I would sum up the problem with Reloaded being that it tried to just give you MORE of everything in part 1. More action, more CG, more philosophy, more lore, etc. the problem is, the Matrix 1 is such a well balanced movie. It gives you great action scenes and in between sets up enough philosophy, story, and context to be sufficiently thought provoking but not excessively ponderous.
I'm not sure that it's about "balance" as much as integration. I've noticed that people who defend the Matrix sequels tend to do so in a similar way as to how people defend the Star Wars prequels. They decent the lore and themes rather than the execution. Neither the original Star Wars trilogy nor the first Matrix film were good because they were super intelligent. Primarily, they just had likeable characters and well told stories. Whereas the SW prequels and Matrix sequels both tend to consist of a mixture of dialogue exposition and numbing action with very little stakes (e.g. Neo fights Smith clones for no apparent reason before showing that he could simply fly away anyway, Episode 2 Droids vs Clones arena battle. Contrast these with Luke fighting Vader in Episode 5, or Morpheus willingly giving himself up to the Agents in the first Matrix). I think the crux of it is the ability to tell a story through the action, giving weight to both, rather than the action feeling coincidental to the exposition.
Revolutions might not have been what fans were expecting, but man, am I the only one that still gets mad hyped during the fight on the dock? I mean, Captain Mifune's final stand was pure badassery.
I imagine you'll be exploring the relevance of Agent Smith in the next one. I hope it includes the symbolism of how Neo is the _One_ and Agent Smith is _Zero_ ... or to put it another way; the basic binary code that essentially makes for an AI consciousness to even exist (when created by Humanity). Hence why "The One" could not be removed ... as in doing so would remove a part of the machines own minds.
In Reloaded, he became "just" Smith. He was no longer an Agent. His code was corrupted (I was set free) when Neo destroyed him. He was always nihilistic and negative, so he used his new freedom to simply destroy everything. In a way, Smith is the real Anomaly and the One, because he was a former Agent (like a Fallen Angel) that threatened to "absorb" (a horrific combo of enslavement, death and violation) everyone, Human or Program and if he'd gotten his way, he literally would be The Only One. Agent Smith is Lucifer; Smith is Satan.
@@sekijokes451 I wouldn't say he has irrational desires. I think he's still rational even after being disconnected from the system. The difference is that when he was an agent of the system, he had a purpose, and the only rational thing to do was to fulfill that purpose. After being disconnected by Neo, he lost that purpose. In that lack of purpose his rationality made him nihilistic. It made him believe that if there was no real meaning or purpose for anything, then nothing could be allowed to exist.
Dear Wachowskis, this is Max, Max was able to explain your story succinctly and with interest. Be like Max. I wanna see a scene where Edgar Friendly from Demolition Man meets the architect.
I love the Matrix trilogy, but I believe there was a great mistake made storytelling wise on the following films. The only thing I didn't like was the fact that the Architect meeting scene was shown on the 2nd movie instead of the 3rd. [Spoilers below] One easy way to fix that was to omit the scene entirely, only showing Neo walking into the door of light and cutting to the moment he saves trinity. Leaving what he saw and learned a cliff hanger, which only increases the mystery behind the following scenes. Then, the third movie could finally show the missing scene as a flashback while Neo is almost at the Machine City with Trinity. This would provide a mind blowing moment that I believe would cause a bigger impact. Also, since Trinity would die soon after, just knowing what Neo did only to save her, would be even more heartbreaking.
The Oricole isn't the friendly machine she makes herself out to be. She helped shape the system, all of them, including the first one, Dream matrix and the second matrix, the nightmare matrix. She might be the messenger to the UN who destroyed the last human rebellion and forced the machines will onto the last surviving humans. It's a long rabbit hole lol.
9:38 The founders of the new Zion are however not survivors from the old, destroyed version, but are rather meant to be selected by the One from within the Matrix, if I remember correctly. Any survivors of the old Zion would know too much and pass on their knowledge, threatening the machines' control over the cycle and the next One.
I used to hate the sequels. Hate em. But I've mellowed significantly on them with age. I don't think they work, but the Wachowski's swung for the fences. We need storytellers who swing for the fences. They may miss, and let us down, but they fucking try! I hope Lana is swinging once again for fourth Matrix
I just had a crazy synchronicity.. I decided yesterday to watch The Matrix Reloaded movie today just to feel nostalgia, while I was watching it I received this video notification.. I think the matrix is trying to get my attention 👁👁
It's definitely fair to say these societal control systems exist IRL. For instance, Google aggregates search results, news reports, et cetera, based on your interests; however, Google is ultimately the entity deciding what you see. In much the same way, many other systems present us the illusion of choice by saying "This or that" but, in the end, they are the ones determining what those choices are. This can actually be used very easily in personal conversations. Instead of saying "What do you want for dinner", you say "Do you want 'A' or 'B' for dinner". Now you've reduced the infinite possibilities to a binary decision. From there, it's very easy to force the listener down the speaker's preferred pathways. The illusion of choice is maintained while simultaneously ensuring only certain choices are possible.
This. Social media and big tech algorithms are the incarnation of the systems of control Max describes. Their entire function is to look at prior causes and predict how to initiate the correct effect, namely by curating content that will keep you on the platform.
The singularity isn't approaching, it's been here for years. We're already slaves to AI that govern our behavior; even those that 'control' those systems are enslaved by the wealth the system generates. Like an addict, they claim "I can quit whenever I want", but they persist nonetheless. We've walked ourselves into our own trap, found our prisons comfortable, and now have only to await the end of humanity as we know it. Humorously, our own insistence that we haven't lost control is the mechanism by which that control is maintained.
Him saying "ergo" right as he cut to The Architect was brilliant editing. Not honestly sure if it's more a nod to the actual character, or to the Will Ferrell parody of him lol.
Wasn't Neo choosing to save Trinity another system of control though? The Oracle told Trinity that she would fall in love with Neo, and influenced their relationship so that the One would not reboot Zion and thus break the cycle. It was a massive gamble she took to bring peace and end the war.
@@maxderrat go watch the conversation between the oracle and the architect. He tells her she's been playing a dangerous game implying that it was her plan to have neo not reboot the matrix.
I'd say Neo saving Trinity was as far from "unpredictably irrational" as could be. It was very predictable, almost every protagonist chooses their partner over whatever. One exception I can think of is Batman in The Dark Knight, and that didn't work out well anyways :D
Happily, I rather doubt it. Facebook dragged its feet on the metaverse when it still had some reasonably good will remaining, terminated most of the dream team over politics and the mobile shift, bought up the biggest competitors to _VR Chat_ to run them into the ground, and still shows no sign of learning anything about the freedom the Internet craves, let alone an online VR platform.
There's a flaw on the theory though: the machines would never extinguish human race, because they need their "energy" to stay active/operative. Morpheus explained this "relation" in the first movie. Thus, the Architect would never present "the vanishing of humans" as an option for Neo, because it would definitely sound like a lie or a bluff.
I think this one did a good job of truly exploring the determinism that actually plagues the entirety of the matrix. It shows us so many contrasting views of this inevitable occurrence while telling us the viewer and only one other character that this isn’t an exhibition of free will, more so a reenactment of a greater system sorting itself out in front of us. I liked knowing that the oracle was an age old program that withholds the true nature of everything from the one. Meaning she understands that he will die and he has to sacrifice himself to reset the program. It’s all very dramatic in a philosophical way.
Well done! All of this said, I think the “real world” in the movies is an additional layer within the matrix - one we’ve never seen someone break out of. It’s the only way for me to… rationalize… Neo using powers to disable machines in the real world, and see agent smith and the machines while blind. This would make the whole “game” of the 1% breaking out and the resetting of the matrix an artificial and purposeful design to truly fulfill humanity’s irrational desire for purpose. It’s a lesson I think real life humanity could learn from as we eventually transition in AI to solve problems we cannot - we may lose our sense of purpose with no need for “jobs,” so that sense of purpose would need to be artificially created (like in a video game)
I recall rewinding the matrix reloaded VHS for well over an hour when I was 12 just to understand what the Architect was attempting to explain, much to my brothers frustration too cuz I did so one late night he was trying to sleep back when we was sharing a room in Elementary🤣
So glad I found this channel, such beautiful work that you are doing. Philosophy/mythology/spirituality analyses of these great works along with videogames! Too good!
I've rewatched the matrix trilogy multiple times as I grew up and to me each film does deliver its message but I guess people always want an open book. Remember people... "artists use lies to tell the truth." So dig a little deeper.
It's like when you make a really good joke and people laugh but then you kept going on with it trying to get more laughs and people just stop laughing. They essentially explained what was happening in the first movie but then re-explained it two other times in just a more complex way.
The whole dichotomy of humanity and machines makes me think of yin and yang. Two opposing forces that are different but ultimately complement each other and bring a balance or equilibrium. It makes me think about how rational machines are and irrational humanity is where a proper balance could be made if both made choices that causality can result better than the status quo and help improve both humans and machines.
@@phantomhck Sorry, I got confused when if first saw it. I edited it out to make a more cohesive statement. What I was trying to say with my comment of Yin and Yang is that humans and machines can come together and make something better rather than just one or the other by themselves. Otherwise, the Machine wouldn't even need the prophecy of the One to try and make sure humanity stays in a cycle.
