Jessica Henwick is an English actress best known for her roles in Game of Thrones, Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens and Netflix’s Iron Fist, the latter of which earned her praise across the board for her standout performance as Colleen Wing. In effect, by the end of 2017, Henwick was listed as one of Variety’s Top Breakout Stars of 2017.
As Henwick has detailed to the press, the day she received the offer from the folks behind The Matrix Resurrections to fly to Los Angeles and chemistry read with the actors up for the Morpheus role— including Yahya Abdul-Mateen II—was the same day she got an offer to screen test for Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. “[The studios] knew about the other offers, and both of them gave me the offer on the stipulation that I could only audition for one or the other. And there was no guarantee that I would get either,” Henwick told Entertainment Weekly. “It was a red pill, blue pill moment for me.” Here’s a closer look at why she made the right choice with Lana Wachowski’s highly anticipated sequel of the beloved Matrix franchise.
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Henwick Already Played an MCU Martial Artist
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Henwick is no stranger to mega franchises, and in Marvel’s Iron Fist, she plays Colleen Wing, a martial artist who runs her own dojo in New York City. The Iron Fist character—AKA Daniel Thomas Rand—first appeared in Marvel Comics in 1974. He is a practitioner of martial arts and wielder of a mystical force known as the “iron fist.” The fictional character had his own solo series in the 1970s, and shared the title Power Man and Iron Fist for several years with Luke Cage. He has starred in numerous solo titles since, including The Immortal Iron Fist. The first season of the Netflix series was released in 2017 and received generally negative reviews from critics but maintained a strong viewership. A second season was released the following year to an improved critical reception, but the show was ultimately canceled.
“The most defining word that comes to mind is alone—in all its positives and negatives,” said Henwick to Interview Magazine in describing her Iron Fist character. “She doesn’t want to be anyone’s love interest and open herself up in that way.”
The actress hasn’t officially confirmed whether it was her Iron Fist character that was being offered to her for Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings or if it was a different role altogether. It’s been done before; indeed, Michelle Yeoh’s role in Shang-Chi as the titular hero’s aunt is her second role overall in the MCU franchise (separate from her role as Aleta Ogord in Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2. Regardless, given that Henwick has already sunk her teeth into a fan-favorite Marvel role in the past, we can’t blame her for expanding her horizons with The Matrix Resurrections.
The Matrix Offers a Juicier Role
Lana Wachowski’s fourth Matrix installment is about to hit the masses, with Henwick co-starring as Bugs, a blue-haired gunslinger with a White Rabbit tattoo. The new film takes place 20 years after the events of The Matrix Revolutions, with Neo living a seemingly ordinary life as “Mr. Anderson” in San Francisco. A therapist prescribes him blue pills to counteract the strange and unnatural things he occasionally sees. He also meets a woman who appears to be Trinity, but they don’t recognize each other—even though we certainly do. When a new version of Morpheus (played by Abdul-Mateen II) offers him the red pill and reopens his mind to the Matrix, Neo joins a group of rebels to fight a new enemy.
Henwick described her supporting character to EW as “the audience’s eyes.” And in an interview with Den of Geek, she detailed how the role was presented initially: “All they told me was a very short description of her being a captain, and a leader, and a true believer in the legend of Neo. Yeah, that was it. It was pretty minimal.”
Last year, Henwick teased the film to ComicBook by claiming Lana Wachowski would again change the course of filmmaking just as she did with the original trilogy — another good reason to choose The Matrix over Shang-Chi. “There are definitely moment on set where Yahya [Abdul-Mateen II] and I look at each other and we just go, ‘Matrix 4.’ Those pinch me moments. Yeah. Lana is doing some really interesting things on a technical level in the same way that you know, she created a style back then. I think she’s going to change the industry again with this film. There’s some camera rigs that I’ve never seen before that we’re using.”
Given these exciting details we’ve learned thus far without even seeing The Matrix Resurrections, it’s not surprising that Henwick ended up going with The Matrix Resurrections as her next project.
Potential for The Matrix 5 Appearance
While Warner Bros. has yet to officially announce that The Matrix 5 is happening, the studio’s CEO Ann Sarnoff has gone on record saying that another sequel is a possibility. But it seems that the original trilogy co-director and The Matrix Resurrections writer-director will have to be on board to make it. “Anytime Lana wants to make a movie, we’re all in,” Sarnoff recently told Deadline. So far, Wachowski hasn’t expressed any intention of making a fifth movie, but The Matrix Resurrections has already received generally favorable reviews from critics thus far. Plus, it will be interesting to see the how the film performs with a dual release, in theaters and on HBO Max. It’s possible that might direct both Wachowski and the studio’s thinking in terms of a follow-up.
Given the extensive press Henwick has done for her seemingly central role in the highly ancipated fourth installment, it seems likely that “Bugs” would return with sequels to come.
