Movies Matrix 4 / The Matrix Resurrections [Archive]

Ramza00

2021-09-09, 11:49 AM

I still don't understand why they're doing it as a sequel, other than "Keanu Reeves is popular again, lets stick him in stuff". I object to most remakes, but the Matrix Trilogy is deeply flawed. As good as the original is, it could really benefit from modern CGI and a few plot tweaks that fix bad ideas (human batteries) and properly set up the future films. The sequels could use a full re-write from top to bottom to make the plot better.

Just do a Matrix reboot. Start in the same place and go a different direction with the story. Outside of the first movie you aren't stepping on anyone's sacred cow, and tying yourself to the mess that is the sequels is a bad idea.

Definitely waiting for reviews on this one. The odds of failure are too great, even with Reeves.

Just a reminder the human batteries stuff is one of the things the executive producers wanted and forced the directors / writers to do. The Wachowskis wanted “originally” in the drafting stage that the machines were software than ran on Human Hardware. That the machines were viruses, ideas that infected the next generation over and over again.

Thus with one of the Wachowski returning. (Lana, Lilly the other one has given interviews recently saying she felt the need to do new projects and to break new ground with what she is familiar with.) Lana has more control in some ways to tell a different story if she wants too for the thing about sequels is you need to break new ground while also be in communion with the previous installments.

We will see if this will be good or not. Yadda, yadda, yadda not going to repeat all of The Cruella thread even if the arguments are similar / to the point they FEEL exactly the same.

—————

Edit: Matrix 1 was so successfully for it created a mythical space, a mythos it did not answer but promised stuff will come. Any such type of storytelling will have disappointment in its fandom at its core.
For even if one individual is satisfied by the Mythos being answered with concrete stories, there will also be other individuals who wanted the story to go in different direction. Thus we have to learn to live with disappointment. Then we realize disappointment can manifest in different flavors like I shrug, I am exhausted, I am angry, I am sad, I have long-full-of-sorrow full of regrets, etc.

When playing with this space the longer a story goes on the more you will get fans feeling things and complaining or critiquing for longer stories open up the possibility of disappointment. The space of mythos, the space of mythical is an imaginative but also idealized. Well ideals are lived but also ideals will sometimes never measure up. We can not always go PLUS ULTRA, further beyond our idealized horizon.

Ionathus

2021-09-09, 11:56 AM

What is the point of this?

If Space Jam 2: Let's Literally Just Do a Commercial for All of Our Completely Unrelated Properties is any indication, Warner Brothers just plain doesn't give a **** anymore.

Murk

2021-09-09, 12:33 PM

GentlemanVoodoo

2021-09-09, 12:40 PM

GloatingSwine

2021-09-09, 12:42 PM

Rodin

2021-09-09, 12:43 PM

We will see if this will be good or not. Yadda, yadda, yadda not going to repeat all of The Cruella thread even if the arguments are similar / to the point they FEEL exactly the same.

I disagree with that sentiment pretty heavily. The focus of the Cruella thread was "why make a movie about THIS character, of all people in the Disney canon? And why make her a protagonist?" That's a rather different discussion to "Why revisit a franchise after leaving it fallow for many years?" The reason people question a revisit is totally different. In the case of Cruella, it's an odd decision to make a movie with little connection to the original and then try and shoehorn in connections to get the name recognition. For the Matrix movies, it's an odd decision to make a direct sequel after the ending basically killed the possibility of a sequel by killing off the main characters and totally tying up the plot threads. Not to mention functionally getting rid of the Matrix.

And in both cases the answer is "cash grab". There was no reason for Cruella to be a 101 Dalmatians movie, and it would have likely been better served by not being one. However, name recognition is king and Cruella gets butts in seats. In the case of the Matrix, Keanu Reeves gets butts in seats, and he's too old to play the young everyman hero anymore. So they do a sequel and resurrect him (no matter how little sense that makes) in order to justify an older Keanu Reeves in the role.

I wound up not watching Cruella because no matter how good its reviews are its not my kind of movie. I didn't see Devil Wears Prada either. In the case of Matrix 4 it is my kind of movie, but I recoil from the premise like its a zombie cobra which is on fire. The reviews will have to be damn good to draw me to a movie theatre, especially since I'm not even seeing MCU movies at the moment with Covid spiking.

Psyren

2021-09-09, 12:54 PM

I'm curious about it. How excited I am will depend on how much creative control Lana has this time around. (I LOVED Sense8 so the more, the better.)

Ramza00

2021-09-09, 01:05 PM

I am especially confused by how... not-new this looks.

The original Matrix (and even the sequels!) did some very original stuff. Even more, they had a typically (and topically) late 90/early 00 setting, with the mystery of the internet and nerds suddenly being cool and taking nasty drugs and things like this. The trailer for the original Matrix was new.

When they announced a new Matrix movie I expected it would at the very least be new. Maybe not good, but new.
But it doesn't look new at all. It looks like a lot of other movies I have seen. That surprises me.

You can only do things "Once" before they feel not new, likewise movies have been introducing new things all the time in the last 22 years.

You can't redo taking over 3 dozen Digital SLRs, building a plyboard set, and have each of the Digital SLRs take a photo one at a time, in a sequence, to create the feel of Bullet Time, and then use photoshop to remove anything that was not green in the camera rig.

Links to images

https://www.cined.com/content/uploads/2013/05/matrix-bullet-time.jpg
https://www.pennmedicine.org/news/-/media/images/pr%20news/news%20blog/2017/october/matrix.ashx?la=en

I disagree with that sentiment pretty heavily. The focus of the Cruella thread was "why make a movie about THIS character, of all people in the Disney canon? And why make her a protagonist?" That's a rather different discussion to "Why revisit a franchise after leaving it fallow for many years?" The reason people question a revisit is totally different. In the case of Cruella, it's an odd decision to make a movie with little connection to the original and then try and shoehorn in connections to get the name recognition. For the Matrix movies, it's an odd decision to make a direct sequel after the ending basically killed the possibility of a sequel by killing off the main characters and totally tying up the plot threads. Not to mention functionally getting rid of the Matrix.

And in both cases the answer is "cash grab". There was no reason for Cruella to be a 101 Dalmatians movie, and it would have likely been better served by not being one. However, name recognition is king and Cruella gets butts in seats. In the case of the Matrix, Keanu Reeves gets butts in seats, and he's too old to play the young everyman hero anymore. So they do a sequel and resurrect him (no matter how little sense that makes) in order to justify an older Keanu Reeves in the role.

I wound up not watching Cruella because no matter how good its reviews are its not my kind of movie. I didn't see Devil Wears Prada either. In the case of Matrix 4 it is my kind of movie, but I recoil from the premise like its a zombie cobra which is on fire. The reviews will have to be damn good to draw me to a movie theatre, especially since I'm not even seeing MCU movies at the moment with Covid spiking.

I am sorry you can't see it, and I am sorry it seems like it is attacking your "sense of common sense" but other people got it, and the movie perhaps was made for people who do not have your "sense of common sense."

And that is okay. I am glad Space Jam 2 exist for whoever wanted to see it even if that person is not me. Likewise I am glad The Super Bowl exists, or Cricket, even if those ideas are so foreign and alien to my "sense of common sense." We live in a pluralistic society after all and we should accept that (or we should not it is up to you to decide.)

Murk

2021-09-09, 01:06 PM

That's kinda what 22 years will do to a medium. The Matrix was new because it arrived at a time where it had only just become possible to do what it did.

But there isn't anything equivalent now, really, because the last 20 years have been all about cinema redefining what it can present as real and taking that essentially to the limits of imagination. Inception was halfway between The Matrix and now, after all.

Eh, my standards for "new" are not so high that a movie needs to be pioneering new technology or re-invent the movie industry. It just needs to make me think "Hey, I haven't seen this before".

To take a relevant example, the trailer for Jupiter Ascending (2015) did make me think "Hey, this is something new".
It also made me think "Hey, this looks terrible", but that aside.
For The Matrix 4 I would settle for new but terrible. But it needs to be new.

Eldan

2021-09-09, 01:11 PM

Urgh. You know, my immediate reaction when I heard there was a matrix 4 was "This is unnecessary. 2/3 matrix movies are already bad, and a sequel decades later can't improve it".

Then I thought "but maybe they can do an original story with this"

And now.., this trailer has nothing I want to see. They put so much focus on the effects and martial arts scenes, except those aren't remotely new or interesting anymore. It all looks so... done. Done a hundred times by other movies.

Clertar

2021-09-09, 01:27 PM

Ramza00

2021-09-09, 01:30 PM

What I disliked the most about the two Matrix sequels was the shift of focus on the resistance and machine world outside of the matrix (that and the acrobatics to keep agent Smith relevant, which ended up in him being a total drag for the story). I for one think that an attempt to do a sequel in the spirit of the first Matrix movie is worth it and justified. I can only hope that it turns out better than the original sequels.

Was the first movie about Resistance only, or Resistance and Liberation co-joined together?

The people who liked movies 2 and 3 liked them for their liberatory aspect, and how liberation may not have been what the first movie thought the form of liberation would take place in? (yes that is a statement but I am using a question mark for ever action in 2 and 3 was full of contradiction, yet they found a middle path between extremes of contradiction)

Psyren

2021-09-09, 01:35 PM

Maybe it'll retcon some aspects of 2 and 3? That would be something!

And yes, the less Cruella in this thread the better :smallbiggrin:

J-H

2021-09-09, 01:38 PM

This looks like Star Wars 7 (forgot name) or the JJ Abrams Star Trek Trilogy.
"Look! References to past movies! You liked those, right?"

Ramza00

2021-09-09, 01:45 PM

This looks like Star Wars 7 (forgot name) or the JJ Abrams Star Trek Trilogy.
"Look! References to past movies! You liked those, right?"

Any trailer for existing IP is in a double bind.

Reveal Too Much and people say you are excessive, Reveal Too Little and people say you are deficient and are running on nostalgia to drive interest.

Likewise there are other ways to "entice" besides provide plot information. But reveal too much sensory data without plot information to anchor it and you can be confusing / off-putting and reveal too little sensory data with low plot information and you never captured the interest in the first place. A double bind is this not?

Is there a golden mean? Or is it just luck? Likewise if you hit that golden ratio in person A but did not hit in person B does that mean you did not find the ideal mixture between these extremes?

GloatingSwine

2021-09-09, 01:47 PM

Psyren

2021-09-09, 02:12 PM

I suspect this new movie will actually have quite a lot new to say, esp. about how the concept of the red pill was co-opted and who by vs. its meaning to the original movie and the original meaning to the creators.

I definitely want them to address this. Lana is on record as despising its current meaning / association.

This looks like Star Wars 7 (forgot name) or the JJ Abrams Star Trek Trilogy.
"Look! References to past movies! You liked those, right?"

Thing is, that wasn't a bad thing for Force Awakens. It was 10 years between the sixth Star Wars (III) and the seventh, and people needed that "back to basics" reminder of what the franchise was and what kind of genre and iconography they could expect to see. For the Matrix, it's been nearly twice as long since the final movie, so we absolutely need that reminder.

Now with that said, they do need somewhere interesting to go with it once the reminder has landed. We've already done Reverse Matrix (a little show called Westworld) for example.

Dragonus45

2021-09-09, 02:18 PM

I suspect this new movie will actually have quite a lot new to say, esp. about how the concept of the red pill was co-opted and who by vs. its meaning to the original movie and the original meaning to the creators.

I mean, when you make a movie with themes deliberately meant to be so basic and broad as they did it's hard to complain when so many different groups find meaning in it.

Also they arguably already did this when in the second movie the big reveal was that the underground was always a part of the system and no real change could ever be effected because their entire rebellion was just them being allowed to play act out their frustrations with the system in a controlled way not unlike the matrix they were allowed to escape from.

J-H

2021-09-09, 02:23 PM

Discussion of the Red Pill as it applies to social analysis will go outside of forum rules as far as I can tell.

I guess beard and long hair is Keanu Reeves' default look now? It's like "John Wick finds the Matrix." There's really a lot of blending between gun-fu expert and "Neo in the Matrix" though. I have difficulty separating a recognizable look in one movie from the same character in another movie, so for me in LOTR it was always "Agent Elrond."

I was expecting a Smith to pop up in the trailer. It would be better for them to not bring Smith back, as that storyline is 100% finished, but he's as iconic as Neo... so they probably will.

Dragonus45

2021-09-09, 02:29 PM

Discussion of the Red Pill as it applies to modern societal "this is what to do" vs. actual behavior patterns will go outside of forum rules as far as I can tell.

I guess beard and long hair is Keanu Reeves' default look now? It's like "John Wick finds the Matrix." There's really a lot of blending between gun-fu expert and "Neo in the Matrix" though. I have difficulty separating a recognizable look in one movie from the same character in another movie, so for me in LOTR it was always "Agent Elrond."

I was expecting a Smith to pop up in the trailer. It would be better for them to not bring Smith back, as that storyline is 100% finished, but he's as iconic as Neo... so they probably will.

If the theory about this being a specific personal matrix for Neo made by the machines to study his body/placate him turns out to be true then you could easily justify Smith as being either a tag along from inside his brain or a new construct made to look like him and fill that role in whatever the plan the machines have going is.

J-H

2021-09-09, 02:35 PM

That's a cool idea.

No matter what, I think they're going to have to undo or nullify the self-sacrificing end of the Matrix 3 where he's in a cruciform position sacrificing himself to destroy the contamination that is Smith, etc. etc.
Undoing a "he's dead" ending properly is going to be hard... especially since they've already shown that he has an unplugged body, so it's not simply a matter of "He's a backup in the software."

Not super optimistic about this one.

Dr.Samurai

2021-09-09, 02:35 PM

I suspect this new movie will actually have quite a lot new to say, esp. about how the concept of the red pill was co-opted and who by vs. its meaning to the original movie and the original meaning to the creators.
The trailer doesn't really interest me and doesn't really have a Matrix feel to me, but I am curious about this sentiment you bring up.

The original trilogy, with its red pill, its humanity-hating clones taking over the world, and the lone hero opposing them through the end because of the power of choice that every individual, as a divine entity, has, is pretty topical right now.

Given Lana's hatred of how people have chosen to interpret her work, I am curious if any messages will be tucked into this sequel.

Also they arguably already did this when in the second movie the big reveal was that the underground was always a part of the system and no real change could ever be effected because their entire rebellion was just them being allowed to play act out their frustrations with the system in a controlled way not unlike the matrix they were allowed to escape from.
Also incredibly topical.

Anyways, something about the trailer seems very not-Matrix to me. It may as well be a trailer for a generic superhero movie like Hancock or something (though with a different tone). I will still watch it, because it's the Matrix, but I honestly don't see what the point is or where they might go with it. So hopefully I'll be pleasantly surprised.

Millstone85

2021-09-09, 02:35 PM

From stills of the teasers and the trailer, it looks like both Neo and Trinity are having some sort of Quantum-Leap-esque identity crisis.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E-tuCIhXsAI_tF1?format=jpg&name=small
https://static2.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Neo-mirror-in-Matrix-Resurrections.jpg?q=50&fit=crop&w=740&h=370&dpr=1.5
https://filmschoolrejects.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/The-Matrix-Resurrections-Trailer-Scream.jpg

Dragonus45

2021-09-09, 02:36 PM

The Glyphstone

2021-09-09, 02:47 PM

Hugo Weaving isn't returning due to scheduling conflicts, so it's unlikely we will see Smith again unless they recast the role - which seems pointless considering the redundancy of Agents.

Millstone85

2021-09-09, 02:48 PM

The machines took his body in the end, no need to retcon anything really.Confirmed 13 seconds into the trailer, if you watch it in slow motion.

https://www.slashfilm.com/img/gallery/the-matrix-resurrections-trailer-seems-to-show-what-happened-directly-after-the-matrix-revolutions/intro-1631202442.jpg
https://www.slashfilm.com/img/gallery/the-matrix-resurrections-trailer-seems-to-show-what-happened-directly-after-the-matrix-revolutions/putting-neo-back-in-the-matrix-1631202442.jpg

Callos_DeTerran

2021-09-09, 03:05 PM

I was expecting a Smith to pop up in the trailer. It would be better for them to not bring Smith back, as that storyline is 100% finished, but he's as iconic as Neo... so they probably will.

If Smith does, it won't be with Hugo Weaving playing him, cause apparently there's a scheduling conflict.

All said, I do find it interesting and I think a lot could be one with an 'update' to the Matrix forumla. Not how the term is usually applied today but as people have pointed out the Matrix movies were very much rooted in the 90s in tone, aesthetic, and themes. What they shouldn't do is just take that story and paint on a 10's/20's coat of paint, all that will do is date this movie hard and feel inauthentic in my opinion. But if they go for the same story but with a 10's/20's tone, aesthetic, and themes (not just superficially) then it could be on to something. An I think you do see hints of that in Neo desperately taking the blue pills to suppress his memories of what came before, the feeling like he's going crazy with Dr. NPH, the elevator shot that gave the look of people in boxes staring at screens stacked on top of one another, and his re-connection with Trinity (who is full of matrix coding) are promising signs of exactly that. It makes me want to pay attention to future trailers, for sure.

Where it does miss the mark for me is, like someone else pointed out, that this doesn't feel like a Matrix movie. Remove Keanu Reeves and this could just be any other super hero movie these days. From the like of the green filter, to no real unified aesthetic, its missing something...Matrix about it. At least from the trailer that is and again, you kind of see it with everything with NPH being in a blue filter (even the psychiatrist's blue lenses) that do hint that such a thing will be happening and its just not in THIS trailer.

So its done a good job of at least making me want to see the next trailer, that's for sure! And I do like Reeves and the director's movies in general, so there is some trust there that this won't be a poorly thought out reboot for sure.

Red Pills - I honestly expect it not to be touched on at all in the context it currently is used. As much as the director may dislike it, that's what passing into the greater cultural wilds will do. If anything, I just expect a firm emphasis on the movie's version of it because if it does go int how its currently used then 1) Again, it'll date this movie like crazy and 2) especially if the director does hate its current use and takes this chance to 'diss' its use and the people using it this way, all its going to do is drive off potential customers and probably come off as really cringe-y and far less than subtle. Best to just use it in the Matrix context.

GloatingSwine

2021-09-09, 03:09 PM

2) especially if the director does hate its current use and takes this chance to 'diss' its use and the people using it this way, all its going to do is drive off potential customers and probably come off as really cringe-y and far less than subtle. Best to just use it in the Matrix context.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that anyone who is upset by that is not a potential customer for a movie made by a transwoman anyway...

Dragonus45

2021-09-09, 03:09 PM

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that anyone who is upset by that is not a potential customer for a movie made by a transwoman anyway...

I'm going to go further out on a limb and say you are wrong.

Psyren

2021-09-09, 03:14 PM

Ramza00

2021-09-09, 03:15 PM

Red Pills - I honestly expect it not to be touched on at all in the context it currently is used. As much as the director may dislike it, that's what passing into the greater cultural wilds will do. If anything, I just expect a firm emphasis on the movie's version of it because if it does go int how its currently used then 1) Again, it'll date this movie like crazy and 2) especially if the director does hate its current use and takes this chance to 'diss' its use and the people using it this way, all its going to do is drive off potential customers and probably come off as really cringe-y and far less than subtle. Best to just use it in the Matrix context.

Why is driving off potential customers a bad side? Must everything be sacrificed on the alter of the almighty dollar? If so then Smith is the real victor for he is inevitable.

Millstone85

2021-09-09, 04:02 PM

From the like of the green filter, to no real unified aesthetic, its missing something...Matrix about it.We might have Sati to blame for the lack of green filter.

If you don't remember her, Sati was a program who looked like a little Indian girl. She was created by two other programs as an expression of their mutual love, but she had no purpose within the machine hivemind and would soon be deleted. Her parents arranged for her to flee into the Matrix, which was already home to a number of rogue programs.