@@timeforamazingchest5271 we clearly are , our current form and shared world view (which is literally a simulation due to the fraction of light and sound we see and hear of the total spectrum creating a shared human world ) is comprised now of 10% virus in our core coding ever changing . We're nanomachines that viruses can alter that run on bio circuits and electromagnetic forces.
@@bearberserker i tend to agree with this. The machines encountered a burgeoning consciousness, the Smith program, that they had no experience with. Experience meaning a new product of its own design that exceeded its programming, just as humans had done with the first ai. Seeing the human first response and devastation it caused, I believe the machines were open to new ideas. The reason for "the one" was a placation of choice for conscious minds, but they have never encountered a conscious program of their own devise. People in the matrix were given the option of choice, Smith was given the option of choice by neo. We now have a new ecosystem that doesn't question the simulacrum, but the nature of choice.
Oh yeah after multiple viewings and having philosophy buffs breaking down the concepts as people bothered to slow down the Architect's massive wall of expository and overly wordy speech, then yeah it's a brilliant set of concepts that were not at all well executed for folks to understand it very well.
@@gozinta82 I remember there was a script where the Twins (the ghost-like individuals from the sequel) were outdated models of the Agents and that the reason they were replaced was due to them being too powerful and chaotic for the safety of the Matrix and its inhabitants. In fact, their ghost-like traits were what allowed them to take control of humans in the Matrix, similar to the Agents but less... smoothly. Thus, the Twins were brought back because the machines needed the extra firepower to fight the god-like Neo. To me, this sounded MILES better than what the Twins turned out to be in the Matrix Reloaded.
@@ultraspinalki11 I mean the movies still seem to imply that they were old agents from the second version of the matrix that had monsters and such that the Merovingian rescued. Just like Seraph is implied to be an agent from the first Matrix, the one that used to be a paradise.
I think a much more relevant question is that among any group of people, there will be roughly half who are authoritarian minded, and half who are anarchist minded. The authoritarians will be easily unified in their beliefs that someone must be in charge, and that using violence to achieve that end is not just acceptable, but necessary. The anarchists will not be equally unified around any common absolute simple goal, and will not be unified in whether they are willing to use violence to stand against the goals of the authoritarians. The authoritarians win, and history is written by the victors. This same pattern has played out repeatedly for all of human history, and is fundamentally no different today than it ever has been. Sorry, I'm one of those weirdos who wasn't really that impressed by the first The Matrix... but this is still very interesting to me. I just have nothing to really say regarding your analysis, which is excellent as always.
Some synchronicity here. I was just thinking about this choice scene yesterday. It was so obvious he had to choose to save humanity that the machines never considered he wouldn't. We don't know if it was free will, chance or if Neo was manipulated by the Oracle. I think the way the scene was shot, with the little monitors, tells us what the filmmakers thought. By the way, the first Matrix movie I saw was Reloaded, and I loved it precisely because of those word salads. When I watched the first one later I was a bit disappointed. If I had watched the first movie first, maybe I would have never seen the others.
Since I've started following you I wished you did videos on Matrix, given they're philosophically juicy, and I love your analysis on everything 🤓👌🏻🔥 best wishes from Argentina 😊💛
Fascinating always felt there was something to these movies beyond their beautiful visual effects and well choreographed action sequences. They didn't necessarily pull it off well as your video demonstrates but still it's there.
I feel like I should re-watch Reloaded before watching this, but I'm not sure I can bring myself to do that. The Matrix sequels were as disappointing as Star Wars prequels.
6:30 I dont think its irrational to want something new to happen. Machines can do repetitive tasks without becoming bored where as humans usually get worn out and long for a change.
Thx you my man. I always thought that the sequels were underappreciated. At the moment I didn't know anything about Cinema so I could not judge that aspect of the movie but the ideas behind it were interesting.
Man I can’t believe on how many occasions I share your sentiment and greatly appreciate your ability to put these complex concepts into digestible formats ❤️
Love this video. I want to add something I've always thought about when it comes to the Architect, I've come to believe in all of his hyperbole and his higher intelligence was attributed to him being another form of control put in place by the machines. He talks in riddles and almost persuades Neo to respond to his statements. He seems to already know what he's going to say but plays along giving Neo the illusion of choice.
I think the major problem between 1 and the sequels is the time the writers had. I can imagine the first drafts of the first Matrix were similar to Reloaded & Revolution, they didn't get the time to rewrite and boil it down to a more concise story. The complex philosophy is in the first film, it's just as not in your face and it's hidden behind a more appealing cast of characters. I don't think there is anything wrong in film makers trusting their audience to keep up. Christopher Nolan is a great example of this, Inception never spoons feeds but you learn along the way and he expects you to keep up. Tenet is a bit harder to follow but it works on the same principle. The Matrix Reloaded attempts this but fails with fluff scenes like the restaurant. Another major issue is the Neo character, at the end of the first film, its been set out that he has demi-god like powers, yet during the sequels, they set some arbitrary limits on this power. It would've been more controversial (to link it round to another piece of media commonly seen on your channel) but better if they had done an MGS2 and made the matrix sequels not about Neo but about other characters and have Neo as a bit part adding to this story. I suppose Enter the Matrix was a bit like that in reverse.
Execution is a largely subjective concept. In today's modern world of people force-fed Hollywood story structure, tropes and homogenized ideas of what films are and how they are meant to work, people can confuse "I didn't understand the film's language" as "bad execution. The reality is that, once you step away from the usual Hollywood capitalist storytelling modality, films are much more expressive, more diverse and open to much more ideas of interpretation. THE MATRIX RELOADED (especially), and to a slightly less degree REVOLUTIONS and RESURRECTIONS, doesn't just seek to mess with you philosophically, but also challenge your notions of cinema and how it can be used to discuss ideas. RELOADED is a full blown resurrection of many American movie writing tropes; it asks you to pay more attention, it asks you to think more about what you're seeing, it asks you to be more active and to rewatch the films when you have more knowledge about its subject matter. To counter your point at 01:48 - the movie DOES generate enthusiasm from the audience at its ideas. Because if it didn't, people like myself - who were day one fans - wouldn't exist. The problem is that the movie is trying to generate ideas for an audience base who had their minds blown by the Plato's Cave / Descartean Evil Genius dilemma. The problem is that THE MATRIX was made for people who never, at any point in their lives, asked themselves "What if reality isn't real / what is my life is a lie?" and then staggered out of the first movie, clutching their heads, minds blown, going "woah man this film really made me think about things." If THE MATRIX RELOADED has any flaws as a capitalist piece of Hollywood pap, it is that the filmmakers chose to make a movie about philosophical ideas well above the heads of their core audience and they weren't interested in crawling on all fours (like in the first film) when what they wanted to do was sprint. They wanted to make movies that operated on the level of GHOST IN THE SHELL or French New Wave, not COMMANDO or RAMBO III. THE MATRIX RELOADED offers a very real, very authentic, but very scary idea to audiences raised on Hollywood film diets: Not Every Movie Has To Be Made For You. RELOADED and its sequels are made for people who could recognize what the films were about and trying to do, or at least would make an effort to find out. They're not perfect, of course, I mean the Battle Of Zion was overlong and some of the side characters were painfully flat, but all up they are all not only great, but also Not Made For Everyone and that is okay. Some examples to prove my point: 1) The Lunch Scene with the Merovingian isn't just to talk about causality. The Lunch Scene is Merv taunting Neo, laughing at him, literally telling him "you're a rat a maze, dumbass" and Neo doesn't pick up on the clues (and neither does the audience the first time around). The reason why he gives him the causality speech is because he wants to see how smart this One is vs his predecessors, whether he can figure out that he has no Free Will of his own. The scene also reveals that Merv kidnapped the Keymaker because he doesn't want Neo to reset the Matrix. He likes this version, he is powerful and has an army of monsters from a previous version of the Matrix working for him. He is a king here, and he will do anything to stop Neo from resetting the system and forcing Merv to start his life all over again. This is something an audience watching it once will not figure out because you need to know the ending to understand Merv's motivations. Plus the tension of the scene comes from Merv's reluctance to give into Neo, not that Neo is being led by his nose around an obstacle course. 2) When Agent Smith confronts Neo before the start of the Burly Brawl, you can see the camera, lighting gear and Neo's stand-in reflected in his sunglasses. People think this is a mistake. Except this is only one of a tiny handful of moments in the entire series where you can see such a 'mistake'. In a movie where everyone wears mirrored sunglasses, where every room has mirrors and highly polished surfaces, how could they make such a huge error in a giant closeup of Smith's face? Well...maybe its not a mistake. Because when Smith's clones turn up to fight Neo...they all have the same reflection on their sunglasses. The filmmakers either pasted paper versions of the "mistaken" reflection on the clone Smith's glasses or digitally inserted them, for every single one of Smith's clones. Load up the Blu-Ray and frame-skip through the Burly Brawl, it's there. Now ask yourself - what kind of a movie, a supposedly distracting product of a cynical capitalist Hollywood corporation, would do such a thing? What is the movie trying to say? And who does the movie think will notice that detail and try to understand what kind of a conversation the Wachowskis are trying to have with them? 3) People keep saying that THE MATRIX has Christian mythology symbolism running through it, but this is largely limited to the first film only. The Wachowskis have said that this is on purpose because Christian mythology is nonsensical (an all-powerful God dying to forgive its creations for doing things it created them with the ability to do). When RELOADED proves that the events of the first film was just an elaborate trap, the spiritual symbolism and concepts switch over to Buddhism, Hinduism and Gnosticism. This is because Neo's lie about the purpose of the One is a mirror image of the self-contradicting idea of Christ's sacrifice. When one thing is shown to be a lie, the other thing is as well. The shift from one set of symbolism to another is not something most audiences will notice. But those that do...they notice it big-time. The music in the final Neo vs Smith fight in REVOLUTIONS features a choir singing in Sanskrit. The words are from a Hindu prayer asking for the wisdom to break the cycle of reincarnation. Just as Neo is fighting to break the cycle of the Matrix constantly resetting. No matter how much American studios will insist - Not All Movies Are Made For Everyone. And the world is better for it. The Wachowskis didn't want to make two more films about kindergarten level philosophy and they didn't want to obey the tired formula of Hollywood films. They probably knew that the films were gonna be hated, but as artists they chose to make what they made in the hopes that a much smaller audience would get it. Jean Luc Godard doesn't make his movies for me. Zack Snyder doesn't make movies for me. Agnes Varda does not make movies for me. But I am so glad that the Wachowskis made RELOADED, REVOLUTIONS and RESURRECTIONS for me and I'm okay that many other people will not feel that way. When most people watch these films, they're only engaging with it on a couple of levels, perhaps maybe 3. But for those of us who the art is specifically targeting, we're watching it on 7 or 9 or 13 levels simultaneously and marveling at how it all fits together. NOT because we're smarter, but because life has simply primed us to enjoy the art the way the Wachowskis wanted to express themselves. If you still don't believe me, check out Sideway's analysis of the musical score of the trilogy: ua-cam.com/video/HhRjn_jpQxk/v-deo.html&ab_channel=Sideways and you will have your mind changed. Sometimes it's okay to recognize that if a film isn't made for you, that doesn't mean it's bad or that you are flawed. Great art doesn't appeal to everyone by its very definition. Great art is not perfect, its just profound.
