the entire passage. The ellipsis mark ... is in the original; nothing has been deleted.

"However, in REVOLUTIONS, is Neo really a Christ figure? It may look so. At the very end of his duel with Smith, he turns into (another) Smith so that, when he dies, Smith (all the Smiths) is (are) destroyed.... However, a closer look renders visible a key difference: Smith is a proto-Jewish figure, an obscene intruder who multiplies like rats, who runs amok and disturbs the harmony of Humans and Matrix-Machines, so that his destruction enables a (temporary) class truce. What dies with Neo is this Jewish intruder who brings conflict and imbalance. In Christ, on the contrary, God himself becomes man so that, with the death of Christ, this man (ecce homo), God (of beyond) himself also dies. The true 'Christological' version of the MATRIX trilogy would thus entail a radically different scenario: Neo should have been a Matrix program rendered human, a direct human embodiment of the Matrix, so that, when he dies, the Matrix destroys itself" (208).

Zizek is right that a more Christ-like Neo would incarnate the God-Machine Matrix, making Neo more specifically the Son of the Architect, maybe with the Oracle as some sort of Mary figure. But Smith as "a proto-Jewish figure, an obscene intruder who multiplies like rats"?

Zizek uses here the rat image from (for the example I know) the Nazi propaganda film DER EWIGE JUDE (THE ETERNAL JEW, 1940); he seems to combine it with a pre-Vatican II image of Jews as the _alazones_-outsiders demanding too much-in the Passion. But what is the tone here? Is Zizek carelessly passing along such bigotry, which then slips past his editor? Or is it Zizek's considered opinion that «The Jew» is "an obscene intruder who multiplies like rats"?

I'm a life-member of the ACLU and will defend-though hardly to the death-Zizek's right to express bigotted or even anti-Semitic views. But in ethically responsible writing and in philosophical writing above all, politically loaded ideas should be expressed directly and as an arguable proposition; they shouldn't be snuck in. Bigotted or racist ideas definitely should never be just snuck in, but presented directly, so they can be challenged directly.

William Irwin, the editor of MORE MATRIX slipped up badly here. Or he and Slavoj Zizek did far worse than slip up.