At one point, she gets turned into a Smith. But like her friends the Oracle and Seraph, she eventually reverts to her normal self. And what she does then is... she creates a sunrise.

https://heavyarmor.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/sati.jpg
https://i0.wp.com/twincitiesgeek.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/revolutions1.jpg
She says it is for Neo, and asks if they will see him again. Cute, eh? And noticeably more colorful than other shots within the Matrix.

So what if Lana Wachowsky now considers that, yup, Sati fixed the lighting in the Matrix? The code is still green, but that no longer leaks into the rendering.

Fyraltari

2021-09-09, 04:05 PM

Hugo Weaving isn't returning due to scheduling conflicts, so it's unlikely we will see Smith again unless they recast the role - which seems pointless considering the redundancy of Agents.

But, that's the core of Smith's character. Despite being made to literally be a faceless, identity-less enforcer of the system he is not interchangeable with the other agents.

Psyren

2021-09-09, 04:22 PM

We might have Sati to blame for the lack of green filter.

If you don't remember her, Sati was a program who looked like a little Indian girl. She was created by two other programs as an expression of their mutual love, but she had no purpose within the machine hivemind and would soon be deleted. Her parents arranged for her to flee into the Matrix, which was already home to a number of rogue programs.

At one point, she gets turned into a Smith. But like her friends the Oracle and Seraph, she eventually reverts to her normal self. And what she does then is... she creates a sunrise.

https://heavyarmor.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/sati.jpg
https://i0.wp.com/twincitiesgeek.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/revolutions1.jpg
She says it is for Neo, and asks if they will see him again. Cute, eh? And noticeably more colorful than other shots within the Matrix.

So what if Lana Wachowsky now considers that, yup, Sati fixed the lighting in the Matrix? The code is still green, but that no longer leaks into the rendering.

I like this idea.

But, that's the core of Smith's character. Despite being made to literally be a faceless, identity-less enforcer of the system he is not interchangeable with the other agents.

If this does well enough for a sequel, Smith/Weaving would be a fine draw there. He's not needed here.

Millstone85

2021-09-09, 04:37 PM

But, that's the core of Smith's character. Despite being made to literally be a faceless, identity-less enforcer of the system he is not interchangeable with the other agents.Interestingly, the sequels cranked up the interchangeability of the agents.

Just look at agents Brown, Smith and Jones versus agents Jackson, Johnson and Thompson.

https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/villains/images/2/2f/Agents_brown_smith_jones_jackson_johnson_thompson. jpg
Anyway, Smith was great, but he is the one aspect of the franchise I have had enough of.

Lemmy

2021-09-09, 05:18 PM

The Wochowsky couldn't make a decent sequel 20 years ago, when the Matrix was still fresh, innovative and relevant... I don't think they'll be able to do it in the era of soulless reboots and sequels.

I might end up watching it when it comes out on DVD or something, just because it's The Matrix... But my expectations are incredibly low. I do hope I'm wrong. It's a franchise that has a lot of potential, but has never really been handled well, save for a few good things here and there.

Psyren

2021-09-09, 05:51 PM

Thrudd

2021-09-09, 06:22 PM

Ramza00

2021-09-09, 07:47 PM

Millstone85

2021-09-09, 07:59 PM

Lemmy

2021-09-09, 08:06 PM

Eh, I'd blame their failure more on the studio executives honestly. Above is like saying "Fox couldn't make a decent movie about Deadpool in 2009, I doubt they can do it in the era of soulless reboots and sequels." Genre fiction has changed a lot since the 'aughts.
Except this time it's the same directors/writers... And, at least IMO, they haven't really done anything good in the last 20 years... It was basically bad/mediocre stuff that sometimes had good ideas, but the execution/development was subpar

I'm not saying the studio doesn't have its share of blame, but just that the Wochowsky do too.

Then again, I really do hope I'm wrong and this movie turns out to be awesome.

Lurkmoar

2021-09-09, 08:11 PM

Ever since I've heard this sequel was in the making, my friends and I have been joking that we would rather see John Wick 4, just bring Carrie Ann Moss in.

I'll probably pass this in the theaters. I highly enjoyed The Matrix and the Animatrix, was lukewarm on the second movie and felt frosty and dour after the third.

Thrudd

2021-09-09, 08:31 PM

The original pitch for the character of Switch was that their appearance would be female in the Matrix and male in the real world. I suppose the intended message would have been that the red pill revealed his true self, while the system kept representing "her" wrong. Maybe Lana will get to use that concept on a new character.

Also, there seems to be a new emphasis on mirrors, and Neo himself gets a mismatched reflection (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?636265-Matrix-4-The-Matrix-Resurrections&p=25190522#post25190522). Maybe this old man is the Mister Thomas Anderson that Neo does not like being referred as.

I think the idea of Switch would be more that she was born male, and therefore the Matrix probably originally had her in a male avatar. Once she escaped and learned the truth, she chooses to have a female avatar whenever she plugs in. As Morpheus tells Neo, what you look like in the construct/Matrix is a digital projection of how you see yourself. And the Matrix can no longer tell them what they should look like, what they really are. I would guess that on the Nebadchanezzar Switch would have been portrayed by an actual trans woman, assuming Zion has the tech to perform the procedures.

Ramza00

2021-09-09, 09:03 PM

Thinking about the Wachowskis and how ambitious they were in 99 / 01 for a multiple media experience. It was already happening in Pokémon with game, tv, movie, card game, etc. But the Wachowskis wanted to do this with live action R adult movies, PS2 games, gruesome anime, MMORPG, etc. Ambitious in ‘01

Yet we see it succeeding in the MCU around ‘11, likewise there were some changes such as making it PG-13 and not R. The Wachowskis and Warner Brothers, they were merely too early and ambitious.

Dr.Samurai

2021-09-09, 09:13 PM

It's time to make an admission... I did not like Reloaded or Revolutions when I saw them in theaters. But after rewatching them multiple times over the years, I actually do like them and appreciate the story for what it is (and from what I can grasp of it of course).

Same thing happened with Marvel Civil War. Didn't really like it in theaters, but the more I watch it the more I actually think it is one of the better MCU films.

Is it expectations, or am I gleaning more from it, or am I just reinforcing neural pathways? I don't know. Probably expectations.

Thrudd

2021-09-09, 09:24 PM

Saintheart

2021-09-09, 10:09 PM

Hopefully Lana and the studio are confident enough to really lean into the trans allegory this time. The Wachowskis are on record as saying that was always one of the intentions of the Matrix in the first place. The "red pill" is a hormone replacement estrogen pill. To reveal your True self. So definitely, many of the people using the "red pill" symbolism today have it exactly 180 degrees off from the original intention.

I have hope for this having some possibly profound meaning/symbolism- but given the track record I'm not sure it will be executed in the greatest manner (just like the other sequels). However, I imagine some lessons must have been learned by the film makers given the benefit of much deep analysis of those films by many people and many years of reflection. So I just hope.

The original pitch for the character of Switch was that their appearance would be female in the Matrix and male in the real world. I suppose the intended message would have been that the red pill revealed his true self, while the system kept representing "her" wrong. Maybe Lana will get to use that concept on a new character.

Also, there seems to be a new emphasis on mirrors, and Neo himself gets a mismatched reflection (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?636265-Matrix-4-The-Matrix-Resurrections&p=25190522#post25190522). Maybe this old man is the Mister Thomas Anderson that Neo does not like being referred as.

As a preface, and to avoid me keeping my caster level low for Wall of Text: The Matrix works a lot better as a psychodrama than it does a work of science fiction. It has a dollop of Baudrillard, sure, and likely more philosophy in 2 hours than most people get in their entire lives, but as science fiction goes The Matrix is no more interesting than The 13th Floor or Total Recall (and Total Recall I'd actually argue is superior because of its wonderful final scene which manages to bring back ambiguity about whether Quaid is in the real world or not.)

But when you take the film - and to a lesser extent the whole trilogy - as a reflection on narcissism, it becomes a lot, lot more interesting and unsettling. I recommend you start your reading here (https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2009/03/what_was_the_matrix.html) before going further with this.

The trailer leads me to hope for (and know that I'm highly unlikely to get) an examination of the fate of the narcissist who doesn't accept reality and ends up hitting old age with all his self-beliefs unrealised. The timing of the trailer's release is interesting. Per Neo's passport from the films, Thomas Anderson's 50th birthday is due shortly - his DOB is 13 September 1971. Said passport also eerily records an expiry date of 11 September 2001, but we'll leave aside.

Why is Neo seeing himself as an old man in the mirror, why does the reflection not represent what the character believes himself to be? Because that's narcissism. Narcissism - the chronic kind at least - is you projecting an image to the world, and responding with denial or rage when the world doesn't reflect that image back to you, when the world doesn't validate the way you see yourself. The mirror is reality, it's Neo's perception of himself as an ageing (but well-built and nigh-immortal) hero that is utterly warped.*

(And that might well be why he's cosplaying John Wick. You really think Reeves said "No movie unless I keep my shoulder-length bangs?" For real? That was intended, there was a reference meant there, unless of course Wachowski lost several million brain cells in the last 20 years or it was just a flat-out marketing ploy to get more eyeballs to the theatre.

After all, there is the demographic to consider. The first audience for this thing is anyone who saw the Matrix films. Assuming they were of legal age at the time the film first came out, that demographic is at least 35+ now. Which is to say, the demographic that also watched anything else Keanu made after growing his hair out post-2005. The second audience is the demographic under the age of 35, for which John Wick is how they remember Reeves, not as Neo. So dressing him like this serves two purposes: it gets everyone who's under the age of 30 in to see the movie … but it also is speaking to every male over the age of 30 who still thinks with about 6 months of training they could be John Wick. Which is to say, every male over the age of 30 who saw a John Wick movie, doubly so if they watched its sequels.

And even better is that if the rumours are true and Reeves does get his hair cut back to look like Neo of the late twentieth century, it'll further support the argument of the film being about narcissism: your current identity isn't working for you, so you resort further and further to identities that do. This film is subtitled Resurrection, but it really should be 'Regeneration', as in, Doctor Who, just take on a new identity as the old one fails you.)

Same deal with Trinity: notice how, in the shot from the trailer, Trinity seems to be in conflict with the skinsuit and/or body she's occupying, and unlike Neo, the body seems to be that of a younger woman? We could make all sorts of political points here, but we won't. (Suffice it to say that Trinity on first look is likely to have pretty much exactly the same disturbing character problem she had in all three of the earlier Matrix films: the reason for her existence is only to love Neo. That's it. Nothing more. I regard the Bechdel test as a pretty useless one, but it's kind of sad that these movies fail it. Unless, of course, you see the Matrix films as being about narcissism, if you see Trinity's interactions with Neo as reflecting the fact that to the narcissist, people only exist as 'types' or exist only in relation to the narcissist, they don't have an independent existence of themselves.)

To sum up, the Matrix shouldn't be a trans allegory or a simulation allegory, it should be an identity/narcissism allegory. Because it works best as that. And it's kind of funny to hear an art creator complain that the audience took the "wrong" message from their film. (a), if you don't want people of the opposite political persuasion to misread your film's intent, maybe don't start by leaning into the idea that conspiracy theories are real down to the Men In Black being literal agents of the System. And (b), it's a bit funny, for a film which examines what's real and what intent is, for the creator to complain about people taking different meanings from it.

* Note there is a suggestion in the trailer that Neo's diet of blue pills isn't working, that he's starting to see his dreams overlaid on reality. Fair enough, your body has become tolerant to the drug you've been giving yourself all this time. But the dirty little secret of the narcissist is that they take the pills to keep the real world from interfering with their dreams ... not the other way round.

danzibr

2021-09-09, 11:22 PM

Hmm maybe Neo will get a shave. Like the old president in the Independence Day sequel.

Thrudd

2021-09-10, 12:54 AM

As a preface, and to avoid me keeping my caster level low for Wall of Text: The Matrix works a lot better as a psychodrama than it does a work of science fiction. It has a dollop of Baudrillard, sure, and likely more philosophy in 2 hours than most people get in their entire lives, but as science fiction goes The Matrix is no more interesting than The 13th Floor or Total Recall (and Total Recall I'd actually argue is superior because of its wonderful final scene which manages to bring back ambiguity about whether Quaid is in the real world or not.)

But when you take the film - and to a lesser extent the whole trilogy - as a reflection on narcissism, it becomes a lot, lot more interesting and unsettling. I recommend you start your reading here (https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2009/03/what_was_the_matrix.html) before going further with this.

The trailer leads me to hope for (and know that I'm highly unlikely to get) an examination of the fate of the narcissist who doesn't accept reality and ends up hitting old age with all his self-beliefs unrealised. The timing of the trailer's release is interesting. Per Neo's passport from the films, Thomas Anderson's 50th birthday is due shortly - his DOB is 13 September 1971. Said passport also eerily records an expiry date of 11 September 2001, but we'll leave aside.

Why is Neo seeing himself as an old man in the mirror, why does the reflection not represent what the character believes himself to be? Because that's narcissism. Narcissism - the chronic kind at least - is you projecting an image to the world, and responding with denial or rage when the world doesn't reflect that image back to you, when the world doesn't validate the way you see yourself. The mirror is reality, it's Neo's perception of himself as an ageing (but well-built and nigh-immortal) hero that is utterly warped.*

(And that might well be why he's cosplaying John Wick. You really think Reeves said "No movie unless I keep my shoulder-length bangs?" For real? That was intended, there was a reference meant there, unless of course Wachowski lost several million brain cells in the last 20 years or it was just a flat-out marketing ploy to get more eyeballs to the theatre.

After all, there is the demographic to consider. The first audience for this thing is anyone who saw the Matrix films. Assuming they were of legal age at the time the film first came out, that demographic is at least 35+ now. Which is to say, the demographic that also watched anything else Keanu made after growing his hair out post-2005. The second audience is the demographic under the age of 35, for which John Wick is how they remember Reeves, not as Neo. So dressing him like this serves two purposes: it gets everyone who's under the age of 30 in to see the movie … but it also is speaking to every male over the age of 30 who still thinks with about 6 months of training they could be John Wick. Which is to say, every male over the age of 30 who saw a John Wick movie, doubly so if they watched its sequels.

And even better is that if the rumours are true and Reeves does get his hair cut back to look like Neo of the late twentieth century, it'll further support the argument of the film being about narcissism: your current identity isn't working for you, so you resort further and further to identities that do. This film is subtitled Resurrection, but it really should be 'Regeneration', as in, Doctor Who, just take on a new identity as the old one fails you.)

Same deal with Trinity: notice how, in the shot from the trailer, Trinity seems to be in conflict with the skinsuit and/or body she's occupying, and unlike Neo, the body seems to be that of a younger woman? We could make all sorts of political points here, but we won't. (Suffice it to say that Trinity on first look is likely to have pretty much exactly the same disturbing character problem she had in all three of the earlier Matrix films: the reason for her existence is only to love Neo. That's it. Nothing more. I regard the Bechdel test as a pretty useless one, but it's kind of sad that these movies fail it. Unless, of course, you see the Matrix films as being about narcissism, if you see Trinity's interactions with Neo as reflecting the fact that to the narcissist, people only exist as 'types' or exist only in relation to the narcissist, they don't have an independent existence of themselves.)

To sum up, the Matrix shouldn't be a trans allegory or a simulation allegory, it should be an identity/narcissism allegory. Because it works best as that. And it's kind of funny to hear an art creator complain that the audience took the "wrong" message from their film. (a), if you don't want people of the opposite political persuasion to misread your film's intent, maybe don't start by leaning into the idea that conspiracy theories are real down to the Men In Black being literal agents of the System. And (b), it's a bit funny, for a film which examines what's real and what intent is, for the creator to complain about people taking different meanings from it.

* Note there is a suggestion in the trailer that Neo's diet of blue pills isn't working, that he's starting to see his dreams overlaid on reality. Fair enough, your body has become tolerant to the drug you've been giving yourself all this time. But the dirty little secret of the narcissist is that they take the pills to keep the real world from interfering with their dreams ... not the other way round.

Nice! Love it! The trans-allegory model explains Trinity's lack of character as being indicative that she is the feminine extension or projection of Neo. She isn't a whole person, she's the feminine self image that lets them (Neo/Trinity) love themselves. This might be weak, however, since one would think that Neo would be the more "hollow" side and Trinity the more fully developed, if she's meant to be what Neo really wants to be. But maybe Neo is pretty "hollow" throughout, as well. He only exists to "be the One". Only together are they a whole person, someone that encompasses both male and female, active and passive.

Being in love with ones' self doesn't negate a narcissism interpretation, either, of course- but I think that the trans experience likely deals more with unhealthy lack of self-love, and so being able to project a version of self that one finds loving and lovable is healthy in this case.
I'm not saying it's a perfect fit, since obviously the films are full of mixed metaphors and so-so sci-fi due to the limitations of the film making process and maybe the film makers themselves.
Maybe it's a case where there are different layers of messages intended for different people (which could also be an unintentional effect of flawed story telling rather than intentional depth).

Callos_DeTerran

2021-09-10, 01:22 AM

Why is driving off potential customers a bad side? Must everything be sacrificed on the alter of the almighty dollar? If so then Smith is the real victor for he is inevitable.

...Do I really need to explain why the movie making money is important? Especially a big budget, special effects driven one like this movie seems to be? Even if the director would be fine if it doesn't succeed financially because they made ART! I amd very certain the people who funded it feel VERY differently. And if the director wants to make more movies and make more art, she needs their support.

So yes, driving off potential customers isn't just dumb or bad, its bad-dumb.

The Wochowsky couldn't make a decent sequel 20 years ago, when the Matrix was still fresh, innovative and relevant... I don't think they'll be able to do it in the era of soulless reboots and sequels.

I might end up watching it when it comes out on DVD or something, just because it's The Matrix... But my expectations are incredibly low. I do hope I'm wrong. It's a franchise that has a lot of potential, but has never really been handled well, save for a few good things here and there.

Honestly the thing that means the most to me on this is that Reeves decided to reprise his role as Neo. He's been very open and honest about the fact that he doesn't need anymore money so everything he works on is something that he's passionate and excited about doing. Which means he liked what he saw in this script and decided it would be worth his time to be Neo again. And since nothing recently has made me doubt Reeves judgement, I have some hope.

Not in the Wochowsky, not in the studio, and not in the IP...but in Keanu Reeves.

Saintheart

2021-09-10, 02:06 AM

And since nothing recently has made me doubt Reeves judgement, I have some hope.

I see your hope and crush it with the reminder he participated (I dare not say 'acted') in 47 Ronin. :smallbiggrin:

...but the sequence with the Tengu monks in that movie was awesome.

Cen

2021-09-10, 02:51 AM

I see your hope and crush it with the reminder he participated (I dare not say 'acted') in 47 Ronin. :smallbiggrin:

...but the sequence with the Tengu monks in that movie was awesome.

He did say recently and 47 Ronin was almost 9 years ago...

Millstone85

2021-09-10, 05:21 AM

But when you take the film - and to a lesser extent the whole trilogy - as a reflection on narcissism, it becomes a lot, lot more interesting and unsettling. I recommend you start your reading here (https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2009/03/what_was_the_matrix.html) before going further with this.Narcissism is awesome. You are deep into depression. You feel like you are hanging on by your fingertips to your last delusions of adequacy. In fact, every part of this song (https://youtu.be/CeAWESP7THs?t=8) has become your reality. Then you follow a link to a psychiatrist's take on one of your favourite movies, and... Why yes, here's your problem, too much self-love!

Dragonus45

2021-09-10, 08:19 AM

Eh, I'd blame their failure more on the studio executives honestly. Above is like saying "Fox couldn't make a decent movie about Deadpool in 2009, I doubt they can do it in the era of soulless reboots and sequels." Genre fiction has changed a lot since the 'aughts.

No, the second movie falling flat was 100% the Wachowski Sisters decision making in that movie, don’t give them a pass on that architect scene.

Hopefully Lana and the studio are confident enough to really lean into the trans allegory this time.

Part of the power of the Matrix was its universal applicability in how it presented its themes. I think trying to shove it into a box, even one that fits it very well, is going to be counterintuitive to making a good sequel.

