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[eekahchu]

Thoughts and connections I have about IRON LUNG- SPOILER WARNING!!!

Gonna post my thoughts and the connections I've made since watching Iron Lung three times. I'll put it all under the cut for those who haven't seen it yet. I'd love for those who have watched it to give it a read and share your thoughts with me! :)

Updated bc I realized I'd left part of my analysis out!

Trees are incredibly important to Simon (and in general in the Iron Lung universe), right? It's also a common theme throughout the movie. The flashback to the last tree, the seedling.. Trees symbolize life and for Simon, hope. There's an insane amount of symbolism and attention to detail in this movie. There's a moment where Simon takes a photo and whatever he's looking at resembles trees and roots. Then the camera pans to the Filament station glass and the crack resembles a tree. (Which, btw, the Filament station glass being salvaged from wreckage caused by something Simon was involved with- even if he tried to stop it- ending up aiding Simon in finding the last hope for humanity is POETRY!) When the creature (who sounds/has the memories of the lady from SM8/probably is a twisted, amalgamation of her and many many others) asks Simon if he would do anything to survive, he says yes and that he never had anything to begin with. But the camera immediately shifts focus to the seedling very intentionally to point out that, yes, he DOES have something. He has hope. But Simon has lost hope for humanity, as he revealed in his conversation to Ava earlier in the movie. He is selfishly only focused on his own life/survival. He thinks he has nothing left to lose and so he allows the creature to lead him to the fragment/light. Once there, he essentially makes a pact with the Eldritch entity that caused the "Quiet Rapture" in order to survive. But, as we horror fans know, you may technically get your wish that you make with an Eldritch God... but they will always TWIST it.

He will "live" but at a price and he will be twisted beyond recognition. As was the lady from SM8 and many others (I mean, "It's human, it's us." But still technically alive? That's about as twisted as you can get!) When Simon "returns" from the eldritch god's realm after making the pact, (I say "returns" bc the symbolism implied in the red thunder you can still see in the blood he vomits up suggests he is still very much within it's influence) the seedling has been cracked. The cost of making a deal with an eldritch god. The crack and shape of the seedling casing reflecting the crack and shape of the Filament station glass and his past/guilt surrounding it's demise. The Eldritch being destroys life and hope. The potential salvation of humanity is in the data Simon downloads. The light. Hope. The Eldritch being is Despair. It tries to convince him to delete the data. To delete the last hope of humanity. It tries to convince him that Ava's death was his fault. It tries to make him despair. But in his final moments he finally sees beyond himself and his own life and acts to protect hope for the future. "It's bigger than me." That's beautiful imo.

and just some other random thoughts I had:

Starlight I believe could also symbolize hope. "The Light" could be a reflection of the stars that have vanished, and thus hope. Whether it's literal starlight or not is up for interpretation but starlight is required for life so it makes sense. The Light is technically the "pinhole" in which the Eldritch being is seeping through into this universe but it is also humanity's last hope. I love that those two things are true at the same time. Humanity once worshiped our star. What IS a God, exactly?

The Filament station glass could not have been used for the sub, to send Simon down, to find hope for humanity, had Simon not been involved in it's destruction somehow. It is a brilliant way to say that, when something bad happens in your life…we tend to only see it as something bad and it can only ever BE bad. But good things can come from dark moments. Dark moments can lead us to the light.

My partner also pointed out (and he helped me with several of these connections by just yapping with me about it) that the blood didn't start hurting him until AFTER making the pact with the Eldritch being. The blood that splattered on his face turned into a burn, the blood that dripped onto his forehead became a laceration, as well as the wounds and boils on his arms. Once the seedling was dead (and thus Simon's hope) and the Eldritch God's influence had seeped into the Iron Lung and into his mind, the blood began harming and changing him.

Speaking of the blood splattered on his face, that moment when the Filament station glass cracks and sprays him with blood is a wonderful metaphor for his involvement in the station's destruction. The guilt that he carries over the lives lost. It could also be the blood ocean/creature/Eldritch being's attempt at making Simon despair.

I'm not sure exactly how the creature was destroyed at the end by the sub exploding and it might sound a little cliché to say that Simon's embracing of hope at the end, thus rejecting the Eldritch God, defeated "Despair"… But it follows the theme. Esp since there was that weird red lightening-like effect that happened right as Simon dies and then the sub explodes. I think Simon forcefully severed his connection with the Eldritch God through his own sacrifice. I dunno. I personally like hopeful messages like that. Simon's sacrifice wasn't in vain. He secured hope for humanity and overcame his "demons" (both metaphorically and literally). The movie doesn't try to hide the fact that Simon wasn't a hero. He was deeply flawed and gave in to despair...it highlights that what is truly important is that we keep getting back up and moving forward. Our failures don't define us. It's what we learn from and do with those failures that matters.

