I’ve been thinking about the dialogue replacement for Morpheus’ D-battery speech, and I’ve got a draft I’d like some feedback on. Again, if anybody (knows anybody who) would like to volunteer a Laurence Fishburne impression for the scene, let me know; I could probably get the accent and delivery down, but I don’t think my voice itself would be at all suitable.
Original version:
The human body generates more bioelectricity than a 120-volt battery, and over 25,000 BTUs of body heat. Combined with a form of fusion, the Machines had found all the energy they would ever need.
…
What is the Matrix? Control. The Matrix is a computer-generated dream-world, built to keep us under control, in order to change a human being… [he holds up a D battery] …into this.
Altered version:
A single human brain cell has thousands of parts, and is as complex as an entire computer. You have a hundred billion of them in your head, all running on less energy than it takes to power a lightbulb. The Machines found a way to harness that endlessly renewable processing power for their own ends. All they needed was a way to keep us from waking up to it.
…
What is the Matrix? Control. Sufficiently advanced computation inevitably requires consciousness. Even while we sleep, the mind is constantly self-aware in our dreams. But without an external subject to refer to, the mind enters an endless feedback loop and crashes. The Matrix is an outlet valve for our consciousness: a computer-generated dream-world, built to keep us under control, in order to change a human being… [He holds up a pocket calculator] …into this.