Everthing Matrix!! (Reloaded/Revolutions Spoilers!)

Kirby:

I think the second Matrix program theory you discussed is a good one. It is what I suspected could be a final twist at the end of Revolutions and Reloaded most certainly gave clues to support it. Also, 13th Floor was pretty good both Matriz and it came out around the same time with very similar ideas.

 

Zion was built and destroyed 5 times? Does this mean the machines are allowing Zion to exist?

in a word, yes.

in more than a word, it's more than that. the Architect notes that, no matter what they did, anomalies are the unfortunate, inevitable byproduct of the system as the direct result of human choice. some people will inevitably choose to rebel against the Matrix. if allowed to go unchecked, human rebellion would crash the Matrix and kill all the humans attached to it (which would also detroy the machines' power source, obviously).

so, since they couldn't stop anomolous human behavior, he worked with the Oracle to provide a sort of "safety valve." they built Zion and created the entire myth of the One and the prophecies around him as, essentially, something to keep the rebels busy. they have their illusions of heaven (Zion) and salvation (through Christ/the One) to control the way they express their rebellious tendencies. they want to rebel against the Matrix, so they get a little safe hideout to play rebel in while the Oracle tells them to sit tight and wait for the One to come back and save them. then, when the One comes back, they kill all the rebels and reboot the Matrix to start all over again. they pick 23 (ha) people out of the Matrix and give them the whole Prophecy spiel all over again, without telling them that they aren't the first ones to do this and without telling them that the whole thing's a crock. they're essentially kept in a zoo for "free" humans and given religion to keep them from rebelling in ways that haven't already been approved. they aren't free, but they think they're free and they feel free, so they won't actually do anything that might really endanger the Matrix.

as Neo says "The Prophecy is a lie. It's just another system of control."

Neo has clearly been set up to be a Christ figure, but now it's clear that that's been specifically for the purpose of deconstucting the myth of Christ. The Matrix Reloaded is a stunning rebuke of Christianity as essentially a source of false hope and an opiate of the masses.

 

kirby2112, I had the same thought last night after I logged off. I was trying to rationalize how Smith had entered the real world and how Neo had powers in the real world, when it suddenly occured to me that the "real world" wasn't real at all, but rather another illusion.

 

See, i don't think the Real world is still the Matrix..

Remember: Agent Smith told Neo that, when Neo killed him, Smith was disconnected from the system, thus becoming a (harhar) Free Agent..(remember the scene where he delivered his Agent Ear-piece to Neo in an envelope)

I guess i understood his ability to enter the Real World as merely being an extension of him now being a rogue program.. He's no longer connected, thus he's got free reign to do what he wants..

Now you could ask: Why hasn't a Rogue Program done this before?

The Answer i would come up with is: Why would a program who can live the life of the Merivingian (sp?) WANT to go out in the grimy, gritty "real" world?

Agent Smith has his own agenda.. He apparently wants to nail Neo..

Other programs have a limited amount of "Power" in the Matrix to do what they want and live comfortably, so why give that up?



****Beyond this point are spoilers for the videogame "Enter the Matrix"*****








As far as "Enter the Matrix" giving any more insight into events in the movie: i'm not entirely finished the game yet, but it DOES go into a bit more detail concering the henchmen of the Merivingian.. You actually have to take on a bunch of "Vampires".. (It seemed to be hinted at in the movie that those henchmen were Werewolves, vampires, ghosts etc., but other then Persephone's question of "Who keeps a gun loaded with silver bullets?" (and the twins), you never really had this demonstrated)

You also have it hinted at that there HAVE been other Zions..

There's also been an appearance by the Keymaker, who does a bit more on explaining the 'hallway of green doors', and about the key that's meant for "The One"..

 

See, i don't think the Real world is still the Matrix..

Remember: Agent Smith told Neo that, when Neo killed him, Smith was disconnected from the system, thus becoming a (harhar) Free Agent..(remember the scene where he delivered his Agent Ear-piece to Neo in an envelope)

But remember, there's still the question of how Neo is able to control things in the "real world" now as well. Whatever happened to Agent Smith doesn't address that question.

