June 26, 2003

The Matrix Reloaded. Reloaded.
Part 2

Read Part One

Okay… here we go again. 

Before I continue with the list of rogue programs, a correction of Part 1.  I got e-mails and I checked it myself and it was true.  The Osiris does come to the surface of the earth, where it sees the huge gathering of squiddies and the diggers.  So you can discount my “the earth is already nice and green and ready for humanity” theory. 

Also, there have been two unnamed male characters inside the Matrix Universe – one in Reloaded, one in Enter The Matrix – that may, indeed, have significance in Revolutions.  More on both later.

And now…

THE MEROVNGIAN – If The Merovingian has story connection to Hades, he would be the brother of The Architect/Zeus, banished to the underworld, aka The Matrix.  The Oracle does not seem to live exclusively in The Matrix.  Nor does The Architect.  But The Merovingian is stuck and has to amuse himself with such banalities as the cheap seduction of virtual women with newly written programs. 

Many of us have theorized that The Merovingian was the first or second version of The One.  That theory would have him choosing to restart the Matrix and somehow, living the next four or five hundred years as a powerful rogue program.  Presumably, the human lives inside The Matrix have not been extended to hundreds of years.  His survival would seem to depend on the survival of the Matrix mainframe.

The Enter The Matrix videogame tells us that The Merovingian will be the one who changes The Oracle into someone/something else in Revolutions.  Will it be in an attack or in a defensive posture? 

The videogame also explains, I am told, that The Oracle allows herself to be transformed by The Merovingian because two other programs gave him her deletion codes in order to save their child.  Who is the couple?  Who is the child? 

And the videogame also offers that there will be a confrontation between Trinity and The Merovingian, the results of which will bring Neo out of his coma.  Hmmm…

PERSEPHONE - Her boredom is evident.  Her desire for human passion is clear.  But my guess is that Persephone, even if she does a little lip reprogramming, is the object of conflict, not the active participant in the conflict.

THE ARCHITECT - The Architect does not seem all that surprised that Neo chooses the “wrong” door.  Why?  Like Zeus, he thinks he knows everything.  But even Zeus had an occasional blind spot. 

One curiosity.  In The Animatrix: The Second Renaissance, there is a line – “And thus, man became the architect of his own demise.”  This was written by the Wachowskis.  Just coincidence?  Or is this an indicator that The Architect once was human? 

SMITH - Smith is now partially human.  And his reaction to this is to become what he described humans to be to Neo, a virus.  He is infecting avatar after avatar inside of the Matrix, usurping their minds and replacing them with his own.  This is, it seems, what he does with Bane.  How can he be “inside” of Bane outside of the Matrix?  Bane let his mind in when he overtook him at the phone drop.  Bane is like a flesh robot with Smith as The Great Gazoo, driving him around in the real world. 

How does Smith fit into the big picture?  His significance must reach beyond his battle with Neo.  How did he return from being destroyed in the first film?  What is the goal of his viral multiplication?  

I would argue that he is another new variable in the history of The Six Matrixes.  His ambition, it would seem to me, is to control the Matrix.  The question is whether his ambitions in his own name.  Or is he a tool of The Oracle or any of the other ghosts in the machine?

One thing we do know about Smith.  He becomes even more human, as evidenced by his display of outright emotion in the teaser trailer, in which he laughs deeply and wildly. 

Brian Ross asks, ”Was Neo's true purpose to enable the Smith virus to come into existence?  If Smith replicates himself ad infinitum, until all the human avatars in the Matrix have been replaced by Smiths (as hinted, at least, in the rain-showdown sequence previewed in Revolutions), does that spell the practical destruction of the Matrix?  Do all the human hosts become sufficiently polluted or displaced, such that the Matrix becomes unusable to the intelligence that depends on it for energy, etc.?”

Good question. 

Okay, now BACK TO THE HUMANS. 

Let’s start with a look at NEO. I want to start with an e-mail from Marc Winter:

“Neo is the One, but he is not fully enlightened.  Not yet anyhow.   Buddhism/Taoism has been a big influence on the Wachowskis.  Lots of people seems to believe the good yet obvious argument that the Matrix is symbolic for our current state in this world, and we can be “awakened” towards realizing our full human potential. 

