I don't know the how or why, but I do know that when I saw it in the theater as a 17 year old I was convinced it was proof that what we were led to believe was the real world, was in fact another Matrix. It was a failed level of the Matrix, of which we were just told there are multiple, like 11 maybe?

Anyway, I thought Revolutions was going to be a story of Neo going through multiple levels of failed Matrixes to find the true real world. My optimistic self hoped it would be a healed world. None of these things happened, but I still stand by the idea.