The Matrix is a Trans Allegory now

[MrL1992]

'Now'? It always did, we just became aware of it. We took a red pill so to speak.

[Madner Kami]

I don't see it as a trans allegory. The Wachowskis might have intended to bring in that theme specifically, whether conciously or subconciously, but the movie is not about transgenderism in particular.
What they created is a work about how there are many layers to life and that not everything is what it seems to be on the surface level. It's, among other things, a movie about the masks we wear in public and the (social) boundaries we submit to, when we are being watched and "outside" (which, somewhat ironically, is equal to the "inside" within the movie's term, aka the Matrix and vice versa). This does obviously include people who hide their mental gender, but also people who hide their physical gender, people who hide their personality, people who hide their thoughts and believes (of all kinds) and so on, but the movie is not about transgenderism in particular.

Sometimes, the art transcends the artist.

[CmdrKing]

It's not unreasonable to think that calling Matrix a trans allegory is a lot; it touches on a lot of other things besides, after all, and is as much a deep dive on transhumanism and the nature of consciousness as the disconnect between the inescapable artifice of the Matrix and the inability to name and describe awareness of that fact.
(That, more than anything else, the "there's something wrong with the world, you don't know what it is, but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad"? That's the trans part of The Matrix, the world is fake your life is fake everything you've ever learned is a lie, you dearly want something else, but because you've only ever learned these fake, wrong things you don't have the words to form the thoughts to figure out what it is. All you know is there's just some people you look at and think very hard "I wish I was like her" but you've been trained to think that's silly and assume everyone probably thinks that way.
(Cis people do not spend hours a day of and on for years on end thinking about being another gender.))

But undeniably it is very much viewing all of its themes and inspirations through a trans lens, because too much of the movie is so obviously personal and too many of the specifics are so clearly a way to make trans struggles understandable and digestible to a cis audience. I don't really have the movie on hand to deep dive this, but I can rattle off one example without looking:

As already noted, Smith's go-to insult is a sneering insistence on using Neo's given name, and the climax of the film, his first uncontested win, is when he firmly asserts his real name (another tell: when he gives out this name to Trinity when the first me, she immediately asks "what's your REAL name" and he answer Neo). But that scene is doubly important, because the setting and the way Smith tries to kill him? Stepping off a subway platform and letting the train hit her is how Lana Wachowski experienced ideation. Two incredibly common issues trans people struggle with, the insistence of authorities and persecutors to use dead names, and suicidal thoughts or attempts, rolled into the climatic scene of the film in a way directly personal to how one of the directors experienced those things. but also in a way that makes it easier to understand how tenacious and harmful those things can be to an audience who may not directly experience them.

[Madner Kami]

But undeniably it is very much viewing all of its themes and inspirations through a trans lens, because too much of the movie is so obviously personal and too many of the specifics are so clearly a way to make trans struggles understandable and digestible to a cis audience.

Then the movie fails in this regard, because clearly most of the cis audience hasn't seen it that way. I mean, I can look at a lot of art "in a certain way" or "through a lense" and interpret all kinds of meanings into it from this switched perspective and there's merit to that, a lot in fact. But if I want to tell my audience something, this way of structuring the art doesn't work. (And yes, I am aware of executive meddling and I'd have been very happy to have at least Switch being her "true self" instead of this random androgynious person getting offed, but that is besides the point.)

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

But undeniably it is very much viewing all of its themes and inspirations through a trans lens, because too much of the movie is so obviously personal and too many of the specifics are so clearly a way to make trans struggles understandable and digestible to a cis audience.

Then the movie fails in this regard, because clearly most of the cis audience hasn't seen it that way. I mean, I can look at a lot of art "in a certain way" or "through a lense" and interpret all kinds of meanings into it from this switched perspective and there's merit to that, a lot in fact. But if I want to tell my audience something, this way of structuring the art doesn't work. (And yes, I am aware of executive meddling and I'd have been very happy to have at least Switch being her "true self" instead of this random androgynious person getting offed, but that is besides the point.)

They haven't seen it that way because it doesn't mention anything about being trans.

