Kayze

So, I'm friends with someone who makes airplanes for a living. They wish to remain anon. I tossed them some SM-13 renders to see if they could make anything of it (for wiki purposes), and got this in response...

The only thing left they had to say:

Below will be some references and notes to help anyone out who may need it!! None of this is meant to come off as rude, I just want to help people out who have not had the opportunity to watch it.

I posted this on my twitter, but I wanna put it here too because tumblr gives me a lot more room to ramble on without cutting off tweets :]

SPOILERS BELOW FOR IRON LUNG!! and a general body horror warning!!

EDIT (4/1/26): I found more close up images of the mutations near the end of the movie!! They will be under everything else :]

EDIT (4/4/26): References and BTS of Simon's arm rip added!! AND HIS PENDANT!! THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT GUYS WE GOT A SOLID PENDANT REFERENCE

BODY HORROR WARNING!! SOME OF THESE PROSTHETICS AND MAKEUP ARE REALLY GNARLY AND GROSS

at the end of the movie, Simon has radiation poisoning (from the x-ray camera; levels that should be fatal), alcohol poisoning (he drank isopropyl alcohol), possibly one or more concussions from blacking out and bouncing around the ship multiple times, lost an arm, and is in the process of mutating due to exposure to the blood in the SM-13 (has likely also lost one of his eyes as it looks clouded over before it becomes swollen to the point that you can no longer see it, half of his face looks boiled along with his body, and eel-like fangs are sprouting out of his cheeks)

each photo Simon takes uses 7,800 millisieverts of radiation; one whole body dose of radiation over 700 mSv can cause Acute Radiation Poisoning

the movie ends with Simon fusing with the tree seed he was carrying; the tree essentially explodes out of the SM-13 and kills Ellie (the eel/monster) (you can see this in a BTS CGI rendering--it's also possible to see it in the film, but the scene is very dark); Simon turning into the Blood Tree (as the Wiki calls it) can also be seen as a callback to The Father's quote earlier in the film: "The last tree WILL live again! When the Last Son of Eden joins the Grove, there will be a thousand trees!" which would make Simon the Last Son of Eden

Elli, the eel/the monster, is a mutated conglomerate of all the people in the SM-8; she speaks with the voice of the SM-8 research lead, who had begun obsessively drinking the blood from the ocean, which is likely what led to the SM-8 crew mutating into Elli, similarly to how it is mutating Simon

the "ignorant god" that Elli refers to is the Eye that Simon sees--it is implied that the Eye is peering into their universe from Its universe (which is red and bloody) and either a) reshaped their world either in Its world's image (the Red Void) or b) reshaped the world according to the first thing it saw--the inside of a person or animal (which is filled with blood)

in the video game, the clearest interpretation of the Quiet Rapture is that it was the biblical apocalypse from the book of Revalation and the reason that all the space stations remained is because they weren't on any of the planets (however, these implications are not present on the same level in the movie--rather, the implications are what the above bullet point says)

Simon has seen the ghostlight of stars; seeing a live star would be new for him, but it would not be his first time seeing a sky that isn't empty

Simon grew up on Eden, (in the game it is the largest remaining spacestation that was originally a Mars colony), which is largely implied to be a cult--they have the Last Tree, which is revered, they are led by a man called The Father, they refer to themselves as Children/Brothers of Eden, and they have tattoos on their necks with the symbol of Eden (Simon's was burnt off by the C.O.I); each of them carry a pendant with a leaf from the Last Tree

it is implied that Eden attacked Filament Station to get bodies to use as compost for the Last Tree, however instead it blew up and killed 62 people

the Light is what triggers Simon's vision of the Eye and the Red Void in which It lives--Elli knows of this connections and seeks to hoard it for herself, only wanting those she approves of (like Simon, initially) to have access to it

Simon is implied to be less religious/cultish than others in Eden, such as the previous occupant of the SM-13 (he chooses to follow the orders of the C.O.I over because he explicitly wants to live, rather than wanting to find his freedom "beyond the Veil"

Simon's sub most likely refilled its oxygen bars through the blood that seeped in, as blood contains oxygen

Simon started hearing Elli after blood from the ocean leaked into the SM-13 and got on his face

Elli refers to the SM-13 as being alive (this would be due to exposure to the blood ocean), and her claim seems to be confirmed by his arm becoming stuck to the ship (before it rips off)

the hallucination Simon had of the mutated person in the SM-13 may have been of himself

the only parent Simon mentions in the movie is his mother, meaning he likely a) didn't have a good relationship with his father or b) didn't know who his father was (dead or alive); it is also heavily implied that his mother is dead and there are no other clear mentions of him having other living family members