That's true horror art imo. It's dark and fucked up but there is a message in there that is beautiful and inspiring. That's what I absolutely adore about good horror. It illustrates the beauty in the morbid and grotesque aspects of life. Iron Lung is a movie that gives you something to REALLY chew on and think about and I appreciate that in a world that feels like it's overflowing with brain-idling, junk food media.

Aside from the story itself, it had some incredible just beautifully cinematic moments. From the subtle camera tilt when the blood drips onto Simon's hand, to the super sick slow-mo when he makes the pact with the Eldritch God. Just all-around incredible work of art and any flaws just make it that much more worthwhile. Esp in today's age of sterilizing every piece of media to a "perfect" polish in order to appeal to as wide of an audience as possible. Art is not perfect. It's the imperfections that makes art, ART!

I am so SO proud of Mark, everyone who worked on Iron Lung, and of this community for rallying behind him. I LOVED Iron Lung, flaws and all. I truly believe it will be a cult classic that will inspire so many generations of aspiring film-makers/creators to come.

Thanks for reading! :)

[heavenbat]

Themes and Motifs in Iron Lung (the movie)

Disclaimer: I have only seen the film once and am operating off what I can remember from that, and also I'm sick so I'm running on fewer braincells than normal, but!! I just wanted to ramble about some things I noticed in Iron Lung that I haven't seen mentioned before.

Also, WARNING: Spoilers below the cut!

One thing that really stuck with me after watching Iron Lung was the way its themes were so pervasive and multi-layered. 

There were, of course, the more overt themes of isolation, of claustrophobia, of being trapped in a hopeless situation. Simon, the protagonist, finds himself in a situation that in many ways reflects the situation that humanity as a whole is in within the universe of Iron Lung: trapped within a metal ship, surrounded on all sides by emptiness, hostility, and death. For Simon, he is locked within a submarine in an ocean of blood; the rest of (what’s left of) humanity is trapped in a few sparse space stations in the vast void of space in a universe now devoid of any hospitable life. And though the space stations are likely more spacious than the titular Iron Lung, the point remains: humans are destined to live and die in those few remaining stations, their very own Iron Lungs. 

While this particular motif is not unique to the movie—it’s possible to make this same connection in the game through reading the data logs—the movie makes it much more explicit and easier to see by more directly connecting Simon to the outside universe. Rather than the audience being Simon/the Convict and only experiencing the isolation and existential doom that humanity faces via reading some (entirely missable) data logs, the audience bears witness to Simon’s isolation, his reckoning with that inevitable doom. We are there with Simon as he is cut off from the outside universe, his own personal Quiet Rapture. 

In the game, it’s much easier to focus on the more immediate concerns of completing objectives while being beset on all sides by strange noises and sights without facing the deeper implications of the setting. The movie downplays some of that, especially in the first half, to make its audience sit with Simon and think about what he must be experiencing. 

But the movie doesn’t just expand on Iron Lung’s existing themes; it also brings its own themes to the table. Two of the more prominent motifs that the movie addresses are those of ‘It Doesn’t Matter’ and Light. 

It Doesn’t Matter

Throughout the movie, this phrase pops up with surprising frequency, to the point where at times it becomes almost a mantra. Ava answers many of Simon’s questions by telling him it doesn’t matter, that he’s only there to do as he’s told without needing to know why. Simon himself starts to repeat it in what becomes an attempt to self-soothe when things start to get too stressful; it doesn’t matter what’s going on, he just has to finish the goal and he’ll be free. It doesn’t matter. 

That nihilism is once again reflective of humanity’s state in the universe of Iron Lung, of the sheer hopelessness of the situation. Humanity is on the brink of extinction, its population somewhere in the hundreds to maybe thousands range, at best. In such a situation it would be all too easy to succumb to despair; it ‘doesn’t matter’ what they do, they’re still doomed. What could one person’s actions truly do to affect any kind of positive change? This is compounded by the faction that Simon once belonged to, the Sons of Eden, who see death as the only freedom, and the only way to potentially keep the only living tree alive by providing their corpses as its sustenance. But that tree is now dead, and so death no longer holds any meaning. The one thing that Simon’s faction had to give their lives some kind of purpose is gone—and so their lives no longer ‘matter’. The situation is hopeless, leaving only the possibility for a sort of quiet resignation. It doesn’t matter; everyone is doomed.

