How deep does the rabbit hole go?
Warning: Reloaded spoilers. Material contributed by Neal and Karen M.

My wife and I left the theater thinking that Matrix: Reloaded was good, but nothing quite as special as the first groundbreaking movie. The fight scenes were incredible, but the story line seemed to be just continuing along with no added depth. Neo is the human savior whose special abilities, which he randomly possesses, will enable him to save humans from enslavement to the machines they created. Statistically after billions and billions of humans had been born within the energy harvesting fields of the machines, one was sooner or later bound to have the unique gifts to do this job within the Matrix. It wasn’t until my wife uttered six simple words that the house of cards of what I thought the movie was about began to tumble in my mind, and we both realized that the rabbit hole may very well go deeper.

"I think Neo is a program."

She went on to explain how Neo could actually effect the sentinels outside of the Matrix. He shouldn’t be able to do that, we both realized. Unless he is still in the Matrix, which leads to our second shocking conclusion: the ships, the transfer process into the Matrix, Zion are all part of the elaborate house of mirrors that is the Matrix.

In Hollywood movies, we know that there is always one last pocket of human resistance fighters left to battle the aliens with their rag tag equipment that they salvaged. We root for Zion because they are us, our last hope. Even the critics mocked Zion in their reviews (left over sets from Mad Max Thunderdome, cliché characters etc.). This ironically works well if Zion is indeed a divergent reality for those who do not accept the Matrix. Wouldn’t this be what our human minds expect Zion to be like? The human dance/orgy ceremony that was so tribal and seemingly primitive would also be exactly how the machines would view human behavior: lives spent in a continuous rave party of debauchery, humans gratifying their every carnal lust.

As the council member said to Neo, the people of Zion do not even know how the equipment that they need for survival works, and most never ventured down to see those machines. How would this even be possible when their very existence depended on them? How did they get set up to begin with? It is all part of the series of programs, allowing people to spend their time sweatily dancing and partying while thinking they have rejected the Matrix. They think they are separate and superior to the zombie horde that accepts the Matrix, when in fact they are just as much playing their "part" as the others are. They are the cliché rebels.

The Oracle is a program whose purpose is to give hope to those who opt out of the traditional Matrix and choose Zion, and to steer the program Neo toward his sole mission: rebooting Zion. The Oracle and the Keymaker programs get Neo to where he needs to go. The Oracle makes corrections to Neo's code if he becomes errant. Her "most programs run smoothly and you don’t even know they are there until they mess up" speech seems to be aimed directly at Neo. "You are messing up, quit being distracted and do what you are programmed to do," seems to be her message. The Keymaker allows access the mainframe. Both programs do their job.

There are several references to previous Neos doing this task. The appearance of a One cannot be something that the Architect leaves to chance, but instead it is designed into the system. When the system is ready the One program is activated. Neo is not a random anomaly, as the Architect later confirms he was "designed" to do this job. He was written with the abilities to defeat the security programs (Agents) and gain access to the mainframe to deposit the code that will reboot Zion.

"The function of the One is now to return to the source allowing a temporary dissemination of the code you carry reinserting the prime program after which you will be required to select from the matrix 23 individuals, 16 female 7 male, to rebuild Zion. Failure to comply with this process will result in a cataclysmic system crash killing everyone connected to the matrix. Which, coupled with the extermination of Zion will ultimately result in the extinction of the entire human race."

Neo is not the least bit amazed by being told that he carries the needed code that must go into the mainframe. This is where he begins to understand his true nature, which allows him to do what he does to the sentinels at the end of the movie. (Another irony is the critics trashing Keanu’s acting as wooden or robotic. Wait until they find out there is a reason for such a performance, just as there was a reason for Zion being so formulaic.) Neo falls into a coma at the end of the movie. The program, now working far outside its normal parameters, has become very unstable. It is also becoming aware of itself and its true nature.