The potential Matrix reboot - why Hollywood why?

[The Romulan Republic]

I have conflicted feelings on the organic processor thing - it makes much more sense, but still, there's something powerful (pardon the pun) about human beings being used for something completely mindless; Morpheus holding up the battery and saying "so they can turn us into this" is a beautiful image. Scientifically garbage, sure, but still.

I originally thought that the whole battery thing was such an imbecilic concept, that it had to be hiding something else.

The idea that came to my mind, after I saw one of the stories in The Animatrix, was that the machines didn't create the Matrix for any practical reason at all, and especially not for energy generation. There would've been plenty of other means of energy generation, after all, that don't rely on terrestrial solar arrays; orbital collectors beaming power down, geothermal energy, fission nuclear power, fusion (considering the advanced tech seen, this wouldn't be beyond the capabilities of the machines), hell even just plain old fossil fuels (there'd still be plenty of coal around and its not like the ruined biosphere could be made any worse).

Rather, the machines made the Matrix because they were fundamentally kind and benevolent intelligences; so that they could keep these lunatic apes from killing themselves. Basically, the Matrix is an insane asylum for an entire species. The machines don't want to exterminate humanity -- humanity already exterminated virtually all other life on earth with their pointless act of spite to block out the sun -- and the machines thought that such a waste was horrific in the extreme. The problem is that these fools are incapable of thinking rationally and their unreasoning aggression would no doubt force the machines to kill them all off unless they could be... contained. Give them a little pen to run around in and be as self-destructive as they wanted without actually affecting anything breakable.

Of course, for such a project to succeed, the humans inside must not be aware that their environment is artificial. If some individuals need to be sacrificed so that the species as a whole can continue on in its little padded virtual cell, then that's unfortunate but by far the lesser of evils.

The interesting thing about the original Matrix movie was that it was essentially the classic Allegory of the Cave, but with the world outside the cave being a crapsack far worse than the cave itself. A further neat philosophical trick would've been the reveal that Neo and the rest of the humans fighting for freedom are, in fact, the bad guys.

I'm rather impressed- this is probably the most concentrated dose of misanthropy I've seen in print in quite some time.

[ScreamingDoom]

I'm rather impressed- this is probably the most concentrated dose of misanthropy I've seen in print in quite some time.

Thanks, I guess? Though I don't understand why you think it's misanthropy. It's pretty much exactly how the Matrix world is presented.

Humanity did declare war on the machines who sent peace envoys. Humanity was the aggressor in the war against the machines.

Humanity did block out the sun, killing pretty much all other life on the planet because they were annoyed that the machines were doing better than they were.

Blocking out the sun did not stop the machines or even slow them down. It was a completely and utterly pointless act of destruction.

Neo and the rest of the Zionists are terrorists. They care nothing about the collateral damage their antics racks up; they murder people with wanton glee (or at least indifference) and justify it with pale platitudes about freedom. The only reason they even agree to the cease-fire at the end of Matrix 3 is because they were losing and knew it. At least that is a rational decision; very little about any of their motivations in the rest of media is.

Humans in the Matrix universe are psychotic, genocidal lunatics bent on self-destruction and taking everything else down with them as they go. That's not misanthropy, that's just a fact of the world.

[SlackerinDeNile]

I'm rather impressed- this is probably the most concentrated dose of misanthropy I've seen in print in quite some time.

Thanks, I guess? Though I don't understand why you think it's misanthropy. It's pretty much exactly how the Matrix world is presented.

Humanity did declare war on the machines who sent peace envoys. Humanity was the aggressor in the war against the machines.

Humanity did block out the sun, killing pretty much all other life on the planet because they were annoyed that the machines were doing better than they were.

Blocking out the sun did not stop the machines or even slow them down. It was a completely and utterly pointless act of destruction.

Neo and the rest of the Zionists are terrorists. They care nothing about the collateral damage their antics racks up; they murder people with wanton glee (or at least indifference) and justify it with pale platitudes about freedom. The only reason they even agree to the cease-fire at the end of Matrix 3 is because they were losing and knew it. At least that is a rational decision; very little about any of their motivations in the rest of media is.

Humans in the Matrix universe are psychotic, genocidal lunatics bent on self-destruction and taking everything else down with them as they go. That's not misanthropy, that's just a fact of the world.

That's the harshest point of view I've seen on that particular issue in the films and I love it, thank you.
It's unlikely that a reboot of the films would go this far with that theme, but if they could at least acknowledge the moral and ethical issues of what the rebels are doing without resorting to turning the one member of their cause who disagrees with their actions and feels betrayed by them into a mad psychopath then I'd be interested.