From my rewatch, here's every tidbit I managed to gather about Simon's canon experience on Eden and Filament (with my own personal analysis included). Because I'm tired of people taking popular hc's and thinking they're canon T_T
This is super long, so fair warning.
Father: "The Consolidation -- they hide their technology, their people… They won't tell you what they found, but I will!"
It's so interesting to me that the exposition is delivered via an Eden sermon. There are so many ways we could have found out about the blood moons, the QR, everything. But THIS method. (Keep this in mind, I'm gonna call it back at the very end lol)
"I know what a skeleton is, I'm not dumb"
This is probably mostly that the COI thinks Edens are uneducated, furthering the idea that the COI is more tech focused and Eden is more religion focused (at least from the COI's pov). I also think that this means Simon has at least a basic education, whether that be from before the QR (since it happened when he was 9-12) or during his time on Eden itself.
"Eden gave me a tattoo… I didn't choose either"
Imo Simon sounds sincere for this line. There’s a lot of evidence later that indicates Simon’s time on Eden wasn’t all bad and that he does miss it in some respects. I think this is just saying it's not a life he had agency in, just like his lack of agency as a COI convict.
Simon surrendered.
Now I have my own theories about if Simon 'surrendered', or if the COI found him when he was in a dissociated state after being betrayed by his brothers. BUT that is theory territory. Let's just say he did not resist arrest for now.
HE REACHES FOR A KNIFE AT HIS HIP OUT OF INSTINCT. NOT TO THE ONE AT HIS SHOULDER.
This is actually so freaking interesting to me. Is the shoulder knife not the one he usually used? Did his mother gift him a sheath and not an actual knife? I think either a) he had two knives, his mother's was precious so he never used it and he had a normal weapon at his side OR b) he kept the sheath close to his heart and it was just a sheath that was gifted, or it was a sheath and knife and he only treasured the sheath so put the knife at his belt and the sheath at his heart. Either way, the sheath seems to be a comfort object, and not one he used to store a usable weapon. Also could be that Simon just carried around a ton of weapons and his hip knife was easiest to grab at a moment’s notice. He probably had a ton of weapons and sheaths, and the fact that he only has his mother’s left means the COI confiscated the others, but he put up a FIGHT about keeping this one.
Genuine emotion seeing the pendant.
This is the first time he looks properly moved by anything, not scared or angry. He obviously does care super deeply for these pendants - whether that be because of the seed inside, because of the Last Tree religion, or because of what it represents (Eden brotherhood).
"I'm sorry, brother."
He says this SO softly, and he kisses his hand with the pendant in it. This is a completely private moment, I believe that he feels genuine remorse about the fate of his brother.
(I'd also like to point out something that will come up a lot more, Eden as a death cult. There's a lot of stuff pointing to that conclusion but there are some points that don't work for the theory as well. Like, if Eden's goal is to just kill everyone, why don't they all just pull a Jonestown or something? Why is this Eden brother deciding to kill himself presented as such a grave decision? This is just the first example of this conflict, we'll see more later.)
"that wasn't supposed to happen"
This is another genuine burst of emotion. Ava riles Simon up and he admits that the EXPLOSION was not meant to happen. Whether that means Eden was planning to kill people, kidnap people to feed to the tree, or go for non murder reasons, and accidentally rigged an explosion instead, is up for debate. We'll see how the evidence stacks up. I will also point out the video game canon (from the wiki): “tensions between the COI and Eden erupted in a 9 day battle on [Filament]… Eden troops resorted to sabotaging the station's reactor”, but keep in mind game=/=film canon necessarily.
"you're not just gonna kill me as soon as I get up there?"
This is PRECEDENT. maybe based on his treatment as a convict, but I feel like based on how exasperated Ava's response was, it runs deeper than the COI. I believe Eden has instilled this sort of thinking in Simon.
Flashback #1: Simon talks back to the Father ("I can still see them") and the father calls him "my son".
The talking back is SO interesting to me. Young Simon is blatantly questioning the QR and by extension what he's been told by Eden. And in response, the Father chuckles, and calls him 'my son'! To me, this gives major vibes that either Eden was not as strict as we thought, or that Simon was favoured in some way (which is what I personally believe, considering the Butcher stuff).
Young Simon looking at his hands, surrounded by bodies.
This is the other thing I really want to talk about. It is extremely likely that this is NOT literally what happened. This is a dream sequence, meaning we're seeing a mixture of reality and Simon's deeper emotions/thoughts/beliefs. I do not believe Filament occured when Simon was a child, or that at any point he stood at the centre of a circle of bodies. I think this shot shows his guilt, the knowledge that he has so much blood on his hands. And it shows that deep down, he's not this brave, strong, mean, Butcher. He's a KID. He's a SCARED KID who was manipulated by a cult into KILLING people.
Shadowed mother figure holds out knife.