Except it does matter. Simon could have easily given up at any point in the movie, and accepted his fate, but clearly his own survival mattered enough to him to keep struggling even in the face of insurmountable odds. And in the climax of the movie, Simon, who has been struggling towards a singular goal of survival at any cost, finally realizes that his actions do matter, that it has in fact mattered the entire time that he fought so hard to stay alive, and that he now has a chance to give humanity a little hope—and that’s worth giving up even his own survival, the thing that has been driving him throughout the entire movie.

In the end, Iron Lung says that even in the darkest of times, the things we do matter, even if they don’t seem like they do. The struggle might seem hopeless, pointless even, but it does matter to even just try to make a difference. We don’t know if Simon succeeded, if the black box was ever found by the rest of humanity, but it still mattered that Simon gave everything to get it to the surface. 

The Light

Iron Lung also has an interesting motif with light, and how it is both a blessing and a curse. The Iron Lung is a dark and dingy place with minimal internal lighting, especially at the back of the sub. He is also forced to pilot the sub entirely blind, the built-in camera his only window to the outside world, and at times the only way he can see at all within the sub. But this camera is as dangerous as it is useful; while it shows him what’s outside the sub, that sight is a double-edged sword, occasionally showing him things he would rather not see. Furthermore, it is heavily implied that the camera is slowly poisoning him with radiation the more he uses it; in other words, the more he uses it to see, the more he cements his own doom. 

This is paralleled when he finds the Light Fragment; it is not a coincidence that the Fragment is shaped similarly to the camera display, being a rectangle that’s taller than it is wide. The ghostly voices on the intercom say that it’s a window through which God (or a God) sees our reality—not unlike how the camera is a window through which Simon sees the world outside the Iron Lung. And, much like the camera, the Fragment is extremely dangerous as well–when Simon gets put in front of it, he is blasted with a beam so powerful it rips through the ship, and maybe even through reality itself. 

In Iron Lung, Light is illumination, is knowing, but knowing comes with its own consequences. 

There are other points in which Light plays a pivotal role within the movie, too; the blinking light of the speaker whenever Ava talks to Simon, the anglerfish vibes given to the monster, the proximity alarms being represented by blinking lights, the naming of Filament Station (though the latter two are pulled from the game, they are given much heavier importance in the movie). Despite being set in a dark and lightless place, Light bleeds (pun intended) through every second of the movie. Light is knowledge, but that knowledge often comes at a heavy cost. 

At the end of the movie, after Simon has sacrificed everything to give humanity the knowledge he found, we linger on one final shot: the black box, containing all the knowledge of what lies beneath the ocean of blood, attached to a tiny beacon of Light floating in endless darkness.

[planetlostinspace]

[suck-my-thermos]

Iron Lung (2026)

[kiratheperson]

“Is The Iron Lung Just A Tampon” – the greatest thread in the history of forums, locked by a moderator after 12,239 pages of heated debate,

[thornethenorn]

That wasn't special effects Markiplier's arm just did that

[divorce-enjoyer]

creating the perfect iron lung viewing experience by depriving myself of sleep the night before and then chugging 3 red bulls in the lobby. just as markiplier intended

[alcordraws]

I always enjoy when Mark plays A Character and Simon Iron Lung is just. So delightful to me. He has giant sad wet boba brown eyes. He's weighted down by an inescapable past that even the looming eldritch horrors taunt him with. He's literally sopping wet with blood. He's competent, but also in a situation with minimal information and the isolation and lack of oxygen are cooking his braincells into goop. He has a long flowing main of hair that would be so lovely if they just gave him a brush. His boobs are massive. His hands are so Shaped. He's concussed and irradiated and doomed by the narrative <3

[septiccoffeefreak]

Most of my thoughts are still jingling around so much that it's hard to pull anything out, but one thing I can say that I haven't seen anyone post yet is- the cinematography LIES to you and it's fucking amazing.

They're trying to convey the horror of being trapped in this submarine, and knowing anything could go wrong at any moment, and we've seen leaks and "condensation" pretty much as soon as the film begins.

In most movies, if the camera stops and goes out of it's way to focus on something: it's telling you, "pay attention to this. something is about to happen with this."

But in Iron lung? there are SO many shots that suddenly cut away from mark, or where he's standing in the background, and our focus is on parts of the submarine itself. and your brain, which has seen movies, goes "that's about to break. that's about to break or leak or start making noise, something is about to happen to this part of the ship" and then....that just, doesn't happen. at least, not yet.

they're CONSTANTLY reminding you that the ship could critically fail, tricking you into thinking maybe it will right now, and then it doesn't, but failures DO happen throughout so the trick keeps working on you and you keep wondering when something is going to give.

it keeps you locked onto the screen and it keeps you on edge, even in "quiet" scenes where things are supposedly safe for a while. You never feel at ease, you never breathe a sigh of relief. it's a CONSTANT tension that never lets up, no matter how well things seem to be going for Simon. Until that glorious catharsis at the end of the film where the horror has reached it's peak and it's over can you actually relax, but at that point- if you're anything like me- the movie as a whole has sent you reeling and you can't even fully articulate what's happened to you in that theatre.

