Years after the release of The Matrix, both of the Wachowskis came out as transgender women.[183] The red pill has been likened to red estrogen pills.[184] Morpheus's description of the Matrix creating a sense that something is fundamentally wrong, "like a splinter in your mind", has been likened to gender dysphoria.[184] In the original script, Switch was a woman in the Matrix and a man in the real world, but this idea was removed.[185]
this post was submitted on 23 Oct 2025
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The last detail about Switch is so cool—I wish they had kept it.
As ~~first time~~ relatively green directors, the studio had a lot of say over what they got to include. Often to the story's detriment. Humans were originally processors instead of batteries (which makes a fuck ton more sense)
I just mentally replaced "battery" with "processor" anyway.
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So was Switch supposed to be a woman in the Matrix because of a bug and in the real world he was his true self, or did the machines allow her to live her true gender in the Matrix?
Just because it's a trans allegory doesn't mean they figured it all the way out. I think it was mostly the broaching of the topic and putting the ideas into normal people's head that something like that could happen. I can imagine a very different social experience if explaining trans in the early 2000s could have been boiled down to "I'm kinda like switch from the matrix."
Bruh. Think through the thought for a moment before you dismiss it as something that wasn't thought through. People with gender dysphoria often question their existence. The robots don't want people to do that, cause they'll start finding the seams. So yeah, everyone meshed with their gender (assuming it could fit within the binary parameters of the 90s) because the matrix wants to be as stable as possible.
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I'd wager Matrix was true expression.
Then the allegory wouldn't make sense though, would it?
The main character would have less reason to want to stay in the real world if they received the "wrong" body. They lived their whole life in the "right" body in the simulation and then wake up just to feel gender dysphoria? It would just be confusing and uncomfortable as fuck for them.
Ah, you're right. I was thinking too hard about it, reasoning that a non-human entity would be unaffected by human errors and cater to the being itself, its mind, rather than its body, and waking up to the reality of being in the wrong body is the issue. But then the point of the allegory, as you reminded me, is that exiting the Matrix is akin to exiting the lie, the false idea of you. I derped.
I guess the real moral is you can fabricate any story that suits you from source material, and ideas can go many ways. What matters is the Wachowskis' vision, then, except in the idea that art is meant to be interpreted by the individual, in which case there will never be a singularity or wholly accepted conclusion..
It could be boiled down to what we can interpret from Switch, what's canon. Then, knowing that she uses femme pronouns, and that her character was Lilly W's internalised egg feelings, this seems the Matrix self is the true self.
She was a woman in the matrix because the robots wanted as little possibility for people to question their existence, so everyone identified with their own images. There was no gender dysphoria in the matrix unless you were nonbinary.
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Isn't this The Entire Point?
That there is value in truth, even if the truth is painful?
That we should believe in and fight for a cause, even if fighting is hard?
Ah see, but he is depicted as the soyjack
And that's what I love so much about it, it really drills down to what you value in life. What's more important, being comfortable, or knowing the truth? Do you really want to know how the sausage is made?
I think of cases like 1930s Germany, where people just ignored the atrocities happening because they weren't happening to them. Those bystanders were like Cypher in The Matrix, where they decided that "ignorance is bliss" and looked the other way. The film certainly paints Cypher as a bad guy, but I think a lot would side with him if he instead were a new recruit who decides to go back to the Matrix shortly after learning the truth.
Anyway, The Matrix is perhaps my favorite movie of all time, I'm still waiting for a sequel. 😉
Yeah, it's a real shame they never made another. I'd love a third Alien movie also, but we'll just have to make do with two.
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Morpheus gave him a choice. But, of course, being a good marketer, he didn’t say how reality would be.
The Matrix, Office Space, American Beauty, and Fight Club all came out in 1999. They all starred white males between the ages of 30-40 who have become disillusioned with their soul sucking jobs in a consumerist society. They all have an epiphany that breaks them away from the corporate consumerist grind and rebel against it, before finally becoming a sage who can live in the world but not be destroyed by it. Except for Kevin Spacey’s character, but seriously, fuck that guy.