At one point in the film, Simon says: “What’s easier to believe? That all the planets and stars disappeared or that a couple space stations disappeared?" meaning that a) wormhole AUs have a canon plausibility and b) Simon not only is not 100% sold on Eden, but he also doubts the reasons he is being told caused the Quiet Rapture

Simon talks to himself a lot and wants to trust other people; he is polite to Ava until everything goes to shit and after he blasts them with radiation, he is very apologetic

there is a point in the movie where the Eye speaks to Simon and they both say "agreed" (I believe around the time he says "I want to live) which may imply that him turning into the tree at the end is Its way of fulfilling this deal; it is debatable how cognizant Simon was of this deal, since he was Going Through It(TM) at the time

Simon throws up blood twice

The sub didn't get all fleshy until after his seed glass cracked, meaning it may have gained treelike-properties from it

for further research, here are video essays about Iron Lung that I have watched and reccommend:

Hail Mary and Iron Lung: How We Face the End Times

Solving Iron Lung: The Entire Movie and Lore Explained

Iron Lung: Complete Lore and Story Breakdown

Everything We Know About the Iron Lung Movie

The black box on the SM-8 contained:

The location and possibly images of The Light, which is a tear in space-time that destroys you and places you in the God's domain / mutates you into a blood creature. The Blood Eel refers to it as "the answer" multiple times.

Information on the nature of the blood itself.

The COI sent the SM-8 crew down to see if they could synthesize food from it. Upon attempting to eat it, they started dying. We hear this over a recording Simon recovers from the data. So the COI wanted it because it contained a possible food source.

The eel was originally MUCH bigger in the concept art than the movie. I think it's implied she's massive, and she was intended to be massive, but having something that big would have destroyed the beautiful camera framing, so they toned it down and made its face look more like a human skull:

The Eye presenting the Eel's severed head to Simon like a dragon it just slew for him?! Hello?!

ALL the eye concept art iterations. My god, I cannot imagine the time it took to do all that.

The human spine and shoulder blades in the Eel's face, just haphazardly congealed in the meat, ribs poking out of her jaw like little baby teeth. Insane.

The eel was injured by the Anomaly (we can hear her screaming in the movie), so we can assume that Simon getting vaporized was not a hallucination. He did not hallucinate any of that. It was real! The whole rest of the time that fight is going on, she's half-cooked. You can see that continuity in the art while she's chomping down on the sub! Meaning, Simon really did truly die and come back to life.

Simon actually took pictures of the damage on her face:

Furthermore, the LIGHT coming from the sub that we didn't get to see well in the movie; HELLO?! The last thing Simon saw was a flash of light. Where did it come from? The pendant, which crackled that same blue-ish color in the scrapped storyboarding scene, maybe? Horrendous knowledge has been bestowed upon me. There was more to that pendant than meets the eye.

The roots you see growing up over the camera in the last few shots of the black box data are not just growing onto the eel. They're going INTO the Eel. Literally shot through her body and rooted into her flesh while she was still alive. What an awful, horrible way to die, for both individuals.

The Blood Tree is using the Eel's corpse as a damn plant starter. It's eating her. She's fertilizer.

and grace is trying so hard to not accidentally be sexist or assign gender roles to a monogendered species, so like, trying hard not to call someone he/him just because they like sports, or she/her just because they seem caring, or whatever. and he's having a hard time about it because he's like oh man why am I assigning the pronouns I'm assigning, i hope I'm not bringing any of my biases into this. just absolutely eating himself up over it

he tries to fix this by starting to roll a die, or throw darts at a dartboard, but his students immediately throw a fit because the point of the word-gifts is that they are specific, picked deliberately for them, right? and grace tries to explain gender bias and so on, but it becomes clear these kids could genuinely not give less of a shit, they just want to know what their AGAG (assigned gender at grace) is, alright? why is this so hard for him to understand??

eventually grace comes to the conclusion that he's on a different planet, and severely overthinking this, and that his kids really just are having fun--they really don't see the grace-given pronouns as categorization, he figures they see them as something more akin to astrology. or an eridian tiktok trend. when grace learns they call the assigning a word-gift he probably cries tbh

"teacher grace!!! what my pronoun question???"

"hmm. getting big they/them vibes off you"

You know, every time I draw something stupid, I think to myself "surely I can't top this!" And then somehow I draw something even dumber

𝘠𝘰𝘶’𝘳𝘦 𝘣𝘦𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘪𝘧𝘶𝘭…

obligatory princess mononoke drawing teeheehee

this will be available as a print when i become sane again, im afraid these tragic gay men occupy all my thoughts

hhhhaaarrAARHRHHH THE BLOOD DRIPPING ON HIS FACE FREAK4FREAK MY GAWD

including a bonus screen cap redraw: