Neo/Morpheus from The Matrix
Oct. 23rd, 2004 02:40 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
jjtaylor.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
ship_manifestoTitle: I've Spent My Entire Life Looking For You
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jjtaylor
Pairing: Neo/Morpheus
Spoilers: For pretty much everything.
Notes: Thanks to sprencious for indulging me.
Quick review of the Matrix canon:
The three movies - The Matrix, The Matrix: Reloaded, and The Matrix: Revolutions
The Matrix video game - Enter the Matrix
The nine animated stories set in the Matrix universe - The Animatrix
The Matrix comics - so far, I think only one volume is published
The Matrix website - www.whatisthematrix.com
About Neo/Morpheus:
Imagine you're a lonely hacker who suspects there's some big secret the world is keeping from you. You know that if you can just find this one person, this one guide, this man of mystery you've been searching for, then you'll be free. That man finds you first, and he invites you to have a chat with him. On a rainy night. In an abandoned hotel. He wears a fancy suit and a long jacket and he does not take off his mirrored sunglasses. He's flirting with you. He tells you he can give you everything. All you have to do is to do what he says. You agree. The next thing you know, you're in a new world, the real world, and everything you know has changed. Except that mystery man. He's there to guide you, to teach you. What's more, he tells you you're special, that he's been looking for you all of his life, that he believes you are the only one who can save the world. He's willing to sacrifice his life for yours. He continues to believe in you even when you don't believe in yourself, to devote himself to you until the very last moment of your life. Hard to resist, isn't it?
The two most important aspects of Neo/Morpheus are the relationship between a teacher-student (or a guide and the guided) and the relationship between a savior and a believer. The majority of the Neo/Morpheus interaction occurs in the first movie, because that is when Morpheus' role as rescuer, instructor, and friend is most vital and most influential.
In The Matrix, Neo, still plugged into the Matrix, is searching for Morpheus. While this is a scene with Trinity/Neo overtones, it also reveals Neo's obsession with finding Morpheus:
Trinity: Please just listen. I know why you're here, Neo. I know what you've been doing. I know why you hardly sleep, why you live alone, and why night after night you sit at your computer. You're looking for him. I know, because I was once looking for the same thing. And when he found me, he told me I wasn't really looking for him. I was looking for an answer. It's the question that drives us, Neo. It's the question that brought you here. You know the question just as I did.
Neo: What is the Matrix?
Trinity: The answer is out there, Neo. It's looking for you. And it will find you, if you want it to.
In a scene soon after, Morpheus attempts to make contact with Neo. He's talking to Neo through a cell phone.
Morpheus: Hello Neo. Do you know who this is?
Neo: Morpheus.
Morpheus: Yes. I've been looking for you, Neo. I don't know if you're ready to see what I want to show you, but unfortunately you and I have run out of time. They're coming for you, Neo, and I don't know what they're going to do.
The key to this otherwise straightforward dialog is Morpheus' voice. He's sultry. And Neo is only able to go through with what Morpheus is asking as long as Morpheus coaches him. When Neo drops the phone, he gives up.
Morpheus calls Neo again because it has become important that they meet. We have yet to even see Morpheus at this point, but there's an imperative in his voice that Neo finds unable to resist.
Morpheus: This line is tapped, so I must be brief. They got to you first, but they've underestimated how important you are. If they knew what I know, you'd probably be dead.
Neo: What are you talking about. What... what is happening to me?
Morpheus: You are The One, Neo. You see, you may have spent the last few years looking for me, but I've spent my entire life looking for you. Now do you still want to meet?
The scene where they meet, and where Neo is famously offered the choice between a red or blue pill, is possibly the flirtiest scene I've ever scene. Morpheus is offering a new world to Neo, Neo is accepting his offer, and there is an almost unbelievable amount of subtext in the exchange. Morpheus holding court, steepling his fingers, staring down Neo, making him promises, and Neo is rapt.
Morpheus: At last. Welcome, Neo. As you no doubt have guessed, I am Morpheus.
Neo: It's an honor to meet you.
Morpheus: No, the honor is mine. Please, come. Sit. I imagine that right now you're feeling a bit like Alice, tumbling down the rabbit hole? Hm?
Neo: You could say that.
Morpheus: I can see it in your eyes. You have the look of a man who accepts what he sees because he is expecting to wake up. Ironically, this is not far from the truth. Do you believe in fate, Neo?
Neo: No.
Morpheus: Why not?
Neo: Because I don't like the idea that I'm not in control of my life.
