The Matrix: Resurrections Director Lana Wachowski Wasn’t Sure Film Would Finish After COVID Shutdown

More than 18 years after the beloved Matrix trilogy came to an end, it’s finally time for fans to return to the real world. Director Lana Wachowski reteamed with Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss to deliver The Matrix Resurrections, which arrives in theaters and on HBO Max in December. This fourth Matrix film has been a topic of conversation for a number of years, and was in development for quite a while, leading some to wonder if it would happen. When cameras did finally begin rolling, a global pandemic caused the production to completely shut down, and Wachowski pondered whether or not there would ever actually be a chance to get it done.

Jessica Henwick, Iron Fist standout and Matrix Resurrections star, recently spoke to Collider about her experience joining the Matrix franchise. Henwick opened about the difficult training and production process, revealing that Wachowski thought there was a chance the cast and crew would never be able to return from the shutdown, and that Matrix 4 would become more of a myth than reality.

“That’s somewhere I felt pressure because those fights are so seminal [to The Matrix]. Those moments from the original have stayed in my head, so many of those fight beats, [so] that was really where I was intimidated going into it,” Henwick said of her training. “I knew I had to be performing up here. You’re performing with Keanu. It’s John Wick. He knows what he’s doing. You can’t hold him back, in any way. I had to give it my all. I devoted myself to it. We trained pretty hard in the run-up and we kept training all the way through filming. 

“When we were shut down for COVID and we went off three months, I still was at home training every day, even though we didn’t know if we were going back. When we got shut down for COVID, Lana said, ‘Well, maybe that’s it. Maybe we won’t come back and film the rest of it. Maybe the new Matrix will go down as this legendary film which incomplete, and no one will ever be able to see it. Maybe that’s what this is meant to be.’ And we were all going, ‘No, you have to finish the film.’ But she really did toy with the idea of just calling it quits… For me, even though I didn’t know whether we would come back, I couldn’t think about that, and so I trained throughout the entire break because I just had to focus. I just had to be positive and go, ‘No, we’re gonna go finish the film. We have to. This can’t be how my Matrix journey ends.’”

As we all know now, Henwick was right. The cast and crew of The Matrix Resurrections returned to the set and completed work on the movie. It’s not a dream or a fairy tale. We actually get to see a new Matrix movie next month.

The Matrix Resurrections arrives on HBO Max and in theaters on December 22nd.