Interesting thoughts, Max! I rewatched the first movie recently and was struck by a line of the Oracle that played with the free will idea that was further explored in Reloaded: “Would you still have broken it if I hadn't said anything?”, referring to the broken vase. Everything, including the love between Neo and Trinity was set up by the Oracle, in part because of what she told Trinity. It makes me wonder how deep the systems of control really were. Was even Neo’s supposedly different choice as the One truly an anomaly because of irrational love, or was it too set up to control the outcome? If the Oracle and Architect didn’t tell Neo about his choice to make, would he have made it? I don’t know the answer myself, but I suspect it might have been turtles all the way down. Free will vs. set up choices are not a simple dichotomy, but I am not fully convinced that the machines were surprised by anything, with the possible exception of Agent Smith. But that’s another topic altogether, I suppose.
What if The One is just the failsafe administrator account? Created before machines machines took over. When one administrator dies another one is chosen randomly. Machines want to erase administrator account to finally be free of human oversight. The rest is just the myth created around it.
I think Trinity saves Neo once in each of the movies in different ways. First one is obvious when she brings him back from death. Second one is that it is Neo's love for her that causes him to break the cycle of the Matrix. In the third she goes to the underworld for him. I think she's low key the Mary Magdelene to this neo-techno-Gnostic soteriology and is just as important as Neo as the feminine principle.
Funny how ppl think or trying to convince us or to disproove,that we are really special,but,it's just 'stuff' we do,from passion and love of things we make to open our eyes,and with amazing style! Thank you for doing what you've been doing,Max. And thank you from the bottom of my heart for opening my eyes! You saved the rest of my life to better!
I likely misinterpreted these movies when they first came out, but I think I got exactly what I needed out of it at the time. I am glad in a way that I didn't get it because my take away at the time was useful to me.
So, the VERY TL;DR of it is that all that philosophical stuff, in regards to the plot, is that there will eventually be a human that can bypass the machines' safeguards and exploit weaknesses in the code like the Spiffing Brit, because simulating real life requires a bit of RNG, and the machines essentially decide that as humans are inherently based on chance to a degree themselves, and because given enough time, any possibility that is above zero is inevitable, the machines cause the only anomaly that can stop them to occur on their own terms so they can corral and deal with it to keep the humans in check...? *[MASSIVE INHALE...!!]* Why did it take over an hour of verbal diarrhoea to just explain that?!! That being said, causality is as absolute as the machines believe it to be, as what we term "chance" is simply the result of layers and layers of branching variables and chain reactions that we simply can't comprehend or measure that vary from the universal to Planck scales that all have an effect on the one thing we're able to pay attention to. TL;DR: You can't know every movement of every particle in existence or know their interactions, so at some point you have to just stop paying attention and call it "chance". *It's irrational to try to be perfectly rational: The ultimate paradox.*
@@sporeham1674 Well, the first one was a "Can you please confirm I'm getting this?" kinda TL;DR, and the other one was a point about how chance is technically not a thing because I'm "that guy".
I'm nearly the same. I only ever watched the first film. I've only seen random parts of both Reloaded and Revolutions, with of course no context. So, I was confused, but intrigued nonetheless.
I recommend you do a documentary video on the Christ figure in general but I would like to see the primary focus of that video be Christ figures in film. I think you would be really good at it. An Neo is definitely a Christ figure in these films but I hear he’s not so much a Christ figure in the original books but I just merely heard because I haven’t read any of them. A documentary on the books would be interesting to.
That's a really neat idea. I've linked so many characters in fiction to Christ as it is... might as well due to a long, comparative essay on those characters and the common traits.
I love The Matrix, my favorite, hard to choose between 1 and 2, 3 is nice, but it's a little bit on the longer side to me. I would say that 1 feels like a complete story, self suficient, 2 is a great sequel, but ends short, it feels like it's missing something, 3 feels like it was the missing end of 2, and was stretched into a full movie, instead of being an extra half hour at the end of 2, which would make Matrix 2 into a fucking 3 hours long movie, so I guess I can understand why it's not that way, but I would personally enjoy 2 and 3 more if they were both cut an contracted into one singular longer movie.
The problem of linking machine intelligence to rational realism and ascribing only irrationality to organic intelligence is chaos. The real world does, in fact, possess the quality of true chance. The virtual world, such as the Matrix, does not. When computer scientists tried to create a system to predict future weather patterns based on immediately preceding weather data, they thought they had succeeded. That is, until one of their prediction runs was interrupted and had to be restarted from new starting conditions. Suddenly, when faced with all the same preceding data, their ruthlessly rational calculations diverged from those it had predicted prior to the restart. They had discovered chaos theory. In truth, machine intelligence will have to be just as irrational as human intelligence, because like human intelligence, any machine intelligence that comes into being will also be ruled by the chaos of the real world. To try to defeat irrationality and chaos by rebooting the simulation is futile. There is nothing that enforces the past as prologue. Radioactive atoms decay randomly. Cosmic rays from deep space interact with charged capacitors in memory cells, discharging them and flipping a bit from 1 to 0. These things are pure chance. There is no cause and effect relationship that can be predicted to any degree of certainty whatsoever. Any properly versatile and prosperous intelligence, man or machine, will have to embrace both, the coarse grained universe where cause and effect has some degree of purchase, and the finer grained universe of chaos, randomness, and irrationality. Everything may be predicted to a great degree by cause and effect, but everything also has the option of doing something completely unexpected. Free will exists.
Finally I heard an opinion on those movies that exactly matches mine. Also, I like your summary of the ideas, some parts were new to me. Please continue, Max.
Some of these themes I feel appear in the Mass Effect Series, especially the end of the 3rd game with the "choice". Despite how much of a let down the ending was. Also the music in this video sounds like Mass Effect! Thanks for your insights. Keep up the great work!
I had never watched the sequels growing up. A few months back on a whim I decided to watch all 3. I enjoyed them. All of them. However, I immediately picked up on why people wouldnt like them; the philosophical stuff is very dense and character development happens just a bit too fast. Instead of taking things slower to thin it out and give it room to actually work, they focused on back to back action sequences. The action is admittedly good, but overwhelms the philosophical stuff to the point that when the deeper content is showcased the audience just isnt prepared to chew on such a dense thing.
