Skip to main content

the matrix - Why didn't the agents take over Neo's body?


Apparently, when someone sees something strange or unusual in the Matrix, it triggers some kind of red flag that tells the agents "come here and take over that body". We see it a few times during the movie, like in the subway station, with an old hobo, for example.


Couldn't the agents add Morpheus's and/or Trinity's faces to the list of triggering elements? If not, what about a self-repairing mirror?


My point is: why didn't the agents simply take over Neo's body? They had many opportunities before he was out of the Matrix. Can't they see through his eyes?


Plus, on a purely cinematic level, imagine how dramatic the scene would have been. Morpheus would have had a dilemma: getting rid of the agent would mean killing the potential One.



Answer



This makes sense if you consider the following to be the case:



  1. Neo was probably not granted immunity by the machine upper hierarchy. I believe they only discovered he was the One when he was examined by the Oracle. At this point he was already unplugged.


  2. Agents were after Morpheus, not Neo. They did not know Neo was important. He was bait.

  3. Let's assume that, once a person's RSI is overwritten by an agent, that person becomes the agent till death. This assumption is supported by most scenes in the movies. It also explains why the agents did not take over Neo right up until Morpheus introduced himself. Neo is no use as an agent.

  4. The rebels knew the possibility of Neo being taken over. There was a gun trained on him all the way to the hideout. At the first sign of transformation (which takes about 3 seconds) he would have been shot and the agents' operation would have been blown.

  5. The only window of opportunity was from the moment Neo walked into Morpheus' room and to the moment he swallowed the pill (which disrupted his signal). This is the part that requires explanation.


So there are two possible answers:



  1. The room with the red chair (or the red chair itself) is shielded. We've seen the same chair used during important conversations in the sequels (even the Keymaker sat on it when he laid out the plan to get to the Room).

  2. The agents were relying on the bug to catch Morpheus because their alert program only kicks in when a person plugged into the Matrix notices an anomaly (such as a person disappearing into a phone receiver). Morpheus and the others did not use their 'powers' during their encounters with Neo. By the time the agents realized what had happened, the rebels were gone.



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

harry potter - Did Dolores Umbridge Have Any Association with Voldemort (or Death Eaters) before His Return?

I noticed that Dolores Umbridge was born during the first Wizarding War, so it's very likely she wasn't a Death Eater then (but she is pretty evil -- who knows?). After that Voldemort was not around in a way that could affect many people, and most wouldn't know he was planning to rise again. During that time, and up through Voldemort's return (in Goblet of Fire ), did Umbridge have any connection with the Death Eaters or with Voldemort? Was she doing what she did on her own, or was it because of an association with Voldemort or his allies? Answer Dolores Umbridge was definitely not a good person. However, as Sirius points out, "the world isn't split into good people and Death Eaters". Remember that he also says that he doesn't believe Umbridge to be a Death Eater, but that she's evil enough (or something like that). I think there are two strong reasons to believe that: Umbridge was proud to do everything according to the law, except when she trie...

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.

aliens - Interstellar Zoo story

I vaguely remember this story from my childhood: it was about an interstellar zoo that came to Earth with lots of bizarre and unusual species, and humans would file through and gape at all the crazy looking creatures from other planets. The twist came at the end when the perspective shifted to the other side of the bars and we discovered that the "creatures" were traveling through space on a kind of safari. They thought they were the visitors and we were the animals. Neither side knew that the other side thought they were the zoo creatures. Answer Got it. Zoo, by Edward D. Hoch. Published in 1958. Link to Publication History Link to PDF

tolkiens legendarium - Did Gandalf wear his Ring of Power throughout the trilogy?

After Gandalf discovered that Sauron was back and sent Frodo on his quest to Rivendell, did he continue to wear Narya (one of the Three Rings)? It seems like a huge risk to continue to wear it after the Nazgûl (Ringwraiths) started to try and reclaim the One Ring; if they managed to get the ring to Sauron, couldn't he be corrupted by his power? Whatever powers Narya bestows upon him couldn't possibly be worth the huge risk, could it? Answer When Sauron forged the one ring and put it on his finger, the other ring bearers were immediately aware of him and his intentions and removed their own rings. There is no reason why they couldn't merely do so again. As soon as Sauron set the One Ring upon his finger they were aware of him; and they knew him, and preceived that he would be master of them, and of all they wrought. Then in anger and fear they took off their rings. "Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age," Silmarillion