# TVAA's The Matrix Explained
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [November 8, 2003, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077 "2003-11-08T15:23:56Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@TVAA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TVAA)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/1 "2003-11-08T15:23:56Z")
(Note: I do indeed intend for this to be in Great Debates. If mods feel it would be better suited for Cafe Society, I have no objection to moving it.)
This is the first in a series of posts explaining questions people have about _The Matrix_, _The Matrix Reloaded_, and _The Matrix Revolutions_, as well as the secondary products.
If you would like an explanation of some aspect of these movies, post your question and **TVAA** will attempt to answer it. If you’d like to offer a counter-explanation, or criticize the interpretations given, go ahead.
Part I: What is the Matrix?
The first thing anyone needs to understand about the Matrix Trilogy is that it’s an allegory: an extended metaphor given the form of a coherent story. Many events that take place in the story are difficult to understand unless viewed in terms of their allegorical significance.
The Machines symbolize the concepts, beliefs, and ideologies of humankind. In order to understand and manipulate the world around us, we rely on ideas about how the world functions. They are the tools that we create, and we are absolutely dependent on them for our survival.
When those ideas become sufficiently complex, though, they blind us to reality. Instead of using them as guides to the world in which we exist, altering and updating them as necessary, we begin to treat our creations as if they were reality themselves. We replace the territory with the map. The result is the Matrix: culture, religion, all the countless unexamined assumptions people make every moment of their lives. It’s the familiar and predictable world in which people believe that they live, the womb in which our minds sleep.
It’s certainly true that no one can be told what the Matrix is. People are unable to question their most fundamental assumptions about the world, primarily because they can’t imagine that the world _could_ be otherwise.
There are always some people who recognize that the model of reality everyone else accepts isn’t necessarily correct. These are the people who wake up from the dream, who recognize their assumptions as assumptions instead of genine aspects of the real world.
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### Author:  [@xejkh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xejkh)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/2 "2003-11-08T15:38:42Z")
Can you explain the significance of the minor characters eg the Architect, the Oracle and maybe Merovingian?
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### Author:  [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/3 "2003-11-08T15:46:27Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by TVAA \*
> **The first thing anyone needs to understand about the Matrix Trilogy is that it’s an allegory: an extended metaphor given the form of a coherent story.**
BWA-hahahahahahaaaa… coherent…
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### Author:  [@Rashak\_Mani](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rashak_Mani)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/4 "2003-11-08T15:46:59Z")
How about the ideas of the Oracle is there to “create mess… or disorder” ? Chaos of sorts.
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### Author:  [@MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MC_Master_of_Ceremonies)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/5 "2003-11-08T15:48:39Z")
I refuse to watch any of the sequels as the whole premise of the film is fatally flawed. The machines supposedly use the humans as batteries, but where do they get food for the humans? Even if they have food source there would be far more efficent ways to convert this to energy and store it.
Anyway that really bugged me when I first saw it and completely destroyed my enjoyment of the film.
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### Author:  [@erislover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erislover)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/6 "2003-11-08T15:56:35Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by MC Master of Ceremonies \*
> Even if they have food source there would be far more efficent ways to convert this to energy and store it.
Like fusion?
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### Author:  [@Urban\_Ranger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urban_Ranger)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/7 "2003-11-08T15:59:30Z")
I think you are reading something that’s not there, **TVAA**
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### Author:  [@II\_Gyan\_II](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/II_Gyan_II)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/8 "2003-11-08T16:28:50Z")
While the creators the Matrix **might** not have intended such a treatment of their story, it **can** be viewed as TVAA depicts it.
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### Author:  [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/9 "2003-11-08T16:41:19Z")
While I gave the first part of the trilogy credit in terms of a thought-provoking storyline, as well as some great new FXs, the second part comes off as nothing but a pretentious and garbled mess. Hollywood at its worst.
To say that the story remains “coherent,” is rather incoherent in and of itself.
As for the third part, I’ll wait ti’ll the video release – if I watch it at all.
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### Author:  [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/10 "2003-11-08T16:49:01Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Gyan9 \*
> While the creators the Matrix **might** not have intended such a treatment of their story, it **can** be viewed as TVAA depicts it.