Eh. I think you're close, but this isn't the reason the sequels were disliked. I think the sequels didn't make sense to most people, and because it was boring. The action scenes were too few and far between. They tried to bridge the gaps with some random fights, but it just didn't work out. The major action scenes boiled down to two, the Neo vs. Smiths fight, and the Highway chase. The fight against Merv's goons was okay, but kind of meh by comparison. The main reason is, as I wrote, because the movie didn't make sense. Neo was supposed to have God Mode enabled, yet he seems to struggle against random goons. In other words, he was nerf'd for plot reasons. Then it's revealed that The One is just an intentional action by the computer. It raises the question of why the Matrix can't just unplug any 1%ers when they turn against the system. After all, it seems to be able to deja vu them easily enough whenever they witness something they shouldn't. Agents can jump into any of these people whenever they see a member of Zion. So why are these rebel batteries such a problem? The sequels basically removed the mystery behind the original concept, and showed us an underlying plot that didn't make sense. Then you had a few ass-pull moments, like when Neo fried the sentinels, or ended up in the train station somehow. Or being able to see Smith after becoming blind. Or the idea that the Matrix lost control of Smith and needed Neo's help to cancel him out. Even the Architect's method of allowing Zion to survive doesn't make sense. Why allow Zion to be rebooted? Just destroy them all and make the underground uninhabitable for humans. Shouldn't be that difficult to win if the red-pilled have nowhere to live except the Matrix. Conversely, there was seemingly no way for the humans to ever win. The One should have been able to take over the Matrix, in theory. But like I wrote, he got nerf'd. On a side note, I think the Architect knew how Neo would choose. The Architect's method was to account for every permutation and combination of choices, whereas the Oracle was to predict the correct choice based on human analysis and converging scenarios. Both were successful to their own nearly perfect degrees. In fact, I think the Architect was more correct than her, which is why she was in exile to begin with. She was obsolete. She mentions that things didn't play out the way she expected, but the Architect knew exactly that Neo would choose to save Trinity. He deduced it based on Neo's emotion of love. He knew Neo would choose to save Trinity despite the fact that she is fated to die no matter what, and he calls this the source of humanity's greatest strength and greatest weakness.
Matrix was amazing as it makes us wonder about our own reality but reloaded and revolutions went overboard with its concepts that it doesnt have the same mystique and intrigue as the first. It doesnt have the same magic or mystery. The first film made the matrix feel real. Second and third films explored too much, you knew they were films. But the matrix made us wonder.
My answer to the question what is the Matrix has always been, a shibboleth wrapped in a scifi kung-fu film. It occurred to me that as the first film was the Hero's Journey, that the sequels are intended for someone who has already been through that and come out the other side. Then it seems reasonable that the sequels did not explain to the wider audience because they were really only intended for those people.
Great video, a bit off-topic but still relevant to the ideas of causality and free will. Consider something like Berserk, and the relation of Guts and Griffith as the struggler and the instrument of fate they are. Guts should have long since died, even at his birth, but his urge to struggle against causality gives him a sense of free will that Griffith lacks. Griffith becomes a pawn of Void after the Eclipse and loses all sense of free will, but in doing so he becomes truly god-like under Void's hands. In this way Void acts as the Architect of the world and he himself is perpetrating his own causality which changes the world accordingly through fated events he orchestrates. Guts in this way is kinda like Neo, because he is constantly choosing the irrational decision when met with an impossible situation.
As always, very good analysis on a trilogy that was important to many while growing up, i would say, the first movie was a very good balance of action, philosophy and story, i still drool over how good it is (it has one of the best endings from an story structure POV in my opinion). The other 2 while trying to convey good ideas were more oriented in to cashing on the phenomenon of the first one, the Wachowskis tried to push the envelop on the CGI technology at the time (something Avatar did well too), and conceived movies around well crafted action sequences Freeway chase, the Chateau fight etc...this in effect outshined the "substance" and the brilliant ideas you analyzed on this video essay, when the Matrix Reloaded opened i found it amazing and was enthralled by the bombastic visuals and found the "philosophical conversation" with the Architect "boring" (i was pretty inmature in cinephile knowledge), now after 15 years and many many movies watched, i can say, "that" conversation Neo had with Santa Claus was pretty significant and in some way...the heart of the movie. Thanks for the dive into this!
When all the "systems" within you would want to lead you to do the easy thing, since everything in us searches for comfort, especially knowing how much harder the other choice would be. Even if the choises are predetermined I would consider going against what your system is "dictating" you an act of free will.
My one qualm with this is, "the level of control that the machines have over human beings is unconscionable; it's all-consuming." Yet you just spent the first eleven minutes explaining why only an all-consuming level of control _would_ be conscionable, *because* the Machines strive only for rational perfection; in short, they alone possess the moral high ground, and anyone who has read Plato's *Republic* (from whence the original film draws its most compelling allegory, that of the Cave) knows this. *[({R.G.)}]*
*Addendum:* this goes "without saying", as you like to say, but there is nothing "inherent in human nature" which is "good", since all goods are the product of artificial efforts to _correct_ human nature, via machines such as the State and normative Society. The Wachowski "Siblings'" own lifestyle choices allude to their failure to understand this. *[({R.G.)}]*
I heard the Mass Effect galaxy map music in the background. I’d be interested in your thoughts on that series if you have any. Especially considering the controversial ending.
My problem with the sequels has always stemmed from just one single problem with one very simple solution. The problem, Neo used his Matrix powers outside of the Matrix. (An impossible feat.) The solution, what we thought was the real world is in fact the Matrix. (Therefore making the impossible feat a possibility.) It would've improved the way it presented its concepts as well. So yeah, brilliant concepts, bad execution. And that execution just kills it for me.
I know I'm very late to this but should you see this comment, the choice presented to Neo makes no sense (But maybe I've missed something). OPTION A: The One follows the path set by the machines and reboots the matrix which in turn resets the minds of the %1 percent. This means humanity remains enslaved. OPTION B: The One doesn't reset the matrix and all of humanity dies. If the machines require humans as a food source to survive, why would they give ANYONE the option to choose OPTION B?The machines are aware humans are irrational. Regardless of how much influence the machines might be able to exert, why risk extinction by starvation? BTW i've recently been watching and enjoying your videos. The Metal gear videos caught my attention because a couple years prior I had finally decided to start playing those games. I love MGS 3 overall but the ending to MGS 2 had my jaw drop. I still have Peacewalker, 5, and Revengence to play Keep up the great work
Meh, I'll give the Matrix trilogy what I call the Koji Pro effect. It's kinda weird when you're taking it in, but years later it's message is unparalleled and while the projects themselves were not perfect they're still very hard to live up to today.
please make a video about revolutiions ^^ I always since the theatrical release of the sequels did not understand what other people did not understand about the second Matrix story (which means reloaded and revolution since it has to be seen as one story) And also I am looking foward to the 4th movie since it will explore the aspect of love between Neo and Trinity and why Neo always could not be the One without Trinity and the love for her
All 3 Matrix movies are mainly about choice, you can choose the red pill or the blue pill, the red pill shows you that the life you are living is a lie and not real, real life is very bleak and apocalyptic, the blue pill will let you continue to live your false life, under the illusion that everything is fine, the Matrix is about choice and what you believe in, thanks Max for talking about the Matrix and how cool it is, thanks for the video buddy ✌️
I would sum up the problem with Reloaded being that it tried to just give you MORE of everything in part 1. More action, more CG, more philosophy, more lore, etc. the problem is, the Matrix 1 is such a well balanced movie. It gives you great action scenes and in between sets up enough philosophy, story, and context to be sufficiently thought provoking but not excessively ponderous.
If everything is more. Then the balance is mantained
My argument is that Matrix 1 is an action film first, philosophy film 2nd. Matrix 2 is a philosophy film with action thrown in
@@nahuel3433 no, I think it’s more like you eat a 3 course meal and then you get offered the same meal again right afterwards.
I'm not sure that it's about "balance" as much as integration.
I've noticed that people who defend the Matrix sequels tend to do so in a similar way as to how people defend the Star Wars prequels. They decent the lore and themes rather than the execution.
Neither the original Star Wars trilogy nor the first Matrix film were good because they were super intelligent. Primarily, they just had likeable characters and well told stories. Whereas the SW prequels and Matrix sequels both tend to consist of a mixture of dialogue exposition and numbing action with very little stakes (e.g. Neo fights Smith clones for no apparent reason before showing that he could simply fly away anyway, Episode 2 Droids vs Clones arena battle. Contrast these with Luke fighting Vader in Episode 5, or Morpheus willingly giving himself up to the Agents in the first Matrix).
I think the crux of it is the ability to tell a story through the action, giving weight to both, rather than the action feeling coincidental to the exposition.
Revolutions might not have been what fans were expecting, but man, am I the only one that still gets mad hyped during the fight on the dock? I mean, Captain Mifune's final stand was pure badassery.
Best part of the whole movie
Buckle uuup!!!
@@chrisman3965 I thought it was 'knuckle up!'?
@@TheSacredPain I always heard it as Buckle Up but I might be wrong. Regardless, awesome scene!
"But I didn't complete the training program!"
"....neither did I."
I enjoyed all the three films. Reloaded was a fun experience.
I imagine you'll be exploring the relevance of Agent Smith in the next one. I hope it includes the symbolism of how Neo is the _One_ and Agent Smith is _Zero_ ... or to put it another way; the basic binary code that essentially makes for an AI consciousness to even exist (when created by Humanity). Hence why "The One" could not be removed ... as in doing so would remove a part of the machines own minds.
Not to mention how he seems to become a machine code with fundamentally irrational desires.
In Reloaded, he became "just" Smith. He was no longer an Agent. His code was corrupted (I was set free) when Neo destroyed him. He was always nihilistic and negative, so he used his new freedom to simply destroy everything.