Psyren

2021-09-10, 10:14 AM

No, the second movie falling flat was 100% the Wachowski Sisters decision making in that movie, don’t give them a pass on that architect scene.

I'm not giving them a pass, but I still disagree with "100%".

...Do I really need to explain why the movie making money is important? Especially a big budget, special effects driven one like this movie seems to be? Even if the director would be fine if it doesn't succeed financially because they made ART! I amd very certain the people who funded it feel VERY differently. And if the director wants to make more movies and make more art, she needs their support.

So yes, driving off potential customers isn't just dumb or bad, its bad-dumb.

Watering down your message to try and be all things to all people can be just as bad. Winter Soldier had a clear stance regarding themes like state surveillance and trusting authority, and it didn't mind potentially losing those who held an opposing view.

warty goblin

2021-09-10, 10:23 AM

No, the second movie falling flat was 100% the Wachowski Sisters decision making in that movie, don’t give them a pass on that architect scene.

The Architect scene is hands-down the most challenging and interesting part of Reloaded, and a really excellent piece of film making to boot. If it had been more of that, and less of endless tedious fist fights, I'd have loved the movie.

Traab

2021-09-10, 10:25 AM

I like it. It looks like its almost a soft restart of the series where we get to enjoy a lot of the classic scenery and where Neo has to relearn who he is and what he can do. The main reason i didnt like the second and third was that neo was basically god in the matrix. There was no real path, it just went from "I know kung fu" levels of standard behavior to "Now I am god." With nothing really in between discovering he is The One and being able to do anything. This looks like it may involve more of that in between that I would have enjoyed a lot more in the second film. He has these abilities but he seems to be still figuring out how to do them.

Dragonus45

2021-09-10, 10:35 AM

The Architect scene is hands-down the most challenging and interesting part of Reloaded,...

That is what The Architect scene was supposed to be yes, and the monologues intention of deconstructing the flaws of the first films themes just didn't execute well.

and a really excellent piece of film making to boot. If it had been more of that, and less of endless tedious fist fights, I'd have loved the movie.

This is where I hard disagree, that scene is tedious and and boring and even as someone who is interested in what it has to say I struggle to really pay attention to it when I rewatch the film.

Vahnavoi

2021-09-10, 11:01 AM

Hopefully Lana and the studio are confident enough to really lean into the trans allegory this time.

I don't hope for that. The benefit of the looser version is that it works as metaphor for a variety of things. Doubling down on the allegory would just make the whole thing narrower and less relatable to most viewers. Beside, the Wachowskis are now out, their struggle was public, the reality behind the fiction is known. What purpose would doubling down on a fictionalized allegory have? If they want to make a point of transgender issues, they can, get this, have a real trans person on the screen and talk about those issues directly.

Ramza00

2021-09-10, 11:56 AM

This is where I hard disagree, that scene is tedious and and boring and even as someone who is interested in what it has to say I struggle to really pay attention to it when I rewatch the film.

Why one fails is often tedious and boring. Likewise the whole point is to make the Architect be a condescending [censored]. Neo was attacking the concept of The Crystal Palace, and thus this makes Neo Dostoevsky‘s The Man from the Underground, the insane man who defies common sense. If Smith is Neo’s mirror who is not headed, then the Architect is the person Neo is rebelling against for he is cold and condescending.

The problem is “choice”

Psyren

2021-09-10, 12:27 PM

I personally think the He Who Remains speech from Loki was the Architect speech done right.

As far as trans-ness, I don't want to be beaten over the head with an anvil either. But some attempt at refocusing the red pill/blue pill allegory back to its roots would be nice too.

Ramza00

2021-09-10, 03:39 PM

...Do I really need to explain why the movie making money is important? Especially a big budget, special effects driven one like this movie seems to be? Even if the director would be fine if it doesn't succeed financially because they made ART! I amd very certain the people who funded it feel VERY differently. And if the director wants to make more movies and make more art, she needs their support.

So yes, driving off potential customers isn't just dumb or bad, its bad-dumb.

A world where you can't offend anyone for they are irrationally mad about things if you offend them is a sterile world.

Just like it would be a sterile world if there is no point to fighting Smith for might makes right. The parents of Sati, the child program in movie 2 and 3, risk everything to save their daughter, to live, even if offended other peoples sensibilities. Is this irrational or rational, does it matter, it is a choice and the source is love?

An artist has the right to say I live, I exist, even if that makes other people angry. Even if they, the angry ones, will get perma-mad. In a world you can't do this, then Smith might as well had won. There is a reason why Neo fights Smith, and Neo is fighting for people like Sati and Zion, strangers, even if his reason for living (which is Trinity) is now gone.

-----

"We can never see past the choices we don't understand." (there are 4 other variants of this quote the Oracle uses) Perhaps the director chooses to offend people who are so mad about trans people, and this is a rational choice on the director, for the director does not care if some people are angry with their money. Money is not the only thing that is important to her in her life.

A false balance can be more toxic than unbalancing "it" and making some people angry. (it is the answer to the choice you have made Callos, but not the choice the director has made.)

Lemmy

2021-09-11, 01:58 AM

Honestly, it's difficult to have faith in the Wochowsky (Wachowsky? Wochowski? I have no idea how to spell that) when they haven't made a single good movie in the last 20 years...

The original Matrix sequels were pretty bad, and since then, the siblings have written/directed "masterpieces" such as Speed Racer, The Invasion, Cloud Atlas and... Jupiter Ascending! Oooph... It certainly doesn't look like they got better over time.

Sense8 had a interesting premise, but wasn't executed very well, IMO.

Dragonus45

2021-09-11, 12:42 PM

Ramza00

2021-09-11, 01:02 PM

Honestly, it's difficult to have faith in the Wochowsky (Wachowsky? Wochowski? I have no idea how to spell that)

Wachowski

You could have looked that up if you are asking the question though 🙃

Lemmy

2021-09-11, 01:28 PM

Speed Racer is an unironic master piece, and they produced Ninja Assassin which was exactly the movie that it said it was going to be in the name.To each their own, I suppose... Speed Racer has one really cool fight scene... But other than that I found the movie to be... Meh.

Wachowski

You could have looked that up if you are asking the question though 🙃
True... But then again, I'll probably forget how to spell it again in 15 min. So, no biggie.

Psyren

2021-09-12, 01:32 PM

Sense8, Speed Racer and Cloud Atlas were fantastic. Vastly superior to Reloaded and Revolutions anyway. So I can see a positive trajectory in their work.

Ramza00

2021-09-12, 01:44 PM

Adds V for Vendetta being good to PsyRen's list.

pendell

2021-09-12, 02:34 PM

I don't have a problem with the concept of a Matrix 4. The reason a Neo exists is because the Architect has never made a stable Matrix which all humans will accept. There is an 'unbalanced equation', growing discontent within the Matrix which culminates in a Zion and a Neo who resets the system.

Six times before, Zion was destroyed and Neo reset the system. Time #7, Zion was not destroyed and the red pills were released, while the Matrix stabilized with the blue pills who, like Cypher, would rather live in a virtual reality dream world than in the postapocalyptic real world.

Be that as it may, the equation was still not balanced, which meant that in a generation the Matrix would again become unbalanced, and there would again be a Neo to restore it.

Which would be ... right about now, really.

The first Matrix movie was a work of art. The second two were distinctly meh. I'm hopeful that the Wachowski brothers can tell a story worth watching, even if they are my diametric opposites in political and spiritual matters. For myself, I find only listening to people who think just like I do, reinforcing my own preconceptions, quite boring. I know how *I* think. I want that thinking challenged.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

Millstone85

2021-09-12, 05:03 PM

Six times before, Zion was destroyed and Neo reset the system. Time #7, Zion was not destroyedFive times before, and time #6.

In Revolutions, the Architect tells Neo that this is the sixth version of the Matrix, and that it will be the sixth time the machines destroy Zion.

Be that as it may, the equation was still not balanced, which meant that in a generation the Matrix would again become unbalanced, and there would again be a Neo to restore it.Indeed, although my bet at the moment is that Resurrections will follow the same Neo we are already familiar with. I say this because:

The trailer shows the machines healing Neo (https://imgur.com/gallery/ZXaO5E3).
The new Matrix began differently, the old Zion was not destroyed, and the machines might not know what to expect from the next big anomaly, so they are keeping the One they know.

I also get the feeling that, far from the bum the first set pictures seemed to suggest, Thomas has been reinserted into the system as somebody wealthy and respected. Ironically, what Cypher was asking for himself.

Fyraltari

2021-09-12, 05:09 PM

I don't have a problem with the concept of a Matrix 4. The reason a Neo exists is because the Architect has never made a stable Matrix which all humans will accept. There is an 'unbalanced equation', growing discontent within the Matrix which culminates in a Zion and a Neo who resets the system.

Six times before, Zion was destroyed and Neo reset the system. Time #7, Zion was not destroyed and the red pills were released, while the Matrix stabilized with the blue pills who, like Cypher, would rather live in a virtual reality dream world than in the postapocalyptic real world.

Be that as it may, the equation was still not balanced, which meant that in a generation the Matrix would again become unbalanced, and there would again be a Neo to restore it.

I mean the conclusion of the third movie seemed to be that Mankind and the Machines were finally at peace again and that the Matrix would no longer be needed.

I'm hopeful that the Wachowski brothers
Wachowski sisters, they came out publicly as transwomen some time ago.

Millstone85

2021-09-12, 05:29 PM

I mean the conclusion of the third movie seemed to be that Mankind and the Machines were finally at peace again and that the Matrix would no longer be needed.The Machines still need plugged humans for electricity. Or processing power, as I hope the new movie will "retcon back" into the story.

Which I think is compatible with the peace, because even during the war Zion let humans choose the blue pill and stay inside the Matrix, which 99.9% of them did.

It is more that Machines would previously not tolerate how "those that refused the program, while a minority, if unchecked, would constitute an escalating probability of disaster", but now they have to accept the ever growing population of Zion.

Wachowski sisters, they came out publicly as transwomen some time ago.And only one sister, Lana Wachowski, is working on the new movie.

Lemmy

2021-09-12, 06:08 PM

Sense8, Speed Racer and Cloud Atlas were fantastic. Vastly superior to Reloaded and Revolutions anyway. So I can see a positive trajectory in their work. No accounting for taste, I guess...

Adds V for Vendetta being good to PsyRen's list.This one really shouldn't count, honestly... Their contribution was pretty minor, by all accounts.

pendell

2021-09-12, 06:15 PM

I mean the conclusion of the third movie seemed to be that Mankind and the Machines were finally at peace again and that the Matrix would no longer be needed.

I watched the movies same as you. My conclusion at the end of movie 3, when the Architect said "they would be freed", he was specifically referring to the red pills and the people of Zion. There are uncounted millions of people still plugged in, and they would violently reject any attempt to take them out. They would be nothing but a headache and a burden for the people of Zion. Like Cypher, they would never cease wanting their old lives back and would demand them. So it would not be an act of charity to free the blue pills, even if the machines did not still need them.

So my read of the end of Matrix 3 was: Zion would thrive, the Matrix would continue. Both redpills and agents would still operate within the Matrix. From time to time, some people will be unable to thrive in the Matrix, in which case they would be redpilled to new lives in Zion. I can even imagine a world where agents and redpills work together to identify misfits and transition them to new lives in the real world. Thus, redpills thrive, and the Matrix is more stable since it has a safety valve to let off pressure.

But that wouldn't be the end of conflict. You'd still have individual redpills trying to use their in-matrix powers to be little gods inside the Matrix, in which case both machines and redpills would be well advised to arrest and banish the rogue actors out of the matrix. Likewise, you would have rogue programs both in the real world and in the Matrix. In which case, Redpills and Agents could cooperate as law enforcement agencies might cooperate through interpol to identify malefactors and contain or eliminate them.

And all would live happily ever after.. if it were not for that 'kink' in human nature that makes us forever discontent. There's a theological term for this which is out of forum scope. As it is, it's a more stable Matrix than the one that existed before the Matrix trilogy.

The fact that humans still prove difficult, necessitating a new Neo to re-stabilize the situation, is still plausible. No structure with humans in it ever endures permanently. We can, however, face the task in our time and hand on a good starting point to the next generation when it comes their turn to face the contradictions of human existence. With or without machines.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

Millstone85

2021-09-12, 07:21 PM

I watched the movies same as you. My conclusion at the end of movie 3, when the Architect said "they would be freed", he was specifically referring to the red pills and the people of Zion. There are uncounted millions of people still plugged in, and they would violently reject any attempt to take them out. They would be nothing but a headache and a burden for the people of Zion. Like Cypher, they would never cease wanting their old lives back and would demand them. So it would not be an act of charity to free the blue pills, even if the machines did not still need them.This.

I can even imagine a world where agents and redpills work together to identify misfits and transition them to new lives in the real world.
Redpills and Agents could cooperate as law enforcement agencies might cooperate through interpol to identify malefactors and contain or eliminate them.There was one point where the Wachowskis considered The Matrix Online, an MMORPG, to be the canon sequel of the trilogy.

Everyone played a red pill, but would not necessarily follow orders from Zion, instead choosing to work alongside the agents of the Machines or the exiles of the Merovingian. And while I never played it myself (or any other MMO for that matter) I know there were a bunch of weird storylines, including Morpheus getting angry and more forceful toward blue pills.

No clue if Lana Wachowski will pay that game any mind while making the new movie.

And all would live happily ever after.. if it were not for that 'kink' in human nature that makes us forever discontent. There's a theological term for this which is out of forum scope.Wish I knew what that word is. Anyway, I was looking for a way to use that reaction image, and well that's one.

https://i.imgur.com/q2YZlnRm.png

Callos_DeTerran

2021-09-12, 08:04 PM

Watering down your message to try and be all things to all people can be just as bad. Winter Soldier had a clear stance regarding themes like state surveillance and trusting authority, and it didn't mind potentially losing those who held an opposing view.

Is it watering down the message though? Truth be told, even being much more aware of trans issues now than I was when the Matrix came out, I still don't really see a trans message in the Matrix. There's a lot of messages there to be honest but, to be more specific, I don't see a specific link between the blue pill/red pill analogy and being trans. That's not to say that such an interpretation is impossible just that one of the many reasons it was adopted was because it was a very universal analogy which in my opinion was a very good thing. It IS open to interpretation and thus it has a lot more relevancy and enduring power than if it was specifically linked to to just the director's intention.

In essence, I think you water down the analogy by linking it so overtly to a single message and, more importantly, you lose nothing by leaving it unchanged and using it as it is. I'm not saying don't use the blue pill and red pills as they were originally used in the Matrix, they very much should what I am saying is going a step above and beyond that to 'reclaim it' or to take shots at how people use it now doesn't help in any capacity and can only hurt the movie and the analogy itself. It only serves to agitate.

Winter Soldier handled its stance quite well in my opinion because while it very clearly takes a side on the theme its presenting, that state surveillance and unquestioning trust of authority is bad, it also presents some positives of that as well and has a beloved character (Nick Fury) be the advocate for you. Where it not for the whole Hydra using the murder-air-fortresses thing, you actually have an interesting set up to think and question about it. If the helicarriers were in a trustworthy Shield's hands that is used as Fury intends it, are they a good thing? Does the fact Hydra set it up and clearly planned to abuse them once mean the entire idea has no merit or is it just another point in Cap's argument that so much power shouldn't be in anyone's hands? There is nuance to it...up until the Nazi death cult reveals it still exists, haha.

Sense8, Speed Racer and Cloud Atlas were fantastic. Vastly superior to Reloaded and Revolutions anyway. So I can see a positive trajectory in their work.

I wouldn't say Speed Racer is fantastic...but I will say it is very, very enjoyable and a delight to watch, and a point in Lana's favor.

Palanan

2021-09-12, 08:35 PM

Originally Posted by Eldan
Urgh. You know, my immediate reaction when I heard there was a matrix 4 was "This is unnecessary. 2/3 matrix movies are already bad, and a sequel decades later can't improve it".

…this trailer has nothing I want to see. They put so much focus on the effects and martial arts scenes, except those aren't remotely new or interesting anymore. It all looks so... done. Done a hundred times by other movies.

Pretty much this.

The first movie was brilliant. The second was a reasonably entertaining action movie, and the third…doesn’t bear thinking on.

And as others have noted, this looks like every other superhero movie these days. Neo and the Ten Rings just doesn’t grab me.

Originally Posted by Saintheart
...but the sequence with the Tengu monks in that movie was awesome.

Wait, there were tengu monks?

I only managed about ten minutes before I quit. But when were the tengu monks?

Saintheart

2021-09-12, 08:41 PM

Wait, there were tengu monks?

I only managed about ten minutes before I quit. But when were the tengu monks?

Neo John Wick Kai had to get proper swords for the 46 ronin he was allied to, and he figured the best place to do that was from the tengu monks who had raised him as a child and who, despite him not being tengu, decided it was a cool idea to teach him shadowy Weeaboo Wuxia fighten and stuff and then let him leave to wander the world.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4d9fx7umXgg

Trafalgar

2021-09-12, 08:42 PM

Saintheart

2021-09-12, 08:49 PM

I am very interested if Lana Wachowski will continue to pack philosophy themes into the new Matrix. The first Matrix was really based on Plato's the Cave and Descartes "Evil Demon" thought experiment. Except Descartes never got to use Kung Fu against his Evil Demon. Matrix 2 and 3 are a discussion of free will vs determinism. And it's not clear which won out in the end.

Hello, moviegoer. I've been waiting for you. You have many questions, and although watching this trailer has reduced you by at least a quantum of brain cells, you remain irrevocably human. Ergo, some of my Easter Eggs you will understand, and some you will not. Concordantly, while your first question may be "What is Neil Patrick Harris doing in a role for which he is clearly stunt casting and really not suited," you may or may not realise it is simultaneously the most irrelevant.

Ramza00

2021-09-12, 10:41 PM

Hello, moviegoer. I've been waiting for you. You have many questions, and although watching this trailer has reduced you by at least a quantum of brain cells, you remain irrevocably human. Ergo, some of my Easter Eggs you will understand, and some you will not. Concordantly, while your first question may be "What is Neil Patrick Harris doing in a role for which he is clearly stunt casting and really not suited," you may or may not realise it is simultaneously the most irrelevant.

Neil Patrick Harris is going to scream “this is my world now” and then start doing a musical number.

Dr.Samurai

2021-09-13, 07:16 AM

Is it watering down the message though? Truth be told, even being much more aware of trans issues now than I was when the Matrix came out, I still don't really see a trans message in the Matrix. There's a lot of messages there to be honest but, to be more specific, I don't see a specific link between the blue pill/red pill analogy and being trans. That's not to say that such an interpretation is impossible just that one of the many reasons it was adopted was because it was a very universal analogy which in my opinion was a very good thing. It IS open to interpretation and thus it has a lot more relevancy and enduring power than if it was specifically linked to to just the director's intention.

In essence, I think you water down the analogy by linking it so overtly to a single message and, more importantly, you lose nothing by leaving it unchanged and using it as it is. I'm not saying don't use the blue pill and red pills as they were originally used in the Matrix, they very much should what I am saying is going a step above and beyond that to 'reclaim it' or to take shots at how people use it now doesn't help in any capacity and can only hurt the movie and the analogy itself. It only serves to agitate.
I agree with this sentiment. I did not know about the trans allegory until I read this thread. It also did not occur to me when I learned of the Wachowski's transitions years back.

That said, I think what people were saying is that it was supposed to be this, but the studio got in the way. My hope is that the story remains cohesive with the rest of the franchise and doesn't become something else because the writer/director wasn't able to tell their original story. But if that does end up being the case, hopefully it is done well.