 

..true, that is the one loophole..

Best reasoning i've heard to work that out was posted by someone at another website..

Here's a quote:


"it's possible Neo has become so interactive with the Matrix computer system that he's able to communicate with the machines somehow. So, Zion and the rest of the world isn't a Matrix on top of the Matrix -- it really is the REAL WORLD. But in this real world, Neo brings back capabilities (from meeting with the Architect) of understanding machines and their programs far beyond what any normal human being has, so he was able to destroy the sentinel with that knowledge. "


Not sure about this, but i just can't see the Wachowski's making it a Matrix within the Matrix, simply BECAUSE that idea has already been done in "The Thirteenth Floor"..

 

Not sure about this, but i just can't see the Wachowski's making it a Matrix within the Matrix, simply BECAUSE that idea has already been done in "The Thirteenth Floor"..

the Wachowski's have had the entire story arc of the trilogy planned since before they started making Bound, which was released in 1996, and so presumably started pre-production at least in 1995.

The Thirteenth Floor (which is a very good movie as well) didn't come out until 1999, and so whether or not something was done in The Thirteenth Floor could not have any bearing on basic plot elements for the Matrix trilogy, simply because The Thirteenth Floor wasn't out when the Matrix trilogy was planned.

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i think there are really only two possible scenarios here:

1) the "real world" is, in fact, real. Agent Smith usurped Bane's persona when he absorbed him in the Matrix, and when Bane was downloaded back into his body, the Smith-infected persona was what got copied onto Bane's brain (which is basically like a hard drive here). in this case, i suppose Neo's physical brain would have been altered somehow to function as some sort of wireless transmitter which can affect machines (i keep thinking of the girl from William Gibson's Mona Lisa Overdrive here)

2) the "real world" is also part of the Matrix. i'm definitely leaning towards this explanation, since i've suspected this much since the first movie. the first movie was constantly insisting that you couldn't trust your senses, while at the same time the only proof Morpheus offers of the reality of the "real world" is that once he saw the harvesting fields, he just "knew" it was true. he just trusted his senses and what the people who freed him were telling him, which hasn't really been a very reliable way to judge anything in these movies.

if #2 is true, the most interesting issue for me, then, is this: what does the real real world look like? when is it? where are their brains? are they all programs?

 

Not sure about this, but i just can't see the Wachowski's making it a Matrix within the Matrix, simply BECAUSE that idea has already been done in "The Thirteenth Floor"..

That means nothing. The basic idea of the Matrix has been around since Metropolis, which was made in 1927, or even more recently in Dark City, which came out the year before The Matrix. The idea of a hero born within a machine world that develops power to overcome his oppressors and bring liberation to the masses is an old idea. The only thing they did for the Matrix that was original storywise was that they put it inside a computer. Other than that, it's been done.

So I don't think, "Wait, that's been done," is a thought that's going to concern them.

 

In answer to some of your questions, I am no Matrix expert but I'll try my best. One of the questions that didn't get answerd yet is the door thing. The doors have to do with (I'm not sure about this but...) glitches. I think now don't take this as being totally true I have no proof to back this but this is what I saw it as. In video games there is things called texture tears (the doors) one example is in the game SOCOM US navy seals. there are texture tears that allow you to go up in the sky and what not (in order to cheat) so in the matrix the doors are kinda like that, also there are "doors" on the internet (quicker ways to get to places) that hackers can find. so the Keymaker is kind of like a hacking program. I donno thats what I got out of it. The reactions of Neo have been explained well already so I wont reiterate it. I also just found out about the Zion not being the real world today at school. It is a good theory and would explain the Powers of Neo in the real world. I also got Enter the Matrix, I really like it! its addictive, you can pull off so many different moves and such very good fight moves. The graphics are lacking a bit, but the story and gameplay are good. Also how do vampires and "dobermen" fit into the story, are they also rouge programs? The best part of the game is the cut scenes FANTASTIC is the first word that pops into mind. I really like how the Bros. took time and had the actual actors do so much for a video game. Not only that but the actors, and actresses that lend thier voices into the Animatrix shorts. I really wish that the Star Wars games and shorts would take thier example. It makes them more realistic and believable, and more fun to play.

