Architect
From The Black Vault Encyclopedia Project
The Architect is a fictional character appearing in the last two films of the Matrix trilogy, created by the Wachowski brothers. The character is played by Helmut Bakaitis.
The Architect is first encountered by Neo appearing as a manicured, humorless bureaucrat sitting in a room whose walls are covered by television screens in a pivotal scene in Matrix Reloaded. He reveals himself to Neo as being the creator of the Matrix. A sentient computer program, he appears as a white-bearded old man (bearing a vague similarity to some Christian depictions of God, Uncle Sam, Colonel Sanders, and Internet pioneer Vint Cerf, plus diametrically opposed to the preferred shell of the Oracle, that of a black woman). In an extended period of convoluted dialogue, the Architect explains that his role is to "balance the equation" of the Matrix.
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The Architect's role
As alluded to by Agent Smith in the first film, the very first version of the Matrix created by the Architect was a failure, ironically because it was a utopia. Its human denizens refused to accept a world of complete perfection. Thus, the Architect modified the Matrix to bring it closer to what the machines understood about human nature. However, the Architect was again beset by failure, as humans resisted being forced into the Matrix against their will.
The solution to this problem was discovered by the Oracle, an intuitive program designed to investigate certain aspects of the human psyche. The Oracle noted that the fault of the earlier Matrix iterations was that they did not take into account the importance of choice; the Architect had merely overlooked this and created a system which was at conflict with the minds of its inhabitants, for whom choice was neurologically inherent.
The Oracle realized that giving humans the choice of whether or not to accept the Matrix, even if they were only aware of this choice at a near subconscious level, led to nearly 99% of all test subjects accepting the program. Thus, the Matrix was rewritten to satisfy the human neuro-imperative to choose: those who chose to accept the Matrix were integrated painlessly into the system, and those who chose not to accept the Matrix were allowed to wake up.
However, as the Architect noted, those who did not accept the program, however few, would inevitably pose an "escalating probability of disaster". He does not state specifically what that disaster is, but refers immediately to the destructions of Zion, which represents an emerging military threat to the machine dominion of the earth while serving as a home-base for dissidents who facilitate the freeing of an increasing number of humans from the Matrix.
The Architect's "measure of control" over this eventuality was the implementation of a system of cyclical control: He programmed The One. Every time the human threat both within and without the Matrix had grown to proportions which began to threaten machine hegemony, a man would be born into the Matrix who would carry within himself the source code of the Matrix "Prime Program". Before this had happened, however, the Oracle would propagate amongst the free humans a Prophecy about a man who could do as he wished within the Matrix, and who would arrive to free humankind and destroy the machines forever.
Once The One emerged and summarily met the criteria of the Prophecy, the Architect begin preparations to have Zion destroyed by a machine army. The Oracle would then guide The One to the Source (the machine mainframe), which would end the war for the humans, according to the Prophecy. On his way to the Source, however, the Architect confronts The One and reveals the true nature of the Prophecy: it does not show those who reject the Matrix how to defeat the machines, it is a means to control those who resist.
The One is then presented with a choice. He may return to the Source at which point the Matrix source code would be reinserted into the program, allowing for the system to reboot. Or he may refuse, and return to the Matrix. Refusal would lead to a system crash, killing all of the inhabitants of the Matrix. Coupled with the destruction of Zion, this would spell extinction for the human race. Cooperation with the Architect leads to the destruction of Zion and re-stabilization of the Matrix. The One would then be allowed to select from the Matrix twenty-three individuals, seven males and sixteen females, to be the first freed within the new iteration and to found a new Zion. Facilitating this cooperation, was programming in The One designed to create a profound attachment to the rest of humanity; this attachment served as incentive to comply.
Presented with this False dilemma, past iterations of The One saw no alternative aside from those supplied by the Architect and choose to cooperate. Consequently, what Morpheus and the rest of Zion believe to be the beginning of their struggle, when that it was The One who freed the first humans and taught them the truth, was in fact, merely the resolution of the fifth iteration of the Matrix and the beginning of the sixth.
