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The viewing audience at least isn't aware of predecessors until the Architect mentions it. When Neo mentioned it to Morpheus he believed so much in the One that he didn't believe Neo wasn't the first One.

So my question is, why didn't Neo ask who he was talking about? Did Neo think he was rambling nonsense to throw Neo off? Or did Neo think they were failed Ones?

Möoz
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Jon Weinraub
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  • I rather suspect that he wasn't listening. Or just assumed he meant other Zionese rebels – Valorum Aug 04 '17 at 19:18
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    The Merovingian didn't exactly give Neo a chance to ask a lot of questions. Neo probably thought the same thing the average audience member thought at the time -- that the Merovingian was talking about other rebels from Zion. – Null Aug 04 '17 at 19:47
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    The first time I watched the movie, I remember I assumed he meant the previous people Morpheus had unplugged, believing them to be The One... – tilley31 Aug 04 '17 at 20:01
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    Another thing to consider: what relevance is there to Neo for him to discover who his predecessors were? All that really matters is that there were other Ones and they all "decided" to merge back into the Source to continue the cycle of the Matrix. They're names and other actions are inconsequential. – Ellesedil Dec 08 '17 at 00:11

2 Answers2

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It went over his head

When Neo meets the Merovingian, he has had no prior inkling that there have been previous iterations of 'The One', or anything to do with the previous cycles of the Matrix, for that matter. As such, it simply went over his head.

You see, this meeting was the first time that Neo (and the viewers) had heard anything about the previous Ones, and to be honest, it even went over my head, when I first watched it.

You will note that the Merovingian scene occurred prior to the scene with the Architect. This may have been why Neo clued-in to the "others" so fast.

Community
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Möoz
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    In an earlier version of the script there were more "The One" candidates. Neo was aware of them. MORPHEUS: You know now, that you had predecessors. NEO: Yes. I’ve heard things. MORPHEUS: What types of things? NEO That there were others, like me, who you thought were going to be special. But they ended up dead. – Valorum Jan 07 '18 at 21:54
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    @Valorum 'candidates' are different in this case though. – Möoz Jan 07 '18 at 22:06
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    Indeed. But if Neo thought that there were other "the one" candidates that came before him, he wouldn't necessarily realised that the Merovingian was referring to actual "The Ones" from previous iterations of the Matrix. – Valorum Jan 07 '18 at 22:17
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    @Valorum Ahh, I get it, it threw him off because he assumed it was about the prrior 'candidates'. Good point. – Möoz Jan 07 '18 at 23:06
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    Nothing would go over Neo's head. His reflexes are too fast, he'd catch it! – Mikey Mouse Feb 19 '18 at 16:48
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Morpheus was aware that Neo was not the fist "One", in fact he specifically mentions this as part of Neo's induction, I haven't seen the first movie in a while but off the top of my head he said something like,"there was a man born inside who had the ability to change whatever he wanted, to remake the Matrix as he saw fit, it was he that freed the first of us". So from the beginning it was understood that Neo had at least one predecessor. Unfortunately this creates way more questions than it answers. Neo's question throughout the series seems to be "I wish I knew what it is I'm supposed to do", so the real question is, what did Neo think his predecessor achieved or failed to achieve that made it relevant at all to have another One? Just another edit here, it seems then that although Neo was aware of at least one predecessor, he was not aware of previous iterations of the Matrix, this is why he says to the Architect "either no one told me, or no one knows", which is said by both the current Neo and what seems to be a recording of his predecessor on one of the monitors, to which the Architect replies "precisely". Also, when Neo asks the Architect "why am I here", the Architect gives him an explanation of where he comes from but not why he is in fact there, when Neo says "you haven't answered my question", the Architect smiles and says "quite right" but also says "interesting, that was quicker than the others", to which the predecessors on the monitors are surprised to hear that there were others, but the current Neo is not, he seems to be the only One that knows he is not the first, however it must also be that each "One's" answer was quicker than the last.

Nic Laatz
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  • Two notes here: [1] Morpheus knowing about the "man born inside [...]" doesn't mean that people know of previous iterations. We spectators know that such a person has to be the previous One, but the first humans to populate the then-new Zion will narrate, in a legend-like style, of how someone special was the first to refuse the Matrix (as people normally do with pills) and then was able to free them. While this is also partially true, this specific narration is also a convenient way for the machines to keep the red-pills ignorant about the real nature of Zion / Matrix / iterations. – Matteo Aug 16 '21 at 23:01
  • [2] I strongly doubt that those in the screens during the Neo-Architect encounter are the previous Ones. In fact, there is no reason to believe that all the Ones had to look identical. Also, there are many more screens than previous iterations of the Matrix - from which it follows that the reactions we see on the screens cannot be the previous Ones' reactions (even if we went by the assumption of all the Ones looking identical). Those are just reverberations of possible (remember that the dialogue is all about determinism VS chance) or even actual responses / moods / emotions of Neo. – Matteo Aug 16 '21 at 23:05