Lana Wachowski Started Writing ‘The Matrix Resurrections’ As A Way To Process Grief

It’s been 18 years since the last The Matrix movie. Considering the disappointing reaction to the sequels and sister/co-director and writer Lilly needing “time away from this industry,” you could understand Lana Wachowski not wanting to return to the world of Neo and Trinity. But she found the inspiration to make The Matrix Resurrections (which brings back Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss) as a way to channel her grief.

“My dad died, then this friend died, then my mom died,” Wachowski said while speaking at the International Literature Festival Berlin, alongside co-writers Aleksandar Hemon and David Mitchell. “I didn’t really know how to process that kind of grief. I hadn’t experienced it that closely… You know their lives are going to end and yet it was still really hard. My brain has always reached into my imagination and one night, I was crying and I couldn’t sleep, and my brain exploded this whole story.”

She said that she “couldn’t have my mom and dad, yet suddenly I had Neo and Trinity, arguably the two most important characters in my life. It was immediately comforting to have these two characters alive again… This is what art does and that’s what stories do, they comfort us.”

The Matrix Resurrections comes out on December 22.