Thus, with the Oracle's help, the Architect was able (at least until events in The Matrix) to maintain a large degree of control over the human race, despite having to cede a measure of control them, through use of the Prophecy and The One.
The Choice of the One, as presented to Neo by the Architect
The Architect offers Neo the same choice he offered his five predecessors. He informs Neo that the machine army is going to destroy Zion. Neo can choose to return to the Matrix, or he can return to the Source, choose a few select humans to restart Zion, and continue the cycle.
In the past, the Ones saw little choice-- an extremely high probability of death for all humanity by refusing to cooperate, or certainty of keeping humanity alive by returning to the Source. But, unlike previous Ones, Neo's programmed attachment to humanity was experienced in a more specific way: in his love for Trinity. Thus, when presented with a choice between the destruction of humanity or losing Trinity, he saw no choice. His emotions led him to choose to attempt saving Trinity, despite the Architect's assertion that there is nothing he can do to save her, not to mention his predictions of doom for all humanity.
The Effects of the Architect's Role in the Matrix on Neo's Choice
The Oracle revealed in The Matrix Revolutions that the summary of Architect's role in the Matrix was to balance it, like an equation. Furthermore, when Neo asked her what Smith is, she tells him,
"He is you, your opposite, your negative, the result of the equation trying to balance itself out."
When the Architect programmed The One as part of maintaining control over the Matrix, he set the stage for the emergence of Smith as a growing threat against the Matrix and the Machine City. He told Neo that he was, "the eventuality of an anomaly....... the anomaly is systemic, creating fluctuations in even the most simplistic equations." These fluctuations appeared to affect Smith, even as Neo destroyed him in the first movie. In Matrix Reloaded, Smith stated,
"Then you're aware of it...... our connection. I don't fully understand how it happened, perhaps some part of you imprinted onto me, something overwritten or copied....... You destroyed me, Mr. Anderson. Afterward, I knew the rules, I understood what I was supposed to do.... but I didn't. I couldn't. I was compelled to stay.... compelled to disobey."
It is unclear whether the Architect directly acted in the interest of balancing Neo within the Matrix, or part of the code inherent to the programming of The One affected Smith. Regardless, due to the actions of the Architect, he was compelled to go against his original programming and driven to increase his power like a virus.
The threat that Smith represented would have been resolved with a systems reboot of the Matrix but Neo refused to cooperate with the Architect's system of control because of his feelings for Trinity. Consequently, Smith was allowed to grow stronger, leading to an escalating threat, not just to the Matrix but the Machine City, and ultimately, to the showdown at the end of the trilogy.
The Architect on Keeping His Word
In the final scene of the film he joins the Oracle and Sati, commenting that she took a "big risk." When asked by the Oracle whether the Architect will honor his promise to Neo, he replies, "What do you think I am.... human?", possibly implying going against his word is impossible for a program such as he, that is bound by perfection.
After the Movie
The name Architect is probably a reference to an alternative name for the archetypal ideology of "God" in some traditions (particularly of note, the Freemasons, who refer to God, in one form or another, as the "Great Architect of the Universe"). The Architect character is one of the Gnostic themes of the series.
Although often misunderstood, the Architect is not the Deus Ex Machina entity that appears near the end of Revolutions.
Copyright
"Original data received from Wikipedia on May 05, 2006. Credit given to original authors can be seenHere."
| The Matrix series (edit) | |
|---|---|
| Films | The Matrix | The Matrix Reloaded | The Matrix Revolutions |
| The Animatrix | Final Flight of the Osiris | The Second Renaissance | Kid's Story | Program | World Record | Beyond | A Detective Story | Matriculated |
| Games | Enter the Matrix | The Matrix Online | The Matrix: Path of Neo |
| Characters | Neo | Trinity | Morpheus | Smith | Agent | Oracle | Architect | Minor characters | Programs and machines |
| Locations | Matrix | The City | Club Hel | Mobil Ave | Zero One | Zion | List of ships in the Matrix series |
| Other topics | Matrix Source Code | The Matrix Character Names |