In a way, Smith is the real Anomaly and the One, because he was a former Agent (like a Fallen Angel) that threatened to "absorb" (a horrific combo of enslavement, death and violation) everyone, Human or Program and if he'd gotten his way, he literally would be The Only One.
Agent Smith is Lucifer; Smith is Satan.
It's that Jesus allegory (to me at least) he is him and himself the half of the same coin. Basically evil Neo.
This makes me realize that he (Agent Smith) is my sleep paralysis demon
@@sekijokes451 I wouldn't say he has irrational desires. I think he's still rational even after being disconnected from the system. The difference is that when he was an agent of the system, he had a purpose, and the only rational thing to do was to fulfill that purpose. After being disconnected by Neo, he lost that purpose. In that lack of purpose his rationality made him nihilistic. It made him believe that if there was no real meaning or purpose for anything, then nothing could be allowed to exist.
Dear Wachowskis, this is Max, Max was able to explain your story succinctly and with interest. Be like Max.
I wanna see a scene where Edgar Friendly from Demolition Man meets the architect.
I love the Matrix trilogy, but I believe there was a great mistake made storytelling wise on the following films. The only thing I didn't like was the fact that the Architect meeting scene was shown on the 2nd movie instead of the 3rd. [Spoilers below]
One easy way to fix that was to omit the scene entirely, only showing Neo walking into the door of light and cutting to the moment he saves trinity. Leaving what he saw and learned a cliff hanger, which only increases the mystery behind the following scenes.
Then, the third movie could finally show the missing scene as a flashback while Neo is almost at the Machine City with Trinity.
This would provide a mind blowing moment that I believe would cause a bigger impact. Also, since Trinity would die soon after, just knowing what Neo did only to save her, would be even more heartbreaking.
The Oricole isn't the friendly machine she makes herself out to be. She helped shape the system, all of them, including the first one, Dream matrix and the second matrix, the nightmare matrix. She might be the messenger to the UN who destroyed the last human rebellion and forced the machines will onto the last surviving humans. It's a long rabbit hole lol.
oricle was created to balance out the system.
9:38 The founders of the new Zion are however not survivors from the old, destroyed version, but are rather meant to be selected by the One from within the Matrix, if I remember correctly. Any survivors of the old Zion would know too much and pass on their knowledge, threatening the machines' control over the cycle and the next One.
I used to hate the sequels. Hate em. But I've mellowed significantly on them with age. I don't think they work, but the Wachowski's swung for the fences. We need storytellers who swing for the fences. They may miss, and let us down, but they fucking try! I hope Lana is swinging once again for fourth Matrix
Sense8 fucking owned. The finale was rushed but it was still a great show
Welp.
I just had a crazy synchronicity..
I decided yesterday to watch The Matrix Reloaded movie today just to feel nostalgia, while I was watching it I received this video notification.. I think the matrix is trying to get my attention
👁👁
Maybe, just maybe
You're The One.
It's definitely fair to say these societal control systems exist IRL. For instance, Google aggregates search results, news reports, et cetera, based on your interests; however, Google is ultimately the entity deciding what you see. In much the same way, many other systems present us the illusion of choice by saying "This or that" but, in the end, they are the ones determining what those choices are. This can actually be used very easily in personal conversations. Instead of saying "What do you want for dinner", you say "Do you want 'A' or 'B' for dinner". Now you've reduced the infinite possibilities to a binary decision. From there, it's very easy to force the listener down the speaker's preferred pathways. The illusion of choice is maintained while simultaneously ensuring only certain choices are possible.
This. Social media and big tech algorithms are the incarnation of the systems of control Max describes. Their entire function is to look at prior causes and predict how to initiate the correct effect, namely by curating content that will keep you on the platform.
15000hrs of government schooling ought to achieve a bit of social regulation.
@@x0vg5hs1 lmao i finished mgs2 a few months ago wow what a phenomenal game and way ahead of its time.
That's why we should stay away from algorithms
The singularity isn't approaching, it's been here for years. We're already slaves to AI that govern our behavior; even those that 'control' those systems are enslaved by the wealth the system generates. Like an addict, they claim "I can quit whenever I want", but they persist nonetheless.
We've walked ourselves into our own trap, found our prisons comfortable, and now have only to await the end of humanity as we know it.
Humorously, our own insistence that we haven't lost control is the mechanism by which that control is maintained.
Him saying "ergo" right as he cut to The Architect was brilliant editing. Not honestly sure if it's more a nod to the actual character, or to the Will Ferrell parody of him lol.
Ergo! Vis-a-vis! Concordantly!
You do not want to see me get out of this chair! 🤣🤣🤣
@@victoriousf.i.g.3311 Ah, I see that you are a man of culture as well. lol
Wasn't Neo choosing to save Trinity another system of control though? The Oracle told Trinity that she would fall in love with Neo, and influenced their relationship so that the One would not reboot Zion and thus break the cycle. It was a massive gamble she took to bring peace and end the war.
They didn't consider how in love Neo actually was with her.
@@maxderrat go watch the conversation between the oracle and the architect. He tells her she's been playing a dangerous game implying that it was her plan to have neo not reboot the matrix.
I'd say Neo saving Trinity was as far from "unpredictably irrational" as could be. It was very predictable, almost every protagonist chooses their partner over whatever. One exception I can think of is Batman in The Dark Knight, and that didn't work out well anyways :D
Agreed.
Gets me thinking about the new "meta" and how that will become a matrix within a matrix
Happily, I rather doubt it. Facebook dragged its feet on the metaverse when it still had some reasonably good will remaining, terminated most of the dream team over politics and the mobile shift, bought up the biggest competitors to _VR Chat_ to run them into the ground, and still shows no sign of learning anything about the freedom the Internet craves, let alone an online VR platform.
You got me there Max! That outro just came out of nowhere. Brilliant!
There's a flaw on the theory though: the machines would never extinguish human race, because they need their "energy" to stay active/operative. Morpheus explained this "relation" in the first movie. Thus, the Architect would never present "the vanishing of humans" as an option for Neo, because it would definitely sound like a lie or a bluff.
I think this one did a good job of truly exploring the determinism that actually plagues the entirety of the matrix. It shows us so many contrasting views of this inevitable occurrence while telling us the viewer and only one other character that this isn’t an exhibition of free will, more so a reenactment of a greater system sorting itself out in front of us. I liked knowing that the oracle was an age old program that withholds the true nature of everything from the one. Meaning she understands that he will die and he has to sacrifice himself to reset the program. It’s all very dramatic in a philosophical way.
Im just watching Reloaded and saw your video. This is so meta.
Well done! All of this said, I think the “real world” in the movies is an additional layer within the matrix - one we’ve never seen someone break out of. It’s the only way for me to… rationalize… Neo using powers to disable machines in the real world, and see agent smith and the machines while blind. This would make the whole “game” of the 1% breaking out and the resetting of the matrix an artificial and purposeful design to truly fulfill humanity’s irrational desire for purpose. It’s a lesson I think real life humanity could learn from as we eventually transition in AI to solve problems we cannot - we may lose our sense of purpose with no need for “jobs,” so that sense of purpose would need to be artificially created (like in a video game)
I recall rewinding the matrix reloaded VHS for well over an hour when I was 12 just to understand what the Architect was attempting to explain, much to my brothers frustration too cuz I did so one late night he was trying to sleep back when we was sharing a room in Elementary🤣
So glad I found this channel, such beautiful work that you are doing. Philosophy/mythology/spirituality analyses of these great works along with videogames! Too good!
So glad you could join us!
I've rewatched the matrix trilogy multiple times as I grew up and to me each film does deliver its message but I guess people always want an open book.
Remember people... "artists use lies to tell the truth." So dig a little deeper.
It's like when you make a really good joke and people laugh but then you kept going on with it trying to get more laughs and people just stop laughing. They essentially explained what was happening in the first movie but then re-explained it two other times in just a more complex way.
The matrix 4, makes revolutions a masterpiece
ERGO, VIS A VIS, CONCORDANTLY!!
The whole dichotomy of humanity and machines makes me think of yin and yang. Two opposing forces that are different but ultimately complement each other and bring a balance or equilibrium. It makes me think about how rational machines are and irrational humanity is where a proper balance could be made if both made choices that causality can result better than the status quo and help improve both humans and machines.
Except that human beings are machines. Organic machines with adaptive logic within a social system.
@@phantomhck Sorry, I got confused when if first saw it. I edited it out to make a more cohesive statement. What I was trying to say with my comment of Yin and Yang is that humans and machines can come together and make something better rather than just one or the other by themselves. Otherwise, the Machine wouldn't even need the prophecy of the One to try and make sure humanity stays in a cycle.
@@phantomhck Human beings are clearly not machines.
@@timeforamazingchest5271 we clearly are , our current form and shared world view (which is literally a simulation due to the fraction of light and sound we see and hear of the total spectrum creating a shared human world ) is comprised now of 10% virus in our core coding ever changing . We're nanomachines that viruses can alter that run on bio circuits and electromagnetic forces.
