caffeinated chocolate

I love that the blood drips over the Eel's left eye, covering (blinding) it.

Another note on Simon's navivation skills. Once he finds a wall, he turns perpendicular to it and checks for more walls. He's figuring out if it's a tunnel of the wall to a much bigger chamber, as well as looking for the crossroads in the tunnels from before.

It's a common advice to find your way in an unknown place, especially a labyrinth: keep your hand to a wall and never let it go. This way you can memorize where you have been and avoid going through the same path twice by turning around too much.

Smile #2: Seeing the depth meter go up.

This entire interaction is intriguing, if I could just gif the entire thing here I would lmao

The first hint that the radio shouldn't be working is that the depth meter is still in the red, and the radio has never gotten a clear signal unless at the edge of the red or higher. Another, and I've checked, is that the radio light not once goes on during the entire time he's talking with Ellie.

It's a notable change as well that the focus on the radio shifts to the speaker. When Ava or David are on the line, the camera pans to the light, but when Ellie speaks the radio is dead. Panning to the dead light would further signal that the voice isn't coming from it.

"You're stuck down here too? I thought I was..."

It's phenomenal acting to see so many things sinking in for SImon.

Yes, he knew Ava lied about him being the first down ever since he found the pendant, and twice confirmed when he found the SM-8. But hearing someone else call out for help, he seems to realize the towship might have running other subs at once with him. They weren't just lying about sending people in the past, but also sending people at the same time as him. Not only that, but that they somehow allow (on purpose or through negligence) the subs to communicate with each other. They lied while possibly knowing the lie would get undone in the middle of the mission.

NOT ONLY THAT, but his first reaction is to reassure Ellie that the towship is still out there, and they can maybe figure out a way to fix the situation for the both of them.

Another O2 marker goes off, and Simon refuses to acknowledge it. He's visibly holding on to a chance at rescue. It's not until Elli insists that "he won't make it" that Simon grasps the pendant, crouches down and tries to cope with the looming certainty that he's a goner.

He asks to for Ellie to keep talking, craving connection for comfort. When Ellie keeps talking about how to best accept his fate, the least painful way to die, he shuts her off. His tone goes dry and quiet in comparison to his wobbly plea.

He also fusses with his hands, tapping his fists together or kneading his hands. He startles out of his spiral as soon as the Rapture is mentioned, and we can see him pushing those feelings down.

He begins shaking his head and touching his forehead, and it grows in tempo as the conversation goes on. Put a pin on that.

"You've actually found something?"

It feels very pointed that when he follows up on Ellie's ramblings about the light, that we get a close up of his left eye. Ellie also notably pingpongs between praising and craving the Light and its knowledge, and trying to shut down conversation about it and to ignore it, since it's too dangerous.

Simon ponders if he has a concussion or getting CO/CO2 poisoning, saying "his head is not right". While those are actually very likely, his dizziness and confusion never bothered him as much until this conversation started. The driving scene messiness could be sourced from exhaustion and those medical concerns, but we never see him sporting a headache in that scene, only losing track of time and signs of tiredness.

To me, this hints that these dizzy spells come from contact with whatever power is making him hear Ellie's voice.

Oh this bit?? Crazy work. Simon has begun to talk to the silence, and it's like a dam slowly chipping apart from the bottom up. He mentions he's "been seeing some things" and we get a quick cut that is almost pitch darkness in the raw movie. I've done some edit of the scene in context, and also blew the levels as much as possible for clarity.

I'm not entirely sure what angle they are using here. I can make out the computer screen and the orange from the lifesaver, but otherwise the angle is a bit of a mystery to me. With the angle, I'm not even sure if we're seeing upright or from inside the wall somehow??

Once more, we see Simon pushing his feelings down. He just poured out some doubts and thoughts he's clearly been harboring for a long time, stuff that might have even gotten him in trouble for sayign in the past. In the silence we have a tendency to fill it, and he does. Then, when the silence continues he self-corrects and pushes it down. Even his voice changes, no longer wobbly and uncertain, but deep and dry, numb.

When asked if he would give up everything just to survive, Simon looks to the pendant and claims "he never had anything to begin with". How far does this sentiment goes?

He had nothing from the moment he stepped into the sub, besides a deal and a promise of a freedom. He possibly never trusted the COI to meet their end of the bargain. COI also isn't home, isn't his people;

He had nothing from the moment he surrendered at Filament Station. His brothers abandoned him, didn't listen to him and left him for dead, whatever bonds there were between them were completely severed. He still calls them brother, honors them, but also begrudges them;

He had nothing since the Quiet Rapture, besides a blind belief that it might be reversed someday. He held on to hope that this wouldn't be permanent and could be fixed, while everyone else gave up hope and surrendered to the dread and defeatism;

He had nothing since he arrived on Eden. Nothing but hs mother's knife and the promise that this was for the best. He's spoken about the rift in mentality between him and the rest of Eden, so just how close did he feel to them? Was he always an outcast?

Much to consider.

Ellie's deal also feels relevant. She strikes the bargain but it's the Pinhole God that grants it later on.

"We will see the answer together. And you will live. And we will be free."

They saw the answer (the Light), Simon was given a chance to live and when he stayed under, the mutations began to set in and lived on as the Blood Tree. The Eel was freed from a cursed, anguished existence and Simon was freed from the grasp of any of the factions.

This is not new information in the fandom but, might as well reiterate <3

I do wonder how the COI scans for points of interest, and how the Light managed to escape their study so far. Depending on how you pace the timeline, there may be several years between the loss of the SM-8 and Simon's expedition. At least five iterations of the hemorover too. It's very odd.

"We wouldn't lie, not about this."

COI just really loves their lying huh?

"It thinks and therefore we are." "Even if your miracle could solve all their problems, [...]"

The sudden close-up of the pendant feels relevant in this conversation. They are talking about the Light, but what is being said and commented matters. Ellie is waxing poetics about Gods, establishing that a God's perception affects reality, reshapes it into that perception. Meanwhile, Simon is skeptical not only of what she's saying, but his focus is entirely elsewhere. He's concerned about being sent down again, still concerned first and foremost of his own survival.

It also matters that the close-up lasts only for this bit of his dialogue. It's an implication that he never believed the Tree as a deity could fix or help Eden. Whatever view Eden had of the Tree does not match his own, which mirrors his own belief regarding the Quiet Rapture.