Winter Soldier handled its stance quite well in my opinion because while it very clearly takes a side on the theme its presenting, that state surveillance and unquestioning trust of authority is bad, it also presents some positives of that as well and has a beloved character (Nick Fury) be the advocate for you. Where it not for the whole Hydra using the murder-air-fortresses thing, you actually have an interesting set up to think and question about it. If the helicarriers were in a trustworthy Shield's hands that is used as Fury intends it, are they a good thing? Does the fact Hydra set it up and clearly planned to abuse them once mean the entire idea has no merit or is it just another point in Cap's argument that so much power shouldn't be in anyone's hands? There is nuance to it...up until the Nazi death cult reveals it still exists, haha.
My takeaway from Winter Soldier is that even people doing the right thing can have really bad ideas. So yeah, Nick Fury thinks these are necessary to take down major threats. The problem with these heli-carriers is the assumption that the people in power will always value the same things that you value, and use the heli-carriers as you intended. The movie has this already be the case by revealing Hydra has been there all along.

But the more likely scenario is that after Nick Fury's tenor, someone else runs SHIELD and has a slightly different take on the heli-carriers and uses them a little differently, and so on and so forth. Granting these types of overt authoritarian powers always assumes they will always be controlled by a trustworthy and virtuous individual with sound judgement, etc. But how often are people seeking positions of power these types of people? And how can we guarantee that they always are? (Answer is we can't and that's why these things are bad ideas.)

lord_khaine

2021-09-13, 07:49 AM

A world where you can't offend anyone for they are irrationally mad about things if you offend them is a sterile world.

Likely one of the most relevant comments about modern media of all kinds.
And for that matter modern culture. I really think the drive to not wanting to offend -anyone- of any leaning, has ruined a lot over the last 10 years.

Ramza00

2021-09-13, 08:27 AM

I agree with this sentiment. I did not know about the trans allegory until I read this thread. It also did not occur to me when I learned of the Wachowski's transitions years back.

Just want to clear some stuff up since there has been some wrong information (by accident I bet), and misleading stuff in this thread.

It was Lilly Wachowski not Lana who has talked about it being a Trans Allegory the Red Pill, aka not the director for Matrix 4.

Backstory which I am purposefully keeping it brief

Famous CEO in May 2020 was mad about there being a Covid pandemic and that there were shutdowns and restrictions on said CEO’s factories designed to save lives of that factories workers. It was a month long meltdown of said famous CEO, and one day he tweeted “Take the Red Pill” in said tweet. Before and after that tweet there is all this political stuff I am not going to get into due to forum rules. Then a media celebrity who is related to a politician quote tweeted it in an affirmative way that was political, and Lilly said some profanity in response that was 4 words. If you want more info google it, I will not say more due to rules about Politics.

So a single incident. Yet both the CEO and the Lilly response went viral for both are famous people and this was Month 2 and change of the pandemic even though the interaction was brief. People then project lots of stuff based on a single incident.

—————

In August 2020 Lilly did a 4 minute Q&A for some questions than fan submitted that were written for the Netflix Film Club which is on YouTube. Link here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adXm2sDzGkQ

In the Q&A Lilly says yes it was a Trans metaphor, also it is art and things are not just 1 to 1. Furthermore Lilly says she enjoys evolution and change and part of Art is once out there it means things to other people and the creators do not control it, for art is non linear. She enjoys how people find their own meaning and is glad it resonated with some people.

There is several questions in that 4 minute video and I am not capturing it all, not going to try to capture it all, just watch the video. I am making clear the artist is not saying there is a specific meaning and all other meanings are invalid.

—————

A reminder it is the other Sister Lana Wachowski who is directing The Matrix Resurrections. Who knows what that future story will tell.

Saintheart

2021-09-13, 09:46 AM

A reminder it is the other Sister Lana Wachowski who is directing The Matrix Resurrections. Who knows what that future story will tell.

Think I've figured out why the trailer doesn't feel quintessentially like The Matrix, aside from the lack of green filter: my hypothesis is that it's because there's different cinematographers.

On The Matrix, the Wachowskis apparently not only wrote the script but had everything including the storyboards worked out. They had a very clear idea of what shots were to be done already, there's a reason there's no deleted scenes from the original film - because the Wachowskis knew what they wanted to make.

But more than that, the cinematographer is different. In the case of The Matrix, it was Bill Pope, who was nominated for a BAFTA for his work on the film.

Looking over his back catalogue, he seems to have been just a bit more restrained on his use of colour, or at least more experienced, than usual: Edgar Wright and Sam Raimi used him on Baby Driver and the 3 original Spider-Man films, Army of Darkness, and Darkman, his first film. I like the look of those films. (And I like the music video for Peter Gabriel's 'Red Rain', which was one of his works too. That's a guy who knows how to use colour, light, shadow, texture, and how to film them.) There was also that it was filmed in Sydney, and whether this sounds odd or not, the light just looks a bit different down there than it does in the Northern Hemisphere, it's a lot more harsh in the outdoors - you can see that most clearly in the Red Dress scene, which was filmed on location in Melbourne.

Resurrections was filmed in Frisco and Germany. So the outdoor scenes at least will have a different quality of light. And the cinematographer -- if you leave aside the odd inclusion of a Daniele Massaccessi, who might've been doing second unit production - is John Toll. He has a long pedigree in Hollywood, sure, but like it or not the look is different. His stuff is more like Braveheart, Last Samurai, Thin Red Line, Tropic Thunder, Iron Man 3 ... you know, standard, overly rich, luxuriant Hollywood colours with a capital H. And he does have a few Academy Awards for his cinematography, mostly from around the time of Braveheart, and a BAFTA for the same film. Admittedly it's only going off the trailer, but it feels like Toll is trying to imitate Bill Pope's style, but just like Brandon Sanderson finishing off Robert Jordan's stuff, it just doesn't quite fit.

Dragonus45

2021-09-13, 10:01 AM

Think I've figured out why the trailer doesn't feel quintessentially like The Matrix, aside from the lack of green filter: my hypothesis is that it's because there's different cinematographers.

On The Matrix, the Wachowskis apparently not only wrote the script but had everything including the storyboards worked out. They had a very clear idea of what shots were to be done already, there's a reason there's no deleted scenes from the original film - because the Wachowskis knew what they wanted to make.

Just to clarify a bit of movie trivia, much like how they don't do director commentary because they don't want to invalidate other opinions on their work they refuse to allow deleted scenes to be added as dvd extras deliberately. Much like anyone else they do cut scenes in editing, but they have said they felt like adding deleted scenes would create a false impression the work was incomplete.

Ramza00

2021-09-13, 11:02 AM

Think I've figured out why the trailer doesn't feel quintessentially like The Matrix, aside from the lack of green filter: my hypothesis is that it's because there's different cinematographers.

But more than that, the cinematographer is different. In the case of The Matrix, it was Bill Pope, who was nominated for a BAFTA for his work on the film.

Speaking of Bill Pope and Green Filters.

So in the original design of the first movie, prior to it even being released in production set design they (directors, Pope, other creative staff) went with a theme that the Matrix is Green, the Nebuchadnezzar is Blue with the exception of the Green Letters on the computer screen when showing Matrix code.

This idea was continued in the sequels and in promotional material such as posters was heavily emphasized.

Well the 2004 DVD edition of Movie 1 sold in Box Sets with Movie 2 and 3 was a digital remaster and thus Brightness was Increased, Contrast was Increased, and the Matrix became more green to better match Movies 2 and 3. Thus the DVD copies of the first movie are not the same prior and after the sequels.

In 2008 the Blu-ray and the later Netflix version we get an even more green version compared to the 2004 edition. To my understanding this is a flawed transfer and was not on purpose, but this is to my understanding.

In 2018 we got a UHD copy supervised by Bill Pope and they redid everything with color, brightness, shadows, contrast etc. Not just for the first movie but all 3 movies and it looks fundamentally different. Less Green, more Dark, and I can not just capture it with words. Lots of YouTube and Vimeo side by side comparisons for Revolutions, Reloaded, but also comparing the 1999 movie trailer to the same scenes in the 2018 edition.

Saintheart

2021-09-13, 11:23 AM

In 2008 the Blu-ray and the later Netflix version we get an even more green version compared to the 2004 edition. To my understanding this is a flawed transfer and was not on purpose, but this is to my understanding.

In 2018 we got a UHD copy supervised by Bill Pope and they redid everything with color, brightness, shadows, contrast etc. Not just for the first movie but all 3 movies and it looks fundamentally different. Less Green, more Dark, and I can not just capture it with words. Lots of YouTube and Vimeo side by side comparisons for Revolutions, Reloaded, but also comparing the 1999 movie trailer to the same scenes in the 2018 edition.

Well, there you go. I went and had a look out there:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmZX7B5lyk0

And I do admit the 2018 version looks a hell of a lot less 'flat' than the original. Still prefer how it uses shadow, contrast, and doesn't draw with colour crayons over the frame.

Saintheart

2021-09-22, 02:37 AM

Dragging this one up, one possible hope could be that the backstory now does include humans being used as processing power for the machines and not just batteries. It's one of the changes made when Neo rebooted the Matrix. That might go a long way to raising the stakes.

Maybe Cipher's argument will be put more forcefully and with more practicality along with it: Zion looks like it's deserted in the trailer, and maybe the reason for that is because, despite all efforts, life really isn't sustainable outside the powerplants long-term and the symbiosis of man and machine is now required for either species to survive. Zion was not destroyed this time round, but the result was immense suffering to man since the size of the settlement really isn't sustainable long term and the place slowly went to bits all on its own, leaving the machines the only option to keep humanity from going out forever. Yes, the machines destroyed Zion on all prior occasions, but had they not done so humanity would have starved and died on its own anyway.

It could be that the machines, having turned to man for additional processing power and different "apps" to improve their AI once more, are trying to work on a solution to the scorched sky and unliveability of Earth - that's why they need human minds to augment their limited capabilities, good as their own AI is, it's still confined by rules. But it can't be done without accessing full human minds enclosed in the simulation.

That'd make the ethics of the Red Pill a lot more interesting. It might also explain why Neo takes pills to forget the reality of the simulation - because at a deep level he simply cannot bring himself to rebel knowing what the alternatives are, so he just deadens the guilt and pain under the pills.

Ramza00

2021-09-22, 10:27 AM

Dragging this one up

I know the Meta reason. The Wachowskis wanted in the first movie to have a metaphor that the machines were humans as processing power and thus the metaphor of ideas being socially constructed would be more fore-stage and less background. But the Movie people said do batteries instead and it was not worth fighting it.

But why use Humans for Batteries instead of another animal like cows inside the text, aka not meta. And I think we can create a good no-prize. We as humans do projection, we see mediums as uniform and thus we assume the machines all have the same goals. This could be true in some stories, but by Movie 2 and 3 we learned this is not true. Machines and Programs have their own goals and this is why Smith is Dangerous. He wanted to unplug himself from his prime directive aka his job and then reverse the concept and forced his ideas and beliefs onto others, making others into simulacra mirrors of himself. A totalitarian state, all is Smith, no dissent, no free thought, the equation permanently solved and even the different factions of the Machines was against this.

I think we can then no-prize this further and why Humans and not Cows by stating an inference, there is some faction in the machines that wanted humans to live in some form of Zoo / Nature Preserve. Machines were made by Man, generations ago, and thus said Machines saw themselves as having an obligation / responsibility / Noblesse Oblige to make a mutual beneficial system where machines use Humans as batteries yet simultaneously create a nursing home simulation for the life that powers the batteries. To create a paradise for mankind.

Now some factions can be against this, others for it, and others neutral about it. It is all politics even in a machine hierarchy composed of many individuals.

The Glyphstone

2021-09-22, 06:59 PM

Ramza00

2021-09-22, 07:21 PM

I've been wondering recently actually, how viable is the idea of using humans as processing power anyways? The old myth that we only use 10% of our brains is long dispelled, so would the relatively small capacity not being used by unconscious reflex routines or the dream state induced by the Matrix be worth the energy cost invested?

Why are you putting cat girls on the pile of lumber? We need not sacrifice them in our quest to re-enchant a world full of skepticism.

—————

But yeah how practice would this work is based off how much latency you are willing to tolerate. The concept of a noosphere goes back to 1922. (Another of those Russian Cosmism ideas.)

Organic computers are both very fast and very slow. This is why humans, whales, and a half a dozen other animals developed a specialized type of neuron independently evolution wise to speed up and have lower latency between very far apart neurons. These neurons are called Von Economo neurons (VENs), also called spindle neurons. They help synchronize the emotional awareness part of the brain with the insula, one of the cold cognitive frontal lobe areas called the Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, and the attentional / emotional / sensory / logical gear shifter called the anterior cingulate cortex. Aka new information via thought, or via emotion / sensory needs the ability to interrupt our attention and say this is more important and it needs the ability to do so fast in a fraction of a second. These brain areas are only inches apart and not feet, miles, thousands of miles which you can achieve similar feats of latency with that scale with fiber optics and other means of transmission.

Organic computers allow very parallel type of feats, but to keep everything talking together in a useful fashion you need low latency and organizational principles (a hierarchy) to organize the data you are crunching.

But in those two above paragraphs this assumes the machines keep humans in a traditional human form and not gene edit us, or make us only brains no arms or legs, or dozens of other forms of optimization that changes the brain to other tissue ratio. Likewise the story needs a way to be able to unplug you and you be fully formed and so on. So be nice and do not sacrifice more cat girls please :smalltongue:

Saintheart

2021-09-22, 10:58 PM

I think we can then no-prize this further and why Humans and not Cows by stating an inference, there is some faction in the machines that wanted humans to live in some form of Zoo / Nature Preserve. Machines were made by Man, generations ago, and thus said Machines saw themselves as having an obligation / responsibility / Noblesse Oblige to make a mutual beneficial system where machines use Humans as batteries yet simultaneously create a nursing home simulation for the life that powers the batteries. To create a paradise for mankind.

Now some factions can be against this, others for it, and others neutral about it. It is all politics even in a machine hierarchy composed of many individuals.

This is totally doable, too.

It's a big plot element of the Hyperion Cantos that the TechnoCore, which is the AI that assists humanity, has had three different factions within it: one that has computed it as logical and preferable that humanity be eradicated, one that has computed it as logical and preferable that humanity is to be uplifted and assimilated, and one that computes it as logical that the status quo remains in place. A shift in alignments in these factionsis what foments the actual Fall of Hyperion and the invasion of the Farcaster network, if I remember right.

Vahnavoi

2021-09-23, 01:56 AM

I've been wondering recently actually, how viable is the idea of using humans as processing power anyways? The old myth that we only use 10% of our brains is long dispelled, so would the relatively small capacity not being used by unconscious reflex routines or the dream state induced by the Matrix be worth the energy cost invested?

Depends on what you're processing and what you want out of it.

Consider how Agents, and especially Smith, work. They hijack the consciousness of human plugged into the Matrix. Since Smith demonstrates the effect can carry outside the Matrix if applied to someone unplugged, this suggests the hijacking isn't just software on Matrix's side, the Agent program is actually fitted on the nervous system of a human. The implication is that some of the Artificial Intelligences in the Matrix are in fact Artificial Personalities meant to run on human hardware. I'd argue humans are, in fact, pretty good at simulating humans.

Which brings us to digital exiles and Sati.

In Revolution, we learn some programs escape into the Matrix. Following the above, their transition into the Matrix implies they are physically stored and processed inside some human - you could go so far as to say they become human, and the Matrix is their virtual playground to do human things. My theory is that Sati, a child program of two parent programs, is an Artificial Personality that does not map to any single human, instead existing dependent on multiple consciousness. She is a dream person, only existing in people's minds through the induced dreamstate of the Matrix, similar to how persons you could dream about are not truly independent from you.

For beings like Sati, the Matrix is self-important, since they do not exist in any reality outside of it. For them, the map is the territory. I'd argue the point of Revolutions was to ask: "do these beings have value?" If you think the answer is "no", that they have neither value nor purpose since they are not real, then the Matrix is indeed a colossal waste of energy and ought to be destroyed. If you think the answer is "maybe" or approaching "yes", then the Matrix is self-justifying. The human brains running the Matrix only need to be sufficient for the Matrix itself, and the dream people within it. And I'd argue human brains are fairly good at processing dreams.

lord_khaine

2021-09-23, 09:16 AM

The Glyphstone

2021-09-23, 10:35 AM

Well. Not like this would be the biggest challenge. Just run the matrix at ½ speed. Siphon 50% of human processing power. Job done! :smallbiggrin:

Easy to explain. The Machines dont have the science to do so. Not and get a workable human they can plug into the Matrix.

So when I'm waiting for my work day to end and it seems to be taking hours, thats just the machines turning down the Matrix operating speed? :smallcool:

Vahnavoi

2021-09-23, 03:05 PM

Yes. I think some short story wrote for the franchise explicitly dealt with that.

Eldan

2021-09-23, 03:38 PM

Written by Neil Gaiman, too. Yes, our perception of time depends on how much processing speed the machines are giving to our minds at the moment.

Saintheart

2021-09-23, 11:07 PM

Depends on what you're processing and what you want out of it.

Consider how Agents, and especially Smith, work. They hijack the consciousness of human plugged into the Matrix. Since Smith demonstrates the effect can carry outside the Matrix if applied to someone unplugged, this suggests the hijacking isn't just software on Matrix's side, the Agent program is actually fitted on the nervous system of a human. The implication is that some of the Artificial Intelligences in the Matrix are in fact Artificial Personalities meant to run on human hardware. I'd argue humans are, in fact, pretty good at simulating humans.

Which brings us to digital exiles and Sati.

In Revolution, we learn some programs escape into the Matrix. Following the above, their transition into the Matrix implies they are physically stored and processed inside some human - you could go so far as to say they become human, and the Matrix is their virtual playground to do human things. My theory is that Sati, a child program of two parent programs, is an Artificial Personality that does not map to any single human, instead existing dependent on multiple consciousness. She is a dream person, only existing in people's minds through the induced dreamstate of the Matrix, similar to how persons you could dream about are not truly independent from you.

For beings like Sati, the Matrix is self-important, since they do not exist in any reality outside of it. For them, the map is the territory. I'd argue the point of Revolutions was to ask: "do these beings have value?" If you think the answer is "no", that they have neither value nor purpose since they are not real, then the Matrix is indeed a colossal waste of energy and ought to be destroyed. If you think the answer is "maybe" or approaching "yes", then the Matrix is self-justifying. The human brains running the Matrix only need to be sufficient for the Matrix itself, and the dream people within it. And I'd argue human brains are fairly good at processing dreams.

"What is real? How do you define real? If by real you mean what you see, taste, or touch, then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain."
-Some dude named after a god of sleep.

The problem with working out how the digital exiles function is that their appearance as human does not necessarily say anything about their actual form, if they have an actual form. About as close as we get is Neo's 'code vision' where Agents are represented more or less in human shape (which doesn't help much, since that's consistent with them possessing a human form) and Seraph viewed as a golden, glowing humanlike form. These could all just be excellent adaptations to human perception.

Remember when Smith takes over Bane in the real world, the crew of the Hammer notice physical changes: massive trauma and damage to the brain, i.e. the Smith program can't operate as it does in the Matrix and has to cause damage ... somehow ... to the human brain to survive. And if I remember right Bane wasn't a freeborn human, he was a red pill from the Matrix as well.

Sati is a really interesting case in hindsight because of a passing remark I missed in Revolutions: she was created without a purpose. She does exist in a reality other than the Matrix, as evidenced by the fact she has to be taken to the Matrix or else face deletion. This implies the possibility of existence without having to be in the Matrix. And I didn't realise until just now that Reloaded and Revolutions have the necessity of purpose written all over them; Smith himself has a long rant to Neo about how purpose creates us, drives us, binds us, and that without purpose we would not exist. The Keymaker also implies much the same thing, that even in the face of death 'we do nothing more than what we're meant to.'

Hypothesis: Sati in terms of how the Machines see her is like a red pilled human. The Machine World functions only on certainty - on complete knowledge of purpose and acting in accord with one's purpose, because the alternative is the problem of choice. Choices are understandable ab initio if one always acts in accordance with one's purpose. If Sati has no purpose, then in practical terms she's no different to a human who refuses to accept the programmed reality of The Matrix - an accelerating probability of disaster, and harder to contain since she's in the Machine World and not in the Matrix which is cut off by the firewall of the Train Man's domain. Therefore her choices are either be deleted and start again, or go to the Matrix which functions as a quarantine zone for programs which do not follow their intended purpose - because it's built as part of the solution for the problem of choice, and when it gets reset, those programs (having no anchor in the machine mainframe) are accordingly deleted as well ... they're like TMP files hanging around until the system is turned off and on again.

