The Wachowskis "The Matrix", a science fiction action film, in 1999. The movie stars Keanu Reeves as Neo, a hacker recruited by a rebellion to aid them in the fight against machines who have taken over the world and placed humanity inside a simulated reality called "the Matrix". Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Hugo Weaving and Joe Pantoliano also star. The movie was a critical and commercial hit for Warner Bros. It won four Academy Awards, including for "Best Visual Effects" for popularizing the bullet time visual effect. "The Matrix" came to be a major influence for action movies and has appeared in
Alter Ego (magazine) the owner of the magazine and it is headquartered in Raleigh, NC. "Alter-Ego" supported the superhero revivals of the era that Jerry Bails dubbed "The Second Heroic Age of Comics", popularly known as the Silver Age of Comic Books. DC Comics editor Julius Schwartz encouraged Bails and collaborator Roy Thomas, who would eventually become Marvel Comics editor-in-chief. Bails contacted readers whose letters had appeared in DC's "The Brave and the Bold" #35, the first comic book to print readers' full mailing addresses in its letter column. Some of those readers were active in other fandoms, and helped spread word-of-mouth about