Morpheus: I know exactly what you mean. Let me tell you why you're here. You're here because you know something. What you know you can't explain. But you feel it. You've felt it your entire life. That there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is but it's there, like a splinter in your mind driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I'm talking about?
Neo: The Matrix?
Morpheus: Do you want to know what it is? The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us, even now in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work, when you go to church, when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Morpheus: That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage, born into a prison that you cannot smell or taste or touch. A prison for your mind.... Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself. This is your last chance. After this there is no turning back. You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes... Remember, all I'm offering is the truth, nothing more... Follow me...
Once Neo is freed, Morpheus becomes his teacher, explaining the Matrix and trying to protecting Neo from the harshness of the transition into the real world. They share a number of scenes alone, often standing side by side while Morpheus instructs and Neo listens.
Neo has a particularly difficult day of training, and Morpheus visits Neo's bedroom at the end of the day, hoping to ease Neo's worries. The tone of the scene rests heavily on the way Morpheus is sitting, the way he holds his body around Neo.
Neo: I can't go back, can I?
Morpheus: No. But if you could, would you really want to? I feel I owe you an apology. We have a rule. We never free a mind once it's reached a certain age. It's dangerous, the mind has trouble letting go. I've seen it before and I'm sorry. I did what I did because...I had to. When the Matrix was first built, there was a man born inside who had the ability to change whatever he wanted, to remake the Matrix as he saw fit. It was he who freed the first of us, taught us the truth: 'As long as the Matrix exists the human race will never be free.' After he died the Oracle prophesied his return and that his coming would hail the destruction of the Matrix, end the war, bring freedom to our people. That is why there are those of us who have spent our entire lives searching the Matrix looking for him. I did what I did because I believe that search is over.... Get some rest, you're going to need it.
Neo: For what?
Morpheus: Your training.
Morpheus' belief in Neo, and his insistence that Neo is the One, is so powerful that it is enough to convert Neo to the belief, until Neo visits the Oracle and is told otherwise. The Oracle also gives Neo the prediction that he will have to trade his life for Morpheus', and Neo isn't sure what to be more shocked about.
Neo: Morpheus. He...he almost had me convinced.
The Oracle: I know. Poor Morpheus. Without him we're lost.
Neo: What do you mean, without him?
The Oracle: Are you sure you want to hear this? Morpheus believes in you, Neo. And no one, not you, not even me can convince him otherwise. He believes it so blindly that he's going to sacrifice his life to save yours.
Neo: What?
The Oracle: You're going to have to make a choice. In the one hand you'll have Morpheus' life and in the other hand you'll have your own. One of you is going to die. Which one will be up to you.
On their way back from visiting the Oracle, Morpheus is captured by Agents when he sacrifices himself so that Neo can escape. Neo insists on returning to the Matrix to save Morpheus, fulfiling the Oracle's prophesy. Neo's line of reasoning in his argument with his crewmates reveals much about his feelings about Morpheus.
Neo: I'm going in.
Trinity: No you're not.
Neo: I have to.
Trinity: Neo, Morpheus sacrificed himself so that he could get you out. There's no way that you're going back in.
Neo: Morpheus did what he did because he believed I am something I'm not.
Trinity: What?
Neo: I'm not the one, Trinity.
Tank: Neo, this is loco. They've got Morpheus in a military controlled building. Even if you somehow got inside, those are agents holding him. Three of them. I want Morpheus back too, but what you're talking about is suicide.
Neo: I know that's what it looks like, but it's not. I can't explain to you why it's not. Morpheus believed something and he was ready to give his life for what he believed. I understand that now. That's why I have to go.
Tank: Why?
Neo: Because I believe in something.
Trinity: What?
Neo: I believe I can bring him back....
So, Neo breaks into the building where Morpheus is being held, kills everyone, blows up an elevator, makes it to the roof and steals a helicopter, flies it to the floor Morpheus is on, shoots in the windows, and then when Morpheus can't make the leap from the building into the hovering helicopter, Neo ties a rope around his waist and leaps out of the helicopter to catch Morphues midair. They fly toward each other with their arms outstretched.
So much of the emotional impact of moments the Matrix movies rely solely on visuals, and so the Neo/Morpheus interaction fades to silent moments together in Reloaded and Revolutions. They are generally standing together, walking together, fighting together, but we're offered little more than a sideways glance or an implied reaction for most of the next two movies.