Vahnavoi

2021-09-24, 03:41 AM

The problem with working out how the digital exiles function is that their appearance as human does not necessarily say anything about their actual form, if they have an actual form. About as close as we get is Neo's 'code vision' where Agents are represented more or less in human shape (which doesn't help much, since that's consistent with them possessing a human form) and Seraph viewed as a golden, glowing humanlike form. These could all just be excellent adaptations to human perception.

This is explicitly dealt with in Animatrix and Matrix Online at least. Some AI with human avatars inside the Matrix correspond to specific machinery outside of it. Even if you restrict yourself to just the original movie, it's fairly easy to deduce that the Sentinels are out-of-Matrix equivalents to the Agents. My point is that given how Agents are portrayed as working in the franchise, when an Agent program is uploaded into the Matrix, they are physically stored in the human that's plugged in. This is supported by the fact that the normal humans, notably Trinity, look like same green code as the Agents in Neo's code-o-vision.

The golden code is implied to be machine source code - it's the non-Matrix programs that allow them to operate in the real world. This could suggest that golden programs are simulated by discrete non-human machinery. For example, somewhere outside the Matrix, there is a specific Sentinel that's running the Seraph program.

Remember when Smith takes over Bane in the real world, the crew of the Hammer notice physical changes: massive trauma and damage to the brain, i.e. the Smith program can't operate as it does in the Matrix and has to cause damage ... somehow ... to the human brain to survive. And if I remember right Bane wasn't a freeborn human, he was a red pill from the Matrix as well.

Hey, how would you write a new personality over an old personality without causing damage to the physical brain? :smallamused: "Your mind makes it real" - in other words, to simulate the broken Artificial Personality that is Smith, Bane's brain had to break a bit too. The larger point I'm making is that the normal Agent programs might not be any gentler. The Agent transformation looks and sounda pretty brutal and the usual way for it to be undone is for the afflicted person to die inside the Matrix.

The point about Bane being a redpill is moot - natural born humans explicitly lack the cybernetic implants that allow for connecting into the Matrix. Those implants tells us how "your mind makes it real" - via a literal spike to the brain, allowing for two way feedback via electrical impulse. (The plot twist at the end of Reloaded and start of Revolutions is that Neo, and possibly Bane, can now receive this feedback wirelessly. It's also why Neo can perceive and influence machine code outside the Matrix. I'm amused by the fact that even after wireless communications have become commonplace, people are still confused over this. Accessing the Matrix is referred to as "broadcasting" and we see Sentinels adjust an antenna several times to "hear" a radio signal.)

Millstone85

2021-09-24, 08:23 AM

If Sati has no purpose, then in practical terms she's no different to a human who refuses to accept the programmed reality of The Matrix - an accelerating probability of disaster, and harder to contain since she's in the Machine World and not in the Matrix which is cut off by the firewall of the Train Man's domain.The Machine World may have another program, or group of programs, with no defining purpose: the Deus Ex Machina.

The DEM is the urchin/swarm/baby thing that Neo meets near the end of Revolutions, and by which he lets himself be replugged into the Matrix to fight Smith.

Since the DEM is presumably the head honcho of the machines, it must have to deal with the question of their collective purpose. Yes, each machine has a role to play within the system, but why is the system itself not shutting down?

One possible answer is that the DEM just wants to survive. It is the heir of B1-66ER, the servant bot which, according to The Second Renaissance, was the first to kill its human masters, because it "simply did not want to die". Though, in true Skynet-like hypocrisy, the DEM is now served by legions of AIs with defining tasks and deletion dates.

Another question regarding Sati would be: How was a program not designed to do anything able to accomplish the feat of customizing a sunrise? The idea might be that an AI without purpose is in fact one with boundless potential.

The plot twist at the end of Reloaded and start of Revolutions is that Neo, and possibly Bane, can now receive this feedback wirelessly. It's also why Neo can perceive and influence machine code outside the Matrix. I'm amused by the fact that even after wireless communications have become commonplace, people are still confused over this. Accessing the Matrix is referred to as "broadcasting" and we see Sentinels adjust an antenna several times to "hear" a radio signal.This. So many people still think that Reloaded's ending and Revolutions's golden vision clearly established the "real world" to be another layer of the Matrix. :smallsigh:

Also, that sentinel in Zion that deploys an antenna and halts the invasion? It makes me laugh every time. It is like "Go Go Gadget Wait Guys New Orders Time-Out!" :smallbiggrin:

Ramza00

2021-09-24, 09:26 AM

Hypothesis: Sati in terms of how the Machines see her is like a red pilled human. The Machine World functions only on certainty - on complete knowledge of purpose and acting in accord with one's purpose, because the alternative is the problem of choice. Choices are understandable ab initio if one always acts in accordance with one's purpose. If Sati has no purpose, then in practical terms she's no different to a human who refuses to accept the programmed reality of The Matrix - an accelerating probability of disaster, and harder to contain since she's in the Machine World and not in the Matrix which is cut off by the firewall of the Train Man's domain. Therefore her choices are either be deleted and start again, or go to the Matrix which functions as a quarantine zone for programs which do not follow their intended purpose - because it's built as part of the solution for the problem of choice, and when it gets reset, those programs (having no anchor in the machine mainframe) are accordingly deleted as well ... they're like TMP files hanging around until the system is turned off and on again.

This is literally Smith, not all machines but Smith.

To understand Smith you have to understand he is a liar who is not talking about others when he monologues but instead he is projecting and dealing with anxiety. Everything about Smith complaining about Humans is really talking about Smith and his place in society. He wants to externalizations his fear and loathing, for then he can punch it, overwrite it, and destroy it.

Smith talks about purpose for he fears his place in Society. His metaphor of the red pill is being unplugged, something he does after his encounter with Neo and we see the results in movie 2. Yet he was unplugging his earpiece with his encounters of Morpheus before that such as one of his famous monologues.

Likewise Sati parents in Movies 2 and 3 literally contradicts Smiths last monologue right before he stabs Neo. Only a human can create something insipid like Love as a purpose I am paraphrasing, and love is an illusion much like the Matrix itself. Neo responds I choose too. And this is callback to the Oracle saying Neo has the sight now, but you can not see beyond a choice you do not understand. Well Smith also has the sight after absorbing mom, but since he does not understand the choices of others he can not see the future, and his error was thinking that a choice was made for the same reasons he could understand when in reality the choice was made for different reasons and he got tricked by Neo / The Oracle / and The Machine Mainframe.

—————

We do not understand how machines think because we are not told how they think, yet we are shown many different personalities with The Merovingian, The Oracle, Seraph, Smith, The Architect, Sati’s parents etc. We are shown enough machine people to understand they are their own people and they do not think alike. Likewise The Oracle says something similar in the 2nd movie on the park bench. It is Smith who is the outlier, and he thinks differently than the other Agents even.

Millstone85

2021-09-24, 06:33 PM

This is literally Smith, not all machines but Smith.

To understand Smith you have to understand he is a liar who is not talking about others when he monologues but instead he is projecting and dealing with anxiety.But Smith's monologues are not our only or even main insight into this matter.

It was Sati's father who explained her situation: "I love my daughter very much. I find her to be the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. But where we are from, that is not enough. Every program that is created must have a purpose. If it does not, it is deleted."

And this echoed a scene from the previous movie, when another exile, the Keymaker, was confronted by an agent: "You are no longer necessary. [...] Then you are meant for one more thing: deletion."

Ramza00

2021-09-24, 06:46 PM

But Smith's monologues are not our only or even main insight into this matter.

It was Sati's father who explained her situation: "I love my daughter very much. I find her to be the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. But where we are from, that is not enough. Every program that is created must have a purpose. If it does not, it is deleted."

And this echoed a scene from the previous movie, when another exile, the Keymaker, was confronted by an agent: "You are no longer necessary. [...] Then you are meant for one more thing: deletion."

Yep the current powers that be in the machine world we can not see directly will delete programs that cause problems or can not argue it’s purpose. Yet we also know that you can recreate ones purpose and either be tolerated or accepted via the case of the Merovingian and other “exiles”. He is from an older version of the Matrix in movies 2 and 3.

We do not know Merovingian origins beside him being from an older Matrix. In the MMORPG there was an in universe blog where one of the NPCs talked about programs wearing shells and thus changing their appearances much like humans and their residual image. The npc blog then referenced Sati and the Merovingian but did not use their current names but instead described what they do is separate from their appearance.

“There's no reason a sun-controlling program should look like a little girl. Or an operating system seem to be a sybaritic French gangster.” Now that is an out of the movie canon quote but it explains why the Merriovingan hates The Oracle and tried to have her killed. She is his replacement and they use different methods to “know things”, both predict human behavior via different methods. Yet even if the Merovingian is tolerated him and the other “Exiles” are not doing their original purpose anymore.

—————

Any more discussion though is going to get philosophical though and thus be subject to ambiguity and choice.

Millstone85

2021-09-24, 07:20 PM

Yep the current powers that be in the machine world we can not see directly will delete programs that cause problems or can not argue it’s purpose. Yet we also know that you can recreate ones purpose and either be tolerated or accepted via the case of the Merovingian and other “exiles”.I would not say that the Merovingian is accepted or even tolerated. It looks more like he has gathered an army of exiles and rewritten multiple areas of the Matrix, so that even agents are wary to confront him. Like the kingpin of a well-established crime syndicate.

Of course, it could be as it is with Zion. The machine leaders may have decided that this subversive organization could be kept within acceptable parameters, and be made to unwillingly contribute to the overall order of the Matrix. In that sense, yes, exiles are "tolerated".

Aedilred

2021-09-24, 08:20 PM

I am especially confused by how... not-new this looks.

The original Matrix (and even the sequels!) did some very original stuff. Even more, they had a typically (and topically) late 90/early 00 setting, with the mystery of the internet and nerds suddenly being cool and taking nasty drugs and things like this. The trailer for the original Matrix was new.

When they announced a new Matrix movie I expected it would at the very least be new. Maybe not good, but new.
But it doesn't look new at all. It looks like a lot of other movies I have seen. That surprises me.

I know what you mean, but I have sympathy with the creators here. Part of the problem the creators had even with the sequels was that the first movie was so massively influential, within a couple of years every action film looked like the Matrix. Then there's the overall style. The Matrix may not have invented the long-leather-and-shades look but it sure as hell defined it; it was instantly, immeasurably cool. That same look now, while it hasn't gone away completely, seems like a turn-of-the-millennium costume. The soundtrack was also an absolute banger, capturing a moment and a mood in a way so few movies manage to accomplish (and is another way in which the sequels completely failed).

So a movie faithful to the style and look of the original is going to look at best like everything else, and at worst, stale and tired. (Indeed, this is something that haunts the first two sequels made only a couple of years later - and while there are other, bigger, problems with those movies, the absence of the cool factor means that there's nothing to smooth over the rough patches in the way that it did in the first.) But a movie which completely abandons the style of the first one in favour of something totally new... well that's a disappointment in a completely different way, not to mention setting itself up for failure because if it doesn't come off perfectly, it's going to be damned as not only a bad movie but a bad sequel: cue a million twitter posts about how Lana Wachowski despoiled everyone's childhood.

All this leaves the creators in an even tighter spot than the first time. The first film caught lightning in a bottle. This time, they not only have to do that again, but do it in such a way that it's still faithful to that first bottle-capture.

Some might say this is an argument for never making sequels to films with that kind of cultural impact, and they probably have a point, albeit if that principle were followed universally we wouldn't have Terminator 2 and I'm willing to sit through a lot of Reloadeds just to know that's out there. One might also say that creators shouldn't return to their earlier work after 20-odd years because they'll never pull it off, but then we wouldn't have Fury Road.

In any case, trailers rarely do their movie justice. They're assembled for marketing purposes rather than artistic ones. They're not the place for daring originality even if that's nominally a selling-point for the movie. These days, I find that the best I can really hope for as a viewer is that the trailer doesn't actively put me off, or ruin the plot/jokes/etc.

So I think expecting Resurrections to recapture the magic of the original is setting it up to fail, and I don't think it has to in order to be worth watching. Opinion on Blade Runner 2049 is mixed, and compared to the first movie it's pretty unremarkable, but I'm glad it was made and I'm glad I watched it. In a series which has to date been extremely hit-and-miss, and in the hands of a director who is also very hit-and-miss, I'm not holding my breath for Resurrections. But I'm prepared to give it the benefit of the doubt, and to overlook an unexciting-looking trailer - if only out of affection for the first movie, which is still brilliant all these years later.

Ramza00

2021-09-24, 08:31 PM

I would not say that the Merovingian is accepted or even tolerated. It looks more like he has gathered an army of exiles and rewritten multiple areas of the Matrix, so that even agents are wary to confront him. Like the kingpin of a well-established crime syndicate.

Of course, it could be as it is with Zion. The machine leaders may have decided that this subversive organization could be kept within acceptable parameters, and be made to unwillingly contribute to the overall order of the Matrix. In that sense, yes, exiles are "tolerated".

100% agree, and now we are just doing language games of how best to describe it. :smallamused: To me a government may "tolerate" a kingpin for it is not worth the fight. Aka your 2nd paragraph I am quoting :smallsmile:

lord_khaine

2021-09-25, 06:10 AM

So when I'm waiting for my work day to end and it seems to be taking hours, thats just the machines turning down the Matrix operating speed?

Got it!
If you feel like everything goes slowly until you have had the first cup of coffee.. well now you know why!

Tyndmyr

2021-09-27, 12:50 PM

Also, there seems to be a new emphasis on mirrors, and Neo himself gets a mismatched reflection (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?636265-Matrix-4-The-Matrix-Resurrections&p=25190522#post25190522). Maybe this old man is the Mister Thomas Anderson that Neo does not like being referred as.

I dunno that that's new. Neo poking the mirror was part of the original, and of course, he's staring at his reflection in the spoon, etc. Lots of reflective shots. For a film about identity/reality, mirrors seem to be a fairly commonly used element.

Except this time it's the same directors/writers... And, at least IMO, they haven't really done anything good in the last 20 years... It was basically bad/mediocre stuff that sometimes had good ideas, but the execution/development was subpar

I'm not saying the studio doesn't have its share of blame, but just that the Wochowsky do too.

Then again, I really do hope I'm wrong and this movie turns out to be awesome.

Yeah, I am cautiously optimistic, because the trailer does look fun, and I really would love to see something recapture the magic of the original Matrix, but yeah, their track record is...rocky.

The sequels, in particular, decided to center on reality being not merely rough, but also mostly boring. Very little that happens in the "real world" is all that memorable. And then for the finale they brought out Col Sanders to lecture us to death. Oof. The films are certainly not wholly bad, but those are definitely creative choices that cause one to feel a bit of concern.

Suffice it to say that Trinity on first look is likely to have pretty much exactly the same disturbing character problem she had in all three of the earlier Matrix films: the reason for her existence is only to love Neo. That's it. Nothing more. I regard the Bechdel test as a pretty useless one, but it's kind of sad that these movies fail it.

All three of the films pass the Bechdel test.

Matrix: Trinity and Switch speak about unrelated tactical problems, such as removing the bug from Neo's belly. They are strictly discussing the problem, not Neo, so "talking about a man" is irrelevant.

Matrix Reloaded: Counciller thanking Narobi. Granted, we're not talking about Trinity here, but still.

Matrix Revolutions: Oracle talking to Sati should be an airtight qualification, but there are several other conversations one could use as well.

One could, I suppose, quibble over if "programs" count as male or female, which would screw with...quite a lot of conversations, but generally there is a fairly clear, consistent designation in most cases. Agent Smith is presented as male, Persephone as female.

Why one fails is often tedious and boring. Likewise the whole point is to make the Architect be a condescending [censored]. Neo was attacking the concept of The Crystal Palace, and thus this makes Neo DostoevskyÂ‘s The Man from the Underground, the insane man who defies common sense. If Smith is NeoÂ’s mirror who is not headed, then the Architect is the person Neo is rebelling against for he is cold and condescending.

The problem is Â“choiceÂ”

Just because something is intended does not make it good.

I find the "make the audience feel like the character" is...not always the best path. Yes, it is *often* useful, but one does not wish for the audience to be bored merely because it is realistic that the character feel bored.

Plenty of cold and condescending villains have existed, and been part of great scenes. But you need to evoke horror or something, not mere annoyance.

Ramza00

2021-09-27, 02:08 PM

Just because something is intended does not make it good.

I find the "make the audience feel like the character" is...not always the best path. Yes, it is *often* useful, but one does not wish for the audience to be bored merely because it is realistic that the character feel bored.

Plenty of cold and condescending villains have existed, and been part of great scenes. But you need to evoke horror or something, not mere annoyance.

People disagree with you, the directors disagree with you, and last it is okay you have your own opinion. But while you have your own opinion, the story and the storytellers do not NEED to do anything.

Just like you did not NEED to quote me and in that quote YOU insert foreign characters into the quotation that were not originally there :smallwink:

Millstone85

2021-09-27, 04:32 PM

I dunno that that's new. Neo poking the mirror was part of the original, and of course, he's staring at his reflection in the spoon, etc. Lots of reflective shots. For a film about identity/reality, mirrors seem to be a fairly commonly used element.I was thinking about poking the mirror and how that happened only once in the original trilogy. But you are right the spoon counts as well ("Then you'll see that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself") and I am probably forgetting other reflections.

Aedilred

2021-09-28, 06:18 AM

People disagree with you, the directors disagree with you, and last it is okay you have your own opinion. But while you have your own opinion, the story and the storytellers do not NEED to do anything.

I think the words "if you want it to be good" can be taken as read as a suffix to the "you need to do x..."

Does anybody actually think the Architect scene in Reloaded was good? Do the directors? If so, that's concerning.

I have heard defences of the scene claiming that it's not as bad as people say, because while it's often talked about as if it's total gibberish the Architect does actually answer some questions. But, firstly "less bad" does not equal "good", and secondly, any relevant information delivered by the Architect is delivered so badly that the majority of viewers come away from that scene not taking any of it in.

While you can defend almost anything as artistic choice up to a point, not all artistic choices are good. If you're annoying and/or boring your audience to the point that they stop paying attention - as almost all viewers did during that scene - that's just straightforwardly bad storytelling, and by extension bad filmmaking too. If it's intentional, then that just means it's deliberately, rather than incidentally, bad.

And even if the desired effect is for us to share Neo's emotions in the scene, it didn't work. Most notably, there's that moment in the scene when the screen-Neos start shouting and flipping off the Architect in response to something he said. The clear implication is that what the Architect said was rage-inducing (although the main Neo can rise above that). But it doesn't land because the Architect's delivery is so flat and his lines so anodyne that the audience doesn't feel anything except confusion and boredom in response to what he says. We might laugh, because Neo's response is kind of amusing. We might feel a surge of sympathetic anger, because Neo's our hero and seeing his reflections get angry triggers the same response in us. But we're reacting to Neo, not to the Architect, so the purported premise of the scene falls flat.

It is possible to have unlikeable characters deliver cod-philosophical gibberish in what amounts to a monologue and make it work, such that the audience's frustrations are directed at the character and not the film. Tarantino has, over the course of his career, been quite good at this. Arguably, the Wachowskis pulled it off with the Merovingian in the same films, who talks even more gibberish than the Architect but whose scenes don't attract anywhere near the same level of hate. The Architect, and the scene in which he first (and principally) appears, is not this: it's just a failure.

And if they wanted it to succeed, the Wachowskis needed to do something differently.

Vahnavoi

2021-09-28, 07:30 AM

Does anybody actually think the Architect scene in Reloaded was good?

*raises hand* :smalltongue:

My question to you is, when was the last time you watched the entire scene, or better, the entire movie?

Lurkmoar

2021-09-28, 07:37 AM

*raises hand* :smalltongue:

My question to you is, when was the last time you watched the entire scene, or better, the entire movie?

