Yahya Abdul-Mateen II has confirmed he will be playing the role of Morpheus in The Matrix Resurrections.
The 35-year-old actor confirmed the news on Friday (10 September) by posting a still on Instagram of himself armed with two guns, sporting Morpheus’s familiar shades and suit and staring straight into the camera.
He captioned the post “MORPHEUS”, declaring that he will be playing the leader of the resistance who freed Keanu Reeves’s Neo from the confines of the Matrix.
Previously, Morpheus was portrayed by Laurence Fishburne in the first three films of the Matrix franchise and in the video game The Matrix: Path of Neo, where he was the only actor to reprise his character’s voice.
Abdul-Mateen isn’t the only newcomer to the franchise. Other actors like Christina Ricci, Jessica Henwick, Jonathan Groff and Priyanka Chopra Jonas have also joined the cast.
On Thursday (9 September), a first full-length trailer was unveiled for The Matrix Resurrections.
It offered a glimpse of what’s to come for the ensemble of characters in the fourth film in the Matrix series, set to release later this year.
The trailer opens with Neil Patrick Harris playing a character who appears to be Neo’s therapist. Neo, who now appears to be going by the name of Thomas, tells him he has been having “dreams that weren’t just dreams”.
“Thomas”, it turns out, appears to have forgotten most of what happened to him during the first three films and seems to be on the verge of a new awakening.
As in the first three instalments, the trailer shows he is to be joined on his quest by Trinity, played by Carrie-Anne Moss.
The trailer includes several references to Alice in Wonderland. In the first film, Neo famously embarks on his journey to the truth by following “the white rabbit”, a nod to Lewis Carroll’s tale. It also echoes much of the mind-bending imagery that was the mainstay of the first three instalments.
The Matrix Resurrections is scheduled to release on 22 December 2021 in the US and in the UK.