This scene, where Morpheus' faith is suddenly shaken, comes at the end of Reloaded. Neo is the one to bring the news to Morpheus and has the responsibility of convincing him that he may have believed a lie:
Morpheus: I don't understand it. Everything was done as it was supposed to be done. Once The One reaches the Source, the war should be over.
Neo: In 24 hours it will be.
Morpheus: What?
Neo: If we don't do something in 24 hours, Zion will be destroyed.
Morpheus: That's impossible, the prophecy tells us...
Neo: It was a lie, Morpheus. The prophecy was a lie. The One was never meant to end anything. It was all another system of control.
Morpheus: I don't believe that.
Neo: But you said it yourself - how can the prophecy be true if the war isn't over? I'm sorry. I know it isn't easy to hear, but I swear to you it's the truth.
In Revolutions, Neo goes missing and remains trapped inside the Matrix. Morpheus asks the operator to go above and beyond in his search for Neo.
Morpheus: Roland. I'd like to run another search through the Matrix.
Roland: For what?
Morpheus: For Neo.
AK: How can he be in the Matrix, sir? He's not plugged in.
Morpheus: Please, for me.
Neo's world-saving mission eventually forces him to leave Morpheus, and their parting scene is so restrained it seems that it was so difficult a moment that neither of them is able to show any emotional at all.
Morpheus: I can only hope you know what you're doing.
Neo: Me, too. It was an honor, sir.
Morpheus: No, the honor's still mine.
As Neo leaves for the Machine City, Morpheus defends Neo from the crew:
Roland: None, it's completely impossible, but he wouldn't listen. He wouldn't even take any ammunition. He was totally out of his goddamn mind.
Morpheus: No, he wasn't. Neo is doing what he believes he must do. I don't know if what he's doing is right, and I don't know if he'll reach the machine city. And if he does, I don't know what he can do to save us. But I do know that as long as there's a single breath in his body, he will not give up. And neither can we.
Morpheus does not give up; even as Neo fights to his death, Morpheus waits in Zion, believing in him.
Fic:
The Matrix fandom is small, and Neo/Morpheus is even smaller, but here are a few stories that caught my eye:
The One
Making It Real
Alethia
If you have questions about how Trinity fits into all of this, if want to talk more about Morpheus' voice or the dynamics of sparring, or if you have a fic you think I should read, comment or drop me an email. And if you haven't seen the movies, or you didn't like them all that much the first time around, watch them (again) soon, for Neo/Morpheus' sake, at least.
Author:
jjtaylorPairing: Neo/Morpheus
Spoilers: For pretty much everything.
Notes: Thanks to sprencious for indulging me.
Quick review of the Matrix canon:
The three movies - The Matrix, The Matrix: Reloaded, and The Matrix: Revolutions
The Matrix video game - Enter the Matrix
The nine animated stories set in the Matrix universe - The Animatrix
The Matrix comics - so far, I think only one volume is published
The Matrix website - www.whatisthematrix.com
About Neo/Morpheus:
Imagine you're a lonely hacker who suspects there's some big secret the world is keeping from you. You know that if you can just find this one person, this one guide, this man of mystery you've been searching for, then you'll be free. That man finds you first, and he invites you to have a chat with him. On a rainy night. In an abandoned hotel. He wears a fancy suit and a long jacket and he does not take off his mirrored sunglasses. He's flirting with you. He tells you he can give you everything. All you have to do is to do what he says. You agree. The next thing you know, you're in a new world, the real world, and everything you know has changed. Except that mystery man. He's there to guide you, to teach you. What's more, he tells you you're special, that he's been looking for you all of his life, that he believes you are the only one who can save the world. He's willing to sacrifice his life for yours. He continues to believe in you even when you don't believe in yourself, to devote himself to you until the very last moment of your life. Hard to resist, isn't it?
The two most important aspects of Neo/Morpheus are the relationship between a teacher-student (or a guide and the guided) and the relationship between a savior and a believer. The majority of the Neo/Morpheus interaction occurs in the first movie, because that is when Morpheus' role as rescuer, instructor, and friend is most vital and most influential.
In The Matrix, Neo, still plugged into the Matrix, is searching for Morpheus. While this is a scene with Trinity/Neo overtones, it also reveals Neo's obsession with finding Morpheus:
Trinity: Please just listen. I know why you're here, Neo. I know what you've been doing. I know why you hardly sleep, why you live alone, and why night after night you sit at your computer. You're looking for him. I know, because I was once looking for the same thing. And when he found me, he told me I wasn't really looking for him. I was looking for an answer. It's the question that drives us, Neo. It's the question that brought you here. You know the question just as I did.
