1. Machines Enslave Humans...In A Computer-Savvy Time - The Matrix
Rule: The Matrix is a simulated world custom-built by the machines to dupe humans into believing that it is real, so they can be exploited as "fuel". It is stated in The Matrix that the machines had previously built a Utopian Matrix for the humans, yet their minds chose to reject it because it wasn't realistic. The machines instead settled on 1999, which humans don't appear to reject, yet did they really need to build a world and a time in which technology itself runs rampant? It is Neo's stature as a hacker that eventually causes him to meet Trinity and Morpheus, allowing him to break free from the grip of The Matrix, discover he is The One, and fight back against the oppressive system. How's about just not feeding the idea of technology to them at all? Assuming a human mind could accept that - and I'm sure it could, as it had until the 1940s when computers were first invented - why take the risk of introducing something so threatening to their very existence? Keep your subjects less tech-savvy and they're more likely to be continually placated, as well as unable to figure out quite what is going on. Which rule-breaking movies annoy you the most? Let us know in the comments below.