Keanu Reeves is an interesting subject for our next analysis for while he has acted in an entire generation worth of movies, he is most memorably known for the role of Neo in The Matrix trilogy.  The significance of this success can be traced back to his chart:

12^th House Virgo Stellium

Because of the high concentration in one sign and house, any stellium of planetary bodies represents a primary area of attention.  Reeves’ four body stellium is in the sign of Virgo and the 12^th house.  Virgo is a discriminating sign quality focused on the finite details (or how the details work together) while the 12^th house governs areas of manifestation that include prisons.  From a high level, these dynamics have resonance with the role of Neo and the plot the The Matrix, but need to be teased out a bit in order to bring the picture into focus a little clearer.

Cazimi Mercury

In my last article, we noticed how planetary bodies positioned close to the Sun are debilitated or weakened.  This condition, known as combust, has an exception when the proximity to the Sun is within 17 minutes or arc.  This placement within “the heart of the Sun” is known as Cazimi and has been historically considered by many ancient astrologers to be one of the most powerful dignities[1] bestowed upon a planetary body.  This dignity is further amplified by Mercury’s placement within the sign that it rules, Virgo.  These two characteristics make a strong testimony to Mercury’s dominance.  As an archetype of communication and thought, Mercury is representative of the mind itself.  Therefore, its fusion to the Sun infers the hero’s (Sun) mind is a powerful weapon.

But, Mercury is also retrograde, a condition that denotes the archetypal function of the planetary body is not operating in a normal fashion and this seems to contradict the initial delineation.  The following perspective offers some clarity:

Individuals born with Mercury retrograde do not simply have different styles of communication from individuals born with Mercury in direct motion: they have an entirely different understanding of the universe.[2]

Neo’s mind had a different understanding of the “universe” and Morpheus made this observation explicit in their first encounter.

You’re here because you know something.  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.  It is this feeling that brought you to me.

Mercury is also tightly conjunct Uranus, the planetary body most closely associated with technology.  Its most obvious correlation would be the Matrix since it is a computer program, but also the electricity stored in batteries, which was the Matrix’s ultimate purpose – a prison that allowed the machines to siphon off a human being’s bio-electricity.  With Mercury’s rulership of the Ascendant, Uranus’ conjunction to both Mercury and the Sun gains more significance as the Ascendant and Sun are two of the most important points in the chart.[3]

While the 12^th house represents the primary area of imprisonment, the opposition from Saturn in the 6^th house offers strong corroboration.  In ancient astrology, the 6^th house was viewed as an area representing slaves and Saturn represents the archetype of structures.  The opposition is a challenging aspect that creates awareness, so Neo was aware that the structure (Saturn) of the Matrix  had created a form of slavery (6^th) by putting his mind (Mercury) in prison (12^th), but his mind possessed a super human discriminating ability (powerful Virgo Mercury) to “see” how it worked (Virgo stellium).  In this regard, Neo was a savior[4], “The One” (hero – Sun) who could wake humanity from this dystopian dream (Pisces polarity).

The power to transform was at his fingertips, which brings us to Pluto.

Pluto Rising (Kite Apex)

Pluto is the last planetary body to analyze within the Virgo stellium, positioned on the Ascendant.  Through my articles, we have explored multiple individuals with Pluto rising and noticed that they tend to display a tangible degree of power.[5]  This is because the Ascendant is the most visible point in the chart.  It is what we project out to the rest of the world.  As a result, any planetary body in close proximity to this angle tends to make its presence known.  Its archetype becomes part of the individual’s general appearance or demeanor.  Pluto is the archetype of power and transformation and Reeve’s is especially powerful not only because it is rising, but also because it is at the apex of a kite configuration.

Kite configurations aren’t terribly difficult to analyze once you break down their two main components.  A kite is basically a combination of an opposition and a grand trine.  By itself, an opposition can grind to a halt due to the stalemate at both ends[6] while the ease of a grand trine can lull the individual into taking the gifts (or luck) for granted and not act on it.  When blended together, Kites can become incredibly productive because the challenge of the opposition will not allow the grand trine to sit on its laurels while the grand trine will provide some ease to the opposition.

The opposition between Pluto and Chiron represents Neo’s awareness of the illusion (Pisces) created by the enemy (7^th house) that has wounded (Chiron) humanity and he must pick it apart (Virgo) in order to transform it (Pluto).  Ultimately, he knows he is the agent of change (Pluto at Asc).[7]

Associates and Imagination (11^th Moon, 3^rd Neptune)

But, Neo can’t do this alone and this is where the grand trine can help.  The sextiles from the Cancer stellium in the 11^th house are significant because this house represents friends and associates while Cancer is a sign quality that is family or clan-oriented.  The Moon is here and well placed in the sign that it rules.  In other words, Neo’s friends are like family to him and they are a strong support system.

The sextile from Neptune in the 3^rd house is most interesting because this house represents our general or immediate consciousness and Neptune represents the function of the imagination.  Neo’s understanding of how to leverage his imagination (Neptune) with his understanding of how the Matrix works (Virgo stellium) makes him dangerous, but those talents require the proper inspiration (sextile) from his clan (11^th house Moon) in order to achieve apex actualization (apex Pluto).  With the trine from the 11^th house Moon, it becomes obvious that Neo’s friends are helping cultivate the imagination.  Why is imagination so important?  Morpheus explains:

I’ve seen an agent punch through a concrete wall; men have emptied entire clips at them and hit nothing but air; yet, their strength, and their speed, are still based in a world that is built on rules. Because of that, they will never be as strong, or as fast, as you can be.