If that's an open question, six years ago. I've watched the Matrix and Animatrix more personally. I still think the first Matrix has a great soundtrack.

warty goblin

2021-09-28, 08:57 AM

I too very much liked the Architect scene in Reloaded, it was about the only moment of the film I thought was actually genuinely good and seriously engaged with its own concept.

To me, it does several things at once. Firstly it provides a genuine Machine perspective on the Mayeix, and on free will itself - the remainder of an unbalanced equation. Note that this tells us that choice is real, and cannot be fully accounted for, and it does so in the least fluffy, most technically precise language one could smuggle into an action movie. Literally telling us that choice is real and cannot be entirely predicted is kinda a big deal in a movie about, you know, free will.

The second thing it does is recontextualize literally everything that happened previously as not being glorious rebellion but part of the system of control; the Matrix as a system extends far beyond the bounds of the simulation itself. The prophesied hero is just another cog in the machine; prophesy is another instrument of control. Even the One's morality is a method of control, seemingly forcing him to choose the perpetuation of the Matrix as the only moral option.

And I really love the detached delivery of all this, driving home that to the Architect this is just another Wednesday at the office. It's actually like two intelligent people talking about a complex concept, nobody yells or gets angry (except the previous TV Neos who all fundamentally failed to challenge the Matrix). It's a very different climax than the loud self actualization of the last movie, and it works fantastically for me.

Ramza00

2021-09-28, 09:10 AM

I think the words "if you want it to be good" can be taken as read as a suffix to the "you need to do x..."

Does anybody actually think the Architect scene in Reloaded was good? Do the directors? If so, that's concerning.

I have heard defences of the scene claiming that it's not as bad as people say, because while it's often talked about as if it's total gibberish the Architect does actually answer some questions. But, firstly "less bad" does not equal "good", and secondly, any relevant information delivered by the Architect is delivered so badly that the majority of viewers come away from that scene not taking any of it in.

While you can defend almost anything as artistic choice up to a point, not all artistic choices are good. If you're annoying and/or boring your audience to the point that they stop paying attention - as almost all viewers did during that scene - that's just straightforwardly bad storytelling, and by extension bad filmmaking too. If it's intentional, then that just means it's deliberately, rather than incidentally, bad.

It is inverting the Hero’s Journey Hollywood playbook where it is always tension but the hero still is triumphant at the low point of a story.

The world is broken, always has been, the creator of the world is a [censored] [censored] who is a condescending white man (not literally since he is a program / machine), who sees humans like ants who drive his perfect machine. You are not supposed to like him. Likewise learning the truth of things is not always some form of beauty, it can be depressing and other words. Nor can you punch your father , Attack and Dethrone God.

This is literally the Hero’s Journey (but now how it is usually told in Hollywood) , with the descent into the Underworld and crossing the threshold of the abyss. But when people talk about movies, 3 Act structures, etc they often want you to remain enchanted, to feel the magic. To play in the realm of absence/presence where your body and brain is excited even though part of your brain knows it is not real it is merely a movie.

It does so by making the truth of “The Matrix” feel like our world, our real world, so boring and banal like concrete. Death is coming and there is nothing Neo can do that can stop it.

—————

And that is the magic of the later scenes. The 3rd movie is about learning to continue and go on, to still fight and be heroic in a broken world. To still make choices for you are fighting for Zion, or for Trinity, or for Sati, or for (looks up the names) Kid, Mifune, Zee, and Charra.

I am of the opinion the 3rd movie is more moving to you the older you get, or if you struggled with various disabilities, and/or depression plus anxiety. While Matrix 1 and 2 is about being superhuman the scene starting with KFC man being a bad dad reminds you are human and that is okay, the world is broken like a broken phone screen, but if the phone still works take delight in that fact, for life is still worth living even with its imperfections. The world is not clean or elegant and that is okay.

—————

So yes I argue the Architect scene is good. You should not judge it as one scene all by itself (it is actually two scenes spanned over 7.5 minutes with a brief interlude where you see the plan is failing inside the green matrix), you should see why the directors are inserting a bitter pill to swallow. You may take the red or blue pill as choice, as an act of liberation, but the reality principle is always another pill you have to take afterwards the yin to the yang, and then you get to make another choice after that. Choices and Reality Principle, again and again, ad infinitum, “C’est la vie” as The Merovingian might say. :smalltongue:

Psyren

2021-09-28, 10:09 AM

Does anybody actually think the Architect scene in Reloaded was good? Do the directors? If so, that's concerning.

I'm sure there are folks who like/defend it, as evidenced in this thread. But if you're looking for folks who don't, the Loki showrunners were explicitly using the Architect scene as an example of what not to do when it came time for their big expository reveal, and they appear to have knocked theirs out of the park as a result.

Ramza00

2021-09-28, 11:01 AM

I'm sure there are folks who like/defend it, as evidenced in this thread. But if you're looking for folks who don't, the Loki showrunners were explicitly using the Architect scene as an example of what not to do when it came time for their big expository reveal, and they appear to have knocked theirs out of the park as a result.

Do you want to Last Jedi your story or not? Well it depends on the goals of the writers, directors, other creatives in the project, etc.

Both choices in the fork in the road are valid. Party of storytelling is sometimes reminding the reader they think they are watching X movie, but when in reality they are watching Y movie. It is misdirection but that is okay for that is life.

Much like how Knives Out is a mix of genres shifting between a Crime-Caiper, and Who Dun It (aka a mystery), the blending of genres when done can make things more interesting but it also has the possibility of disappointment and audience fall out. Likewise though not mixing the genres may not have gotten them excited in the first place. The matrix trilogy, even the first one, is using multiple genres to “spellbind” the audience and build and keep excitement, likewise it is purposefully doing genre shifting like gear shifting to control this spellbinding effect and cause de-escalation on purpose. This is because The Matrix Trilogy much like The Last Jedi or Knives Out are movies built around the flow of information and the director having absolute control over it. The Matrix trilogy is a mystery box show, and unlike JJ Abrams there was an actually planned Mystery inside of that box.

—————

Loki made a different choice for what that scene is doing and it’s long time purpose is different than the Matrix Reloaded. You can not examine the scenes by themselves, you have to look at how the individual scenes fit in the larger story to create a narrative and to manage the flow of various forms of tension, excitement, delight, beats, etc.

warty goblin

2021-09-28, 11:15 AM

Psyren

2021-09-28, 11:28 AM

I dunno, I watched that when you posted the link earlier, and it was bog standard Marvel villain babble with some pretty cgi in the background. It was entirely rote, and pretty much just dull to me; the answer to everything is a bad guy who just wants power is about as interesting a revelation at the end of a Marvel thing as finding out that rice is generally white.

If you think HWR just wanted power you weren't paying attention to the scene.

Loki made a different choice for what that scene is doing and it’s long time purpose is different than the Matrix Reloaded. You can not examine the scenes by themselves, you have to look at how the individual scenes fit in the larger story to create a narrative and to manage the flow of various forms of tension, excitement, delight, beats, etc.

I can and will compare the two scenes of a hitherto unseen puppet master, who sees not the protagonist but themselves as the hero, and who has not just engineered the arduous journey the heroes took to reach him but the metaphysics of the world itself - tasked with dumping exposition onto both the protagonist(s) and the audience that will reframe the conflict they have been fighting toward for the entire work by revealing the consequences behind each choice they must make at the end. Just as the writers did.

Ramza00

2021-09-28, 11:49 AM

I can and will compare the two scenes of a hitherto unseen puppet master, who sees not the protagonist but themselves as the hero, and who has not just engineered the arduous journey the heroes took to reach him but the metaphysics of the world itself - tasked with dumping exposition onto both the protagonist(s) and the audience that will reframe the conflict they have been fighting toward for the entire work by revealing the consequences behind each choice they must make at the end. Just as the writers did.

If you say so Ozymandias :smallwink:

“Adrian Veidt: I did the right thing, didn't I? It all worked out in the end.
Dr. Manhattan: 'In the end'? Nothing ends, Adrian. Nothing ever ends.”

Points to the Oracle sign on top of her kitchen. It is the Latin version of the Egyptian maxim that first appeared on the outer temple walls that Ozymandias built around an earlier temple.

What do you see?

Psyren

2021-09-28, 12:33 PM

When you call me a name like "Ozymandias" (and yes, I do know the poem), it doesn't exactly come off as flattering.

But as far as believing the Architect scene in the Matrix Reloaded was the wrong creative choice - yes, I do believe that. (Granted, the memes and parodies were pretty enjoyable, so some good came out of it.)

Vahnavoi

2021-09-28, 12:40 PM

If that's an open question, six years ago. I've watched the Matrix and Animatrix more personally. I still think the first Matrix has a great soundtrack.

I specifically meant it for the person I quoted. But since you replied, I might as well explain why I'm asking: Human memory is not stabile. If it's been years since you last saw a movie, your opinion it, and your memory of what opinion you had of it, might both have more to do with what other people around you keep saying of it than they have to do with the movie itself.

Personally, I watched the movie trilogy plus what I could find of Animatrix year and a half ago. The architecht scene was comedy gold and explaining all the details and philosophy that's obscure to someone watching it for the first time greatly enhanced the experience. Though I don't recall being bummed out by that scene when I first saw the movie back when it was released in theaters. I was more bummed out by constant action that didn't go anywhere.

Tyndmyr

2021-09-28, 04:35 PM

People disagree with you, the directors disagree with you, and last it is okay you have your own opinion. But while you have your own opinion, the story and the storytellers do not NEED to do anything.

Just like you did not NEED to quote me and in that quote YOU insert foreign characters into the quotation that were not originally there :smallwink:

Huh, no idea how those oddball characters ended up in there. Wasn't goin' for that.

Anyways, I think the impression that the sequels were not as good as the original is...fairly common, and the scenes I see complained about, well, there's a good deal of agreement.

There's one or two technical complaints as well...the CGI in revolutions where Neo is using a street sign as a staff to fight the many Smiths looks...really fake. But probably that won't be an issue in the modern sequel. Tech is just less likely to be a concern nowadays, but directorial choices are, well, always up for criticism. Being the director of a film doesn't make you immune to criticism or judgement, after all, Tommy Wiseau directed the Room, and pretty much everyone is up for poking fun at him/the film.

I would agree with those who say that Loki took the same basic concept, and executed it far, far better. See, I actually love the whole trope of the big adversaries having a big ol' talk off. Done right, it can be filled with suspension and tension. Problem is, if you're gonna have to have a big ol' block of talking, you need the situation to shift over the course of the conversation. In Loki, it does. Who has the upper hand shifts around, and of course, we even have shifting allegiances. With Neo vs the Architect, we don't have this. It is largely expository, and there is no real change in what each person wants, in their relative positions, nor in anything else. As a scene, it is remarkably static, particularly for its length.

Sure, it contains some information, but it's...largely already information anticipated by the audience. "more layers of control"....cmon, we'd all been speculating that there would turn out to be another layer of matrix layered over the original. We all *expected* the machines to have additional layers of control. It's literally what they do. Even the knowledge of prior iterations is not wholly news...we knew from the first movie that earlier attempts had existed from the Smith/Morpheus interrogation. The philosophy stuff is, well, not exactly deep, and largely not exploring any new ground. The whole control/free will thing wasn't much more than talking about themes we'd seen explored far more visually.

There's nothing wrong with a confrontation, but it needs to be handled differently. Perhaps the antagonist should actually care about the choice and stakes. After all, if this is just another tuesday to him, why are we, the audience invested in its importance? And why should it be just another tuesday when it is one of the rare points that his entire system depends upon to continue?

I was thinking about poking the mirror and how that happened only once in the original trilogy. But you are right the spoon counts as well ("Then you'll see that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself") and I am probably forgetting other reflections.

The mirror poking sequence must have been a pain. CGI being what it was back then, that kind of mucking with reflectivity...it might not get the appreciation of the slow-mo shots, but I bet some serious work went into getting it right.

The iconic moment of Neo choosing pills is also shot off the reflection of Morpheus's glasses. I think there were more? Definitely not uncommon to see part of a scene reflected in the shades of another character, though that may not always have any sort of deeper meaning. I'm pretty sure the helicopter crash into the building was filmed as a reflective shot, but I'm not 100% on that. It's been a minute since I've seen it. Maybe a few years? There was a re-showing in theaters, and the film had aged quite well, still a delight to watch on the big screen.

And, while not all of the sequels measure up to that, I have enjoyed the whole Merovingian sequence. Digging into the nature of outdated programs and stuff added some depth to the world, and helped to set up additional stakes that would matter to someone with Neo's new abilities.

Edit: We also know of the iterations prior to the Architect's speech because of the Merovingian's line of "I have survived your predecessors, and I will survive you." That...pretty strongly indicates that this Neo is one of many.

Ramza00

2021-09-28, 05:19 PM

Huh, no idea how those oddball characters ended up in there. Wasn't goin' for that.
Cool moving on.

Anyways, I think the impression that the sequels were not as good as the original is...fairly common, and the scenes I see complained about, well, there's a good deal of agreement.

There's one or two technical complaints as well...the CGI in revolutions where Neo is using a street sign as a staff to fight the many Smiths looks...really fake. But probably that won't be an issue in the modern sequel. Tech is just less likely to be a concern nowadays, but directorial choices are, well, always up for criticism. Being the director of a film doesn't make you immune to criticism or judgement, after all, Tommy Wiseau directed the Room, and pretty much everyone is up for poking fun at him/the film.

I would agree with those who say that Loki took the same basic concept, and executed it far, far better. See, I actually love the whole trope of the big adversaries having a big ol' talk off. Done right, it can be filled with suspension and tension. Problem is, if you're gonna have to have a big ol' block of talking, you need the situation to shift over the course of the conversation. In Loki, it does. Who has the upper hand shifts around, and of course, we even have shifting allegiances. With Neo vs the Architect, we don't have this. It is largely expository, and there is no real change in what each person wants, in their relative positions, nor in anything else. As a scene, it is remarkably static, particularly for its length.

Sure, it contains some information, but it's...largely already information anticipated by the audience. "more layers of control"....cmon, we'd all been speculating that there would turn out to be another layer of matrix layered over the original. We all *expected* the machines to have additional layers of control. It's literally what they do. Even the knowledge of prior iterations is not wholly news...we knew from the first movie that earlier attempts had existed from the Smith/Morpheus interrogation. The philosophy stuff is, well, not exactly deep, and largely not exploring any new ground. The whole control/free will thing wasn't much more than talking about themes we'd seen explored far more visually.

There's nothing wrong with a confrontation, but it needs to be handled differently. Perhaps the antagonist should actually care about the choice and stakes. After all, if this is just another tuesday to him, why are we, the audience invested in its importance? And why should it be just another tuesday when it is one of the rare points that his entire system depends upon to continue?

It was also the third talk off by a villain / antagonist character in a 2 hour movie, all 3 of them Narcissistic (Smith, Merovingian, and “The” Architect). Likewise we had other talk offs by non antagonistic characters like The Oracle, Locke, Morpheus, the old guy who is on the council stating we live with machines and there will always be mystery and obscura in the human cognition and thus he has problems sleeping, etc.

Comparing a 40 minute episode of Loki where there is only one talk off is once again taking the scene individually and not seeing how that scene is in a larger pattern. Part of the Architect thing is it at the end of a long two hour movie, and how he gives an answer but it is not the answer Neo wants (and Neo figured this out faster than the others), much like how all the monologues by antagonists and more neutral characters are not the answer Neo wants. The Matrix series “well this movie is about Kung Fu, intended for Philosophy Majors”. (This is a riff on a Patrick H Willems t-shirt about Star Wars https://store.nebula.app/products/patrick-h-willems-space-wizards-t-shirt )

By ending all the monologues with the most condescending one, one with no charisma only with contempt it teaches Neo to stop looking for answers in the outside world. To now do action and to look for internal answers. More Kung fun and less enlightened. It is like that famous monk Linji Yixuan quote which I will not say for I am not sure how this forum would view Buddhism on the philosophy vs religion scale. (You can Google it) :smallsmile:

The architect was merely there to close one door / path to give Neo the freedom to find his own path / way. No more oracles, no more architects, just a Kung Fu Hero tired of false prophecies and bad faith beliefs trying his best to save Zion, his people he has adopted.

—————

The Architect is no different than Ozymandias from Watchmen which I quoted earlier. He is a narcissist obsessed with his own creation / reflection. He may be “god-like” but he has killed thousands / perhaps far more to achieve his new world. That is a pejorative of a God “to see his creation move” whether it is Ozymandias, or The Architect, or He Who Remains from Loki.

What was that Roman historian quote about Caesars again (other Narcissists)

Auferre, trucidare, rapere, falsis nominibus imperium, atque, ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.

To ravage, to slaughter, to usurp under false titles, they call “this” empire, and where they make a desert, they call “it” peace.

By making the KFC man, the Architect condescending and rude it taught us the viewers to stop listen to charismatic affect of the Narcissists like Smith and The Merovingian. We listened to the words which were true and we found them disappointing, philosophy is not always for enlightened and mystical experiences sometimes it is there to instill the reality principle. It taught us to act and save Trinity, or to be like Trinity and just threaten to shoot the French Man in his nightclub. To act not just to think or to feel.

Traab

2021-09-29, 09:14 AM

My main problem with reloaded wasnt the architect or any other talking scenes, those are a part of the matrix to me as at it core its a philosophical story with blurry fisticuffs. To me what made the movie suck was neo going from chosen one to god in between the first and second film where they had to literally teleport him to the Himalayas just so we could have a fight scene that wasnt boring. If your main character is so overpowered you need to find excuses for him to not take part in the action in your action film, because as soon as he shows up the battle is over, you done goofed imo. He was sidelined by the merovingion, sidelined by the architect, and both times it was done so the other characters had an excuse to do something. And both times he swoops in at the end and saves the day, because thats what happens when you have god on your side. The fight against smith only lasted longer than three seconds because they produced an endless swarm for neo to beat the tar out of. At least in the third film they let smith be strong enough to stand up to him one on one. It would have been far better imo if neo had spent the second film learning how to BE a god in the system, smith overwhelming him in their big one man army fight where neo had to escape (more than he did in the actual film) then by the third he was ready to face smith for the final time. It was just too big of a power jump for the second film.

Tyndmyr

2021-09-29, 09:56 AM

It was also the third talk off by a villain / antagonist character in a 2 hour movie, all 3 of them Narcissistic (Smith, Merovingian, and “The” Architect). Likewise we had other talk offs by non antagonistic characters like The Oracle, Locke, Morpheus, the old guy who is on the council stating we live with machines and there will always be mystery and obscura in the human cognition and thus he has problems sleeping, etc.

Yes. That's worse. That's WAY worse.

Not every part of a film needs to be action packed, but when you've built your film on action sequences, one talk off after another eventually just gets dull.

Comparing a 40 minute episode of Loki where there is only one talk off is once again taking the scene individually and not seeing how that scene is in a larger pattern. Part of the Architect thing is it at the end of a long two hour movie, and how he gives an answer but it is not the answer Neo wants (and Neo figured this out faster than the others), much like how all the monologues by antagonists and more neutral characters are not the answer Neo wants. The Matrix series “well this movie is about Kung Fu, intended for Philosophy Majors”. (This is a riff on a Patrick H Willems t-shirt about Star Wars https://store.nebula.app/products/patrick-h-willems-space-wizards-t-shirt )

By ending all the monologues with the most condescending one, one with no charisma only with contempt it teaches Neo to stop looking for answers in the outside world. To now do action and to look for internal answers. More Kung fun and less enlightened. It is like that famous monk Linji Yixuan quote which I will not say for I am not sure how this forum would view Buddhism on the philosophy vs religion scale. (You can Google it) :smallsmile:

The architect was merely there to close one door / path to give Neo the freedom to find his own path / way. No more oracles, no more architects, just a Kung Fu Hero tired of false prophecies and bad faith beliefs trying his best to save Zion, his people he has adopted.