Okay, so let’s look at what enlightenment is with respects to Buddhism/Taoism (and most Western philosophy).   It’s perfection.  Pure perfection.  One can never be wrong because you know all that has passed and all that is to come.  One has a full and perfect understanding of causality and defies it. 

With Neo, he has the gift, but he’s not quite perfect yet.  Remember, he bleeds in that fight against Merovingian’s bodyguards.  Also, in that brilliant scene with the Architect, we see all his thoughts in the back of the television screen.  They are disjointed, a mishmash of emotions, not collected and focused as One.  He’s still confused. 

Now in the end, in the “real world” Neo stops the sentinels.  How?  Well, enlightenment certainly doesn’t just apply to when you’re in the Matrix.  It’s a pure and clear state of mind.  It must apply outside as well as inside.  And Neo is beginning to realize that his power need not apply only to the world inside the Matrix.  He’s finding himself.   

There are other little touches pointing toward this.  I love how fluid he moves now.  Also it that scene with the Architect, even though he’s a experiencing a flood of emotion he still keeps cool, never getting out of hand.  The way he sees the Matrix is also a neat touch.  He’s witnessing casualty itself and is beginning to understand it.  Very nice.”

Interesting.  And I can’t really argue with it.

How does Neo stop the sentinels outside of the Matrix?  

Again, the most popular answer is The Matrix Inside The Matrix.  But I’m still not buying.  In the Enter The Matrix videogame, I am told that The Oracle states that Neo is in coma because "his mind has separated from his body." And so the question, where is his mind? 

So far, the body and mind separation we have experienced have been in the death of awakened humans and in Smith, splitting off a part of his consciousness to go back to reality with Bane.  The deaths have occurred when the mind in the Matrix avatar believes that it has been killed.  Every power Neo has inside of the Matrix comes from his belief that he can do anything.  The other characters were “stronger” inside the Matrix in Reloaded than they were in the first film… but they still are not as free as Neo. 

So when Neo finds the power outside of the Matrix to stop the squiddies, the shock of his power might be what sends him into the coma.  It is beyond his mind’s comprehension. 

Of course, that still doesn’t answer the “how” of the situation.  And I think that the answer may be actual divinity. 

MORPHEUS – Morpheus’ loss of faith is a major event in Reloaded.  How will that lack of faith manifest itself in Revolutions?  30 pieces of silver anyone?  Cypher was clearly the Judas of the original film, but he is gone now.  Will Morpheus’ loss cause him to betray Neo… even with an eye to challenging Neo to rise to resurrection. 

There is Morpheus’ great and mysterious line in the Revolution teaser, “He fights for us.”  The cutting suggest that he is awed that Neo is fighting for human kind.  But he could mean Agent Smith.  He could mean The Merovingian.  He could mean all kinds of things. 

Some people have seen the teaser and said that Seraph and Morpheus fight.  I am not 100% convinced that the person Seraph fights, whom we see only from behind, is Morpheus.  He is bald.  But after watching it over and over again, the person Seraph fights doesn’t seem as dark-skinned as Laurence Fishburne or to have the same shaped head. 

TRINITY:  She’s resurrected Neo.  She’s been resurrected by Neo.  What comes next?  She is one of the characters that leaves us very little to predict a future path with.  Her roles seems to be to be Neo’s true love, changing the dynamic of his journey. 

Apparently, she will face off with The Merovingian.  And many people assume that the extended lovemaking scene assures that she will be carrying Neo’s baby.  There is no other proof that I have heard of… but it sure seems to make a lot of sense.

LINK:  Link is a non-believer.  But slowly he is finding his faith.  Will his lack of pure faith end up being a plot turn in Revolutions? 

THE KID:  He may seem like a minor annoyance at this point.  But watch The Animatrix.  As usual, there is the surface and there is what lies beneath.  Kid’s Story seems to be a basic tale of how The Kid got to Zion.  But I think there is only one reason for his existence.  When he turns up in the Matrix, Trinity says that she didn’t think that “self-substantiation” was possible.  That would mean getting out of The Matrix without being guided by someone else. 