Yes, and I can see images in the clouds. What of it?
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### Author:  [@Hamlet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamlet)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/11 "2003-11-08T17:02:10Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by MC Master of Ceremonies \*
> \*\*I refuse to watch any of the sequels as the whole premise of the film is fatally flawed. The machines supposedly use the humans as batteries, but where do they get food for the humans? Even if they have food source there would be far more efficent ways to convert this to energy and store it.
>
> Anyway that really bugged me when I first saw it and completely destroyed my enjoyment of the film. \*\*
You, my friend, need to relax a bit.
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### Author:  [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/12 "2003-11-08T17:03:23Z")
What it’s really about is the choosing between an attactive lie which enslaves you, and an unnattractive truth which sets you free.
I’ve always suspected ideological liberals live in an artificial fantasy world. The Matrix is as good a metaphor as any.
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### Author:  [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/13 "2003-11-08T17:03:48Z")
> [@](#):
>
> _TVAA_
> as well as the secondary products.
Some of these erm **Number Two** s seem to be number threes. Does this resnonate with you on a personal [_sic_] level? How does the First Rule of Holes obviate the Big Wank theory of sequels? If you cannot step into the same river twice [_Heraclitus_] how was there so much liquid that - lo! - it splasheth on the indoor shades of all the try-hards at once, as tho’ t’were simultaneously released in all markets at once?
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### Author:  [@II\_Gyan\_II](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/II_Gyan_II)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/14 "2003-11-08T17:11:27Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by rjung \*
> \*\*Yes, and I can see images in the clouds. What of it? \*\*
The Matrix is entertainment.
Entertain yourself however you wish.
TVAA chooses to map it to human interfacing.
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### Author:  [@lucwarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lucwarm)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/15 "2003-11-08T17:12:20Z")
One can see it as a metaphor for Goedel’s Incompleteness Thereom. Just as the Matrix forces us to choose between a comfortable lie and an uncomfortable truth, GIT demands that we choose between completeness and consistency in an abstract system. Indeed, both concepts flow from the fundamental limitations imposed by math/physics.
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### Author:  [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/16 "2003-11-08T18:00:02Z")
Really, though, it’s basically a fancy kung fu flick that people are trying to read stuff into.
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### Author:  [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/17 "2003-11-08T19:06:38Z")
The energy conversion thing was made even more impossible to believe in the third movie
since they flew to a level where there WAS sunlight…the machines could simply fly a glider into the sky to gather solar!
But none of the troublesome things were really satisfactorily answered, and they added MORE things on top of that! If we are supposed to buy into this as an alternate universe it ought to either deviate even MORE from ours than before (since it is unrelated to ours,) or they should do more exposition to explain why the physics and meta-physics of the world differ so much from ours.
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### Author:  [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/18 "2003-11-08T19:15:25Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by TVAA \*
> It’s certainly true that no one can be told what the Matrix is. People are unable to question their most fundamental assumptions about the world, primarily because they can’t imagine that the world _could_ be otherwise.
Why do you conclude this? I believe the opposite, that the human mind is capable of abstract thought even if it contradicts their known world. Consider quantum mechanics. I’m sure that some people have trouble imagining that it might be the case, but I think most of us are able to accept that the world may not be what it seems at first.
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### Author:  [@Feistymongol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Feistymongol)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/19 "2003-11-08T19:22:40Z")
All three of the matrix movies were fairly pretentious. It all boils down to sexy hollywood actors posing in tight leather clothing doing computerized kung fu moves. That’s all it was really, any deeper philosophy was injected to make the movies seem “profound” and to baffle the vapid assbag audiences lining up to throw their money at this tripe.
Nietzsche said something like “they muddy their waters so as to make them appear deep” that totally applies to the Wachowskis.
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### Author:  [@Hydrocortisone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hydrocortisone)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2003, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvaas-the-matrix-explained/212077/20 "2003-11-08T19:28:28Z")
> [@](#):
>
> It all boils down to sexy hollywood actors posing in tight leather clothing doing computerized kung fu moves.
Wasn’t Trinity wearing vinyl?
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