BloodyMary + Simon’s mischaracterization
This has been said a lot across multiple platforms and I can’t tag everyone, but I need to talk about the way Simon has been mischaracterized because of BloodyMary. I have a lot to say, bear with me here.
Prefacing this with why I think Simon has been mischaracterized so badly:
I know most of the problem comes from people in the fandom who haven’t engaged in the source material. I see SO many fics tagged with ‘author has not watched Iron Lung’.
I think the biggest issue is that PHM has a much larger fanbase; it’s had a fandom since 2021, the movie was in most cinemas for months, and it had millions of dollars worth of advertising. On top of that, it’s relatively easy to pirate, whereas Iron Lung hasn’t been until very recently. There have been edits since the day it premiered, Ryan fucking Gosling is in it. My point is that it’s a far more mainstream piece of media, and because of that, most of the BloodyMary writers/fanartists come from the PHM fandom first.
(Please don’t pirate Iron Lung, or any indie films)
Iron Lung, on the other hand, showed almost exclusively in requested theaters, for a few weeks at most, and then came to YouTube in May. It’s had virtually no advertising aside from Mark himself, less edits/art/fan content etc, and it’s also a genre that is less appealing to a wider audience.
(I came from the Iron Lung side and was very late to PHM, so I was around for the early tumblr/ao3 characterization of Simon.)
All that to say I GET IT. I get that most people have come from the PHM side, haven’t had access to Iron Lung to characterize Simon properly, and wanted to write fics etc.
But please. I beg you. Simon’s character development is so insanely important to the dynamic he would have with Grace. He’s not stupid or incapable or blindly violent and I’m SICK of people making him useless. There’s a lot ableism and racism (Simon, of Korean descent, worshipping Grace, a blonde-haired, blue-eyed white man, for instance) in too many fics, but that’s another whole conversation.
I can pull up receipts for some of this for better examples, and I will because I feel like I need to.
Simon’s intelligence:
Simon is treated like he’s stupid in the movie. The C.O.I. There’s multiple times where Ava and David repeat themselves like he might be confused.
[ “Are you sure it was a skeleton?” Ava to Simon ]
We then almost immediately see him mapping the blood ocean from the inside of the SM-13. No lights, no window, no equipment and no outside help. He manages a fairly accurate map of his surroundings, some of which he expands with X-rays from places he isn’t even in anymore.
Violence/The Butcher:
Yes, Simon has a history of violence. He’s absolutely far from being innocent HOWEVER! It was him doing what he was asked. Religion is an insanely easy way to manipulate vulnerable people, and Simon was, up until a point, indoctrinated by Eden. In a flashback we see him as a child, standing over a pile of bodies with blood on his hands. There’s no scenario in which he’s not innocent, but there’s a lot more to the situation surrounding it.
In the movie, he lashes out more in fear than in a genuine attempt to hurt. The camera, he even admits is him acting out of fear, and he regrets it. He apologizes repeatedly for it. Ava sent him down there and he still apologizes. He apologizes to the sub when he hits the control panel. He yells and then looks guilty every time.
[ “I’m sorry, about the radiation. I didn’t know.” - Simon to Ava ]
When he does act with intentional violence, it’s towards the eel, when he realizes he’s dying and the blackbox needs to make it to the surface.
Whilst I do think he would initially lash out towards Grace, he would also immediately back off when he realizes that Grace isn’t an active threat. He would be insanely wary, he’s trapped in another unfamiliar situation that he’s not in control of and has no method of escape from.
Simon and the Hail Mary:
There’s a whole ton of fics where Simon isn’t able to operate in Mary: can’t handle zero gravity, couldn’t pilot, etc.
Simon who comes from a civilization that moved off earth before Grace was even born?? He’s lived on Mars and then on Eden and at least one other space station before the events of Iron Lung. He knows space and space travel. Is the Hail Mary what he’s used to? No, but its basic functions are essentially the same. Mary’s controls are supposed to be intuitive, and Simon piloted and restarted the SM-13 using pretty much ONLY his intuition, he hardly looked at the manuals.
Rocky would be a shock, the state of the pre-quiet rapture universe would be a shock, the amount of resources available to Grace would be a shock.
Simon calling Grace ‘Angel’:
Simon was part of a cult. He’s deeply distrustful of religious and authority figures, having had a bad relationship with both. Both of those things are very important to Simon’s character development.
[ “Let’s not get into that. I hear enough of that kind of talk on Eden.” - Simon when asked by Elli if he believes in God ]
He argues about it with David earlier on in the film.
The point is, Simon’s relationship with religion is inherently negative. Even The Light/The Portal is made to look like an angel [ Molly Brown/Deadlymelodic, the concept artist for the movie describes it here ].
I don’t think Simon would want to associate Grace with something that has caused him that much damage. Would he call Grace an angel in a pain med induced state when he first wakes up on the Hail Mary? Maybe, but I don’t think it’s something he’d continue, and if he did, I think that it would be sarcastically.
Simon constantly tries getting a reaction from people. He spends a lot of time in the movie arguing and talking back to Ava, David and then Elli, baiting them into replying or admitting what they’re doing to him. Yes, he’s scared and remorseful, but he’s also sarcastic.
[ “Sure, things are somehow faster when I don’t know what I’m doing.” Simon to David ]
Grace, a scientist, the least religious person possible for Simon to meet in any scenario, would absolutely have a reaction to being called an angel. It’s more likely to be discomfort than anything else, especially if he understands Simon’s relationship with religion.
There’s no way in hell that Simon would become blindly devoted to Grace. There’s a very clear power dynamic in the “Grace-saves-Simon” scenario and Simon would be very aware of it.
Anyways, that’s most of what I have to say in the shortest possible format. Full disclaimer I love bloodymary, and I consume a LOT of content related to it. I swear I’m not coming at this from the perspective of a hater.
I don’t normally engage in fandom discourse but I’ve been lurking on this for weeks now and I wanted to say something.
*cracks knuckles* in my next essay I’m going to discuss how this extends to how Simon is written in sexual situations as innocent and inexperienced which contributes to the fandom infantilizing him —
*gets dragged off screaming*