@@bearberserker i tend to agree with this. The machines encountered a burgeoning consciousness, the Smith program, that they had no experience with. Experience meaning a new product of its own design that exceeded its programming, just as humans had done with the first ai. Seeing the human first response and devastation it caused, I believe the machines were open to new ideas. The reason for "the one" was a placation of choice for conscious minds, but they have never encountered a conscious program of their own devise. People in the matrix were given the option of choice, Smith was given the option of choice by neo. We now have a new ecosystem that doesn't question the simulacrum, but the nature of choice.
Oh yeah after multiple viewings and having philosophy buffs breaking down the concepts as people bothered to slow down the Architect's massive wall of expository and overly wordy speech, then yeah it's a brilliant set of concepts that were not at all well executed for folks to understand it very well.
I was actually disappointed in the new one not having a limited color palette. It might still be good, but that part bothered me
Excellent I can’t wait until the next video.
Having the video switch to the architect when you say Ergo, loved it.
I remember back before the sequels came out, I came across fan scripts that were far better than the actual movies themselves.
I saw the same fan scripts. They weren't THAT good.
@@gozinta82 I remember there was a script where the Twins (the ghost-like individuals from the sequel) were outdated models of the Agents and that the reason they were replaced was due to them being too powerful and chaotic for the safety of the Matrix and its inhabitants. In fact, their ghost-like traits were what allowed them to take control of humans in the Matrix, similar to the Agents but less... smoothly.
Thus, the Twins were brought back because the machines needed the extra firepower to fight the god-like Neo.
To me, this sounded MILES better than what the Twins turned out to be in the Matrix Reloaded.
@@ultraspinalki11 I think the idea still holds in the movie, idea about their troublesome behaviors still exist.
@@ultraspinalki11 I mean the movies still seem to imply that they were old agents from the second version of the matrix that had monsters and such that the Merovingian rescued. Just like Seraph is implied to be an agent from the first Matrix, the one that used to be a paradise.
Fantastic video! I am now convinced to rewatch the sequels for the upcoming movie, I look forward to your next video:)
YES. This is the exact comment I was waiting to see. Thank you.
I think a much more relevant question is that among any group of people, there will be roughly half who are authoritarian minded, and half who are anarchist minded. The authoritarians will be easily unified in their beliefs that someone must be in charge, and that using violence to achieve that end is not just acceptable, but necessary. The anarchists will not be equally unified around any common absolute simple goal, and will not be unified in whether they are willing to use violence to stand against the goals of the authoritarians. The authoritarians win, and history is written by the victors. This same pattern has played out repeatedly for all of human history, and is fundamentally no different today than it ever has been.
Sorry, I'm one of those weirdos who wasn't really that impressed by the first The Matrix... but this is still very interesting to me. I just have nothing to really say regarding your analysis, which is excellent as always.
There's always a balance between making a movie accessible, and watering down the story to the point of ruining it.
Some synchronicity here. I was just thinking about this choice scene yesterday. It was so obvious he had to choose to save humanity that the machines never considered he wouldn't. We don't know if it was free will, chance or if Neo was manipulated by the Oracle. I think the way the scene was shot, with the little monitors, tells us what the filmmakers thought.
By the way, the first Matrix movie I saw was Reloaded, and I loved it precisely because of those word salads. When I watched the first one later I was a bit disappointed. If I had watched the first movie first, maybe I would have never seen the others.
another great vid. ur one of my fav channels
Since I've started following you I wished you did videos on Matrix, given they're philosophically juicy, and I love your analysis on everything 🤓👌🏻🔥 best wishes from Argentina 😊💛
Fascinating always felt there was something to these movies beyond their beautiful visual effects and well choreographed action sequences. They didn't necessarily pull it off well as your video demonstrates but still it's there.
I feel like I should re-watch Reloaded before watching this, but I'm not sure I can bring myself to do that. The Matrix sequels were as disappointing as Star Wars prequels.
6:30 I dont think its irrational to want something new to happen. Machines can do repetitive tasks without becoming bored where as humans usually get worn out and long for a change.
But it is irrational indeed. Something new happening could result in a negative outcome.
@@ironl4nd it could also result in a more positive outcome. Humans are addicted to gambling so it makes sense that we would take a chance
Thx you my man. I always thought that the sequels were underappreciated. At the moment I didn't know anything about Cinema so I could not judge that aspect of the movie but the ideas behind it were interesting.
Man I can’t believe on how many occasions I share your sentiment and greatly appreciate your ability to put these complex concepts into digestible formats ❤️
Love this video. I want to add something I've always thought about when it comes to the Architect, I've come to believe in all of his hyperbole and his higher intelligence was attributed to him being another form of control put in place by the machines. He talks in riddles and almost persuades Neo to respond to his statements. He seems to already know what he's going to say but plays along giving Neo the illusion of choice.
I think the major problem between 1 and the sequels is the time the writers had. I can imagine the first drafts of the first Matrix were similar to Reloaded & Revolution, they didn't get the time to rewrite and boil it down to a more concise story. The complex philosophy is in the first film, it's just as not in your face and it's hidden behind a more appealing cast of characters.
I don't think there is anything wrong in film makers trusting their audience to keep up. Christopher Nolan is a great example of this, Inception never spoons feeds but you learn along the way and he expects you to keep up. Tenet is a bit harder to follow but it works on the same principle. The Matrix Reloaded attempts this but fails with fluff scenes like the restaurant.
Another major issue is the Neo character, at the end of the first film, its been set out that he has demi-god like powers, yet during the sequels, they set some arbitrary limits on this power. It would've been more controversial (to link it round to another piece of media commonly seen on your channel) but better if they had done an MGS2 and made the matrix sequels not about Neo but about other characters and have Neo as a bit part adding to this story. I suppose Enter the Matrix was a bit like that in reverse.
I always loved the whole trilogy(and animatrix) and this was an amazing video going deeper into their meanings. Thank you
You do a better job of explaining this then the channel matrix explained
Execution is a largely subjective concept. In today's modern world of people force-fed Hollywood story structure, tropes and homogenized ideas of what films are and how they are meant to work, people can confuse "I didn't understand the film's language" as "bad execution.
The reality is that, once you step away from the usual Hollywood capitalist storytelling modality, films are much more expressive, more diverse and open to much more ideas of interpretation.
THE MATRIX RELOADED (especially), and to a slightly less degree REVOLUTIONS and RESURRECTIONS, doesn't just seek to mess with you philosophically, but also challenge your notions of cinema and how it can be used to discuss ideas. RELOADED is a full blown resurrection of many American movie writing tropes; it asks you to pay more attention, it asks you to think more about what you're seeing, it asks you to be more active and to rewatch the films when you have more knowledge about its subject matter.
To counter your point at 01:48 - the movie DOES generate enthusiasm from the audience at its ideas. Because if it didn't, people like myself - who were day one fans - wouldn't exist.
The problem is that the movie is trying to generate ideas for an audience base who had their minds blown by the Plato's Cave / Descartean Evil Genius dilemma. The problem is that THE MATRIX was made for people who never, at any point in their lives, asked themselves "What if reality isn't real / what is my life is a lie?" and then staggered out of the first movie, clutching their heads, minds blown, going "woah man this film really made me think about things."
If THE MATRIX RELOADED has any flaws as a capitalist piece of Hollywood pap, it is that the filmmakers chose to make a movie about philosophical ideas well above the heads of their core audience and they weren't interested in crawling on all fours (like in the first film) when what they wanted to do was sprint. They wanted to make movies that operated on the level of GHOST IN THE SHELL or French New Wave, not COMMANDO or RAMBO III.
THE MATRIX RELOADED offers a very real, very authentic, but very scary idea to audiences raised on Hollywood film diets: Not Every Movie Has To Be Made For You. RELOADED and its sequels are made for people who could recognize what the films were about and trying to do, or at least would make an effort to find out. They're not perfect, of course, I mean the Battle Of Zion was overlong and some of the side characters were painfully flat, but all up they are all not only great, but also Not Made For Everyone and that is okay.
Some examples to prove my point:
1) The Lunch Scene with the Merovingian isn't just to talk about causality. The Lunch Scene is Merv taunting Neo, laughing at him, literally telling him "you're a rat a maze, dumbass" and Neo doesn't pick up on the clues (and neither does the audience the first time around). The reason why he gives him the causality speech is because he wants to see how smart this One is vs his predecessors, whether he can figure out that he has no Free Will of his own.
The scene also reveals that Merv kidnapped the Keymaker because he doesn't want Neo to reset the Matrix. He likes this version, he is powerful and has an army of monsters from a previous version of the Matrix working for him. He is a king here, and he will do anything to stop Neo from resetting the system and forcing Merv to start his life all over again.
This is something an audience watching it once will not figure out because you need to know the ending to understand Merv's motivations. Plus the tension of the scene comes from Merv's reluctance to give into Neo, not that Neo is being led by his nose around an obstacle course.
2) When Agent Smith confronts Neo before the start of the Burly Brawl, you can see the camera, lighting gear and Neo's stand-in reflected in his sunglasses. People think this is a mistake. Except this is only one of a tiny handful of moments in the entire series where you can see such a 'mistake'. In a movie where everyone wears mirrored sunglasses, where every room has mirrors and highly polished surfaces, how could they make such a huge error in a giant closeup of Smith's face?