[shed-some-light]

ok so if you've ever wanted to see markiplier whimpering and covered in blood this is the movie for you.

[gothic-cepho]

mark….. i beg you…. drop the hi-res costume bts pictures….. i wanna recreate that jumper….. please

[venomrevenge]

iron lung has made me excited about a movie in a way i dont really get for movies anymore. i really cant stop thinking about it. this felt like art that is so full of love. and no pro-military propaganda in sight because they weren’t funded by anyone like that. it felt like it was exactly what they wanted it to be. it felt like a love letter to humanity. this movie is the black box and the black box was Simon’s love letter to humanity.

[viv-bugg]

“Dude he’s totally gonna cry!”

I saw the #1 movie in America (yesterday). Please go watch Iron Lung if you are down for a gritty sci-fi horror experience!

[the-light-in-the-blood]

The "god" of Iron Lung

I am relentlessly fascinated by the Speaker's "do you believe in god?" speech. These are some vague thoughts I have thus far.

Firstly, I think it's important to clarify I believe there are multiple entities involved; two fish things (which are almost certainly the corrupted and morphed forms of the researchers from the SM-8, like how Simon was becoming corrupted and changed at the end, which is supported by the credits being for "SM-8 Research Lead/The Speaker" and "SM-8 Research Assistant/The Whisper" - they're listed as both), and then the ""god"" or the light or however one wishes to refer to that.

In a way, it reminds me of Azathoth from Lovecraftian lore. Azathoth is a blind idiot god whose dreaming creates reality, and, should it wake, the dream ends and all reality ceases to exist. Everything you are, your memories, your experiences, your whole life, is merely a product of the vivid hallucinations of this eldritch entity.

I think there might be something slightly adjacent happening with the god in Iron Lung; only it's not sleeping, it's seeing.

Key points of dialogue, quoted from the movie:

"It's what caused the Quiet Rapture. Or a fragment of it, at least. It was a light, can you believe that? Shining through the hole like it didn't even matter, like nothing in this universe could ever possibly matter."

"An ignorant god sees a sliver of our universe through a pinhole and thinks it understands all that is and all that will be; and it will. Because a god makes sense of what it sees despite what it should be. The light; it illuminates, and it blinds. It thinks, and therefore we are."

This concept of a hole being mentioned multiple times suggests, to me, that it's important. What is on the other side, I don't know. Is it a tear in the fabric of reality, something interdimensional? The other side of a black hole singularity? I've only got wild guesses to throw at that, and that part doesn't matter so much anyhow.

What does matter is that, whatever it is, it gives this so-called god access to see a sliver of our universe. And I feel like what the Speaker is saying, about how "a god makes sense of what it sees, despite what it should be", implies that this entity's thoughts or beliefs, inasmuch as it may have them, dictate the very reality of the universe. Things change to accord to its understanding, even if that wasn't how they were originally or defies the natural order of things.

For example–and this is a stretch, I'm not saying this is my solid theory of what happened, but just theoretically say–if that ignorant god looking through a pinhole doesn't see, doesn't recognise planets and stars, for whatever reason, and thinks it understands "there are no planets or stars here", then there are no planets or stars. Not anymore.

Maybe it sees Simon - "I see you" - and believes he exists, so he exists, even when by all accounts he should have been long dead. Same for the researchers-now-fish-monsters; perhaps having seen the light and it having seen them, it believes them alive, so they are alive, technically, even if its in a monstrous, torturous, corrupted, would-have-been-better-off-if-they-were-dead, can't-take-it-down-here-anymore form. ("Is that how you're alive?" "Yes... no.") (The god, the light, doesn't truly understand what "alive" is. Or "human". It doesn't understand; but it will, because what it understands, is what is, whether it should be or not.)

"It thinks, and therefore we are".

It thinks, and therefore the whole universe accords to its understanding and perspective. The original order of things? Irrelevant. Nothing in this universe could ever possibly matter, not when mere thought reshapes it.

And so a god makes sense of what it sees, despite what it should be.

[thesassiestcolor]

Something something Simon screaming "you want the butcher??" while cracking the Fish's teeth (reverting back to what Eden made him) while his last words are "this is bigger than me" (the COI's slogan) and something something humanity will be saved by combining both factions strengths

[sleepy-n-thinkin-stuff]

Markiplier randomly during the iron lung movie:

[justanotherrandomwriter]

my cousin just sent me this 😂😭

I was respectfully staring during that scene.