Neo: What is the Matrix?
Trinity: The answer is out there, Neo. It's looking for you. And it will find you, if you want it to.
In a scene soon after, Morpheus attempts to make contact with Neo. He's talking to Neo through a cell phone.
Morpheus: Hello Neo. Do you know who this is?
Neo: Morpheus.
Morpheus: Yes. I've been looking for you, Neo. I don't know if you're ready to see what I want to show you, but unfortunately you and I have run out of time. They're coming for you, Neo, and I don't know what they're going to do.
The key to this otherwise straightforward dialog is Morpheus' voice. He's sultry. And Neo is only able to go through with what Morpheus is asking as long as Morpheus coaches him. When Neo drops the phone, he gives up.
Morpheus calls Neo again because it has become important that they meet. We have yet to even see Morpheus at this point, but there's an imperative in his voice that Neo finds unable to resist.
Morpheus: This line is tapped, so I must be brief. They got to you first, but they've underestimated how important you are. If they knew what I know, you'd probably be dead.
Neo: What are you talking about. What... what is happening to me?
Morpheus: You are The One, Neo. You see, you may have spent the last few years looking for me, but I've spent my entire life looking for you. Now do you still want to meet?
The scene where they meet, and where Neo is famously offered the choice between a red or blue pill, is possibly the flirtiest scene I've ever scene. Morpheus is offering a new world to Neo, Neo is accepting his offer, and there is an almost unbelievable amount of subtext in the exchange. Morpheus holding court, steepling his fingers, staring down Neo, making him promises, and Neo is rapt.
Morpheus: At last. Welcome, Neo. As you no doubt have guessed, I am Morpheus.
Neo: It's an honor to meet you.
Morpheus: No, the honor is mine. Please, come. Sit. I imagine that right now you're feeling a bit like Alice, tumbling down the rabbit hole? Hm?
Neo: You could say that.
Morpheus: I can see it in your eyes. You have the look of a man who accepts what he sees because he is expecting to wake up. Ironically, this is not far from the truth. Do you believe in fate, Neo?
Neo: No.
Morpheus: Why not?
Neo: Because I don't like the idea that I'm not in control of my life.
Morpheus: I know exactly what you mean. Let me tell you why you're here. You're here because you know something. What you know you can't explain. But you feel it. You've felt it your entire life. That there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is but it's there, like a splinter in your mind driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I'm talking about?
Neo: The Matrix?
Morpheus: Do you want to know what it is? The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us, even now in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work, when you go to church, when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Morpheus: That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage, born into a prison that you cannot smell or taste or touch. A prison for your mind.... Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself. This is your last chance. After this there is no turning back. You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes... Remember, all I'm offering is the truth, nothing more... Follow me...
Once Neo is freed, Morpheus becomes his teacher, explaining the Matrix and trying to protecting Neo from the harshness of the transition into the real world. They share a number of scenes alone, often standing side by side while Morpheus instructs and Neo listens.
Neo has a particularly difficult day of training, and Morpheus visits Neo's bedroom at the end of the day, hoping to ease Neo's worries. The tone of the scene rests heavily on the way Morpheus is sitting, the way he holds his body around Neo.
Neo: I can't go back, can I?
Morpheus: No. But if you could, would you really want to? I feel I owe you an apology. We have a rule. We never free a mind once it's reached a certain age. It's dangerous, the mind has trouble letting go. I've seen it before and I'm sorry. I did what I did because...I had to. When the Matrix was first built, there was a man born inside who had the ability to change whatever he wanted, to remake the Matrix as he saw fit. It was he who freed the first of us, taught us the truth: 'As long as the Matrix exists the human race will never be free.' After he died the Oracle prophesied his return and that his coming would hail the destruction of the Matrix, end the war, bring freedom to our people. That is why there are those of us who have spent our entire lives searching the Matrix looking for him. I did what I did because I believe that search is over.... Get some rest, you're going to need it.
Neo: For what?
Morpheus: Your training.
Morpheus' belief in Neo, and his insistence that Neo is the One, is so powerful that it is enough to convert Neo to the belief, until Neo visits the Oracle and is told otherwise. The Oracle also gives Neo the prediction that he will have to trade his life for Morpheus', and Neo isn't sure what to be more shocked about.
Neo: Morpheus. He...he almost had me convinced.
The Oracle: I know. Poor Morpheus. Without him we're lost.
Neo: What do you mean, without him?
The Oracle: Are you sure you want to hear this? Morpheus believes in you, Neo. And no one, not you, not even me can convince him otherwise. He believes it so blindly that he's going to sacrifice his life to save yours.
