Strong and Moving!

Admirable film.

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Well.. actually the second of the second of the second, looking at the film's title. These 9 minutes continue where "The Second Renaissance Part 1" left off. Unfortunately it is equally forgettable just like the first part. Men rejected machines' peaceful attempt to return, so a war is unavoidable. And of course there can only be one possible outcome to that. Stupid men. So they want to destroy the sky? Another brilliant idea. NOT. The director is Mahiro Maeda again, who already worked with Tarantino and the script comes from the Wachowskis just like the script for the famous live action movies. I have to say I was never too big on "The Matrix", but these animated short films are even worse. And also, they almost have no reference to the films anymore at all. Not recommended.

With the human economy almost in complete ruin the world fights back against the machine city, but underestimates their resilience. With no option left but to black-out the sky and eliminate the main source of machine power, the humans launch an attack on robot-kind and are quickly cut-down. Those who are captured are experimented on in the beginning of the Matrix concept.It's pretty depressing stuff, and highlights the cheapness and futility of human life. As with the film series, it's very, very much like the Terminator mythology, but as long as humans are greedy, vain, and stupid it will always be relevant.IE: It will ALWAYS be relevant.

Of the Animatrix shorts, this is the third, and, obviously, of The Second Renaissance, it is the second part. After the first one(which perhaps had more to say, but that is debatable) told us the events leading up to the war, this shows just that: The stand-off between the two forces. We already know the final result, so this is not about the destination, but the journey. The depiction is very dark, bleak and apocalyptic, and it achieves what was obviously one of the things they went for: It is not a pleasant sight. The irony is bitter and arguably cruel. The story-telling is similar. The animation is nice, with a well-integrated mix of 2D and 3D. Very effective direction and choice of color schemes. This has nudity or what comes very close to it, and definitely violent and disturbing images, and is not for the faint of heart. This is controversial, just as the one before it. On the DVD, there is a making of that goes over both, and is very informative and well-done, and a commentary track, not in English but with subtitles, and it is definitely worth taking in. I recommend this to any fan of the Matrix franchise, Part I of these(watching it is a must for the experience of this one) and/or science fiction in general. 8/10

Part 2 goes on where part 1 stopped (such a surprise!), as the machines feel they don't belong to the humans any longer and start their own country, zero-one. Their economy is growing and they become a threat to all mankind, so they bomb them with everything they got... but fail (as you would expect since otherwise there wouldn't have been a matrix).Part 2 is a bit more gripping than part 1, although I keep on wondering: is it really important for us to 'know' this? The animatrix series should be an extra for the matrix movies, and for instance 'Osiris' is just that... but Renaissance, whether it's part one or two, feels silly more than intense and pointless more than important... 5/10.