In the first film the of The Matrix trilogy, the premise is put forth that the “real world” as we experience is a simulation that we are plugged into since birth, without any frame of reference to know that we are experiencing is in fact a constructed hyper-reality designed to emulate the late 1990’s. The protagonist, Neo, is then removed from the Matrix, and made aware of the real world: a world torn apart by war between man and machine (the ‘other’), a war man is losing. Already in the first movie, existential questions of which is real are asked: the
character Cypher, in his plans to be reinserted into the Matrix, puts forth
that if he doesn’t know it’s fake, to him it will be real. This echoes of Eco’s
and Baudrillard’s observations of Disneyland as a hyperreality in that the lust for “real” is
arbitrary: “in fact, once the fetishistic desire for the original is forgotten,
these copies are perfect” (Eco, 39). However, Eco’s premise relies on
Disneyland as a voluntary hyperreality, a reality that we knowingly walk into and accept, as opposed to the Matrix, which is forced upon the perceiver. In this triology, Wachowshi siblings attempt to reconstruct hyperreality in the medium of film with special effects, visual and auditory, and through the plot, which is unpack further.

The Wachowski siblings address this in the
second installment of the trilogy, Matrix: Reloaded. 

Reloaded takes us into
the fictional Zion, the last free human city, unplugged from the Matrix. Doom is approaching: the machines are tunneling into Zion, and will soon destroy it.
Society here is aware of the Matrix, of the hyperreal that is imposed. While the general populous is conveniently zealous that unplugged
reality is
better than the Matrix, the key characters still grapple with the implications
of a false, but better, life. Death is approaching Zion, but life could still
continues in the Matrix. The movie reaches its climax withNeo meeting The Architect:
the program that designed the Matrix. Here, The Architect explains to him that ‘Neo’, as he knows, is also
a design of the Matrix, that he is one in a long line of successive Neos that
were all freed, all saw the doom of Zion, and were all forced to reboot the
Matrix and repopulate Zion—only to have the process repeat itself… Neo challenges this future by attempting to redefine it for himself. ‘Neo’s world is much the one from Blade Runner, but the plot is a story of a hero, unlike a the noir film Blade Runner. Here, the Wachowski siblings attempt to put a post-modern twist to the phantasmagoria aspect of hyperreality, using concepts developed in an era of ‘New Media’ (described in another section). This is the perspective that we want to analyze. The Matrix trilogy parallels the power dynamics of America at the sociohistorical instance, and mirrors Hasen’s description of ‘mixed reality’ (discussed later). The role of power dynamics is the subject of this analysis. Even though it is a post-modern depiction of hyperreality in the age of ‘new media’, as Blade Runner did in a more explicit fashion, and still holds some aspects of modernity.

Seen in Blade Runner, the population of Zion seems to be colorblind, with races and ethnicity scattered across all strata, and a single culture is depicted, unified against the dichotomous ‘other’, ‘machines’. What this implies is that, similar to Hansen’s concept of ‘mixed reality’, the mind is what keeps the body from letting go of all of its historical signifiers that tie a body to a certain sociocultural group that has been universally constructed by the Matrix, or hyperreality. In this sense, the Wachowski siblings imply that the reality that we all live in now, especially in the time of ‘new media’, is all hyperreality, which can be a dangerous claim because it promotes ‘colorblindness’. At the same time, this phantasmagoria does not let go of one master novel: ‘Neo’, as the white savior, who obviously is ‘the one’ to liberate the people still plugged into the Matrix and Zion from the power of the machines. To reify the fact that the basic power dynamics that still mirror the basic power dynamic structure in modernity, we look at a conversation that Councilor Hammon has with Neo.

Councilor Hamann: Down here, sometimes I think about all those people still plugged into the Matrix and when I look at these machines I…I can't help thinking that in a way…we are plugged into them.

Neo: But we control these machines; they don't control us.

Councilor Hamann: Of course not. How could they? The idea is pure nonsense. But…it does make one wonder... just… what is control?

Councilor Hamann: [Of] course. That's it. You hit it. That's control, isn’t it? If we wanted we could smash them to bits. Although, if we did, we’d have to consider what would happen to our lights, our heat, our air…

Neo: So we need machines and they need us, is that your point, Councilor?

Councilor Hamann: No. No point. Old men like me don't bother with making points. There's no point.

In this instance of the movie, it becomes clear that the power dynamic attempts to be as post-modern as possible, embodying ‘colorblindness’, but still ‘otherizing’ another entity based on an inside and outside, constituted by the gates to Zion. If Zion represents America, the pinnacle of Western thought, than the machines could represent ‘other’-Americans. Even though this seems like a stretch, but when the Matrix: Reloaded (2003) is put into a sociohistorical context it can seem a little more obvious. It is not only a post-modern time that this blockbuster movie is release, but a post-911 time too. A time that the focused ‘otherizing’ on American-immigrants, particularly Middle Easterns and Latinos, and the focus of politics had been on our borders and homeland security. The sovereignty of ‘real’ America, or, in the case of the Matrix, Zion relies on the dichotomy of the ‘other’ to define the purpose of the ‘real’. Above, Councilor Hammon tries to point out this inherent flaw, but Neo, the hero of this new phantasmagoria, fails to see it. Neo echoes the same answer that someone from modernity might respond to Councilor Hammon’s deconstructionist comment, control defines what reality is—the ability to “shut these machines down”—, and determine the fate the of a different entity—besides the fact that the ‘real’ humans of Zion rely on machines. This basic dichotomous power dynamic exemplified in “The Matrix: Reloaded”, and the type of phantasmagoria that it creates, exemplifies further how even in terms of ‘hyperreality’ aspects of modernity still pop-up and continue to engender the audience with the same aspects of its worldview.

1. Theoretical Outcomes for Hyperreality in America