I’m a fan of the movies and I was pretty amazed when I found this collection in my library.

Page count: 176
Original publication: as webcomics at the movie series’ official website 1999-2004.
Matrix comics vol. 2 publication year: 2004
Publisher: Burlyman Entertainment

The book contains twelve short stories each done by different people. Before each story, there’s also a short introduction about the creators. Most of them are quick stories about the humans who are trying to get on with their lives in the Matrix but a few are set partly in the real world. There’s no explanations of Matrix or agents or anything in the stories, so the reader should be familiar with the movies. I really liked this approach.

“Farewell Performance” by Jim Krueger and Tim Sale. An eager young journalist wants to interview an escape artist. The perfomer is hunted down by two men in black.

“Déjà Vu” by Paul Chadwick. It’s about a couple where the wife is a psyhic or sensitive, and dreams about being in a tank controlled by machines. She can also predict some things.

“System Freeze” by Poppy Z. Brite and Dave Dorman. This is a short story with some illustrations. It’s about an Artificial Intelligence prorammer who is climbing Mount Everest. She’s such a good programmer that the agents have taken notice.

“The King of Never Return” by Ted McKeever. This is the story of a group of Sion rebels. They get back to Matrix and do what ever they want because they know it’s not real. They don’t want to be part of someone else’s war or prophecy. I have to admit that this would probably sound very appealing to many people. Unfortunately, I didn’t care for the art at all.

“An Asset to the System” by Troy Nixey. A young man saw his father murdered when he was eight and has always wanted to be a police officer. Currently, he’s a security guard. Unfortunately for him.

“A Path Among Stones” by Gregory Ruth. Little Emma Pearson is having trouble with reality and is interviewed by a psychologist. The doctor dignoses her as an schrichoprenic when she says that nobody is real and that in her dreams people have wires coming from their heads. The art is very simplistic with white, green, and black being the only colours except for a dash of red in a couple of panels.

“Run, Saga, Run” by Keron Grant. Saga Talmer is one of the kids whom the Oracle is teaching. However, Saga is tried of waiting to know the real world and decides to take matter into her own hands. The art is manga-style.

“Wrong Number” by Vince Evans. Sometimes is just very hard to get an operating phone line, especially when you want an exit from the Matrix.

“Broadcast Depth” by Bill Sienkiewicz is one of the more complex tales. Maggie is on a mission in Matrix. Her eight-year old twin girls are on a ship where the Zionites test potential mission operatives. The girls have decided to join their mommy in the fake world to celebrate mommy’s birthday. I don’t usually like Sienkiewicz’s art but here it fits the world and the mood even though it’s sometimes hard for me to follow it.

“Who says you can’t get good help these days?” by Peters Bagge. This is a three-page humor story about what happens when Morpheus gets the wrong address and a perfectly ordinary guy is set to Neo’s path.

“Saviors” by Spencer Lamm and Michael Oeming. This is another interesting glimpse of Zionist who don’t agree with Morpheous. Hitch has just seen his parents die when they were disconnected from the Matrix. He doesn’t want anyone else to die so he makes a deal with the agents.

“I Kant” by Kaare Andrews and Ron Turner. I think this one is set after the third movie. People are trying to figure out what to do next. This is also done in manga style.

I liked the majority of the stories. They didn’t really add to the movies, except maybe for the last one, but they deepened the world. I’ve sometimes idly wondered what it would be like to live in Matrix; hearing weird stuff happening and maybe feeling sometimes that things aren’t right. These stories answered those questions somewhat.