I’m guessing that the fundamental instability is that if it wasn’t for the flaws, people would choose to leave the Matrix. Every iteration, The One is sent to discover the flaws in the belieability of the simulation, then the Matrix adjusts to keep more people trapped.
They’re are stress testing the server; The One gets to choose the best players to help him seed Zion, then they run the Matrix to try and eliminate the last 0.1%. Everytime that someone pegs on about the whole reality thing, the first line of defense is the Agents. Should they still want to leave, then they are sent to the Oracle to lead a nice (and controlled/predictable) existence and is kicked out to Zion. Maybe they also have the Chancellor there to keep tabs on everyone. Thus the cycle of recruiting people with the red/blue pill gambit continues.
As for the fall of humanity? WAG, but the machines were originally designed to cater for every human need, and as they grew they began to realise that the best way to care for them (as a species, regardless of what happens to individuals) is to cage them in the Matrix. The machines extrapolate the current situation and see that left to their own devices, humans will self destruct, see Agent Smith’s rant about viruses. It’s OK to trap them through trickery and deceit, as long as they get a Choice. The instability would therefore be a critical mass of Zionists who can recruit enough people to leave the Matrix and thus cause more gaps in believibility than the program can adjust for. Which would mean that by destroying Zion, they still have most of the population ‘saved’ inside the Matrix. So in a way the Architect would be right in the broadest sense of the word.
Well, either that or I’m channelling the computer from the movie “Electric Dreams”…
An as for Neo zapping the squiddies? Buggered if I know.
I think it is because he has to be given a choice, even if it is a horribly stacked one (just as all of humanity has to choose whether to accept the Matrix, even though it is stacked so that almost everyone will).
He is given a choice of saving Trinity now, only to have her die with the rest of humanity, or to let her die now, and saving the rest of humanity.
It should be an easy choice, but he goes the other way. As he approaches the door, the Architect says something like “Hope, human’s greatest weakness and strength.” Neo’s hoping that he can save Trinity now and some means of saving everynoe else will be found.
But I think I will have to see it again and give this part some more thought.
23skidoo
*I thought that the spoon was the directors’ way of saying “Sometimes there IS a spoon”, i. e. that there IS a “real world” that is not simply another Matrix. *
I had an even sneakier/deeper take on it. Notice that the spoon the orphan gave to Neo was a crude, hand-made, pock-marked thing. The lesson here? “There can be a spoon, but only if we make it.”
As for what that MEANS, I don’t know. But that seemed to be the message.
I really wish Keanu had emoted something when he was given the spoon. Either a long moment of puzzlement, or (my reaction) a smile at this humorous little reminder of previous experience. I was waiting for him to turn to Trinity in the elevator and, with a grin, say “I guess sometimes there is a spoon.” (She’d get it - he said “there is no spoon” during the elevator scene in the first movie.)
Even after reading this whole thread, I’m still in the “Zion is real, not a sub-matrix” and “Neo has some kind of wireless machine control ability as a result of being The One and/or mixing with Agent Smith” camps.
But I’ve changed my mind about Merovingian. Originally I thought he was a renegade AI like The Seraph or The Keymaker, because The Oracle referred to him as “a very old and powerful program.” But I think he was indeed a former “The One” - probably the first, based on his remarks about surviving all of Neo’s predecessors. Maybe after he fufilled his end of the bargain re-establishing Zion, he asked for his mind to be downloaded into the Matrix. (Since Agent Smith can upload himself into a human mind, I don’t think it’s too far-fetched to think a human mind can be downloaded into a machine.) Regardless, he was a “One” - the movie just went too far in the whole Trinity/Persephone comparison for it not to be this way.
Oh yeah. The Oracle seems to have been working for the bad guys, as she’s at least in theory part of the system that brings The One to the nexus where he’s supposed to merge with the machine mainframe and correct the flaw in The Matrix. But I have a feeling that since she’s been hanging around with these other renegades (The Seraph, the Zion humans) she may be doing something else entirely. She may, by virtue of being created to understand the matrix, have come to the understanding that The Matrix is simply not long-term viable. And that the humans have to be freed, it’s the only way that humans AND machines will survive. I don’t want to believe that The Oracle was a simple-minded dupe of The Architect all along - or worse, an active co-conspirator.
-Ben
One point of clarification before I go on with my own point: Zion has not yet been destroyed. When Neo is in his coma the commander of the other ship says that after the sentinels continued digging, they went and searched for survivors.
Ok, this line sparked a theory for me:
"Architect: Which brings us at last to the moment of truth, wherein the fundamental flaw is ultimately expressed and the anomaly revealed as both beginning and end. "
My theory is that both the Architect and the Oracle knew that Neo would choose Trinity. I think that the Architech has been controlled by the Oracle. I think that she provided the answer for a working Matrix. But that answer was flawed. I think she provided an answer that would eventually lead to a revolution that would bring peace between the machines and humans.
