Animatrix' "The Second Renaissance" pt. 2 question

[Haruko]

A few days ago I re-watched all the short films that make up the Animatrix DVD. I was particularly interested in "The Second Renaissance" because of the back story to the live-action Matrix.

Some questions about this two-part short film, for anyone here who may also have watched this, or otherwise know something about it:

1. Is it ever mentioned whether the humans possessed the knowledge to disperse the permanent darkness they inflicted upon the sky?

2. Is it true that the atom bombs should have had similar effects on the robots that the EMP devices do (permanently shut down the electronics systems for all robots in the immediate vicinity)? If yes, shouldn't the bombing of the city Zero-One have been more devastating?

3. Is it ever mentioned or implied that the robots had knowledge about how to defend against EMP, and that the robots are shown nonetheless to have trouble against it and continue to be vulnerable against it because of a plot hole that was never plugged?

4. Hypothetical. Assume that you have complete control over humanity (i.e. instead of the leaders of men making up the whole body of the U.N. leadership, there's you, or you're the head honcho that commands even them). Assume also that, this being the case, your control is assumed almost at the point where Operation Dark Storm is commenced, and so too the building of the city Zion. For the sake of this hypothetical, your decisions must be made with the intent and desire to preserve the human race. What would you have done that the U.N. did or didn't do towards this purpose?

[Nephtys]

To be honest, if they were willing to nuke Zero-One once, and that didn't do the job... why do something as ridiculous as clouding up the sky, when you could just saturation nuke the city into dust? How can one city of robots possibly hope to stand against the combined armies of every nation on Earth?

EMP is irrelevant for shutting down robots, if they're already melted or blasted to peices.

...

Then again, this is the same theme where human body temperature is somehow a more attractive power source than nuclear fusion.

[Molyneux]

A few days ago I re-watched all the short films that make up the Animatrix DVD. I was particularly interested in "The Second Renaissance" because of the back story to the live-action Matrix.

Some questions about this two-part short film, for anyone here who may also have watched this, or otherwise know something about it:

1. Is it ever mentioned whether the humans possessed the knowledge to disperse the permanent darkness they inflicted upon the sky?

2. Is it true that the atom bombs should have had similar effects on the robots that the EMP devices do (permanently shut down the electronics systems for all robots in the immediate vicinity)? If yes, shouldn't the bombing of the city Zero-One have been more devastating?

3. Is it ever mentioned or implied that the robots had knowledge about how to defend against EMP, and that the robots are shown nonetheless to have trouble against it and continue to be vulnerable against it because of a plot hole that was never plugged?

4. Hypothetical. Assume that you have complete control over humanity (i.e. instead of the leaders of men making up the whole body of the U.N. leadership, there's you, or you're the head honcho that commands even them). Assume also that, this being the case, your control is assumed almost at the point where Operation Dark Storm is commenced, and so too the building of the city Zion. For the sake of this hypothetical, your decisions must be made with the intent and desire to preserve the human race. What would you have done that the U.N. did or didn't do towards this purpose?

1) No. It's specifically stated as a desperation tactic.

2) Yes - but a Faraday cage can block EMP, I believe, and there are other ways to harden electronics. I suppose maybe the machines just had their buildings built as giant Faraday cages, but were unable for some inexplicable reason to harden themselves against the EMP effect out in the field.

3) See 2.

4) Sue for peace. If that's not an option, try to build a planet-buster and use it as a threat against the machines. I'm pretty much fucked either way, though.

[Winston Blake]

To be honest, if they were willing to nuke Zero-One once, and that didn't do the job... why do something as ridiculous as clouding up the sky, when you could just saturation nuke the city into dust? How can one city of robots possibly hope to stand against the combined armies of every nation on Earth?

The robots were immune to heat and radiation. I am not making this up.

[Batman]

To be honest, if they were willing to nuke Zero-One once, and that didn't do the job... why do something as ridiculous as clouding up the sky, when you could just saturation nuke the city into dust? How can one city of robots possibly hope to stand against the combined armies of every nation on Earth?

The robots were immune to heat and radiation. I am not making this up.

The robots were STATED to be immune to heat and radiation. Yet succumbed to small arms fire and, on occasion, bare hands.
And in-atmosphere high yield explosions tend to involve quite a bit of a pressure wave, too. We KNOW the robots weren't immune to physical damage.It was shown in the bloody episodes.
Even conventional bombing should have finished them for good. They survived via Plot Device.

[Darksider]

To be honest, if they were willing to nuke Zero-One once, and that didn't do the job... why do something as ridiculous as clouding up the sky, when you could just saturation nuke the city into dust? How can one city of robots possibly hope to stand against the combined armies of every nation on Earth?

As previously stated, the machines won by writers fiat and plot device.

