As the fourth instalment of the iconic cyberpunk film series is on its way, it's time to re-enter the Matrix. Matrix 4 will plunge us back into a dystopian future filled with sentinel robots and digital fabrications, announced just shy of the 20th anniversary of the Matrix. And after Warner Brothers' landmark announcement, next year's Matrix 4 will not only be available in theatres, it will also stream on the same day on HBO Max. When is it coming out? Who's taking part? Will there be Keanu Reeves in it? Everything we know about the fourth Matrix film is here. 

When is MATRIX 4 coming out? 

Matrix 4 is now officially headed for release on Dec. 22, 2021, originally slated for May 21, 2021, then bumped to April 2022 due to COVID juggling. The radical, post-pandemic release strategy of Warner Bros. will also see the movie available on HBO Max on the same day but for one month only. The movie goes back to being a theatrical exclusive after the streaming run. Right now, with no subtitles, it's simply called Matrix 4. But considering The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions were the other two sequels, we anticipate an eventual "R" word added to the end. 

Only one of the WACHOWSKIS comes back … 

And that would be Lana Wachowski, who is preparing to write, direct, and produce. She wrote the screenplay with David Mitchell, the author of Cloud Atlas, and Aleksander Hermon, with whom she worked on Netflix's Sense8. Due to her work on the Showtime series Work in Progress, a more reality-based series than previous Wachowski projects, Lilly Wachowski won't be involved. She gave the Matrix sequel her blessing, but stated in interviews for the series that she feels more attracted to creating works that deal explicitly with social problems. After Bound, the original trilogy of Matrix, Speed Racer, Cloud Atlas, and Jupiter Ascending, Matrix 4 will be the first film not created by the two sisters together. 

Who else on the production side is returning? 

Grant Hill, along with Geof Darrow and Steve Skroce, who were both concept and storyboard artists on the Matrix films, was one of the original producers on the Matrix Reloaded returns. 

Who is in the caste of MATRIX 4? 

In what reports suggest are the lead roles, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II (Watchmen) and Jessica Henwick (Iron Fist) have been cast. It is highly rumoured that a young Morpheus will play Abdul-Mateen II and that Henwick will be a "Neo-like" female character, but that has not been confirmed. Along with Toby Onwumere of Sense8, Neil Patrick Harris (How I Met Your Mother) and Jonathan Groff (Frozen) have also been cast. In January 2020, another Sense8 alum, Eréndira Ibarra, along with Indian actress Priyanka Chopra, joined the cast. 

In the role of Niobe, Jada Pinkett Smith will return, as will Lambert Wilson as The Merovingian. And perhaps most significantly, Carrie Anne Moss and Keanu Reeves are returning as Trinity and Neo for the diehard Matrix-heads. In The Matrix Reloaded, Trinity and Neo gear up. The explanation for the return of Keanu Reeves is the simplest: Neo is the result of a statistical anomaly repeating itself over and over again in the Matrix. Although Neo's most recent representation seems to reset the Matrix, there is still anomaly, meaning that he could come again. In fact, the Oracle says at the end of the Revolutions that she believes she's going to see Neo again. As she dies outside the Matrix, Trinity is a bit more difficult and her coming was never prophesied through statistical anomalies. Nonetheless, she was born in the Matrix, and she was able to reappear somehow. 

Laurence Fishburne informed the New York Magazine in August that he was not involved in the sequel. "I didn't get invited. Perhaps it'll make me write another play. I'm searching for that blessing. I wish good for them. I hope it's great." We don't know for sure, but with as much finality as it might seem, the Matrix trilogy did not end. Neo self-sacrificed to save the Matrix (and thus the machines called off their attack on Zion). The Matrix is rebooted and is home to both the people inside and some independent programmes not anticipated by the Architect. It's peaceful, but it might not last long, as the architect points out. 

As expected, about just what's in store, everyone involved with the fourth matrix has been very tight-lipped. Only a motorcycle chase really promised a set of photos. There has only been one very sparse comment beyond that. The relevant script is very exciting," Yahya Abdul-Mateen II told Entertainment Weekly." It's that! We're just going to have to wait to see.