Morpheus is inferring that the abilities of the sentient programs that “police” the Matrix are limited to a set of parameters built into their programming.  Robots, machines, programs will only do what they have been programmed or built to do.  As a result, they lack the ability to improvise.  The Matrix provides an interesting, if improbable, thought experiment because it challenges us to appreciate how pervasive improvisation is to our daily existence.

Every second we are manifesting new ways to do things.  A combination of words to convey meaning.  A blending of shapes and/or colors to express inner yearnings.  A progression of movements to win a contest or beat an opponent.  Our imagination makes us godlike because we have the ability to create something that didn’t exist before we manifested it into existence.[8]  This impulse is as natural and involuntary as breathing.  Even the most highly sophisticated computer program could never simulate humanity because this would require this innate spark of creativity.

Honestly, astrology can’t simulate this either.

The Red Pill

The biggest misconception of the astrological system tends to center on an assumed degree of predictive specificity.  Some of this can be blamed on astrologers[9], but much of it is due to the sea change in perspective towards a general scientific or technological determinism that slowly evolved into our consciousness since the breakthroughs of Newtonian mechanics.[10]

Astrology can’t predict what a person will do or decide because those actions or responses are often a reflection of creativity, but it can reveal the general archetypal patterns that provide an overall existential structure.  This shouldn’t offend our general need of freedom for this usually isn’t defined any further than the will. But to what extent does conceding the existence of a defined will/ego/identity compromise that freedom?  Sure, we are free to make any decision, but without any compelling reason otherwise, why would anyone spend time doing things that are not in their best interests?  Eventually, you can’t escape who you are and we are so attached to our identities/egos that we would never think of these “things” as separate, possibly even restrictive.

Most, if not the majority of astrologers subscribe to an evolutionary paradigm that subtly borrows from religious traditions like Buddhism. They believe we are born at a moment specifically selected according to a planetary alignment whose unique blend of archetypes and signs fulfill a particular karmic destiny.  Within this structure or system, if an identity’s purpose is to provide a temporary lesson, then how could it also exist as a permanent fixture to an eternal soul?  More to the point, if identity is temporary, then why are we in service to it and to what extent is this service slavery? Again, most people like who they are, so I assume there wouldn’t be any discord with equating an identity to a prison, but how would we feel if we were suddenly flooded with memories (and emotions) of who we were and have been in prior lifetimes?

The Matrix resonates because it taps into our collective yearnings of another true reality beyond the illusion we currently reside.  This is the basis of many religions, all of which branch out from the archetypal stream of Neptune and while the Matrix’s dystopian plot turns this archetype on its head, it shouldn’t be discounted that it exists for a reason; humanity’s collective desire to return to unity suggests that reality may very well be just an illusion.  Hopefully, these articles will show that astrology is one the best tools for analyzing the code within its structure.

End Notes

[1] It is important to note that Cazimi is a dignity used primarily in horary delineations.  While this isn’t horary, this also isn’t a natal chart delineation either.  We are analyzing a chart for archetypal resonance with an individual’s creation.

[2] Kevin Burke, Astrology: Understanding the Birth Chart, (Minnesota: Llewellyn Publications, 2001), 229.

[3] The Moon is the third.

[4] Because of their association with self-sacrifice and martyrdom, the Pisces-Virgo polarity is often recognized to contain the “savior” archetype.  Usually, we would anticipate this archetype to manifest from the Piscean end, but the Matrix plot has turned this polarity on its head by showing the dysfunction of “oneness” and need for the unique discrimination of individual freedom.

[5] While Kurt Cobain was literally an agent of transformation, Pluto manifested most prominently through the roles played by Al Pacino and Keanu Reeves.  Pacino embodied Pluto’s penchant for power with Michael Corleone, while Reeve’s Neo was a fictional agent of transformation.  All manifestations remain true to Pluto’s core archetypal nature.

[6] Or “see-saw” wildly between either archetypal polarity of expression.

[7] The conjunction between Ascendant ruler and Sun strengthens delineation of Neo being “The One” who would bring about change through his Pluto rising.

[8] Morpheus understood this, but it was Einstein who immortalized the maxim: “Imagination is more Important that Knowledge”.

[9] In 2016, a highly regarded astrologer wrote an article that was published in a reputable astrological magazine predicting the election loss of Donald Trump.  His conclusion was based on the fact that the beneficial transits or progressions that were supporting Trump throughout the campaign were going to turn negative shortly after the election.  While his conclusion was wrong, the foundation it was based upon was not.  It would be difficult to argue that President Trump has enjoyed that same degree of success governing as he did campaigning.  In fact, it could legitimately argued that his “luck” seemed to run out as soon as the election ended.  Astrology supports this, but sometimes astrologers make bad predictions and the entire system gets blamed.

[10] Over-confidence with cause-and-effect has fostered misguided conceptions like Laplace’s Demon, but also an apparent endless stream of movies/stories predicting dystopian futures where machines gain consciousness and take over.