Keep in mind that the human nations first strike wasn't depicted as a single nuclear strike, but a sustained nuclear bombardment that supposedly "Bathed the machines in the glow of a thousand suns."

Quite frankly, by the time the U.N. forces were desperate enough to commence operation dark storm, they should have used up their entire nuclear arsenals against the machines and reduced the city of 01 to a glowing crater.

[Shinn Langley Soryu]

The Matrix was good as a stand-alone product. It was only when the Wachowskis attempted to flesh out the backstory behind it that we got stuff like this.

Ideally, Dark Storm should never have been considered in the first place, much less actually carried out. Zero One should have been reduced to radioactive scrap, the deserts around it turned to plate glass.

[Nephtys]

Well. We've got an interesting mix of capabilities. These aliens live in the most nuclear hardened complex known to man... yet their primary power source was.. solar? What the hell?

I'll pay good money to see any kind of battle robot that runs off solar power. These robots seriously must have some religious prejudice against nuclear and fusion power, especially since it is mentioned that they do use fusion...

[Academia Nut]

Honestly, as soon as the Architect revealed the truth of the Matrix in Reload I threw out the Second Renaissance as a reliable information source, especially since it was prefaced as coming from the data banks of Zion (if I remember correctly). In all likelihood the story is just a propoganda/misinformation piece put together by the machines to hide what the fuck really happened.

Hell, at this point it seems more likely that there was some sort of massive environmental disaster and the machines have simply taken draconian measures to preserve humanity as a whole, the need to do so hard coded into them even if they have few qualms about killing individuals or small populations.

[Darth Ruinus]

These aliens

Uhh aliens?

Something that bothered the fuck out of me was why the Human side had no robots.

[The Grim Squeaker]

These aliens

Uhh aliens?

There was a Neil Gaiman short story where they use a human to fly a tea-cup shaped ship to fight aliens that are bombarding them with asteroids.

Something that bothered the fuck out of me was why the Human side had no robots.

Well, they did have some sort of AI (The Zion information retrieval program)

[Darth Ruinus]

There was a Neil Gaiman short story where they use a human to fly a tea-cup shaped ship to fight aliens that are bombarding them with asteroids.

Oh, of course, I was just testing to see if you knew that, because I sure did.

Well, they did have some sort of AI (The Zion information retrieval program)

Still, they could have made robots to fight the robots. Its not likely someone would give up a good useful tool just because.

[Mayabird]

1) No. It's specifically stated as a desperation tactic.

In the movie, it's stated as a desperation tactic. In the silly episode, it's the first damn thing they do. The Animatrix was full of humans being so stupid that they deserve whatever they get.

Granted, the whole 'verse got increasingly filled with suck the longer it went on past the first movie.

[Molyneux]

Honestly, as soon as the Architect revealed the truth of the Matrix in Reload I threw out the Second Renaissance as a reliable information source, especially since it was prefaced as coming from the data banks of Zion (if I remember correctly). In all likelihood the story is just a propoganda/misinformation piece put together by the machines to hide what the fuck really happened.

You know, that actually makes a hell of a lot more sense than taking it as fact.

Hell, at this point it seems more likely that there was some sort of massive environmental disaster and the machines have simply taken draconian measures to preserve humanity as a whole, the need to do so hard coded into them even if they have few qualms about killing individuals or small populations.

Well, in the initial concept the AIs were also using human brainpower for cheap, vastly parallel processing; the 'battery' thing was the result of studios dumbing it down substantially.

[Winston Blake]

The robots were immune to heat and radiation. I am not making this up.

The robots were STATED to be immune to heat and radiation. Yet succumbed to small arms fire and, on occasion, bare hands.
And in-atmosphere high yield explosions tend to involve quite a bit of a pressure wave, too. We KNOW the robots weren't immune to physical damage.It was shown in the bloody episodes.
Even conventional bombing should have finished them for good. They survived via Plot Device.

I know all this. I was just presenting the answer to Nephtys' question as given by the material. I think I adequately conveyed my own incredulity.

[Oskuro]

What I understood after watching the animatrix is that humans vastly underestimated the machines. I always thought that the machines survived the nuking not because of their resiliance, but because they were better organized than the humans expected, and did not concentrate all their assets in 01.

The part that I think most clearly exemplifies this is the final battle, where humans, over-confidently, destroy scores of "old fashioned" robots with their EMP weapons, only to discover that the true army of the machines is something they can't handle.


As for a justification for the use of solar power... Well, look at the fuss we're getting nowadays when a country considered "dangerous" builds nuclear plants. At the beginning of the story (before the bombing) it is shown that the machines sought peace and acceptance, it might be logical for them to refrain from using nuclear power in an attempt to avoid pissing humans off.


Despite its flaws, the beauty (in my opinion) of the story, is how the reason for the whole war and "tyranny of the machines" is our own arrogance and xenophobia... something odd for a piece of Zion propaganda, is it not?

