X2: X-Men United, The Matrix: Reloaded

One cannot live on arthouse films alone. The summer tradition of big, booming, brains-optional blockbusters has returned, and the first two out of the gate are ones we’ve been looking forward to, perhaps a little guiltily. We don’t have any grandiose expectations for the return of Marvel Comics’ mutant metaphors for prejudice and teenage angst; X2 is burdened by more characters and nicknames and powers than anybody should bother to keep track of. But the guys with lasers coming out of their eyes ought to blow stuff up real good. The Matrix movies are more streamlined, thanks to a story structure with only one primary character—Keanu Reeves’ Neo, the high-tech action hero with Buddha nature. But Reloaded also has to set up November’s trilogy-closing Revolutions, not to mention having a much better film to live up to than X-Men. If the writer/director Wachowski Brothers can deliver on the fight-scene promise shown in the Reloaded trailers and still deliver a story with some real ideas in it, we’ll gladly be the first to say “whoa.”