Rant incoming because this post reallyyy irritates me. (No offense to OP Iโm sure theyโre a great person but this specific opinion of theirs ground my gears down to the fcking bearings okay)
โCold blooded murdererโ??? SIMON? The man who apologized to a damn DESK that he hit too hard? The man who apologized throughout the entire movie after accidentally irradiating three people, even though those three people were effectively the ones sending him down into a hellish landscape of blood? The man who sobbed over accidentally breaking the seed pendant? Ohhhhhhhh I am so sick of people mischaracterizing Simon as this violent, cold-blooded freak of a killer.
Everything we see in the movie points to him being an unwilling participant. He consistently claims, even AFTER being effecticaly tortured psychologically, that he didnโt want to hurt anyone, that he had nothing to do with Filament Stationโs destruction. Even Ava seemed to believe him near the end. There is NO indication that he was ACTUALLY at fault for FS, and EVERY indication that he wasnโt.
The only indication we see in canon that Simon has ever killed anyone himself was the flashback of him as A CHILD, standing over dead bodies with blood on his hands. Then we see an image of someone, presumably his own mother, handing him a fcking knife. At least to me, they to show those two flashbacks in that specific order ON PURPOSE. It is showing us that child-Simon was being nurtured to kill by the adults; that event, him killing other kids AS A KID HIMSELF is probably how he got the name โThe Butcherโ. So yes I will say Simon has probably murdered people in the name of Eden, but he is not a goddamn โcold-blooded killer.โ
And that quote? The โYou have the highest body count out here, killer!โ
Here is the whole conversation we hear during that sequence:
Simon: โI didnโt want them to die.โ
Brother of Eden: โExcuse me? What the fuck did you just say? When did you grow a conscience, Simon? You go the highest body count out here, killer! Not one of us has more blood on their hands than you. Simon The Butcher lost his nerve. Youโre gonna have to kill your own brothers to stop this!โ
Simon: โYouโre not my brother.โ
Brother of Eden: โYour words, not mine, Butcher! I wasnโt even there. Iโm just the guy who told you to cross the wires.โ
Yeah. โI wasnโt even there, Iโm just the guy who told you to cross the wiresโ was so clearly a reveal that the flashback conversation was being altered by the eel. That male voice is of the other Eden brother who died on the SM-13 before Simon, whose consciousness joined the eel upon his death just like the people on SM-8. The Eden guy โwasnโt even thereโ (โthereโ = the attack on Filament Station). Just like how the eel contradicts herself on Simonโs mother; โA mother who wouldnโt even recognize the killer she spawnedโ/โOr is death the only thing she taught you?โ Which is it, a mother who taught her son to kill or a mother who would hate her son for the โmurdererโ heโs become? The eel is clearly grasping at straws in this whole sequence to make Simon break and destroy the blackbox, but he doesnโt, because he KNOWS the eel is fucking with him.
And the first two lines, the โI didnโt want them to dieโ and the โExcuse me?โฆ.โ lines: You know what that sounds like to me? It sounds like Simon having a conversation with someone who is full up on Edenโs dogma, hounding Simon for โbetrayingโ Eden by trying to stop them from blowing up a whole damn station of innocent people. And that line โYouโre gonna have to kill your own brothers to stop thisโ SPECIFICALLY is what makes me think this is what one of the other soldiers of Eden told Simon BEFORE they finalized the attack on FS. That Simon was gonna have to kill his own brothers to stop them from blowing up Filament Station. Which means, at least to me, that Simon got his โbutcherโ title BEFORE Filament Station, again probably for what heโd been forced to do as a child in that flashback.
Simon explicitly says: โEden gave me a tattoo, the C.O.I made me burn it off. I didnโt choose either of them.โ This is so obviously the movieโs way of telling us that Simon had already been working on deconstructing the cultish lies heโd been taught on Eden; he didnโt choose Eden. He was forced to be there, he was an UNWILLING GODDAMN PARTICIPANT in Edenโs agenda FROM THE GET GO. Itโs one of the first damn things we learn about him!!!
Yes, Simon has probably killed people, at least as a child. But there is NOTHING in the movie that would ever convince me that Simon is a โcold blooded killerโ and I am sooooooo tired of people making him seem like a merciless violent asshole! No, he is not a patron saint, no he is not perfect, YES he is flawed and an extremely complex character but he IS NOT COLD BLOODED FFS. He is the DEFINITION of โunwilling participantโ.
Did I overreact to this post? Definitely. But this is my blog and Iโll overreact however I damn well please on here๐ญ
gracieabrams
amandla