Cipher’s a much better example. He’s tempted not with being an office drone, but with having a steak in a fancy restaurant, so being upper middle class? Anyway, that’s enough to get him to resort to literal murder.
Anyway, 1999 was a weird year in film. It seems almost trite nowadays that having a stable job with stable housing and being able to afford Starbucks every day was the bane of human existence, when nowadays it’s living in the lap of luxury.
There's a reason they thought 1999 was peak in the matrix. If the biggest problem was boredom.
Having a stable job just means masking everything different about yourself so you can be a good little worker ant in the capitalist machine. I want a stable job in the sense that I do something I genuinely want to do which serves my fellows.
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You mean that dead-end job and no social life to speak of? Not to mention the clashes with police he had.
Neo wouldn't even have left his house to go to the party if it wasn't for the white rabbit reference.
Living the dream.
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“Would you rather have an average mediocre life, or a bi-polar life that swings between being a god and a pauper on the run?”
EDITED: Sorry guys I tried to make an argument in favour of the movie, but of course I forgot trans is bad and therefore movie bad
Also, y'know, Neo was miserable and depressed and trying to figure out why he felt like there was something deeply wrong with the world and then took a pill to explore the truth and gain the agency over his life he was lacking. Unrelatedly the authors are trans and left wing.
Couldn't possibly be a metaphor for how modern society crushes freedom of expression and agency in order to serve the powerful often in ways most people aren't even aware of.
Then I choose ignorance as it's bliss while life is hell.
Edit: I find it offensive that the commenter I replied to insinuates that there's any transphobia in my comment.
Attitudes like this is why I'd rather do my transition alone that surrounded by the mainstream trans community.
And thats why the choice matters. Morpheus didn't rip him out. There were too pills, youre free to choose the other.
Morpheus didn't give him all the facts and rushed him into a decision before giving him the chance to process what little information he was given.
That's not a choice. That's a con-job.
Ah right right, the movie would have flowed better if he was given a course on existentialism and a detailed recount of life on the outside.
How about a quick. "Hey. Just so you know, we live in sewers and eat gruel. Now make your choice."
the matrix reboot we should have gotten, instead of whatever the fuck that 4th movie was.
nio takes the blue pill, credits roll
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but nio taking the blue bill then credits roll, isnt a very engaging movie
I’ve seen this many times and it’s always fucking funny for me every time. The combination of the picture and the caption is so perfect.
PORRIDGE SLOP NEOOOOOO
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Idk man, didn't look perfect or comfy to me. Disconnecting was not necessarily an upgrade in life quality, but he was certainly more free than he was before.
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They tried to make the Matrix seem ominous, then they showed the girl in the red dress.
Obviously there are also counter arguments as for every philosophical position, but the experience machine is a thought experiment to show how hedonism isn't a good basis for well being if you're trying to base your virtues or ethics in well being
I never understood why this was seen as a good counterargument. I think the hedonist would say just say "yes, hook me up" assuming people aren't suffering in the real world that they would otherwise be helping. The reason for wanting to make change is if people are suffering, so if no one is suffering the hedonist would just say sign me up, no?
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There's an interview with Keanu where he tells the story of how he explained the plot of Matrix to some child, who basically replied with "what does it matter if it's real or not?"
Cipher had the right idea
Cipher: "I love steak. Yum yum yum. Even if its fake, I love steak."
Agent Smith, smiling: "As soon as I don't need you anymore, I'm going to turn you into a literal cockroach and step on you."
Cypher really was cyberpunk Ralph Cifaretto.
Neo basically had no free will and had no real choice in the matter anyway. The Architect designed the Matrix so that the One would appear eventually and reset the instance after the rebellion. If he didn’t take the red pill he would have woken up in another way. He only had true free will when he decided to save Trinity.
Neo is basically Christian mythos cyber-Jesus... why would he stay in comfort but aimless boring routine instead of trying to find the truth about the world and make it a better place, even if it means risking his own life? 🤷
I mean its obviously better to live free and without false reality I find it crazy this is even being debated.
Oh, hey Cypher!
There are some takes in these comments.
at least there is no ads there
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