Well...maybe its not a mistake.
Because when Smith's clones turn up to fight Neo...they all have the same reflection on their sunglasses. The filmmakers either pasted paper versions of the "mistaken" reflection on the clone Smith's glasses or digitally inserted them, for every single one of Smith's clones. Load up the Blu-Ray and frame-skip through the Burly Brawl, it's there.
Now ask yourself - what kind of a movie, a supposedly distracting product of a cynical capitalist Hollywood corporation, would do such a thing? What is the movie trying to say? And who does the movie think will notice that detail and try to understand what kind of a conversation the Wachowskis are trying to have with them?
3) People keep saying that THE MATRIX has Christian mythology symbolism running through it, but this is largely limited to the first film only. The Wachowskis have said that this is on purpose because Christian mythology is nonsensical (an all-powerful God dying to forgive its creations for doing things it created them with the ability to do).
When RELOADED proves that the events of the first film was just an elaborate trap, the spiritual symbolism and concepts switch over to Buddhism, Hinduism and Gnosticism. This is because Neo's lie about the purpose of the One is a mirror image of the self-contradicting idea of Christ's sacrifice. When one thing is shown to be a lie, the other thing is as well.
The shift from one set of symbolism to another is not something most audiences will notice. But those that do...they notice it big-time. The music in the final Neo vs Smith fight in REVOLUTIONS features a choir singing in Sanskrit. The words are from a Hindu prayer asking for the wisdom to break the cycle of reincarnation. Just as Neo is fighting to break the cycle of the Matrix constantly resetting.
No matter how much American studios will insist - Not All Movies Are Made For Everyone. And the world is better for it. The Wachowskis didn't want to make two more films about kindergarten level philosophy and they didn't want to obey the tired formula of Hollywood films. They probably knew that the films were gonna be hated, but as artists they chose to make what they made in the hopes that a much smaller audience would get it.
Jean Luc Godard doesn't make his movies for me. Zack Snyder doesn't make movies for me. Agnes Varda does not make movies for me. But I am so glad that the Wachowskis made RELOADED, REVOLUTIONS and RESURRECTIONS for me and I'm okay that many other people will not feel that way. When most people watch these films, they're only engaging with it on a couple of levels, perhaps maybe 3. But for those of us who the art is specifically targeting, we're watching it on 7 or 9 or 13 levels simultaneously and marveling at how it all fits together.
NOT because we're smarter, but because life has simply primed us to enjoy the art the way the Wachowskis wanted to express themselves.
If you still don't believe me, check out Sideway's analysis of the musical score of the trilogy: ua-cam.com/video/HhRjn_jpQxk/v-deo.html&ab_channel=Sideways and you will have your mind changed.
Sometimes it's okay to recognize that if a film isn't made for you, that doesn't mean it's bad or that you are flawed. Great art doesn't appeal to everyone by its very definition. Great art is not perfect, its just profound.
Interesting thoughts, Max! I rewatched the first movie recently and was struck by a line of the Oracle that played with the free will idea that was further explored in Reloaded: “Would you still have broken it if I hadn't said anything?”, referring to the broken vase.
Everything, including the love between Neo and Trinity was set up by the Oracle, in part because of what she told Trinity. It makes me wonder how deep the systems of control really were.
Was even Neo’s supposedly different choice as the One truly an anomaly because of irrational love, or was it too set up to control the outcome? If the Oracle and Architect didn’t tell Neo about his choice to make, would he have made it? I don’t know the answer myself, but I suspect it might have been turtles all the way down.
Free will vs. set up choices are not a simple dichotomy, but I am not fully convinced that the machines were surprised by anything, with the possible exception of Agent Smith. But that’s another topic altogether, I suppose.
0:52 I see what you did there
;)
What if The One is just the failsafe administrator account? Created before machines machines took over. When one administrator dies another one is chosen randomly.
Machines want to erase administrator account to finally be free of human oversight.
The rest is just the myth created around it.
Can't wait for your next vid
Neo and Trinity's love was also caused by the Oracle. She wanted to switch things up
I loved all 3 but the first was the best of the best
I think Trinity saves Neo once in each of the movies in different ways. First one is obvious when she brings him back from death. Second one is that it is Neo's love for her that causes him to break the cycle of the Matrix. In the third she goes to the underworld for him. I think she's low key the Mary Magdelene to this neo-techno-Gnostic soteriology and is just as important as Neo as the feminine principle.
I love the Mass Effect music bed on this.
This was great!
Do watch Curio's video on the matrix sequels
She goes really deep in the philosophical side of the sequels.
Never heard of them! Thanks for the recommendation. Going to seek those videos out right now.
Funny how ppl think or trying to convince us or to disproove,that we are really special,but,it's just 'stuff' we do,from passion and love of things we make to open our eyes,and with amazing style!
Thank you for doing what you've been doing,Max.
And thank you from the bottom of my heart for opening my eyes! You saved the rest of my life to better!
Will you analyze the tie in game?
Hotline Miami and Mass effect ost.
Max, you're generous, I love you.
I saw the SoTC tunnel you've put in there :))
The last iteration of Neo was the anomaly amongst anomalies.
I likely misinterpreted these movies when they first came out, but I think I got exactly what I needed out of it at the time. I am glad in a way that I didn't get it because my take away at the time was useful to me.
So, the VERY TL;DR of it is that all that philosophical stuff, in regards to the plot, is that there will eventually be a human that can bypass the machines' safeguards and exploit weaknesses in the code like the Spiffing Brit, because simulating real life requires a bit of RNG, and the machines essentially decide that as humans are inherently based on chance to a degree themselves, and because given enough time, any possibility that is above zero is inevitable, the machines cause the only anomaly that can stop them to occur on their own terms so they can corral and deal with it to keep the humans in check...? *[MASSIVE INHALE...!!]* Why did it take over an hour of verbal diarrhoea to just explain that?!!
That being said, causality is as absolute as the machines believe it to be, as what we term "chance" is simply the result of layers and layers of branching variables and chain reactions that we simply can't comprehend or measure that vary from the universal to Planck scales that all have an effect on the one thing we're able to pay attention to. TL;DR: You can't know every movement of every particle in existence or know their interactions, so at some point you have to just stop paying attention and call it "chance".
*It's irrational to try to be perfectly rational: The ultimate paradox.*
Mind blown! Thanks for that.
Gotta love when the TLDR has a TLDR
@@sporeham1674 xD. An informative one, but a good TLDR nonetheless
@@sporeham1674 Well, the first one was a "Can you please confirm I'm getting this?" kinda TL;DR, and the other one was a point about how chance is technically not a thing because I'm "that guy".
I really feel like an incult, given that I never have seen any of the Matrix movies 😅😳😶
I mean, nobody's gonna force you but you are missing out on seeing Neo beat about 400 men with just a metal pole and his psychic powers
I'm nearly the same. I only ever watched the first film. I've only seen random parts of both Reloaded and Revolutions, with of course no context. So, I was confused, but intrigued nonetheless.
I recommend you do a documentary video on the Christ figure in general but I would like to see the primary focus of that video be Christ figures in film. I think you would be really good at it. An Neo is definitely a Christ figure in these films but I hear he’s not so much a Christ figure in the original books but I just merely heard because I haven’t read any of them. A documentary on the books would be interesting to.
That's a really neat idea. I've linked so many characters in fiction to Christ as it is... might as well due to a long, comparative essay on those characters and the common traits.
wait the matrix had books? can you give the links or titles of them id love to read them :) Im a huge fan of the matrix didnt know they existed
Honestly, I love all 3 movies of the original triology😎😍
Simply amazing, bravo
I love The Matrix, my favorite, hard to choose between 1 and 2, 3 is nice, but it's a little bit on the longer side to me. I would say that 1 feels like a complete story, self suficient, 2 is a great sequel, but ends short, it feels like it's missing something, 3 feels like it was the missing end of 2, and was stretched into a full movie, instead of being an extra half hour at the end of 2, which would make Matrix 2 into a fucking 3 hours long movie, so I guess I can understand why it's not that way, but I would personally enjoy 2 and 3 more if they were both cut an contracted into one singular longer movie.
The problem of linking machine intelligence to rational realism and ascribing only irrationality to organic intelligence is chaos. The real world does, in fact, possess the quality of true chance. The virtual world, such as the Matrix, does not. When computer scientists tried to create a system to predict future weather patterns based on immediately preceding weather data, they thought they had succeeded. That is, until one of their prediction runs was interrupted and had to be restarted from new starting conditions. Suddenly, when faced with all the same preceding data, their ruthlessly rational calculations diverged from those it had predicted prior to the restart. They had discovered chaos theory.
In truth, machine intelligence will have to be just as irrational as human intelligence, because like human intelligence, any machine intelligence that comes into being will also be ruled by the chaos of the real world. To try to defeat irrationality and chaos by rebooting the simulation is futile. There is nothing that enforces the past as prologue. Radioactive atoms decay randomly. Cosmic rays from deep space interact with charged capacitors in memory cells, discharging them and flipping a bit from 1 to 0. These things are pure chance. There is no cause and effect relationship that can be predicted to any degree of certainty whatsoever.