Is The Kid the child that is protected by The Oracle allowing herself to be transformed by The Merovingian?  Could be. 

So let’s ask again, WHERE IS NEO’S MIND? 

Could it be that Neo’s mind is back in the Matrix, self-substantiating his mind back into the Matrix, the same way The Kid self-substantiated himself out of the Matrix?  Is he now, like Smith, in both realms at the same time?  Has Neo stumbled into a way to get in and out of the Matrix without a hard-wired telephone?

And then there are THE MYSTERY MEN

SUBZERO offers these observations… “Not all the Matrices were 100 years old. A homeless guy in the game (who some say is in the Revolutions trailer...dude with black mask...who knows) was uttering crazy talk about the last Zion lasting 72 hours.

D.P. Comments:  In the European teaser, which may be the one on Enter The Matrix, there is a shot of a guy who looks homeless and looks like Bruce Spence.  He is smiling wildly.  Also, there are other reports that Enter The Matrix tells us that the battle to destroy the previous Zion lasted 72 hours, not that Zion itself only lasted 72 hours. 

SUBZERO continues with one of the most noted observations, followed by a wild theory – “If you rewatch Reloaded you'll see just as Neo & Co. are walking towards the Merovingian's table, they show a bearded man being escorted away from that very table. He looks at Neo, the camera slows, and threatening musical overtones are heard for a brief second and then it's gone. I think he's the father of this kid the Oracle talked about, whoever the kid and the mother may be, I think he was there to give the Merovingian the key to the shell program of the Oracle. That would explain The Merovingian saying 'her time is almost up' in regards to the Oracle. He has her shell code and figures to do something with it, or initiate some kind of plan to attack her after he disposed of Neo.

And after writing this, a new theory comes to mind. Smith. All of them. They're in cahoots with the Merovingian! That's how Smith is following around the Oracle.  He agrees to kill the Oracle for Merovingian, but is really using whatever 'Vingy gives him in order to achieve his own personal goals...elimination of one Thomas Anderson. Whaddaya think? We've seen that Smith does, after all, have keys to ALL the doors in the backdoor/easteregg alley.”

Interesting!  Someone has to be letting Smith into these keyed zones.  Again, the question seems to come back to whether the ultimate bad guy in this story is The Oracle or The Merovingian. 

IN CLOSING:  Here are some loose ends….

1. Why Does Seraph have to resort to guns in the teaser trailer?  If he can fight Neo to a standstill, why does he need guns?  Could it be that the Merovingian’s bodyguards who can only be killed with silver bullets turn up?  Could he be crossing over to the “real” world?

2. Did you notice that the first machine to be executed for killing his human “master” was B1 66 Er, which seems to suggest Bigger Thomas of Native Son, much as the robots being thrown into pits seems to refer to the Jewish Holocaust.

3.  Jean Baudrillard, who coined the term “the desert of the real” speaks about The Matrix, in French, right here.

4. I think the ultimate answer to the series may be the realization that everyone can be their own The One.  All it requires is complete faith.  That is what brought The Kid out of the Matrix.  It is what powers Neo. 

Okay… that’s all I have for now.  I encourage you to send in your ideas and concepts about Reloaded and Revolutions.  I will do one more follow-up next week. 

There are no answers.  There are only questions.

READER OF THE DAY:  REESE’S PIECES writes, “Whatever the final outcome, I imagine the ending is supposed to have some degree of finality––some Biblical scholars have claimed that human history is made up of seven periods of time, starting with the beginning of known human Time once Adam and Eve tasted of the forbidden fruit. This corresponds with the seven seals mentioned in Revelations...let's hope Demi Moore isn't involved somehow. :-)

We are now, according to such ideas, at the eleventh hour of the sixth period of time which will lead to Armageddon, the cleansing of the Earth and the eventual reign of Christ. Seeing there have been six segments of the Matrix, with the seventh now at the brink, I am guessing there will be a sense of impending change with Neo ushering in a cleansing and rebirth.

Who knows? Either way, I'm guessing the transition will be big.

Sorta makes me think of the end of THX-1138, when they step out of the underground for the first time and see things as they really are, eh?”

E ME:  Bring it.