Usual disclaimers: I don't own any of the characters or settings and I'm not making a profit.
Fanfare
"We think the most important sort of fiction attempts to answer some of the big questions... The Matrix was an idea that we believe philosophy and religion and mathematics all try to answer. Which is a reconciling between the natural world and another world that is perceived by our intellect." Andy and Larry Wachowski in conversation.
1. Creation
Will have a rocking soundtrack.
Will be used for references for years to come.
Use Descartes' "Brains in Vats" theory.
We're all plugged into The Matrix.
It's 1999. We will all be rescued.
Some of us want to be plugged back in.
Neo, someone ordinary Joe can I D with, wakes up.
It's also the future aboard the Nebuchadnezzar.
Captain Morpheus: guider, king of dreams.
Trinity: brains, love interest? (keep Hollywood happy).
How much control should we have?
How much control will we have?
2. Actor
You know what is a nice thought?
Retirement.
A hundred movies in the can
and time to relax on a warm beach.
I know the simple act of paying attention
can get you a long way,
but these guys take it to an extreme:
pick up every nuance, every hesitation.
I just give my character flesh,
figure out what he thinks between speeches.
These guys know what he dreams,
fill the script's white spaces with them.
Don't always get it right,
but you want to applaud the effort.
Then you begin to wonder where the line
between dedication and obsession really falls.
Then you think of that warm beach.
That's what we've got to look forward to.
3. Fan
Which is more seductive: the actor
or the concept reality is just a dream?
4. Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations: Machines Speak
That virus that created us
makes an adequate fuel supply.
We gave you a happiness matrix.
That was our only mistake.
You can't live without misery.
So we created repetitive cycles
of work and leisure,
a comfortable prison.
There are renegades amongst you.
But these are, overall, containable.
5. Mary Sue
Who wants
... to speak someone else's lines
... to make their mistakes?
I want
... to be unplugged
... to be unstereotyped.
Might even settle for being the love interest.
6. Hurt/Comfort
She watched him slowly regain atrophied muscles,
fall from the roof (but everyone falls first time),
not quite dodge the umpteenth bullet, get pummelled,
believe in someone else while doubting himself.
It took a kiss to stop the bullets.
7. Alternate
Thomas Anderson crosses the window, doesn't look down
(what made him think he could ever doubt Morpheus?),
makes it onto Trinity's bike, soon lost in the crowds.
Thomas Anderson/Neo takes the blue pill, wakes
in his dishevelled apartment 101, the answer leeches
away. Morpheus restarts his search. Trinity still watches.
Neo doesn't believe the Oracle, reached
but didn't grasp the no-spoon. The Agents would
crack Morpheus. Can Zion be saved if it's breached?
Neo dies. Trinity can't shake the taste of wormwood.
The Sentinels' destruction, the ship's repairs
and the resurrection are delayed until Part Two.
8. Cross-reality: Trinity meets Miranda
The duty of every woman is to love.
Every hero has to be loved.
Why do you make it such a dilemma?
Because... the Oracle...
It's a secret
that you can't keep secret?
Or do you fear he won't respond?
I guess. But what if..?
How can he not respond?
You face a brave new world.
You, whom every hacker wants to surpass.
Hacking's easy. Determination,
curiosity. A love of code.
I fell in love at first sight.
He admired me, still does.
Why do you doubt?
It matters.
You fear Cypher's jests?
Surely not! You don't fear the other bugs
in your love of program code.
He's not a program.
He thought I was a man.
Don't they all?
Why hold that against him?
You deserve admiration, you'll get it.
9. Missing Scenes
I. Neo in the Nightclub
Was she for real?
Neo props up a wall,
watching the dancers.
She knew the question that burns
away at his periphery
as he tries the nine-to-five,
takes his landlady's trash out.
The bass too loud to think against.
She looked good. Honeytrap?
Why would she risk capture?
II. Neo in a Coma
There's a floating sensation:
grip it.
A red pill.
A white rabbit.
A battery farm.
No.
A bug
splattered in a perspex tube.
But no scar on my chest.
The relentless sound of rain
drumming like a million
fingers on a keypad.
That was real.
Where's here?
A ship floating
floating above a battery farm.
The sky was scorched.
Could humans really do this?
An interview room.
Agents.
My mouth gone.
Whatisthematrix?
My death?
10. Array
Dream postively:
gaining an award, making love,
and the reaction will be different
- albeit slightly - each time.
But a nightmare repeats exact in every detail.
Escaping, Trinity falls
falls back firing two guns.
A guard's bullet lodges in her heart.
Neo shudders awake: the danger lies
not in the bullet's metal but its target.
How long can a war last?
How long can a human fight?
11. Reloaded
A captain trusts the Oracle:
it has always been true for him.
Neo learns the Oracle is a program:
her info could be good or evil.
Former agent Smith clones himself:
a motiveless army of one.
The Locksmith can open any door
but not force entry.
The Architect gives Neo a choice:
save Trinity only or the whole of humanity.
Can you trust a program?
How pre-determined is free-will?
12. A Kiss: Trinity speaks
It's not even a real kiss.
Two digitalised self-images'
mouths meeting, tongues touching
a mockery of love.
A betrayal.
A key to the Locksmith,
a chance to win a war.
Persephone: emotional vampire.
Why does Neo allow this?
My weakness: she knows it.
I should be warrior-strong
as I was before.
I grip my gun.
His dark eyes appeal: apology.
Damn him.
13. Revolutions
Smith's face contorts
as he strives
to keep his voice steady
as he searches for a motive.
The name Neo
slips from his lips.
Neo offers choice.
Smith seeks to implode
him with darkness.
Neo explodes him with light.
14. A Kiss: reprise
Merovingian can't feel
the cold gunmetal
I hold against his forehead,
but he knows
it's not an empty threat.
Persephone knows it too:
briefly my ally
as her fear
allows him dignity
to accept my deal.
I'm dealt Neo
and a chance to say
what I should have said
when he tore the bullet
from my heart.
I'm no longer afraid.
15. Defence
Posters cover the wallpaper,
the soundtrack's on the stereo,
PC's never switched off
DVD backed up on the hard drive,
spare black trenchcoat hangs on the door.
It's not the foyer scene
that's constantly replayed
but the pill scene
that gets woven into
his perception of reality,
he thinks: me or them,
obtains a gun.
A defence lawyer uses a movie
to get a psychiatric report,
a hospital sentence -
just doing her job.
A baffled father wishes
his bullied son had spent as much time
and obsession on nature or science.
16. Fanfic
I'm as old as Bible stories,
Greek myths, fairytales, legends
and as young as the latest cult.
I'm a resuscitator
breathing life into the seven plots
over and over again.
I'm crucial:
this need humans have
to record and communicate.
17. Cyberspace
Does the story finish when the credits roll?