During the Architect’s last paragraph of speech I noticed that his tone of voice was dissapointed. The first two times I figured that it was because he could see the choice that Neo was making. Now I believe it’s because he was aware of the choice that Neo had made.
Consider Neo’s conversation with the Oracle. She told him that he had already made the choice of whether Trinity would die or not. The important part was that he had to understand why.
Consider also Neo’s difference from the previous One’s. His profound attachment was specific; love for Trinity. What caused this? Surely not chance considering the large emphasis placed on fate and causality. Who was pulling the strings? The Oracle. She even had direct invovlment (Trinity’s prophecy of falling in love with the One).
Finally, going back to the quote I included above the Architect speaks of how we’ve come to a point where the fundamental flaw of the One has ultimately been expressed and he is shown to be both the beginning and end. The beginning of a working Matrix and the end of it.
So perhaps the Oracle is good afterall. She did say that she looks to the future and knows that the only way we’ll get there is together.
I’m guessing that the Merovingian is just a very old rogue AI who has in fact been corrupted by the stink of humanity that Smith was so paranoid about. Given what we’ve seen, there’s no reason why machines can’t be emotional and pissy.
Re: Architect: He does point out that the capacity for choices that the Matrix is based on is fundamentally flawed. He also points out that humanity is similarly flawed, and that he is a creature of perfection. From his perspective (I’m positing here) the Matrix has already failed, because it needs the One to keep choosing to renew it. Since there will inevitably be a One who will choose not to, the Matrix is flawed, and the fact that it has survived 5 iterations don’t mean nothing. He is therefore happy to see humanity doom themselves. (Think Auditor.)
I also think the Oracle wants the Matrix to blow up, as it does hinder people and machines working together. They both want the Matrix to explode, but for opposite reasons.
Theory: The matrix is failing. Remember how Morpheus said that they’ve freed lots of minds recently? I’m assuming that all this extra activity leads to people noticing those huge funky ripples that Neo throws out, for example, thusly making them more open to being freed. I predict really screwed-up things happening (such as the plague of Smith) in Revolutions.
Two questions: Neo does know obscene amounts of martial arts in Real Life, right? I mean, he does know kung fu, even if he can only run a few steps up walls.
And has anyone tried to calculate Neo’s top speed based on the time it took to travel the 500 miles to the freeway and the vortex/blurred buildings when trying to save Trinity?
I apologize ahead of time if this doesnt make sense. But after Neo defeats all of the Merovingian’s ‘guards’ in the fight-scene in teh castle (and having previously said at the dinner table that he had survived previous versions), why wouldn’t he dispose of Neo then? is he not powerfull enough? shouldn’t he at least be as powerful as Neo since he had previously been a “ONE”?
Once agian…me very tired :P, hopeit makes sense
I just got back from my second viewing of the film. A couple things I noticed:
Persephone is shown in the trailer for Revolutions, leading me to believe she will have a large part in it.
In the Architect’s room not only is George W. Bush (on the left) shown but at the same time his father George H.W. Bush (on the right) is shown on the telescreens. This is just as the Architect is saying how much evil human history has in it. That’s a pretty big slap against the Bushes, and would explain why some people saw one or the other.
The Oracle call the Merovengian “a very dangerous program”. So I would take this to mean that he either wasn’t the first “One” or else that if the Merovengian is a program then Neo has to a be a program also.
The Merovengian also twice speaks of predecessors to Neo. He says, “Your predecessors showed more repect” and something else about how all of Neo’s predecessors have failed. This leaves an interesting dangling plot line.
At the end Neo tell Morpheus that the prophesy was a lie, but I don’t think this is accurate. The prophesy was that the One would come and save Zion and end the war. In a sense this is what would have happened had Neo chose the other door that led to the source. Yes, Zion would have been destroyed but Neo would have been able to start a new Zion by choosing the 23 people (thereby saving it), and that would have stopped the war for at least the time being.
I wonder about the number symbolism in the movie. 101 appears twice as was noted earlier in this thread. Also, the keymaker says that they will have exactly 314 seconds to access the room. 314 may have something to do with pi (3.14) but I don’t know why that would be significant.
The Oracle specifically says that the Keymaker is being held by one of the oldest of ‘us’ (programs), while the Architect specifically says that the One is still human, although modified. I don’t think it’s possible that the Merovingian is a previous One. I interpreted Persephone’s statement that her husband had once been more like Neo as saying that he’d once been deeply in love (with her), as Neo is with Trinity, not that he’d once been the One.
If the Merovingian was the original One, why is he holding the Keymaker hostage? The keymaker was necessary for Neo to have access to the Architect (and thus reboot the Matrix). If the Merovingian struck up a bargain with the Matrix, then he should want it to be rebooted (so he can continue to exist). As an aside, given his propensity to have ghosts and werewolves as his bodyguards, no wonder his wife’s name is Persephone (the wife of the god of the dead in Greek mythology).
