(The story of Sarah's car wreck will be continuing later.)

There’s nothing I love more than a good mystery. In fact I think I am more entranced by mysteries that I know may never be solved – hence my current fascination with Isabella V., or any number of conspiracy theories.

But now, for the next six months, I have The Matrix. With its multitude of loose ends writhing in my head like the spectral locks of the Twins. The dialogue of this movie was crap, the music overdone, the action scenes a bit much. And Neo with that ham-handed heart massage! I almost expected Motley Crue’s “Restart My Heart” to come over the theatre speakers. That, or to hear him mutter like a frustrated virgin – “no, no, honey, I know what I’m doing, I’ll find that G-spot here in a second… here! No? Oh.” But there is meat left in this story, and it’s all in the analysis.

In six months this will all come crashing down – I fear that the brothers Wachowski have a Midichlorian-esque present in store for us, something that will be so vapid, so blunt-edged and mind-dulling that the entire geek population of the world will rise up out of our chairs and thrust our bean-like desk-job bodies against the foul barricades of the Warner Brothers compound.

Then again, to date, the Wachowskis have handled their maniacal movie-plotting duties with aplomb.

So! Onward with the conjecture.

Axiom : We were deliberately given all of these loose ends to try and put together. We have a bloody candlestick and Mr. Body in the conservatory. Now… whodunit?

Axiom : The answer, such as it may be, will not be severely complex. However, it will be unexpected.

Axiom : We are dealing with filmmakers, not philosophers. As such, plotholes will appear. Two men simply could have not considered every theory that the Internet will generate. But it will be consistent with the previous movies! Refer back to the script of the Matrix I at every possible opportunity. Therein lies the truth! Sort of.

Money...

(The story of Sarah's car wreck will be continuing later.)

There’s nothing I love more than a good mystery. In fact I think I am more entranced by mysteries that I know may never be solved – hence my current fascination with Isabella V., or any number of conspiracy theories.

But now, for the next six months, I have The Matrix. With its multitude of loose ends writhing in my head like the spectral locks of the Twins. The dialogue of this movie was crap, the music overdone, the action scenes a bit much. And Neo with that ham-handed heart massage! I almost expected Motley Crue’s “Restart My Heart” to come over the theatre speakers. That, or to hear him mutter like a frustrated virgin – “no, no, honey, I know what I’m doing, I’ll find that G-spot here in a second… here! No? Oh.” But there is meat left in this story, and it’s all in the analysis.

In six months this will all come crashing down – I fear that the brothers Wachowski have a Midichlorian-esque present in store for us, something that will be so vapid, so blunt-edged and mind-dulling that the entire geek population of the world will rise up out of our chairs and thrust our bean-like desk-job bodies against the foul barricades of the Warner Brothers compound.

Then again, to date, the Wachowskis have handled their maniacal movie-plotting duties with aplomb.

So! Onward with the conjecture.

Axiom : We were deliberately given all of these loose ends to try and put together. We have a bloody candlestick and Mr. Body in the conservatory. Now… whodunit?

Axiom : The answer, such as it may be, will not be severely complex. However, it will be unexpected.

Axiom : We are dealing with filmmakers, not philosophers. As such, plotholes will appear. Two men simply could have not considered every theory that the Internet will generate. But it will be consistent with the previous movies! Refer back to the script of the Matrix I at every possible opportunity. Therein lies the truth! Sort of.

Money Question : Is Zion in the Matrix?

Possibility A.

No. Zion is not in the Matrix. It still is under control by the machines; only through direct physical means, rather than virtual-reality gimcrackery.

This may mean that Neo can somehow either broadcast his presence back to the Matrix, locate the code that runs the Sentinels, and stop them. It may also mean that Neo has learned to use his bioelectric body as an EMP generator, thus extending his powers into the real world. (This step may have been achieved by meeting with the Architect, raising Trinity from the dead, or swallowing the Oracle’s candy – another red pill. Or maybe the jump came from Agent Smith… either when Neo ‘killed’ Smith in the first movie, or when Smith attempted to take over Neo in the second.) The answer here affects another question – how far do the machines control and/or are able to manage Neo? If his powers are limited to the Matrix, the machines effectively control Neo – if they take away the Matrix, then they take away his powers, they remove what makes him The One.