[GreyICE]

Yeah, in all honesty you can make a character trans in everything but specifically saying "I'm transgender", and the character will be interpreted as cis by most of the audience. I mean look at Khorra. We have a woman who bounced from a dysfunctional relationship with a guy she thought "oh this is the perfect hot, cool, amazing guy to date" but later admitted they had no attraction and no chemistry, to a dysfunctional relationship with a guy she was good friends with and remained good friends with, but had no real chemistry, to a relationship with a woman. And still half the audience said "I can't believe she's gay!" Like really, really, there were no clues? None whatsoever?

There's an extreme amount of heteronormativity in western culture that virtually guarantees that anyone who doesn't specifically come out and say "I'm cisgender, I'm gay, etc." will be read as straight, sometimes to the point where audiences will be outright angry when they discover otherwise.

[Madner Kami]

Yeah, in all honesty you can make a character trans in everything but specifically saying "I'm transgender", and the character will be interpreted as cis by most of the audience. I mean look at Khorra. We have a woman who bounced from a dysfunctional relationship with a guy she thought "oh this is the perfect hot, cool, amazing guy to date" but later admitted they had no attraction and no chemistry, to a dysfunctional relationship with a guy she was good friends with and remained good friends with, but had no real chemistry, to a relationship with a woman. And still half the audience said "I can't believe she's gay!" Like really, really, there were no clues? None whatsoever?

There's an extreme amount of heteronormativity in western culture that virtually guarantees that anyone who doesn't specifically come out and say "I'm cisgender, I'm gay, etc." will be read as straight, sometimes to the point where audiences will be outright angry when they discover otherwise.

You are reaching there. The vast majority of humankind doesn't find their perfect partner on the first try and it has nothing to do with "not being able to see beyond cis". On the contrary, what you are painting there is a really ugly picture, because everyone who doesn't find their perfect partner on the first try must be gay/bi/trans/attackhelicopter, according to your statement.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

Yeah, in all honesty you can make a character trans in everything but specifically saying "I'm transgender", and the character will be interpreted as cis by most of the audience. I mean look at Khorra. We have a woman who bounced from a dysfunctional relationship with a guy she thought "oh this is the perfect hot, cool, amazing guy to date" but later admitted they had no attraction and no chemistry, to a dysfunctional relationship with a guy she was good friends with and remained good friends with, but had no real chemistry, to a relationship with a woman. And still half the audience said "I can't believe she's gay!" Like really, really, there were no clues? None whatsoever?

There's an extreme amount of heteronormativity in western culture that virtually guarantees that anyone who doesn't specifically come out and say "I'm cisgender, I'm gay, etc." will be read as straight, sometimes to the point where audiences will be outright angry when they discover otherwise.

You are reaching there. The vast majority of humankind doesn't find their perfect partner on the first try and it has nothing to do with "not being able to see beyond cis". On the contrary, what you are painting there is a really ugly picture, because everyone who doesn't find their perfect partner on the first try must be gay/bi/trans/attackhelicopter, according to your statement.

He didn't say "not able," he referred to directed attention and expectations of the character. The problem is choice.

[GreyICE]

You are reaching there. The vast majority of humankind doesn't find their perfect partner on the first try and it has nothing to do with "not being able to see beyond cis". On the contrary, what you are painting there is a really ugly picture, because everyone who doesn't find their perfect partner on the first try must be gay/bi/trans/attackhelicopter, according to your statement.

Well, as we've established, you're an absolute spanner, so why am I not surprised at this moronic drivel of a response. If at some point you have something resembling a coherent idea... actually I honestly hope to fuck if you manage that at some point in your life you don't waste it on this website. I doubt you've got more than two or three of them in you.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

Well let's not say things we can't take back. But yeah, the text isn't explicit, but it doesn't really have to be for allegory. What is required more or less is an understanding of trans experience and that ranges from innate and privileged to commonly understood.

Mainly though, the idea of socially prescribed gender roles seems pretty fitting for the metaphysical facets of the story. But I guess more importantly is that we've seen a commonly transcribed trans narrative where the gender roles as we're talking about it here is rather domineering and pervasive down to an intimate level.

Now, nothing is explicit in the movie, but metaphysical basis is similarity, and further the nature expressed by trans people often is a personal connection. The fact that it came from two trans women that spent their whole lives together makes it kind of ambiguous as to how it couldn't be an allegory.