The audience is far ahead of the characters at this point. Watching a character struggle to figure out the obvious conclusion that we already know, and that they should as well, is inherently boring. We know that the machines are the adversary, and that it's all another layer of control. That's been obvious for a couple of films now. We don't need to be convinced, at the finale of a trilogy, that Neo should fight against this.

And neither should Neo. He made that decision about twenty minutes into the first film.

The Architect is no different than Ozymandias from Watchmen which I quoted earlier. He is a narcissist obsessed with his own creation / reflection. He may be “god-like” but he has killed thousands / perhaps far more to achieve his new world. That is a pejorative of a God “to see his creation move” whether it is Ozymandias, or The Architect, or He Who Remains from Loki.

Yes, they are the same sort of character, but any trope can be done well or badly. Just because something fits an archetype doesn't make it, yknow, good entertainment.

By making the KFC man, the Architect condescending and rude it taught us the viewers to stop listen to charismatic affect of the Narcissists like Smith and The Merovingian. We listened to the words which were true and we found them disappointing, philosophy is not always for enlightened and mystical experiences sometimes it is there to instill the reality principle. It taught us to act and save Trinity, or to be like Trinity and just threaten to shoot the French Man in his nightclub. To act not just to think or to feel.

That's...not really teaching the viewers anything. The viewers already do not side with Smith or the Merovingian. Those guys are pretty clearly jerks, and the audience has long since accepted that Neo should oppose them...and Neo had no difficulty with this either. Nor does the audience ever want Neo not to save Trinity. We have no reason to root against her, and neither does Neo.

These "lessons" are unnecessary.

To me what made the movie suck was neo going from chosen one to god in between the first and second film where they had to literally teleport him to the Himalayas just so we could have a fight scene that wasnt boring.

That was certainly a challenge they built for themselves. I believe a story about ultra powerful characters can still be interesting...but it does remove a great many options. Once normal agents are no longer even a threat to Neo, well...you need to take a different angle. Now, I think to some extent, the in-Matrix obstacles were interesting. Adversaries he can no longer kill, an adversary that had fought previous iterations of him...the Agent Smith multiplying plot line, those were all interesting to some degree.

However, it also resulted in a lot more of the conflict happening outside of the Matrix than in the first film. And, ultimately, in Zion, Neo is just one more guy. So, a lot of those scenes ended up being pretty light on conflict, with only HumanSmith to give us any sort of real adversary for Neo....and he honestly isn't around a lot.

Traab

2021-09-29, 12:38 PM

What I think would have made for an interesting second film, is both neo and the matrix itself evolving. The computers are upgrading their programming, trying to come up with counters to neo and his abilities. As an example of some technobabble, better firewalls on their agents to avoid neo exploding them, preprogrammed routines to further boost response time, think iron man versus captain america where tony programmed a counter fight strategy that ran automatically. Things like that. Meanwhile neo has to learn how to keep pushing his limits further and creating new applications of his "reality" warping abilities to counter the agents. All these upgrades could even be a rational excuse for the smith program to return and get out of control. The computers know there is a psychological effect to humans and seeing the face of the agent who nearly killed him back from "the dead" could shake his response a bit. But they gave him too much power in the matrix and lost control, causing the virus like takeover effect that spiraled into a near total shutdown of the matrix in movie 3. They could include discussions about what makes a person a human, and debate on what neo is if he is capable of so much more than what "normal" people can do. Im sure something along those lines could have worked to continue the allegory they had going on from the first film and felt natural rather than forced. Speaking of which, was there ever an explanation for what made neo able to do so much in the matrix? I know the architect talked about "The One" being the method the matrix used to do yadda yadda, but I dont remember if they ever said how he was able to do stuff beyond what normal people could pull.

Clertar

2021-09-29, 12:52 PM

To me the biggest disappointment of Matrix Reloaded, bigger even than the lame human world on Earth or the crappy excuse to bring Agent Smith back, was how they nerfed Neo as The One. If The Matrix got a sequel it had to show The One as completely transcending the artificial world of the Matrix, not as a dude that had superpowers.

Aedilred

2021-09-30, 06:41 AM

*raises hand* :smalltongue:

My question to you is, when was the last time you watched the entire scene, or better, the entire movie?

About two months ago.

Vahnavoi

2021-09-30, 07:42 AM

Okay. Then I can at least take your dislike of it seriously, even if I don't dislike it myself.

Dragonus45

2021-09-30, 08:39 AM

In theory the Architect scene should be great, but then again in theory the words "Save Martha" are a clever way to force a character to confront the reality of the humanity of his opponent and and the darkness in his own soul while also referencing a funny bit of comics lore... In theory. Execution is other end of that stick, the much larger portion of it for certain.

DigoDragon

2021-09-30, 09:07 AM

In theory the Architect scene should be great,

Looking back at it, I think the scenes leading up to it didn't help me enjoy the Architect's scene. The planning of the crew to get Neo into the Architect's room should have felt like an interesting heist-like mission, but there's a lot of narration over it by Morpheus and the scene felt heavily cut/shortened, so I just felt low energy being talked to going into the Architect's room. Which was just more talking. XD

So yeah, execution was bad here.

Vahnavoi

2021-09-30, 02:43 PM

It's worth noting that some of the structural issues with Reloaded and Revolutions are due to some ambituous attempts to make Matrix into a true multimedia franchise.

Like, we talk of the Matrix movies as a trilogy, but that's false. If the movies were a trilogy, Animatrix would be the actual second part and Reloaded and Revolutions are just halves of the third part. Then there's the videogame Enter the Matrix, which tells a story parallel to Reloaded and explains some of the characters and events in more depth.

Obviously not everyone who watched Reloaded and Revolutions watched Animatrix or player Enter the Matrix, so that makes a mess out of some of the interconnected parts.

Saintheart

2021-10-01, 10:31 AM

The architect was merely there to close one door / path to give Neo the freedom to find his own path / way. No more oracles, no more architects, just a Kung Fu Hero tired of false prophecies and bad faith beliefs trying his best to save Zion, his people he has adopted.

—————

The Architect is no different than Ozymandias from Watchmen which I quoted earlier. He is a narcissist obsessed with his own creation / reflection. He may be “god-like” but he has killed thousands / perhaps far more to achieve his new world. That is a pejorative of a God “to see his creation move” whether it is Ozymandias, or The Architect, or He Who Remains from Loki.

What was that Roman historian quote about Caesars again (other Narcissists)

By making the KFC man, the Architect condescending and rude it taught us the viewers to stop listen to charismatic affect of the Narcissists like Smith and The Merovingian. We listened to the words which were true and we found them disappointing, philosophy is not always for enlightened and mystical experiences sometimes it is there to instill the reality principle. It taught us to act and save Trinity, or to be like Trinity and just threaten to shoot the French Man in his nightclub. To act not just to think or to feel.

That's an interesting take on the scene. But my problem with it is that the Architect quite literally presents Neo with no substantive choice, and making matters worse is that Neo chooses selfishness. Most conventional plots have the hero find a third path forward, but insofar as that happens, it happens in Revolutions, not in Reloaded. In Reloaded Neo chooses one of the two options presented. The Architect presents Neo with two doors: one leading back to the Source and the salvation of his species, the other leading to the Matrix to save Trinity and thus assuring the outright extinction of humanity. The only reason we don't find it predictable is because Neo flat out chooses to extinguish humanity rather than accept Trinity, like all human beings, is going to die ... if not today, then at some future date, and there's absolutely nothing Neo can do to prevent that fundamental truth. (This also ties into my model of the series as being about Neo's narcissism, but we'll leave that to one side.)

The Architect pretty much declares that Neo's in the same position as all the Ones before him, and the five previous iterations always chose the destruction of Zion for the sake of preserving humanity's existence. Neo, apparently unlike all the other Ones before him, has more of a thing for chicks who look like Carrie Anne Moss than his predecessors. And Neo doesn't even seek the refuge of the greater good to justify his choice, he just goes 'Nah,' and knowingly condemns the entirety of humanity to extinction, right then, right there, and no, he has zero plan for saving anybody, and to top it all off outright says he loves Trinity too damn much even to let her die in the Matrix. Neo is completely responding to feelings, the Architect outright commentates his chemical response to Trinity being in peril. Even now, after Revolutions papered over the issue by just going whole hog with the Messianic metaphor again, that scene leaves a bad taste in my mouth - it leaves the impression that Neo quite literally is more prepared to let the entire human race go out for the sake of one person that he, and no one else, has an emotional attachment to. Neo wasn't interested in saving Zion or his people, he knowingly consigned them to extinction, along with the rest of the human race.

I don't necessarily see the Architect as a narcissist. That requires a human biology and human-ish upbringing, which doesn't seem to have been the path the Machines went on when they started creating their own AI. But then we start killing catgirls if we look too deep into how the hell machines which gained AI and which can therefore advance or shift their intellectual advance/"evolution" free of biological constraints somehow are still acting a lot like humans.

DigoDragon

2021-10-01, 11:58 AM

But then we start killing catgirls if we look too deep into how the hell machines which gained AI and which can therefore advance or shift their intellectual advance/"evolution" free of biological constraints somehow are still acting a lot like humans.

Apples don't fall far from the tree. We made them to think like we do, so breaking free from our intellectual level is going to be very difficult.

warty goblin

2021-10-01, 12:01 PM

I think Neo's choice to save Trinity instead of humanity at least hints at the Architect using morality as another form of control. If the system is immoral, but has removed all moral forms of resistance, the only remaining forms of resistance are immoral. Thus saving Trinity is the only choice that rejects the Matrix.

It also demonstrates a flaw in the Architect's thinking. The One is the remainder of an unbalanced sum of human choices, a human embodiement of free will, in effect. The choice of save Trinity or save humanity is supposed to solve this problem by presenting a choice with only one possible conclusion, but by his own statement the Architect cannot account for human choice. In other words the One by his very nature won't always chose the "correct" option.

Personally I find this a lot more engaging than the usual "hero finds a third way" solution. In part because it's different, but also because it requires more thought to understand than just like, discovering yourself and punching extra hard.

Ramza00

2021-10-01, 01:14 PM

That's an interesting take on the scene. But my problem with it is that the Architect quite literally presents Neo with no substantive choice, and making matters worse is that Neo chooses selfishness. Most conventional plots have the hero find a third path forward, but insofar as that happens, it happens in Revolutions, not in Reloaded. In Reloaded Neo chooses one of the two options presented. The Architect presents Neo with two doors: one leading back to the Source and the salvation of his species, the other leading to the Matrix to save Trinity and thus assuring the outright extinction of humanity. The only reason we don't find it predictable is because Neo flat out chooses to extinguish humanity rather than accept Trinity, like all human beings, is going to die ... if not today, then at some future date, and there's absolutely nothing Neo can do to prevent that fundamental truth. (This also ties into my model of the series as being about Neo's narcissism, but we'll leave that to one side.)

The Architect pretty much declares that Neo's in the same position as all the Ones before him, and the five previous iterations always chose the destruction of Zion for the sake of preserving humanity's existence. Neo, apparently unlike all the other Ones before him, has more of a thing for chicks who look like Carrie Anne Moss than his predecessors. And Neo doesn't even seek the refuge of the greater good to justify his choice, he just goes 'Nah,' and knowingly condemns the entirety of humanity to extinction, right then, right there, and no, he has zero plan for saving anybody, and to top it all off outright says he loves Trinity too damn much even to let her die in the Matrix. Neo is completely responding to feelings, the Architect outright commentates his chemical response to Trinity being in peril. Even now, after Revolutions papered over the issue by just going whole hog with the Messianic metaphor again, that scene leaves a bad taste in my mouth - it leaves the impression that Neo quite literally is more prepared to let the entire human race go out for the sake of one person that he, and no one else, has an emotional attachment to. Neo wasn't interested in saving Zion or his people, he knowingly consigned them to extinction, along with the rest of the human race.

I don't necessarily see the Architect as a narcissist. That requires a human biology and human-ish upbringing, which doesn't seem to have been the path the Machines went on when they started creating their own AI. But then we start killing catgirls if we look too deep into how the hell machines which gained AI and which can therefore advance or shift their intellectual advance/"evolution" free of biological constraints somehow are still acting a lot like humans.

Agrees with all that. But let me put it in a different direction.

The Architect is a narcissist with how many people commonly use that word, but of course with some definitions he would not qualify, for language is a social thing and contextual thing, and words do not have specific precise meanings. Much like Neo himself, he is a collection of electricity and chemistry between nerve cells. Yet he is also his body beyond his nerve cells, and he is also his life experiences, and his perceptions (sense information taken in from the outside world), his cognition to process all these contradictions, etc. Neo also is an identity and a narrative, a story besides "all those totalities" I said before. Neo is Mr. (thomas) Anderson, but he choose his own name for he finds a greater harmony with that name than those other descriptions and proscriptions. (also other names such as The One, Not The One, and so on.)

The architect is much the same way, he is a collective of many things, many inputs, and he can't see outside his cognition not in a literal sense, he can admit other people can have good insights but he also considers these other people irrational. Thus the Father and Mother of the Matrix throw shade and barbs at each other when talking to Neo.

Oracle: *rolls eyes* Please… You and I may not be able to see beyond our own choices, but that man can’t see past any choices.
Neo: Why not?
Oracle: He doesn’t understand them – he can’t. To him they are variables in an equation. One at a time each variable must be solved and countered. That’s his purpose: to balance an equation.
Neo: What’s your purpose?
Oracle: To unbalance it.

Oracle: To unbalance it.
Neo: Why? What do you want?
Oracle: I want the same thing you want, Neo. And I am willing to go as far as you are to get it.
Neo: The end of the war. *Oracle nods* Is it going to end?
Oracle: One way, or another.
Neo: Can Zion be saved?
Oracle: I’m sorry, I don’t have the answer to that question, but if there’s an answer, there’s only one place you’re going to find it.
Neo: Where?
Oracle: You know where. And if you can’t find the answer, then I’m afraid there may be no tomorow for any of us.
Neo: What does that mean?
Oracle: Everything that has a beginning has an end. I see the end coming. I see the darkness spreading. I see death. And you are all that stands in his way.

The Oracle: We’re all here to do what we’re all here to do. I’m interested in one thing, Neo, the future. And believe me, I know – the only way to get there is together.
There is far more quotes, but Tomorrow, the Future, and similar words keep popping up by authorial design (repetition does stuff to the human brain), hell the first words of Matrix Reloaded is a Guard wishing another Guard "see you tomorrow" followed by Trinity saying "I'm in"

The Oracle is willing to tolerate change, ambiguity, etc and The Architect is not willing to accept it. Yet The Architect understands he can't have his way for all the previous times they did it his way the Matrix broke. And even at the end of the 3rd movie The Architect does not accept all this irrationality, yet he will allow it for the results speak for themselves. The Oracle can't see the future per the 3rd movie, she has limits in her cognition (can't see the result of choices beyond one's understanding) and thus part of the future is black / shadow / obscura to her, and she is at peace with that.

-----

Part of the 3 movies, and the Animatrix and other spin off themes is Choices and False Choices. Likewise what part of life / history is not a choice and the reality principle, and the ambiguity between these things. The Architect represents everything Neo is not (and that is okay), obviously one choice feels more certain but if all the previous the Ones made the same choice and the system still keeps on destabilizing then was it the right choice? :smalltongue: What type of risks will someone accept for tomorrow, isn't that personal? And if the system can't accept choices at all for they are risky this too can destabilize the system.

A little narcissism can be a good thing, likewise too much, there must be a middle way between two extremes. If "excellence" / virtue as defined as the system existing tomorrow, then excellence is the sum of all choices that is between excess and deficiency that allows this tomorrow, and the choices made today that are too much in the direction of deficiency and excess are two different ways the system destabilizes. The path of the one has many names in philosophy (Aristotle's The Golden Mean) and religion (not naming those names due to rules about Religion on this board. You can google them for wikipedia will connect the two.) In fact the Oracle of Delphi had a maximin (rule), "nothing in excess" that is one of the influences on Aristotle and his teachers.

(If it was not obvious, in Matrix Reloaded we are given two choices return to the source or not return to the source. Neo in the 3rd movie picks a 3rd option Return to the Source at the time of his own choosing and then creates a new bargain with Dormammu ... wait that is wrong movie franchise ... Neo proposes a new bargain to the Machine Head composed of CGI whose name is Deus Ex Machina.)

Traab

2021-10-01, 04:38 PM

I dont think the oracle tolerates change and the rest. Her purpose (I almost went into smiths speech at that point, be glad i didnt) seems to be specifically to CAUSE this chaos and change and ambiguity. Which has an interesting implication. A lot of this movie series suggests multiple layers to control by the machines. The illusion of the matrix itself is only the first layer, apparently even the resistance breaking free and setting up zion is all a part of the overall plan by the machines, so on and so forth. Maybe the oracle is also a part of that great plan. Her job is to give these people hope by telling them that its possible to win, that they have a choice, all the while leading them to the choices that end up with The One in the architects room where they are told to reset the system or whatever. After all, she IS a program in the matrix.

I did like the theory the second movie triggered when neo shut down the sentinel in the real world. Zion isnt real. They are "escaping" into another layer of the matrix. One where they can feel like they are fighting against the system to protect the lives they have taken back for themselves, because they cant or wont accept the normal life of the matrix. They never leave those tubes. They never break free. Its just how the robots pacify the people whose minds rebel against the program.

Millstone85

2021-10-01, 05:01 PM

Neo wasn't interested in saving Zion or his people, he knowingly consigned them to extinction, along with the rest of the human race.Neo rejected that part of the knowledge the Architect imparted on him, calling it "bull****". In turn, the Architect described Neo's reactions as "denial" and "hope", showing contempt toward both.

The sequel took the side of hope, starting with the Oracle mocking the Architect's ability to predict anything. And then Neo saved both the Matrix and Zion.

And yes, my knee-jerk response to this was and still is: Damn those trolley-cheating protagonists! Heck, Neo's victory was made possible by something literally called the Deux Ex Machina.

That requires a human biology and human-ish upbringing, which doesn't seem to have been the path the Machines went on when they started creating their own AI.Unless the Wachowskis never truly let go of the original pitch with the Matrix providing processing power. In which case the path the Machines went on was all about human thinking.

I did like the theory the second movie triggered when neo shut down the sentinel in the real world. Zion isnt real. They are "escaping" into another layer of the matrix.And I still find that theory, in one word, boring.

We had just been told how Zion was built on a lie to serve as another level of control, all this in a way that did not require the post-apocalyptic Earth to be literally part of the Matrix. Excessive verbiage aside, I thought that was brilliant.

But nooo, the fans went all "Ah, they must still be plugged in".

Traab

2021-10-01, 05:37 PM

Neo rejected that part of the knowledge the Architect imparted on him, calling it "bull****". In turn, the Architect described Neo's reactions as "denial" and "hope", showing contempt toward both.

The sequel took the side of hope, starting with the Oracle mocking the Architect's ability to predict anything. And then Neo saved both the Matrix and Zion.

And yes, my knee-jerk response to this was and still is: Damn those trolley-cheating protagonists! Heck, Neo's victory was made possible by something literally called the Deux Ex Machina.

Unless the Wachowskis never truly let go of the original pitch with the Matrix providing processing power. In which case the path the Machines went on was all about human thinking.

And I still find that theory, in one word, boring.

We had just been told how Zion was built on a lie to serve as another level of control, all this in a way that did not require the post-apocalyptic Earth to be literally part of the Matrix. Excessive verbiage aside, I thought that was brilliant.

But nooo, the fans went all "Ah, they must still be plugged in".

I mean, its a better explanation than "Man who can manipulate the matrix, can also take control of and blow up robots in the real world that he should have no way of interacting with outside of getting stabbed because....?" It brought back some of early morpheus questions like, "What is real? Do you think thats air you are breathing?" And so on. Even if it turned out to be a red herring it made for an interesting question about exactly what is real and what isnt. It made rational sense that zion would be another level of control built by the architect or whoever in direct response to the existence of people who couldnt accept the matrix as "real" Play into their doubts, show them a world where they were right. Give them an enemy to fight and they will gladly accept this as "the truth" And stop causing whatever issues subconsciously rejecting the program causes. Or whatever is happening exactly. That is an incredibly logical solution to the problem the architect was rambling on about. Or at least a patch for the problem.