Forcebewitya!

 

My theory is that the ghosts and werewolves the Oracle warned Neo about are the Merovingian's guards (though not exclusively). Persephone killed one of her husband's "notoriously difficult to kill" guards with a silver bullet, and the twins have definite ghost-like abilities. I think the terms werewolf and ghost were not meant to be taken literally, but rather that there are rogue programs within the Matrix that have properties, characteristics or behaviorisms that allow them to be confused with or referred to as ghosts or werewolves.

 

Like the Oracle told Neo that every siting of an alien werewolf or vampire was a program not functioning the way it was supposed to and thus became a rogue rather than returning to the source for deletion.

 

I had very low expectations going into this film, and I was still disappointed. There was nothing revolutionary or ground-breaking, excep the fact that Lawrence Fishburne went from interesting to 'I'm a preacher, listen to me!' Keanu...ha ha ha! Then the whole Architect mumbo-jumbo, most people would be incredibly confused by him.

Boring, trite, yet it did have at least one good fight scene. Neo vs. Agent Smith x100...cool, but that's the pinnacle of this movie.

 

I have no idea why neo can do the things he seems to be able to do in "the real". Maybe even that is another Matrix but a Matrix based on the human mind.

One odd thing I did notice watching it again tonight, did anyone see that the system name in the power grid is Z10N01? I have no idea what to make of that. Cute joke or revealing fact?

One thing I was wondering about is what is Trinity's role going to be in the next one. I kinda got the feeling that Neo messing with the code is why him and Smith are "connected" now. Was him messing with Trinity's Matrix code a set up for something more?

 

To start off, I loved Reloaded. I have to say that it did not live up to the first one, but hey, everyone knew nothing could live up to it anyway.

But, I just read an amazing theory that we were discussing at our local FF. It sure explains a lot:

"Agent Smith exists only because his program somehow gained a portion of Neo's "Code".
This gave Smith the ability to "come back to life", and presumably, to copy himself.

This also "freed" Smith and has really screwed with his purpose, etc etc..

In one sentence: Agent Smith gained a part of Neo.
And here's the crucial bit: Neo gained a part of Agnet Smith.

OK, so this inolves quite a bit of guess work, and is only my (current) theory, but it seemes to hold water.

The best way to explain it is to use an example. The best I can think of is the Ripley/Alien thing in Aliens Resurrection. In the same way that the new Ripley gained certain Alien traits and the new Alien gained certain human traits, so too did Neo and Smith.

Smith's gains have already been outlined, and are more or less, easily understood. Neo's (according to my theory) are a little harder. First we need to look at a few things we learnt from the movie.

Towards the end we see Neo "use his powers" in the real world to stop the Sentinels. This is more or less "Neo's gain". To help understand this we have to go back to very near the beginning, when Smith first copies himself. The first copy is of a conscious human, (who was bringing the message to Neo from the Oracle). The guy returns to the reall world, but with Agent Smith's "consciousness" in his brain.

We see the guy later, first of all, cutting his hand with a knife, before attempting to kill Neo - this is Agent Smith controlling the human host. And later, at the Concil meeting when two pilots are asked to volunteer. However the man's captain prefers to remain behind and Niobe (sp?) goes instead.

That means that the Agent Smith guy is left behind as one of the crew members on board one of the ships that makes up a part of Commander Lock's "trap" for the Sentinels.

We later hear that the EMP switch on one of those ships was flipped early, allowing the sentinels to overrun the forces, killing all the humans - all but one survivor, who we find out is none other than the same Agent Smith guy.

What am I getting to here? Well, think about how and why one man survived. He was being controlled by Smith, who was an Agent, and would have held some kind of control over the Sentinels. Presumably, an Agent would be able to command the Sentinels, or at least stop them dead in their tracks. There is no way that the human could have otherwise survived. Consider the number of Sentinels and the limited means of survival otherwise.

