Sati is not just the term for widow's self-immolation. Sati is the name of one of the incarnations of Parvati, the goddess who appears to be the spouse of Siva but is actually half of the being which the two of them together make up; she is the potent form of their energy, (actualization and activity), while he is the potential form of their energy (nascence, stillness).

Sati is a kind of savior. When a cosmos is flooded, she incarnates herself as a boat in which the seeds of all forms of being are kept safe. Sort of like the back-up drive on your computer. She also is a river and other things.

In one story Sati does destroy herself (destroys that particular manifestation of herself, anyhow) in flames. They are the ceremonial flames at her father's palace, and her father has just snubbed and insulted Siva (who is quite alive). Her father wants to have a lovely ceremony, and Shiva is too messy and scary and weird to be invited. By plunging her body into the flames, Sati desecrates them, preventing her father, who has personally rejected the substance of holiness (Shiva) from sanctimoniously performing a public "holy" deed. Her immolation is an act of protest against the sacrilege, spiritual bankruptcy, and hypocricy of religious form without content. It is also interpretted as having many other meanings.

Indian widows who committed suicide were sentimentally compared to Sati and their act was called "the Sati Act", which, of course, it wasn't /isn't. So I doubt that widow-burning was the symbolism that the directors intended in the character's name. If, indeed, they really intended any symbolism at all. I fear they didn't really have any, or else they ultimately couldn't weave together, in a satisfying plot, the many metaphorical threads they spun in the first two movies.

Actually, there was another ship besides the Nebudchanezzer and the Logos, and that ship was the one that crashed. Several people seem to be under the misconception, but if you rewatch Reloaded, you will see it's not the case at all.

Also, I do not think an inconclusive ending is always a sloppily written ending. In fact, I am of the opinion that any ending more conclusive would be ignoring key issues. The implications of the real world (both the Matrix's and ours) do not allow for a nice tie-up to a messy situation. I have to admit to some confusion regarding why you believe an endlessly reborn world instantly signifies the need for a sequel. The Passion of Christ does not have a conclusive ending--it seems it does as he returns to the heavens, only to have angels appear and say, "And he'll be back..." Why should the Neo's story, obviously reflecting Christ (in the more Gnostic than orthodox sense, but Christ nonetheless), be any more neatly tied up?

Kaliyuga,
What marvelous information about Sati! I was under the impression that Sati was sacrificed (as the previously mentioned widow was) when she became a part of Agent Smith. She was then able to revive, or redeem, all the previous programs just as our widow redeemed her ancestors. They were all reborn into the next life, or, the next incarnation of the Matrix. However, the boat symbolism also seems to fit, like a back-up drive on your computer, as you say.
Thank you for the new perspective! Please visit us again, at the Mercuriosity Shop!

Drea-Chan,
Yes, I must have missed that there was another ship during the montage sequence. But you have some great questions!

I agree with you that an inconclusive ending is not always a sloppy ending. Poe's poem--The Raven--is essentially inconclusive. Lenore doesn't return, the Raven never leaves, and the narrator presumably still sits, brooding. Yet the story is satisfying. The haunted tone of the tale, and the narrator's own doomed questions he chooses to ask, knowing full well what the answer will be, help to bring the storyline to its unresolved--yet satisfying ending. And it seems satisfying because the story was written so all of the elements support that ending. It is internally consistent, and I am not left with questions.

The trick of any storyteller is to come up with a conclusive--or at least a satisfying--ending, AND not ignore key issues or questions that the storyteller himself has raised. I think the storteller has the responsibility to the reader to be able to clean up a "messy situation" in their narrative, because the storyteller created the narrative. The movie "Murder by Death" lambastes writers (in this case, bad mystery writers) who drag readers along, and then create a conclusion from elements or characters that had not been previously acknowledged in the story. Such "dirty tricks" are unfair to the reader.

I may not have been clear about my sequel comment. An endlessly repeating story needs no sequel, but unanswered questions such as--why did Neo have the superhuman ability to stop the sentinels outside of the Matrix, or will the denizens of Zion ever get to liberate the sleeping humans from being used as batteries, or if the Architect lied about the Oracle being his opposite number, how can he be trusted to keep his word about leaving the free humans free--seem to call for the need of a sequel to tie up loose ends.

And you are right, the Passion of Christ doesn't have a conclusive ending, but that doesn't stop lots of people from waiting for one to come, even in a blockbuster movie format.

2 things:

1- from my blog: "And while I never thought this bore mentioning because [I felt] it was fairly obvious-- maybe it does.

I don't recall an instance where Neo's "powers" were able to affect anything but the machines. Given the ammount of wires in miseur messiah, I don't think it's too much of a stretch to consider the boy a wireless adaptor.

So even while he was not logged into the Matrix, he was on the network, and consequently able to enter commands.

Just my thoughts on the matter..."

2- The Corporate Mofo Guide to Revolutions:
http://www.corporatemofo.com/stories/031109matrix.htm

Huzzah for discussion!

Concerning the architect, I think the end of Revolutions shows he cannot lie ("What do you think I am? Human?"). He is a logical program--the rationality to the Oracle's faith. In my estimation, the Oracle can lie...or at least bend the truth. She deals in uncertainties. The Architect, however, is a binary figure. He solves the equations, and what comes of the equation is the truth. No questions, no emotions, just correct and incorrect. He is "bound by the parameters of perfection." Therefore, when the Architect says something will happen, it will happen. The Oracle is the opposite. She works in riddles, in questions, and in unexpected conclusions. She takes into account free will--so much so she can never provide conclusive answers. The Oracle and the Architect are the extremes, where humans (Neo specifically) are the middle ground. They are rational, making choices and accepting the consequences, but they are also emotional and changeable.

Perhaps these aspects of the Oracle and the Architect are a bit covert, but I'm of the opinion they're very much there.

You may all get me to like the final installment of The Matrix yet! I found the "Corporate Mofo Guide" that n0sh suggested to be very informative. I had considered the idea that the sentinels may have been responding to the part of Thomas Anderson that was Neo when they stopped working at the end of "Reloaded". Or, to put it another way, that the sentinels were pre-programmed to react a certain way to the human carrying the Neo program. I don't mind connecting the dots so much, as I feel like I'm creating theoretical dots to connect to other theoretical dots just to make the plot work for me.

Other notes on the Oracle: She is patterned on the Oracle at Delphi, who breathed the fumes that rose from the floor of the temple. Read more about the Delphic Oracle at http://pub8.ezboard.com/fbalkanhistoryfrm3.showMessage?topicID=10.topic

This explains why we always see her smoking. And her grandmotherly side is always baking "cookies" that she installs in the other programs.

One theory I heard at the pub was The Merovingian (the term refers to a group of people who were supposed to have descended from the bloodline of Christ) may have been a previous matrix's Neo. For more Merv madness, go here: http://www.21stcenturyradio.com/merovingian-twyman.htm

Well, I think my wireless network theory is supported by a couple of things in Revolutions.

1- After using his powers for the first time, he goes into a sort of trance and his psyche is trapped in a place not on the Matrix. Although, they have to take him back to the matrix to unplug him. Because they don't know any other way to log him off.

2- Once blinded, Neo is able to see the machines as well as machines that are not physically present. Programs running around the network perhaps?

I do believe the machines created Neo as someone to tell them what to do, because they had to, on some level, obey their creators. But they made sure he didn't know he was allowed to tell them what to do.