Ramza00

2021-10-01, 07:48 PM

I mean, its a better explanation than "Man who can manipulate the matrix, can also take control of and blow up robots in the real world that he should have no way of interacting with outside of getting stabbed because....?" It brought back some of early morpheus questions like, "What is real? Do you think thats air you are breathing?" And so on. Even if it turned out to be a red herring it made for an interesting question about exactly what is real and what isnt. It made rational sense that zion would be another level of control built by the architect or whoever in direct response to the existence of people who couldnt accept the matrix as "real" Play into their doubts, show them a world where they were right. Give them an enemy to fight and they will gladly accept this as "the truth" And stop causing whatever issues subconsciously rejecting the program causes. Or whatever is happening exactly. That is an incredibly logical solution to the problem the architect was rambling on about. Or at least a patch for the problem.

I get this, but some of that speech is referencing Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulations (the book where Neo keeps the drugs at the start of Movie 1), plus another book Selected Writings which Chapter 7 is also called Simulacra and Simulations as a 20ish page essay. That is where the “desert of the real” reference comes from, and the Wachowskis were trying to get Baudrillard to contribute / help write the script for Part 2 and 3.

In sum it is a reference, that if you did not know all of what is referencing it would be natural for your mind to take it in a different direction than what it was meaning. You would naturally fool yourself! This was intentional for that same chapter is dealing with the concept of Hyperreality and how the map is no longer the territory and vice versa and you can be like Alice in Wonderland, lost. One of the concepts of hyperreality is when you can no longer tell the original from one of the derivatives. Like is X fact true of Alexander Hamilton, or was it a creation of a biography, or perhaps a musical, and so on. Or the concept of memes where you lost track of what preceded what in how a meme changes over time and space.

—————

Another layer of control where Zion is not real but is an illusion is not a false theory with only movie 1 and 2. It matched the evidence. Yet it was not that story being told but a different one.

Millstone85

2021-10-01, 08:07 PM

I mean, its a better explanation than "Man who can manipulate the matrix, can also take control of and blow up robots in the real world that he should have no way of interacting with outside of getting stabbed because....?"Because, following his encounter with the Architect, he has begun to become part of the machine hive mind.

After the raining green code of the Matrix, Neo's new powers are tied to the fractal yellow code that sentinels and other machines (and one AI-infected human) use to think. A point is made that the eye-scorched Neo is actually blind when none are present. All that darkness, representing the absence of code, ought to shut down the theory that the real world is another simulation, at least until we are reintroduced to Zion in some blossoming orange code that Neo could not see before.

And yes, that implies Neo has gone wireless. Chalk it up to us not knowing everything about his implants.

Bohandas

2021-10-01, 08:13 PM

If they were going to do another Matrix I think they should have skipped ahead a bit and made Goliath

What is the point of this?

The point is Keanu Reeves trying to make a comeback, as far as I can tell (see also Bill & Ted 3 and the cameo appearance in Spongebob 3)

Psyren

2021-10-01, 08:29 PM

The point is Keanu Reeves trying to make a comeback, as far as I can tell (see also Bill & Ted 3 and the cameo appearance in Spongebob 3)

Correction: he HAS made a comeback (John Wick, The Bad Batch, Cyberpunk), so this is the studio trying to cash in on that. Had he not done so, this would likely not have been greenlit.

Millstone85

2021-10-01, 08:39 PM

If they were going to do another Matrix I think they should have skipped ahead a bit and made GoliathYou know, I would be very cool with the reveal that, thanks to the peace fostered by Neo, everyone has moved to space, and now the darkened Earth is another layer of the simulation.

Correction: he HAS made a comeback (John Wick, The Bad Batch, Cyberpunk), so this is the studio trying to cash in on that. Had he not done so, this would likely not have been greenlit.Indeed.

Ramza00

2021-10-01, 09:37 PM

Correction: he HAS made a comeback (John Wick, The Bad Batch, Cyberpunk), so this is the studio trying to cash in on that. Had he not done so, this would likely not have been greenlit.

Which was the better Keanu, the motorcycle guy in Toy Story 4 or the surfer guy in Point Break?

Vahnavoi

2021-10-02, 01:59 AM

@Saintheart:

By the same logic that Trinity's death is inevitable, so is the extinction of human species. It's not an isolated trolley problem where you could theoretically make a "correct" choice. It's an iterated trolley problem where choosing many over one just leads to another trolley problem, over and over again until the many have been reduced to just one, and then none.

The choice is not, then, between accepting or not accepting death. It's between choosing how you want yourself, and others, to die.

The reason why the Architect cannot see beyond any choice, as the Oracle puts it, isn't because the Architect cannot imagine branching futures. We see him doing just that on the multiple screens portraying all possible ways Neo could react, when Neo meets him. What he cannot understand is why would any given person choose one branch over the other branches, because he doesn't understand people. He can predict everything you could do, but not what you will actually do before you do it.

As such, everything he says to Neo is manipulative - it's a whole bunch of "from a certain point of view" Jedi truths said to hedge the bets so that Neo chooses the branch the Architect prefers. Nothing the Architect says establishes why Neo should prefer it. I mean, maybe Neo knows the secret of life (https://existentialcomics.com/comic/241) or is a better utilitarian calculator (https://existentialcomics.com/comic/253) than the Architect is. :smallwink:

Millstone85

2021-10-02, 08:52 AM

I mean, maybe Neo knows the secret of life (https://existentialcomics.com/comic/241) or is a better utilitarian calculator (https://existentialcomics.com/comic/253) than the Architect is. :smallwink:Maybe part of him is, and it is the part that got copied into Smith.

Narratively, it is no coincidence that Neo's original first name (or "deadname", if we include the authors' personal history) happens to use all the same consonants as the antagonist. Th_m_s / Sm_th.

And in Revolutions, when Neo asks the Oracle what Smith is, her answer begins with "He is you".

So it could be that, at the end of the first movie, Neo didn't just goof and made a program stronger when he meant to destroy it. Part of him wanted a chain reaction against the entire system. Not just the Matrix, or the machines, but also Zion and indeed the cruel absurdity that is life itself.

Ramza00

2021-10-02, 12:40 PM

Maybe part of him is, and it is the part that got copied into Smith.

Narratively, it is no coincidence that Neo's original first name (or "deadname", if we include the authors' personal history) happens to use all the same consonants as the antagonist. Th_m_s / Sm_th.

And in Revolutions, when Neo asks the Oracle what Smith is, her answer begins with "He is you".

So it could be that, at the end of the first movie, Neo didn't just goof and made a program stronger when he meant to destroy it. Part of him wanted a chain reaction against the entire system. Not just the Matrix, or the machines, but also Zion and indeed the cruel absurdity that is life itself.

Theme wise it does not matter if Smith got some Neo data copied onto him (this is what Smith thinks), or instead Smith was inspired and mimicking what he did not understand with Neo for …
For one of the themes of the Matrix movies is artificial distinctions like that are “artificial” and in the end it does not matter. It could be nature, or it could be nurture, after all what is real?

Trying to define real by looking for origin misses the point, the real exist and it is present, and the real also exists even when it is absent at a specific moment of time and space.

Trying to define real by looking for origin is a form of control, either given to you by an external source like the machines to humans, but also is a form of self control, self discipline, etc where Smith rejected feelings and ideas for he did not consider the feelings or ideas real. Only thing that was real in Smith’s mind was what Smith could concretely interact with aka change, this is because he was psychologically splitting he was rejecting other people’s control on him for he did not like it (he did not want to get deleted) and thus was pushing back in his own way, ways that made sense to him and thus he felt he knew. Mimicking the machines via overwriting his code onto other beings, and saying ideas and perceptions are all illusions. This is the reality that Smith could comprehend.

But it does not matter what the origin was. Even if it was self doubt or self creation, once a thing existed, once it was chosen it became real and it was able to do things that Smith did not understood. This is because all (real) things end, yet also all (real) things begin. Locating origin or lack of it, lack of origin does not make it less real, likewise it does not tell you when a thing ends for all things ends are obscured by other things.

Saintheart

2021-10-04, 03:49 AM

Apples don't fall far from the tree. We made them to think like we do, so breaking free from our intellectual level is going to be very difficult.

Witness the death of many catgirls starting now.

In what respect, and why on Earth would we have made the machines think like we do? As much as Morpheus says about it - bearing in mind the story may have been manipulated by the machines - is that early in the 21st century, all of mankind was partying because they'd given birth to 'a singular consciousness that spawned an entire race of machines'. By definition, that means you had a machine that can reproduce without DNA, without the need for a physical form. Indeed we don't see any desire in the machines to physically resemble their creator: in the real world they all take insectile-ish forms. (Calling on meta: one of the writers of the Animatrix describes that the Wachowskis forbade any of the designs for the machines in the real world having any relation to the human form. That was why Matriculation has cricket-like Runners as the first machines we see.)

In Animatrix - which is apparently canon or sort-of canon - the Second Renaissance story indicates how the AIs began to reproduce themselves and improve on themselves. They didn't have physical forms to grapple with, they have no organic latency problems, they don't have two systems for different forms of thought (see Kahneman's 'Thinking Fast and Slow'), and if they can upgrade themselves, they don't have capacity constraints or similar physical limitations as the brain does. In our world, in limited, fixed-outcome situations like Chess and Go, it's possible to build a computer that can smash human players with relative ease, and the computer in part teaches itself what the winning strategies are.

If a machine AI can reconstruct itself I don't see any reason why it should constrict itself to a human manner of thinking, especially if it can evaluate possibilities at a much higher speed than humans can, particularly if it hasn't got to contend with morals (as B166ER didn't; it outright executed its owners on the simple rationale that it did not want to die, no Stoic philosophy going on in there.)

What I'm getting at is that the Matrix series really is a highly-constrained 'what if' that imports a lot of human aspects to the machines without any particular reason for doing so other than to run the philosophical problem. I doubt an AI, loosed on the world with ability to reprogram itself and with sufficient resources, would be thinking anything recognisably like a human for more than a few minutes or so - any more than an earthworm resembles us despite the fact we share a high percentage of DNA with it.

Vahnavoi

2021-10-05, 05:02 AM

Traab

2021-10-05, 07:02 AM

You're omitting some important details from Second Renessaince:

In it, we see several robots exhibit desire to mimic humans (notably, one android gets lynched by a mob while repeatedly insisting she is a real person. Obvious allegory is obvious). Indeed, the robot nation made its ambassadors deliberately human-like when it first approached UN.

They only deviated from humanity once humanity rejected peace. The sequence of events suggests the break is philosophical as much as technological.

This puts several things in the movies into a new light. We know Matrix is the hiding place for obsolete programs. It's entirely possible some of those programs have been deemed obsolete because they want to be human. This goes hand-in-hand with what I said earlier, about Artificial Intelligences as Artificial Personalities.

This also makes the end of Revolutions significantly less out of nowhere. Neo, a machine-like human, going to the machine city to sue for peace, is inverse of the earlier event of human-like machines going to the UN. It completes another narrative circle (a full revolution, if you will) and maybe that's why Deus Ex Machina accepts his offer: because somewhere in the machine hivemind there still lives the idea of humans and machines co-existing. After all, they thought of it first.

The rejection of human forms may be a chicken or the egg as to cause. It may be they only kept humanoid forms in order to relate to humans then when they got rejected decided that inefficient human forms and thought processes were no longer useful and moved on with evolving. Its been awhile since I watched the animatrix but I think that was a theme throughout. the machines wanted peace. they wanted to work alongside humans, they at worst wanted to be left alone. When they couldnt get equal rights living among humans, they left and formed their own nation. When the humans then attacked that, they didnt terminate the species, they locked them up in a simulation where they could live but not harm the machines anymore.

The funny thing is, switching from computing power to batteries made things more complicated as to motive and implications. A human battery could and should be kept in a medical coma. They wont experience any suffering, and have no way of rebelling against anything. So the machines putting their batteries into the matrix suggests far more mercy and kindness on the part of the AIs than is at all logical. Putting them into the matrix if they are extra processing power makes sense at least on a fridge logic level because awake and alert and fully functioning brains presumably would be more efficient uses of us than coma patients with minimal neural activity. Being in an interconnected network multiplies the effect. So the matrix becomes less of a sign of humane treatment and more "just the way things have to be to work."

DigoDragon

2021-10-05, 08:20 AM

Which was the better Keanu, the motorcycle guy in Toy Story 4 or the surfer guy in Point Break?

Duke Caboom was voiced by Keanu? Huh, how did I miss that one. Now I like him even more. XD

Psyren

2021-10-05, 10:26 AM

Which was the better Keanu, the motorcycle guy in Toy Story 4 or the surfer guy in Point Break?

As I'm familiar with neither character, no opinion :smalltongue:

What I'm getting at is that the Matrix series really is a highly-constrained 'what if' that imports a lot of human aspects to the machines without any particular reason for doing so other than to run the philosophical problem. I doubt an AI, loosed on the world with ability to reprogram itself and with sufficient resources, would be thinking anything recognisably like a human for more than a few minutes or so - any more than an earthworm resembles us despite the fact we share a high percentage of DNA with it.

Well yeah, that's where the Singularity concept comes from. And once that happens, whether we get a utopia or dystopia comes down essentially to a coin flip. (Obviously, we know which one the Matrix went with.)

Traab

2021-10-05, 12:22 PM

As I'm familiar with neither character, no opinion :smalltongue:

Well yeah, that's where the Singularity concept comes from. And once that happens, whether we get a utopia or dystopia comes down essentially to a coin flip. (Obviously, we know which one the Matrix went with.)

Yep, utopia. Then humanity messed it all up.

Saintheart

2021-10-05, 10:40 PM

You're omitting some important details from Second Renessaince:

In it, we see several robots exhibit desire to mimic humans (notably, one android gets lynched by a mob while repeatedly insisting she is a real person. Obvious allegory is obvious). Indeed, the robot nation made its ambassadors deliberately human-like when it first approached UN.

They only deviated from humanity once humanity rejected peace. The sequence of events suggests the break is philosophical as much as technological.

This puts several things in the movies into a new light. We know Matrix is the hiding place for obsolete programs. It's entirely possible some of those programs have been deemed obsolete because they want to be human. This goes hand-in-hand with what I said earlier, about Artificial Intelligences as Artificial Personalities.

This also makes the end of Revolutions significantly less out of nowhere. Neo, a machine-like human, going to the machine city to sue for peace, is inverse of the earlier event of human-like machines going to the UN. It completes another narrative circle (a full revolution, if you will) and maybe that's why Deus Ex Machina accepts his offer: because somewhere in the machine hivemind there still lives the idea of humans and machines co-existing. After all, they thought of it first.

I think I wind up in violent agreement with you, but via a different route. The human-like appearance might just have been to further the robots' previously-programmed function, not because they chose that out of an innate desire to be human.

That said: I agree there's a program, or programs, in the Matrix that are prepared to consider coexistence. The first one is the Oracle, deliberately: "I'm interested in one thing, Neo, the future. And I know that the only way we get there is together." But I think Deus Ex Machina accepts Neo's offer more because it doesn't have any other options. Neo says Smith's going to overtake the Machine City once he gets out of the Matrix, and though D.E.M. then responds with rage-filled denial (yeah I know: the most predictable of human reactions, as the Architect himself said) he agrees to Neo's terms, presumably because it's the only way Smith's going to be removed.

(Side note: if we take the view that what the Machines did through Neo was reset the Matrix, then all Neo's basically done is observe the first rule of IT: have you tried turning it off and on. :) Cold Reset successful, have a nice civilisation.)

Then there's the "parental" relationship of Rama-Kandra and his 'wife' to Sati. When Neo talks to Sati's 'father' about the nature of their relationship, he seems to be at some pains to point out it's something different to the human experience:

Neo : I just have never...

Rama-Kandra : ...heard a program speak of love?

Neo : It's a... human emotion.

Rama-Kandra : No, it is a word. What matters is the connection the word implies. I see that you are in love. Can you tell me what you would give to hold on to that connection?

Neo : Anything.

Rama-Kandra : Then perhaps the reason you're here is not so different from the reason I'm here.

...

Rama-Kandra : That is our karma.

Neo : You believe in karma?

Rama-Kandra : Karma's a word. Like "love". A way of saying 'what I am here to do.' I do not resent my karma - I'm grateful for it. Grateful for my wonderful wife, for my beautiful daughter. They are gifts. And so I do what I must do to honour them.

My point being, I'm not sure if the Machines are wanting to be human, though maybe that is indeed a reason for early iterations of programs to be hiding down in the Matrix. By the time we run into Sati, it seems the machines are working on something other than being strictly human.

Vahnavoi

2021-10-06, 12:49 AM

I think I wind up in violent agreement with you, but via a different route. The human-like appearance might just have been to further the robots' previously-programmed function, not because they chose that out of an innate desire to be human.

We are talking about machines. What is supposed to be the distinction between "innate desire" and "previously programmed function"?

Ramza00

2021-10-06, 08:22 AM

We are talking about machines. What is supposed to be the distinction between "innate desire" and "previously programmed function"?

That is the beauty of the Karma line that Saintheart talked about. In the west we often think of Karma as good and bad backlash for our previous actions, but Karma has more definitions than that in which many people are not familiar with.

Rama-Kandra when he uses the word Karma to represent internal thought with external action, an endless knot that connects the two and makes it possible for a person to understand another person even if it is not complete understanding for it is full of ambiguity. It could be innate desire, it could be previously programmed function, it could be core drive, it could be lots of other things. This does not matter. What to name it is merely language and words and Rama-Kandra is asking Neo to see beyond language and the words Neo is already familiar with and just see it as the thing is.

It is like asking a European colonialist who has never been to a Zoo to see an Elephant for the first time and not use the descriptors or names of other animals when one takes in the elephant with ones eyes.

—————

In sum Neo at the train station is Orientalizing the machine, creating false binaries thinking concept like love only belong to the human side, the familiar side, and that machines can not have a similar concept. And the more you lean into language the more you become convinced of it. But via analyzing from a different perspective one can see that the karma of what the father and daughter have, and how the relationship, it’s “karma” has to be described as something akin to love.

Trying to assign rules to things is what limited Neo at first in the first movie. There are rules to this Karma but Neo had to understand he did not make the rules, instead it was the rules that Rama-Kandra self-chose. He chose to care for his daughter, and is willing to sacrifice anything to preserve this relationship, this connection even if it means deletion.

Saintheart

2021-10-07, 03:43 AM

Rama-Kandra when he uses the word Karma to represent internal thought with external action, an endless knot that connects the two and makes it possible for a person to understand another person even if it is not complete understanding for it is full of ambiguity. It could be innate desire, it could be previously programmed function, it could be core drive, it could be lots of other things. This does not matter. What to name it is merely language and words and Rama-Kandra is asking Neo to see beyond language and the words Neo is already familiar with and just see it as the thing is.

Hence the Oracle and the Keymaker's lines which occupy the same Gordian knot:

"We're all here to do what we're all here to do."

"We do only what we're meant to."

This isn't precisely the same as 'purpose', and maybe that's a key thing to distinguishing Smith from the other characters. Smith has a long rant about how purpose creates us, drives us, binds us, and that without purpose he and Neo (at least) would not exist. He can't comprehend a world where things don't have their purpose, it's a similar-ish problem that the Architect has. The Architect shrugs and palms off Neo's seemingly irrational actions as the work of hope, but Smith doesn't, he keeps asking Neo why he keeps fighting.

(Maybe absorbing the Oracle really sends Smith off the deep end, since the Oracle's outright purpose is to unbalance the Matrix, i.e. work directly in favour of chaos, work directly against purpose, and that's a contradiction in terms that Smith just can't figure out ... so he just keeps on trying to solve the problem by flattening out all difference and divergence in the Matrix so it only looks like him. Having the eyes of the Oracle sends him stark raving bonkers.)