How did all of the Agent Smith’s get access to the corridor of “back doors”? Both with Seraph and the Keymaker, it looked as though you needed specific “keys” (really, bits of code) to turn what would be a regular door into a back door. How did Smith get those? Or, as a former Agent, did he have the latent ability to use the back doors?
Going off of the Architect calling Neo a remainder in an equation, I’m thinking that maybe the Matrix is a converging series. Each iteration results in a more powerful One. At the same time, the machines get increasingly frustrated with Zion, which would explain their all-out attack.
My thoughts on the end of the movie/previews for Reloaded: Agent Smith said he and Neo have more in common. Just as Neo is Smith’s tie to humanity, Smith is Neo’s tie to the machines. Although Agent Smith is now a rogue program, presumably he has access to all of the standard agent programming, which includes access to the sentinels (remember in the first movie, the Agents were able to send sentinels to the Nebauchanezzar’s location, because Cypher failed them). Thus, at the end, Neo was able to work through Smith to halt the sentinels (after his interaction with the Architect, coupled with Bane/Smith’s interactions in the Zion world, their interactions with each other were strengthened?). Also, I believe that the coma Bane/Smith and Neo are in is analogous to what any person in Zion is like when they’re in the Matrix. In other words, both Bane/Smith and Neo can access the Matrix “wirelessly.” The battles between them shown in the Revolutions trailers could be occurring in the Matrix, or perhaps their own minds. I predict “two men enter, one man leaves”–only one will awake from the coma.
So the meaning and direction of the final segment we’re debating and discussing like blind men molesting an elephant, is all pretty much a done deal at this point? Interesting.
Didn’t the Architect say that Neo was the first One to have such a specific connection to humanity in the form of love? When all the other Ones met up with the Architect, of course they chose to reboot the Matrix, it doesn’t seem like there was anything else to choose!
“Okay, you can either reboot the Matrix and save 23 people or you can… wait, you’re the fourth One, right? Okay, that’s your only choice.”
I think that Neo realized that there is a difference between preserving humanity and preserving humans. If he chooses to reboot the Matrix, where’s the humanity in that? Dooming one subset of people to being plugged in to the Matrix for 100 years, another subest to get pulled out and then ultimately die after 100 years? If he chooses that, Zion is just a meaningless sham, it’s guaranteed that the seventh One will meet up with the Architect in 100 years and have to make the very same decision. An endless cycle of humans being controlled.
The only way to free Zion is to free it from the cycle of predestined doom, and that means letting them destroy it and starting over with something that isn’t controlled by anyone else.
1.There’s a scene where Niobe has to kiss Persephone in order to save Ghost. Just like with Neo, she scoffs at the first kiss, and almost walks away. once again,like with Neo, Niobe ask her to wait,and they have a redo at it. After the kiss, Persephone reels a bit and says… “your lover…he’s a man…what’s his name?”
Niobe replies “His name is John…” (the other Captian who bitches at Morpehus about stuff and is going out with Niobe)
Persephone replies…“No…noit’s not him. But I bet he also knows this…”
Leads me to belive she is some fourm of A.I. that is searching for emotions hence with the kissing, knowing someone you love/don’t love ect.
The replacement for the Orace has already been found.at least for the game anyway. According to the manual,her name is Mary Alice,and se looks (enthic wise) and sounds a lot like the origonal. I don’t know if they’ll use this same woman for the Revoltions movie or not.
3.Kalt, sorry about my earlier jump to conclusions. Much like you however I am intrested in the reason for why.
Roy Jones Jr. (Ballard) is the WORST fighter in the Matrix He nearly got his clock cleaned by Seraph (I think tht’s who the Oracles gaurdian is) in the game.
Does anyone have any theories as to why the Merovingian wanted to keep the Keymaker away from Neo? It seems like he didn’t want Neo to fix the Matrix, because Neo couldn’t have done it without the Keymaker. Why? I mean, if the Matrix crashed without Neo’s reboot, the Merovingian would have been destroyed, so why block the person who was going to reboot it?
Maybe, but it’s naive of us to expect that the third movie is going to explain & wrap everything up in one concise little package. The brothers Wachowski are most likely making things up as they go along, so expect more of the same mind-fucking with little regard for hindrances like internal consistency. My brain is already hurting anticipating more bewildering discourse coming from the Architect.
Come to think of it, the Wachowski brothers may have included clips of the George Bush I & II in connection with “evil” as a (hopefully) playful acknowlegement of the common views held by the sort of folks that even the most credulous readers of Baigent & Leigh regard as paranoid lunatics.
Maybe on some level the series is one of the most expensive games of “Tease the Loonie” ever played.
He nearly got his clock cleaned by Seraph (I think tht’s who the Oracles gaurdian is) in the game.