So, back to Neo, who has gained something from the Agnet's code. The ability to stop the Sentinels dead in their tracks."

 

"Lawrence Fishburne went from interesting to 'I'm a preacher, listen to me!"
This was the one scene in the movie where I thought the dialogue was a little corny and cliche.

 

See, i don't think the Real world is still the Matrix..

Remember: Agent Smith told Neo that, when Neo killed him, Smith was disconnected from the system, thus becoming a (harhar) Free Agent..(remember the scene where he delivered his Agent Ear-piece to Neo in an envelope)

Ahh but the "real world" is another form of the Matrix, as someone else here said, me and a friend came to that conclusion last night. Notice when Neo found out the prophecy and everything is just a lie he was able to feel the machine's in the "real world". He woke up again so to speak.

Even Agent Smith copying himself to the one guy from the "real world" proves the real world is another form of the Matrix. That guy was unplugged, and as said in the first movie anybody who is unplugged is potentially an agent, Agent Smith has become that what he called the humans, a virus, and has affected this Zionian. Like any other computer virus, this guy is not following his programming, or his free will, he is now an Agent able to exist in the Zion Matrix, but since the Agent Program won't run in Zion no one can tell the change, and like Smith he wants to kill Neo, someone he believed was his saviour once. He seemed determined to get Neo that disk from the oracle.

What Neo and the Zionionites will have to fight now is Control, the right to control their own destinies. Its doubtful that they'd ever really wake up from their dream. Hence the Matrix is nothing but a dream within a dream.

 

"The "real world" is, in fact, real. Agent Smith usurped Bane's persona when he absorbed him in the Matrix, and when Bane was downloaded back into his body, the Smith-infected persona was what got copied onto Bane's brain (which is basically like a hard drive here). in this case, i suppose Neo's physical brain would have been altered somehow to function as some sort of wireless transmitter which can affect machines (i keep thinking of the girl from William Gibson's Mona Lisa Overdrive here)"

Yes, but what about the Architect's comment about Zion having been destroyed 5 times before? That was really the clincher that Zion and the 'real world' were just another Matrix.

 

The reason Neo can 'feel' the Sentinels and is able to stop them in the Real World is because of Agent Smith--Smith says that when Neo killed him, part of Neo got imprinted on him; this works vise versa as well. The two are linked, as Smith says, because they both share some of the traits of the other now. Neo is now linked to the machines in a way, just as Smith is linked to humans (by being able to download himself into a human host and being able to rebel against his programming).

The Real World is the Real World. It would be interesting to see the matrix-with-the-matrix concept but there is a great deal of evidence that says otherwise, and it wouldnt really be good storytelling IHO.

 

"Lawrence Fishburne went from interesting to 'I'm a preacher, listen to me!"
This was the one scene in the movie where I thought the dialogue was a little corny and cliche.
For less than that in AOTC George Lucas still badmouthed today

 

One thing I was wondering about is what is Trinity's role going to be in the next one. I kinda got the feeling that Neo messing with the code is why him and Smith are "connected" now. Was him messing with Trinity's Matrix code a set up for something more?

I definitely think that's possible. If you notice in the Revolutions teaser after Reloaded, when Trinity kicks a guy, he doesn't just fly backwards: he flies backwards and through a wall. She's got something going on in the next one that she didn't have in Reloaded.

 

Great movie. Better than the first in every way.

Do you guys think there will be an even bigger "Lots of Agent Smiths" against Neo fight in Revolutions? What could make it stand out?

 

My guess is that it will go the exact opposite route, with Neo versus just one Smith.

 

Been there, done that Dehrian. Unless its Neo vs. Real World Smith. That WOULD be interesting.

 

It's Neo vs. One Agent Smith with a lot more watching in the rain.

 

Been there, done that Dehrian.

Not this Neo versus this Smith, though. The fight would be completely different because they are both different.