I think The Iris has an antithesis.
Our major sources on The Iris are the Shambali, and the two characters we currently have ingame of Shambali origin are Zenyatta and Ramattra. Interestingly, both Zen and Ram both have some sort of duality embedded into their kits. Zen has his orbs while Ram has a calm, calculated form and a berserker mode.
While I’m aware Zen’s abilities aren’t canon, I still believe that this is still meant to be some sort of message. I can’t help but think that The Iris, much like the monks, has a sort of duality to it. If all is one within The Iris, then its antithesis would be something akin to the primordial Chaos from Greek Mythology: nothingness.
I believe the evil side of The Iris (the eye we see in Sombra’s connected web) was what caught Sombra and scared her into hiding. I think there’s only one thing that would have such a level of omniscience and power to both find her and scare her.
What are your thoughts?
I’m not sure if the Iris itself is even a real entity, honestly. It certainly seems more like an emergent religion based on Buddhist practices that the omnics have developed to give themselves meaning.
It’s possible the Iris itself is a real force, though what it is remains totally up to speculation and you may very well be right. Then again, the focus on balance might just be part of the Shambali religion in particular, so who knows for certain.
Personally, if I had to take a stab at guessing what found Sombra, I would put my money on something like a God Program that escaped the crisis unscathed. It would certainly have a connection to Overwatch because of the crisis, connections to Talon because of Doomfist’s desire to start a second crisis, and the companies because they are likely all using omnic tech (Volskaya industries certainly is, for example).
We don’t know a lot about what a God Program is, how it works or what circumstances it requires to exist. But what we do know beyond reasonable doubt is that they are terrifying intelligences well beyond the average human mind. The sort of thing that conduct a global war on it’s own. If Sombra found one hiding out in the depths of cyberspace, there’s a fair chance that she ended up on it’s bad side.
Especially because… y’know. She’s Sombra. I don’t think she can exist without causing aggravation to the people around her.
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I would have bet on a God Program too, but Michael Chu already debunked anything that could come out of it. God Program was just a nickname for Anubis, not a subset of powerful A.I. And he is currently shut down. Until the new lore team retcons it back, I think it can be swept up under the rug.
And honestly, I was in full doubt mode about The Iris too. Thought the Shambali were just predators waiting for the perfect chance; but I find it hard to believe that there isn’t something beyond the curtains of the material world now that Kiriko confirmed magic.
Unfortunately, the ‘God Program’ thing is a a bit of a “death of the author” scenario. Did Chu say that? Yeah. Did anyone take any notice? No, because what the hell else do you call something that’s like Anubis, but isn’t? Even if Chu didn’t intend to use it as shorthand, basically everyone else does because it’s a clear term to refer to machines that are similar to Anubis that’s unique as a phrase to the Overwatch Universe.
Honestly, I only invoke God Programs as a concept for what Sombra could have found because I can’t think of anything else that sounds plausible. The Illuminati? Some cabal of even crueler, more evil robots? The Talon behind Talon? All sounds pretty flat compared to ‘Giant Eldritch Machine Intelligence lurking out on the internet’ in my opinion.
Ultimately, I don’t think the Shambali are up to anything malicious. It doesn’t really fit their place in the ongoing story to be anything other than a peaceful organization. And without more knowledge on what exactly Shambali worship involves (Do they leave offerings? Is the Iris considered a deity, or a concept? What’s the hierarchy in the monastery? Can humans join the Shambali religion? Is the Shambali a unified religion, or a splinter group of a greater belief?) We can’t really speculate further in my opinion.
I have a theory that embraces a bit what can be seen in the video game “Detroit Become Humans” and a bit the philosophy of the Khala for the StarCraft 2 Protoss.
My hypothesis concerns an algorithm secretly inserted into the omniums that allowed the Omnics to take on a deeper and more human-like consciousness. Perhaps an algorithm that had the directive to fight humans, a sort of “virus” created by a conspiracy whose grand plan was the development of the human species to Gods: they had created perfect creatures (omnics) and they were able able to dominate them after giving them power. A sort of “definitive test” which in other mythological tales has never been overcome. See for example the Greek or Norse mythology which have as an epilogue the end of the divinities and the prosperity of humanity who received the gifts and developed them to the point of being able to challenge the Gods. Yes, I’m referring to the theory of evolution that Doomfist often mentions. I think the “Virus” was the cause of the awakening of the omniums that started their production.
But over the years something has changed: the virus has begun to replicate other types of human aspects. A sort of balance in which darkness cannot exist without light. So I guess that Aurora had what in Detroit Become Human they called rA9, the awakening on self-awareness that goes far beyond the simple intention to destroy or build. Suddenly extreme actions had the question “why” in the software process, thus creating the first sentient omnic.
So here are two lines of thought:
- For “the conspiracy” is the truth about the origins of the Omnic Crisis and why it is being unleashed. Sombra is disadvantaged that this plane could have been born long before her birth, and that few now know the deeper details behind the eye icon;
- For the Omnics, the image of the now “refurbished virus” thanks to Aurora still contained the remnants of the conspiracy logo (the eye), thus generating the theory of the iris. To them, this shared awakening is similar to the philosophy of the protoss Khala in StarCraft, a simultaneous sharing of that teaching Aurora spreads. A kind of Plug-in of this “refurbished virus” that allows omnics to be more human;
Obviously it is a completely random theory, we can all understand that the eye for the developers was an artistic choice that paid homage to the sign of the Illuminati. But I like to see something more specific in it, a much more mechanical truth that finally gave rise to two lines of thought: “a virus to overcome human capabilities” or “the generation of a flow that is impossible to stop because it has become aware” (properly as the origins of the world among the many random facts that allowed it to give life on Earth). I honestly don’t know how to connect this type of Lore to Anubis, if not for a deeper principle based on the exploitation of the old intentions of the “virus” that perhaps Ramattra does not welcome, preferring instead to follow the Khala philosophy that I mentioned earlier for the Protoss .
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my current theory is that the iris is some sort of mass-update-pusher hardware from the omnic crisis, likely one of only a few left—if not the only one. the only way such a facility could have survived was that didn’t house an ai of some kind, and was offline in some remote part of the world (like the mountains of nepal maybe? lol). aurora’s “journey” (coughomnicjesuscough) would have been uncovering & restoring the facility, and her “sacrifice” would be plugging herself into the system to give the basis of her sapience to every existing omnic. i have no doubt there was some degree of magic involved, likely responsible for why (what was probably) a small satellite facility would be able to reach the whole planet, and fried aurora’s original body with the immense energy required. the “iris” that omnics describe being able to feel sometimes is likely the remnants of aurora’s sentience; a holy mother to every omnic, if u will.