Neo: What?
The Oracle: You're going to have to make a choice. In the one hand you'll have Morpheus' life and in the other hand you'll have your own. One of you is going to die. Which one will be up to you.
On their way back from visiting the Oracle, Morpheus is captured by Agents when he sacrifices himself so that Neo can escape. Neo insists on returning to the Matrix to save Morpheus, fulfiling the Oracle's prophesy. Neo's line of reasoning in his argument with his crewmates reveals much about his feelings about Morpheus.
Neo: I'm going in.
Trinity: No you're not.
Neo: I have to.
Trinity: Neo, Morpheus sacrificed himself so that he could get you out. There's no way that you're going back in.
Neo: Morpheus did what he did because he believed I am something I'm not.
Trinity: What?
Neo: I'm not the one, Trinity.
Tank: Neo, this is loco. They've got Morpheus in a military controlled building. Even if you somehow got inside, those are agents holding him. Three of them. I want Morpheus back too, but what you're talking about is suicide.
Neo: I know that's what it looks like, but it's not. I can't explain to you why it's not. Morpheus believed something and he was ready to give his life for what he believed. I understand that now. That's why I have to go.
Tank: Why?
Neo: Because I believe in something.
Trinity: What?
Neo: I believe I can bring him back....
So, Neo breaks into the building where Morpheus is being held, kills everyone, blows up an elevator, makes it to the roof and steals a helicopter, flies it to the floor Morpheus is on, shoots in the windows, and then when Morpheus can't make the leap from the building into the hovering helicopter, Neo ties a rope around his waist and leaps out of the helicopter to catch Morphues midair. They fly toward each other with their arms outstretched.
So much of the emotional impact of moments the Matrix movies rely solely on visuals, and so the Neo/Morpheus interaction fades to silent moments together in Reloaded and Revolutions. They are generally standing together, walking together, fighting together, but we're offered little more than a sideways glance or an implied reaction for most of the next two movies.
This scene, where Morpheus' faith is suddenly shaken, comes at the end of Reloaded. Neo is the one to bring the news to Morpheus and has the responsibility of convincing him that he may have believed a lie:
Morpheus: I don't understand it. Everything was done as it was supposed to be done. Once The One reaches the Source, the war should be over.
Neo: In 24 hours it will be.
Morpheus: What?
Neo: If we don't do something in 24 hours, Zion will be destroyed.
Morpheus: That's impossible, the prophecy tells us...
Neo: It was a lie, Morpheus. The prophecy was a lie. The One was never meant to end anything. It was all another system of control.
Morpheus: I don't believe that.
Neo: But you said it yourself - how can the prophecy be true if the war isn't over? I'm sorry. I know it isn't easy to hear, but I swear to you it's the truth.
In Revolutions, Neo goes missing and remains trapped inside the Matrix. Morpheus asks the operator to go above and beyond in his search for Neo.
Morpheus: Roland. I'd like to run another search through the Matrix.
Roland: For what?
Morpheus: For Neo.
AK: How can he be in the Matrix, sir? He's not plugged in.
Morpheus: Please, for me.
Neo's world-saving mission eventually forces him to leave Morpheus, and their parting scene is so restrained it seems that it was so difficult a moment that neither of them is able to show any emotional at all.
Morpheus: I can only hope you know what you're doing.
Neo: Me, too. It was an honor, sir.
Morpheus: No, the honor's still mine.
As Neo leaves for the Machine City, Morpheus defends Neo from the crew:
Roland: None, it's completely impossible, but he wouldn't listen. He wouldn't even take any ammunition. He was totally out of his goddamn mind.
Morpheus: No, he wasn't. Neo is doing what he believes he must do. I don't know if what he's doing is right, and I don't know if he'll reach the machine city. And if he does, I don't know what he can do to save us. But I do know that as long as there's a single breath in his body, he will not give up. And neither can we.
Morpheus does not give up; even as Neo fights to his death, Morpheus waits in Zion, believing in him.
Fic:
The Matrix fandom is small, and Neo/Morpheus is even smaller, but here are a few stories that caught my eye:
The One
Making It Real
Alethia
If you have questions about how Trinity fits into all of this, if want to talk more about Morpheus' voice or the dynamics of sparring, or if you have a fic you think I should read, comment or drop me an email. And if you haven't seen the movies, or you didn't like them all that much the first time around, watch them (again) soon, for Neo/Morpheus' sake, at least.
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