Ian and I saw Reloaded last night with the full weight of nerd disapproval preparing us for a mediocre movie at best.
When I left the theater I felt totally cheated. Cheated because I expected a terrible disappointment and instead I got an awesome movie that kept me thinking long past my leaving the theater. Cheated because I listened to people who I trust who said it was crap and barring the first 20 minutes or so, it was awesome instead.
So I went and read all the forums at aintitcool, and here at EA, and USENET, and discovered that by in large the negativity seems to come from just a few vocal camps.
1 - The people who thought there was too much talking and so the movie was boring. These people sometimes mix up there being too much talking with there being dialog they simply didn't understand. You'll see the word "pseudo-religious" and "psychobabble" sprinkled throughout their flavor of rant.
2- The people who had already created a vision of Reloaded in their heads and so any discrepancies from that view made the movie wrong/stupid/unappealing. Whether it's bitching about Neo not having godlike powers, or the moaning about there being not enough X or Y and too much A or B, to these people their particular vision was manifest destiny, and Reloaded was a bucket of ice water to the face.
3 - People who love "the other movie" laughing at every instance of Matrix failure. Be it LOTR or Xmen or even your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, these folks are draining their nerd sacks with shadenfreud to see their "enemy" weakened or killed. Sad, really.
I'm not sure exactly why there are not more people testifying to the quality of the movie. My best guess is that they feel that the movie speaks for itself. That's certainly how I feel.
Posted by Matt at June 2, 2003 06:45 PM