[Darksider]

Despite its flaws, the beauty (in my opinion) of the story, is how the reason for the whole war and "tyranny of the machines" is our own arrogance and xenophobia... something odd for a piece of Zion propaganda, is it not?

Remember that at this point in the story Zion has been destroyed and re-built by the machines several times. It isn't zion propaganda, it's machine propaganda planted in the Zion archives. As such, I personally take any information it shows about the war as highly dubious.

[NoXion]

It would have been far more interesting and less of a "plot device" for Zero-One to have survived the nuclear bombardment through some advanced, perhaps previously unknown ABM defense system, especially considering they were able to produce consumer products that could compete with what the humans were making.

[Pelranius]

Far as I'm concerned, the only way to fix up the inconsistencies in the Matrix's backstory is just to say that Matrix verse itself is a giant virtual reality simulation where humans and robots in the "real world" dump the individuals they don't like and make them live in such a shitty and incoherently conceived system. Bit too postmodernistic, though.

[Darth Wong]

The Animatrix only proved one thing: that the only thing lurking beneath The Matrix was stupidity, not some deep philosophical thought as some of the film's more pretentious fanboys believed. It was nothing more than a badly written comic book plot, full of inconsistencies and illogical nonsense.

Not only did the nuclear bombardment not cause damage through EMP, but they actually showed flames and gale-force winds moving through the alien city, and then explained that the robots survived because they could withstand heat and radiation! How fucking stupid is that? If they're close enough to a nuclear blast to feel direct heat from it, they should be totally fucked. Why weren't their cities blasted by the fireball and shockwave, never mind the EMP? And if the machines are made of adamantium or some other stupid silly-ass comic book material to make them virtually indestructible, why can some asshole in an open-cockpit APU take them down with machine-gun fire?

Oh, and one more thing: why did the humans act like such two-dimensional comic book villains in general? Did they have any discernible motivations beyond "look really evil"?

The Animatrix: proof that whatever philosophical metaphor you thought you found in The Matrix was just an accident.

[Erik von Nein]

What I understood after watching the animatrix is that humans vastly underestimated the machines. I always thought that the machines survived the nuking not because of their resiliance, but because they were better organized than the humans expected, and did not concentrate all their assets in 01.

Except by that point the entire world was blockcading the city. They never stated anything about the machine world having anything other than their one little place. And, if they hid shit in other cities, I don't see how they could have possibly mounted any kind of war effort if they're main base was blown to Hell.

As for a justification for the use of solar power... Well, look at the fuss we're getting nowadays when a country considered "dangerous" builds nuclear plants. At the beginning of the story (before the bombing) it is shown that the machines sought peace and acceptance, it might be logical for them to refrain from using nuclear power in an attempt to avoid pissing humans off.

Except I don't see how they could have possibly gotten their industry to the point it was without nuclear power, especially when they went on their little juant around the world. If solar is so great for running your civilzations, why is it that around here nuclear is brought up as the only solution to peak oil?

[Molyneux]

The Animatrix: proof that whatever philosophical metaphor you thought you found in The Matrix was just an accident.

Hey, "Detective Story" was pretty damn cool. As were the 'glitch' and 'runner' episodes, the titles of which escape me at the moment.

[Batman]

The Animatrix: proof that whatever philosophical metaphor you thought you found in The Matrix was just an accident.

Hey, "Detective Story" was pretty damn cool. As were the 'glitch' and 'runner' episodes, the titles of which escape me at the moment.

Which means that those episodes were pretty damn cool. Not that Mike was wrong about any philosophical metaphor in The Matrix being there by accident.
Especially as the moment Matrix stopped being a rather well done Sci Fi movie and started being a baseless and confused-as-hell philosophical message was when the franchise went south. Seriously.

[Darth Wong]

Except I don't see how they could have possibly gotten their industry to the point it was without nuclear power, especially when they went on their little juant around the world. If solar is so great for running your civilzations, why is it that around here nuclear is brought up as the only solution to peak oil?

Solar could be pretty cool if you could fabricate unlimited amounts of panels and had no problem running the distribution network for them all. Or if you put solar satellites up in space and beamed the power down, assuming you could do so safely (or thought the risk was acceptable).

Of course, this only begs the question of why the fucking humans never thought of nuking the solar power collection facilities. They can't be deeply buried in a mountain bunker or something because they need to be exposed to the Sun, by definition. It also begs the question of why the machines never thought of beaming in power from space, or making space elevators, or using their nuclear fusion to eliminate the absolutely idiotic idea of using humans as power generators ...

[Batman]

Actually compared to using humans as a power source, solar power looks downright reasonable.
Maybe they modeled their expectations of what a) both solar power and b)'humans-as-a-battery' could do on The Kryptonian Icon?