The fact Simon's mother is so shadowed makes me think she died early. After the QR (if this woman was giving her son a knife in civilised society I would be quite worried), but maybe not long after that. However, I would like to point out that she looks quite imposing in the shot, and also she is giving her very young son a knife. It makes me think she maybe was a true Eden believer (speculative), either that or Simon's memory has been manipulated to think that way.
Simon looks scared in Filament.
He's terrified. Is it because he finally feels guilt for the first time? Because he finally understands the extent of his actions? Has something else happened ("my brothers abandoned me!" more on that later). And not only does he look scared, he looks out of it. He's yelled at and he doesn't react. Sort of points for my dissociation theory.
Young voice saying Simon TURNS INTO "don't just stand there, do something" (explosion).
See above r.e. dissociation theory. The young voice saying Simon is also funky, because it suggests he really WAS a kid for Filament, if there are other kids yelling for him, and he looks like an adult now because he's reliving it. Eek I dunno, the idea of a bunch of kids doing brutal space battle feels really goofy to me. The fact Simon is seemingly just standing there as well is points for the theory he chickened out of Filament (again, I’ll explain that more when it comes up).
"I just wanna live. why does nobody else want that?"… Everyone on Eden has just given up.”
Huzzah, a point for Eden-is-a-death-cult! However, if their whole thing is to die, give up, why not pull a Jonestown? It means their goal is more complex than 'everyone die immediately'. And so then what were they doing on Filament?? It takes away from the theory that they were doing a supply raid or something (they don't want to live that long), but adds credibility to the theory they're going to kill people in the name of the tree or something similar. I have a secret third option which I really like, I’m going to be making a full post on it, and also I will bring it up later in this analysis so stick around x.
"noone on Eden wants to think they're the ones that vanished"
Gives some insight into Eden's belief system; they have some kind of 'chosen children' mentality where they can't stand to think they aren't the ones that were chosen to remain.
doesn't wanna talk about god… "enough of that kind of talk on eden"
Enough said. Interestingly, he doesn't sound super traumatised when he says he doesn't wanna talk about it, he sort of just sounds annoyed. This again makes me think there wasn't anything insanely mind shattering going on with religion on Eden, instead just regular amounts of apocalyptic christian cult trauma yk (that Simon just has not processed).
"they blame me for what happened. I was the only one trying to stop it."
And why would he lie in this scenario? He's talking to a fellow convict, he's probably going to die. He's spilling his heart right now. This is a very interesting piece of the puzzle to me, and I don't quite understand how it fits with everything else. From this analysis I've gathered that Simon was not as anti-Eden as we thought. But he was trying to stop something? Maybe these can be reconciled if Simon was only trying to stop the explosion, he realised something was going wrong with the plan. We later get the idea that Simon ‘lost his nerve’ on Filament, so this could have been his turning point from Butcher to the one trying to stop it.
"yeah I really don't wanna talk about it".
He is SO guilt-ridden. I really think he had some kind of change of heart, catalysed by Filament. I do think the reason he sounds so off saying this is because he thinks it's a trick, that this person is trying to get him to admit that he is an evil murderer, which he thinks they already know. He doesn't realise she genuinely has no idea.
"it's gone. How do you not know?"
Simon says this sadly, but he sounds mostly agitated. It makes me think Filament happened long enough ago such that it is common knowledge, and not AS raw of a wound. This is backed up by the video game lore, which places Filament and the last convict realisation as ~20 years apart, Simon’s story would fall somewhere in this range.
REALLY MAD "I didn’t blow up Filament Station, but the ones who did aren’t getting punished, just me! I didn’t get a choice! I just drew the short straw and then I traded one fancy metal box to die in for another, while people that I thought were my brothers ABANDONED ME!"
Oh this is so important. 1) Simon is NOT the one who rigged the explosion, which we already surmised. 2) 'aren't getting punished' to me implies that these people are in a position to BE punished, but aren't being punished. Also implies the explosion was someone's active fault, not an accident. 3) drawing the short straw, the fact he's the one that's punished is luck, I don't think it was meticulously planned, even if his abandonment was intentional. 4) he was abandoned by his brothers. I have no idea how this lines up with #2, since it feels like 2 is saying there are people who the COI should be punishing but aren't, and 4 is saying he is alone and his brothers aren't there (meaning no one to punish). There are a few different ways to reconcile these ideas, I have my own conclusions, but there are so many ways to interpret that I’ll just leave this section here.
"I just wanna go home"
SIMON. MISSES. EDEN. I will stand by the idea that Eden was not all Christian psychic mind torture bullshit. Simon has fond memories of his mother, he treasures the pendant, he shows remorse for his brother that died. There are parts of Eden that he cares about and misses.
genuinely loses his entire fucking shit crying and stuff when he sees the pendant is broken. His last straw. See above, he really does care about the seedlings. I feel like to him, this is representative of his shattered connection with Eden; it's a world he'll never be able to return to.
"I had nothing to do with Filament Station, I swear! That wasn’t part of the plan! They didn’t listen to me!"
