The two Wachowski sisters had signed the original trilogy before collaborating on several films, among which were Jupiter Ascending, Cloud Atlas and Speed Racer, as well as on the Netflix series Sense8. Lilly had then stepped back, leaving Lana to direct the fourth installment alone, Matrix Resurrections.
The latter had cost 190 million dollars but had brought in only 37 million on the American market, while sharply dividing critics.
Drew Goddard, screenwriter of The Martian and Project Almanac, must now write, direct and produce the next film in the franchise. In an interview granted to KCRW’s The Business program, Lilly Wachowski reveals that Goddard would not want to go further without first obtaining the Wachowskis’ blessing.
At the Wachowski sisters’ fingertips
Lilly explains that she and Lana could still “stick their noses in a little bit” before deciding whether or not they want to give the project the green light. However, she personally considers her time in this universe to be over: “Warner Bros. wants to do something else. They will always want to do something else. Personally, I no longer want to play in this sandbox. For me, it’s over.”
She continues: “But maybe something is brewing with Drew Goddard, and he doesn’t want to move forward without our blessing. So that creates a pretty complicated situation where we may go in and stick our noses in a little bit to see what we think of it and decide whether or not we want to give Drew our blessing. So there could be something coming, but for now, nothing is certain yet.”
The next Matrix is not yet in production
According to the latest news, last March, Goddard was still working on the script and did not yet know when the project would be far enough along to actually enter production.
In essence, the Wachowskis seem to have retained, if not a real veto right, at least a moral right of oversight over the franchise’s future. They visibly have no desire to come back and play in the sandbox, but nevertheless insist that Warner not build just anything there and that the sequel remain, as far as possible, faithful to the spirit of what had been done before. A precaution George Lucas perhaps should have considered before handing over the keys to Star Wars…
