Cypher was supposed to be the one before Neo
Fake Steaks over real gruel
In the matrix Cypher is one of the most enigmatic characters. On the surface he seems shallow. The most memorable scene is him eating steak with Agent Smith discussing his eventual betrayal .
In the end during his betrayal he comes off as a cardboard cut out of a villain but one presupposition changes everything.
Cypher was supposed to be the one. That was what he was sold on. And through his own experiences Cypher developed a philosophy which was essentially “Reality is overrated”
Imagine for a while that you went through the exact same arc that Neo did
You are contacted by Morpheus and Trinity
Morpheus tells you about how the matrix cannot be explained. At how you feel something is wrong.1
Morpheus: 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.
Get asked to pick the blue pill vs red pill
Pick the red pill
but instead of becoming superman and doing cool things like dodging bullets
The oracle tells you that “you are not the one”
You get stuck with a desk job
and not just a desk job but a worse one than the matrix.
You eat gruel every day.
Fall for Trinity but it’s unrequited.
and then see Trinity fall for the new kid on the block.
You are also not free
Cypher: Free? You call this free? All I do is what he tells me to do. If I had to choose between that and the Matrix, I choose the Matrix."
The scene in which Cypher talks to Neo really explains it all
When I see Cypher tell Neo “why oh why didn’t I take the blue pill”.
You don’t even see code anymore. You just see food.
And Cypher really misses his steak.
With every day that passes he grows more and more resentful of the life he has to live. Even when Cypher is outside the matrix he lives within it. He wants to experience the best of the matrix again and he wants to forget all about the “real world”.
He reimagines being offered the pills by Morpheus in painful detail. He cannot believe he fell for the lie that the Matrix cannot be explained. He cannot believe he took the blue pill without knowing what’s on the other side of the blue pill and what the real world would be like.
And then he sees Neo getting everything he was supposed to.
Smith offers him a deal and Cypher takes it. He betrays Nebuchadnezzar and Morpheus. Is it any surprise that he did?
The matrix isn’t that hard to explain. Oh and by the way all humans live in a simulation. The machines took over, and use humans as batteries. It does make the movie considerably less cooler if it was explained earlier.