Also, Agent Smith is able to affect the real world now – just as any rogue human in the Matrix can contact his or her operator for a quick infusion of knowledge, Smith can now overwrite a person’s consciousness totally, turning their real selves into him. Which begs the question – has this happened to any other humans in Zion? And is this knowledge transmittable by any other means, such as blood? This may explain why Bane was cutting his hands as he waited to stab Neo – if nothing else, infect him again with Smith’s consciousness.

A final point – this does not reveal that the Architect has lied at any point. As per his simulations revealed to him, Trinity did, in fact, die. He did not inform Neo (or the audience) that she may be brought back to life.

Possibility B.

Zion is totally within an outer layer of the Matrix. It is another simulacrum provided for our entertainment, a red-tinged funk palace (apart from the sick green tint of the Matrix and the blue tint of the Underground) that makes you feel like you are rebelling by giving you a simple for-or-against option. Don’t like Britney Spears? Then we’ve got a punky Avril Lavigne for you. All of your options are defined by us, all of your base are… no, let’s not go there.

This means that Neo’s powers within the Matrix are expanding – he is able to see through facades that no one else has approached. (His coma here would be explained by the cognitive dissonance at discovering that your reality is just another layer of the Matrix. Or possibly from exhaustion at bending the rules of the Matrix even farther.) It also easily explains Bane’s takeover from Agent Smith – Smith is still trapped within the Matrix. The Architect has left out very important pieces of information in his story, and may be lying outright.

This opens up the possibility for more and more Matrices, and the possibility that the machines may not know how deep the Matrix goes.

Possibility C.

Zion is real. But upon exit from the Source, Neo is caught in successive layers of the Matrix. He never saves Trinity, who dies, as the Architect says she would. He exits the Matrix and senses the actions of the Sentinels, as he would inside the Matrix. And he stops the Sentinels with a blank wave of his hand. His erstwhile compatriots are now embodied by programs. The coma is brought on by the realization that he is still inside the Matrix and that Trinity may be dead.

In this case, Agent Smith still has control over Bane in the real world, but Neo’s powers are still confined to the Matrix. While both of Neo’s rivals can now affect the real world, either through legions of Sentinels or by formatting someone’s wetware and overwriting their brain-based OS, Neo has no apparent power to counteract them there.

There are a thousand other questions that I will lay out – if nothing else, I enjoy bullshitting about such topics.

Who is the Mother of the Matrix? The Oracle? The Architect appeared to scoff at the idea that the Oracle could be the Mother – his reaction was hard to read, however. Persephone, then, with her understanding of, or at least a need of, love? A program that appears to be male, perhaps? Someone we haven’t met?

What is the Oracle’s agenda? In myth, the actions of a true seer tend to be preordained – they often just ‘go through the motions’ that they perceive. Who made her and is she fulfilling her purpose? Is she under control by the powers-that-be in the Matrix, an integral part of those powers-that-be, or totally rogue? Even if you assume that the Oracle was created to fine-tune the Matrix as a mechanism for control, and that she is fulfilling her purpose flawlessly, this question is not adequately answered.

What is Agent Smith’s agenda? Is it still an eventual suicide, the only escape from the Matrix that he once had? Now that he is the second systemic anomaly, how does his future work into the Matrix? Will my favorite character finally get to really Fuck Shit Up?

How long does it take to produce a new anomaly?

Did the gift of the spoon mean that Zion was another level of unreality?

Do any previous anomalies still exist? Could Morpheus or Councillor Zerbe be a previous Messiah? How about the Merovingian, for whom his love of Persephone faded and therefore could not save, as Neo’s love for Trinity is expected to save both his life and the rest of the human species? Morpheus claimed that, in the first movie, the only previous Messiah that he was aware of died… but that does not mean much. Certainly the Architect did not preclude the possibility of the survival of previous ‘Ones’.

Argh. There are far too many questions left. This movie must be debated with a full rack of brownies and a hookah at the ready!