Any properly versatile and prosperous intelligence, man or machine, will have to embrace both, the coarse grained universe where cause and effect has some degree of purchase, and the finer grained universe of chaos, randomness, and irrationality. Everything may be predicted to a great degree by cause and effect, but everything also has the option of doing something completely unexpected. Free will exists.
I do like all of these movies. I just don't always like watching them.
That last one is a crawl.
Agreed.
Great ideas, bad execution - The Babadook.
You worth millions of subscribers..
Finally I heard an opinion on those movies that exactly matches mine. Also, I like your summary of the ideas, some parts were new to me. Please continue, Max.
Great video as always! always loved the matrix
Interesting video. Hope you will make the second!
Some of these themes I feel appear in the Mass Effect Series, especially the end of the 3rd game with the "choice". Despite how much of a let down the ending was.
Also the music in this video sounds like Mass Effect!
Thanks for your insights. Keep up the great work!
6:29 this phrase reminds me of the manga/anime world's end harem
I had never watched the sequels growing up. A few months back on a whim I decided to watch all 3.
I enjoyed them. All of them. However, I immediately picked up on why people wouldnt like them; the philosophical stuff is very dense and character development happens just a bit too fast. Instead of taking things slower to thin it out and give it room to actually work, they focused on back to back action sequences. The action is admittedly good, but overwhelms the philosophical stuff to the point that when the deeper content is showcased the audience just isnt prepared to chew on such a dense thing.
You deserve an award for this!
Of course you have more upcoming matrix related videos fucking love your work
1, 2, 3 begins from brilliant, about nice, to weak...
Eh. I think you're close, but this isn't the reason the sequels were disliked. I think the sequels didn't make sense to most people, and because it was boring. The action scenes were too few and far between. They tried to bridge the gaps with some random fights, but it just didn't work out. The major action scenes boiled down to two, the Neo vs. Smiths fight, and the Highway chase. The fight against Merv's goons was okay, but kind of meh by comparison.
The main reason is, as I wrote, because the movie didn't make sense. Neo was supposed to have God Mode enabled, yet he seems to struggle against random goons. In other words, he was nerf'd for plot reasons. Then it's revealed that The One is just an intentional action by the computer. It raises the question of why the Matrix can't just unplug any 1%ers when they turn against the system. After all, it seems to be able to deja vu them easily enough whenever they witness something they shouldn't. Agents can jump into any of these people whenever they see a member of Zion. So why are these rebel batteries such a problem? The sequels basically removed the mystery behind the original concept, and showed us an underlying plot that didn't make sense.
Then you had a few ass-pull moments, like when Neo fried the sentinels, or ended up in the train station somehow. Or being able to see Smith after becoming blind. Or the idea that the Matrix lost control of Smith and needed Neo's help to cancel him out. Even the Architect's method of allowing Zion to survive doesn't make sense. Why allow Zion to be rebooted? Just destroy them all and make the underground uninhabitable for humans. Shouldn't be that difficult to win if the red-pilled have nowhere to live except the Matrix. Conversely, there was seemingly no way for the humans to ever win. The One should have been able to take over the Matrix, in theory. But like I wrote, he got nerf'd.
On a side note, I think the Architect knew how Neo would choose. The Architect's method was to account for every permutation and combination of choices, whereas the Oracle was to predict the correct choice based on human analysis and converging scenarios. Both were successful to their own nearly perfect degrees. In fact, I think the Architect was more correct than her, which is why she was in exile to begin with. She was obsolete. She mentions that things didn't play out the way she expected, but the Architect knew exactly that Neo would choose to save Trinity. He deduced it based on Neo's emotion of love. He knew Neo would choose to save Trinity despite the fact that she is fated to die no matter what, and he calls this the source of humanity's greatest strength and greatest weakness.
Matrix was amazing as it makes us wonder about our own reality but reloaded and revolutions went overboard with its concepts that it doesnt have the same mystique and intrigue as the first. It doesnt have the same magic or mystery. The first film made the matrix feel real. Second and third films explored too much, you knew they were films. But the matrix made us wonder.
looking forward to your revelations video!
My answer to the question what is the Matrix has always been, a shibboleth wrapped in a scifi kung-fu film. It occurred to me that as the first film was the Hero's Journey, that the sequels are intended for someone who has already been through that and come out the other side. Then it seems reasonable that the sequels did not explain to the wider audience because they were really only intended for those people.
Great video, a bit off-topic but still relevant to the ideas of causality and free will. Consider something like Berserk, and the relation of Guts and Griffith as the struggler and the instrument of fate they are. Guts should have long since died, even at his birth, but his urge to struggle against causality gives him a sense of free will that Griffith lacks. Griffith becomes a pawn of Void after the Eclipse and loses all sense of free will, but in doing so he becomes truly god-like under Void's hands. In this way Void acts as the Architect of the world and he himself is perpetrating his own causality which changes the world accordingly through fated events he orchestrates. Guts in this way is kinda like Neo, because he is constantly choosing the irrational decision when met with an impossible situation.
0:53 ah, I see what you did there!
Matrix video? A surprise to be sure, but a welcome one.
As always, very good analysis on a trilogy that was important to many while growing up, i would say, the first movie was a very good balance of action, philosophy and story, i still drool over how good it is (it has one of the best endings from an story structure POV in my opinion). The other 2 while trying to convey good ideas were more oriented in to cashing on the phenomenon of the first one, the Wachowskis tried to push the envelop on the CGI technology at the time (something Avatar did well too), and conceived movies around well crafted action sequences Freeway chase, the Chateau fight etc...this in effect outshined the "substance" and the brilliant ideas you analyzed on this video essay, when the Matrix Reloaded opened i found it amazing and was enthralled by the bombastic visuals and found the "philosophical conversation" with the Architect "boring" (i was pretty inmature in cinephile knowledge), now after 15 years and many many movies watched, i can say, "that" conversation Neo had with Santa Claus was pretty significant and in some way...the heart of the movie. Thanks for the dive into this!
When all the "systems" within you would want to lead you to do the easy thing, since everything in us searches for comfort, especially knowing how much harder the other choice would be. Even if the choises are predetermined I would consider going against what your system is "dictating" you an act of free will.
My one qualm with this is, "the level of control that the machines have over human beings is unconscionable; it's all-consuming." Yet you just spent the first eleven minutes explaining why only an all-consuming level of control _would_ be conscionable, *because* the Machines strive only for rational perfection; in short, they alone possess the moral high ground, and anyone who has read Plato's *Republic* (from whence the original film draws its most compelling allegory, that of the Cave) knows this.
*[({R.G.)}]*
*Addendum:* this goes "without saying", as you like to say, but there is nothing "inherent in human nature" which is "good", since all goods are the product of artificial efforts to _correct_ human nature, via machines such as the State and normative Society. The Wachowski "Siblings'" own lifestyle choices allude to their failure to understand this. *[({R.G.)}]*
I heard the Mass Effect galaxy map music in the background. I’d be interested in your thoughts on that series if you have any. Especially considering the controversial ending.
My problem with the sequels has always stemmed from just one single problem with one very simple solution.
The problem, Neo used his Matrix powers outside of the Matrix. (An impossible feat.)
The solution, what we thought was the real world is in fact the Matrix. (Therefore making the impossible feat a possibility.)
It would've improved the way it presented its concepts as well.
So yeah, brilliant concepts, bad execution. And that execution just kills it for me.
2:00 yet I remember many said they didn’t quite understand the first Matrix.
That's exactly why I don't have any hopes for upcoming Matrix rehash
I know I'm very late to this but should you see this comment, the choice presented to Neo makes no sense (But maybe I've missed something). OPTION A: The One follows the path set by the machines and reboots the matrix which in turn resets the minds of the %1 percent. This means humanity remains enslaved. OPTION B: The One doesn't reset the matrix and all of humanity dies. If the machines require humans as a food source to survive, why would they give ANYONE the option to choose OPTION B?The machines are aware humans are irrational. Regardless of how much influence the machines might be able to exert, why risk extinction by starvation?
BTW i've recently been watching and enjoying your videos. The Metal gear videos caught my attention because a couple years prior I had finally decided to start playing those games. I love MGS 3 overall but the ending to MGS 2 had my jaw drop. I still have Peacewalker, 5, and Revengence to play
Keep up the great work
Meh, I'll give the Matrix trilogy what I call the Koji Pro effect. It's kinda weird when you're taking it in, but years later it's message is unparalleled and while the projects themselves were not perfect they're still very hard to live up to today.
Dude when I was 10 and 11 these movies were the coolest ish.
please make a video about revolutiions ^^
I always since the theatrical release of the sequels did not understand what other people did not understand about the second Matrix story (which means reloaded and revolution since it has to be seen as one story)
And also I am looking foward to the 4th movie since it will explore the aspect of love between Neo and Trinity and why Neo always could not be the One without Trinity and the love for her
All 3 Matrix movies are mainly about choice, you can choose the red pill or the blue pill, the red pill shows you that the life you are living is a lie and not real, real life is very bleak and apocalyptic, the blue pill will let you continue to live your false life, under the illusion that everything is fine, the Matrix is about choice and what you believe in, thanks Max for talking about the Matrix and how cool it is, thanks for the video buddy ✌️