OK, I just saw Reloaded again last night and the line when Trinity says "You know what they say about the life you save." has been eating away at me... just an itch that I can't scratch...

So I thought I would post here and see if anyone had any insight...

What does she mean?

The only thing I could come up with is... is the saying "The life you save may be your own." but I don't see how that would have any relevance to the situation with the kid worshipping Neo...

I googled and searched and found nothing...

Any help?

Maybe that you might regret it. Similar to the expression "No good deed goes unpunished".

You're responsible for the life you save? [though that's not quite how it is usually said]

dtcarson is right; I believe it is based in ancient Chinese philosophy. Now that he's saved the kid, Neo's responsible for him, so he better just get comfortable with the adoration...

Please, lets not discuss this travesty anymore.

I thought Reloaded was pretty damn good. Cut out that damn rave scene in the beginning and I think the film is as good as the first one. The third one is another story though.

The comment about the "life you save" refers back to the Animatrix. There is a skit where the boy is contacted by Neo. The boy takes his own life, essentially taking himself out of the matrix. Then the boy follows Neo around, because he feels he "owes" his life to Neo for showing him the truth. Hence the reason for Trinity's comment.

Thanks for the responses guys. Greatly appreciated.

IMHO the second and third are equally bad. The only reason the second one gets a pass while the third doesn't is that the second raises bad questions while the third has the horrible answers.

All IMO...I honestly don't know why people assign so much reverence to the first film.
It seems like the sequels are lambasted solely by contrast to this first, philosophically transcendent, deeper than space prophetic masterpiece. The Wachowski brood basically went in saying that they wanted to do a live action Ghost in the Shell. It's as if the subject of "what is real?" has never been tackled by Mamoru Oshii, Shirow Masamune or William Gibson (let alone P.K. Dick). A lot of people I know think of the first one as groundbreaking when it's really extremely imitative with freakishly poor pseudo science. (Using humans for BTUs??? It would take way more energy than they would produce to keep their bodies alive and that doesn't account for the operation of the immense mainframe to keep them entertained.)

Did I like it, though? Yup. It was fun. I also think the sequels are fun. I like a lot of stuff in the sequels better than any scenes in the original. To me it was a fine trilogy. None of the films holds up to serious scrutiny and I wouldn't watch them enough to justify owning them, but they blow away the recent Star Wars movies and do their job. Entertainment.

(Animatrix on the other hand is seriously worth owning. I watch that thing all the time and its existence alone justifies the whole of the project.)

The whole Matrix trilogy is a work of art. Sure the sequels may be not as good as the first one, but as a whole, they are excellent. I'm sure the Watchowskis did not have the two sequels in mind when doing the first one, just like George Lucas did not have the two sequels as well as the prequels in mind (especially the prequels). The Watchoskis are master directors and writers. Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions are still excellent and intelligent action movies. Audiences didn't like the sequels because people wanted more questions and clear answers, which they could use in their lives as The Matrix inspired many peoples thoughts and lives. The Matrix is like a seminar led by Jesus Christ, Tony Robbins, Susie Ormon, or Joyce Meyers. But in Matrix Reloaded and Revolutions, the gurus left the building. But they were still intelligent kick-ass action/sci-fi films!

The Matrix: Reloaded, Explained

The Matrix: Revolutions, Explained