Blowing up Filament was either not planned (either impromptu or accidental), OR not something Simon was made aware of. I think the former, since Simon was clearly favoured at Eden, I don't think they'd lock the literal Butcher out of the murder plan. The explosion being impromptu and against Simon’s wishes lends itself to the chickened-out theory, which works for me personally. If we go the explosion-was-an-accident route, Simon knew something was wrong, and he was ignored. Maybe they were doing something mechanical/electrical, and Simon was the only one who noticed some kind of mistake? It's interesting to consider what position Simon would have been in to NOTICE some kind of danger, the basic thought is that he was going around butchering it up, but if that's the case there's so way he would have noticed something going wrong.
"I can read"
Same as the skeleton section at the start. Eden's children are educated.
"it is worth ANYTHING" and Simon looks really taken aback.
Ties into the abandonment stuff. Simon has been taught that he is not worth anything at all, not to his brothers (who have not rescued him), and CERTAINLY not to the COI. This is aberrative.
hallucination! There's a lot here ;-; let's go:
"62 others didn't make it out of Filament Station and no, that doesn't include your compatriots."
Edens died at Filament, in the explosion. I don't think this was planned.
Brother: "Leave it! We're all dead, anyway."
This is very very VERY strong evidence that Edens were on Filament to get something. I have an idea of what it is, but I won’t spoil it. Keep an eye out, I’m super hype about this theory. Other than that this line kind of confuses me. ‘We’re all dead anyways’ gives the impression that whether they grab it or not, they’re screwed. Due to the imminent explosion? Due to the radiation from said explosion (as indicated in the video game lore)? Due to this probably being the COI’s last fucking straw, prompting a full on war? I’m leaning towards the second option, but this is all very speculative.
Simon: "I didn't want them to die."
Brother: "Excuse me? The fuck did you just say?! When did you grow a conscience, Simon? You got the highest body count out here, killer! Not one of us has more blood on their hand than you!… Simon the Butcher lost his nerve."
Yet more chickened-out-of-filament evidence. Like the dream sequence, I'm highly dubious that this was an actual exchange Simon had with a brother. I think he's expressing regret about either the Filament deaths, or all the deaths he caused in general, and this is how he feels his brothers would respond. Esp since this brother is the one who died in the SM-13.
Brother: "You're gonna have to kill your own brothers to stop this"
Simon: "You're not my brother."
Eden Brother: "Your words, not mine, Butcher."
The question is, which ‘your words’ are we talking about? If the brother is talking about Simon’s line, he’s saying that even as Simon tries to distance himself from Eden, he will always be their Brother. If the brother is talking about his OWN line as an echo of something said in the past, it implies that at some point Simon says he needs to kill his brothers to stop something, which is more convoluted, but far more interesting in terms of Implications™.
The Father: "The Consolidation can burrow in their secrets. We must bear these burdens! These hardships, this anger! The sorrow… We must carry them… We are the keepers of Eden! We must help them!"
Help WHO??? This line is difficult. If 'them' is filament, this is evidence for them going to kill everyone a la death cult. But that doesn't relate to 'secrets'. This could be calling back to the Father's first speech, about AT-5 being the COIs secret? This raises more questions. THAT I will answer in my super cool theory :3 trust trust.
Simon's Mom: "Simon, don't be like that… You'll love it there."
Kind of basic, Simon didn't want to go to Eden, but his mother did. Okay.
Simon: "The Last Tree's dead… It's Eden's grave."
This is DAMNING. I think it's the truth, or the tree is very close to dead. It corroborates with some concept art I've seen of a twisted Last Tree with a skeleton coming out of it (I think elli's concept designer posted abt it?). That's why the pendant is so precious too, it's a seedling that can't be replicated, there's no more tree to drop seeds. The whole 'our bodies become the soil' shtick also ties in, Eden is desperately trying to revive or keep this tree clinging to life by feeding it bodies, which are pretty good fertiliser. (surprise surprise, also ties into my upcoming theory…)
hallucination segment over!
"How many more bodies will you climb over to save yourself? Always thinking of the life you'll never get back. Thinking of a mother who wouldn't even recognize the killer she spawned. Or maybe she'd be proud. Is death the only thing she taught you?! Half-measured! Half-committed! NEVER ENOUGH!"
Ok girl if you didn't want him to kill people why did you ✨gift your child a knife✨. Jokes aside, this is strong evidence Simon's mother died early, she gave him the knife sheath, but she didn't see him become the Butcher. Also big big evidence for Simon a) missing Eden and b) chickening out of whatever happened at Filament.
"please keep this safe mama"
Average I-miss-my-mom evidence.
YIKES. That was a lot. If you’ve gotten this far, I’m sorry. A properly written and condensed theory based on some of this will be coming out soon. I’m hoping to get it out asap because I haven’t seen anyone else talk about it, and so if I don’t manage to get it out first I’m gonna be so sad.
Anyways, bye!
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