{"id":21935,"date":"2026-02-11T12:37:33","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T11:37:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/11\/is-surprise-box-office-hit-iron-lung-the-future-of-video-game-films\/"},"modified":"2026-02-11T12:37:33","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T11:37:33","slug":"is-surprise-box-office-hit-iron-lung-the-future-of-video-game-films","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/11\/is-surprise-box-office-hit-iron-lung-the-future-of-video-game-films\/","title":{"rendered":"Is surprise box-office hit Iron Lung the future of \u2018video game films\u2019?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The YouTube gaming star\u2019s weird and divisive adaptation of his obscure horror film is a game within a film about a game \u2013 and hints at new directions for storytelling<\/p>\n

\u2022 Don\u2019t get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up here<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Something weird struck me early on while watching the movie Iron Lung, which has so far taken $32m at the box office<\/a>, despite being a grungy low-budget sci-fi thriller adapted from an independent video game few people outside of the horror gaming community have even heard of. Set after a galactic apocalypse, it follows a convict who must buy his freedom by piloting a rusty submarine through an ocean of human blood on a distant planet. Ostensibly, he\u2019s looking for relics that may prove vital for scientific research, but what he finds is much more ghastly. So far, so strange.<\/p>\n

The film was also written, directed and financed by one person \u2013 the YouTube gaming superstar Mark \u201cMarkiplier\u201d Fischbach \u2013 who also stars. But that\u2019s not the weird part, either. The weird part is that watching the film Iron Lung feels like watching Fischbach play Iron Lung the game. Maybe it\u2019s the fact that he spends most of the movie sitting at the sub\u2019s controls, trying to figure out how to use them correctly \u2013 like a gamer would. Maybe it\u2019s that, as the film progresses, he has to solve a series of environmental puzzles linked by various codes, computer read-outs and little injections of narrative \u2013 just like in a video game. Long periods of the movie involve Fischbach trying to decide what to do next, the camera close up on his confused face. This is incredibly similar to watching his YouTube videos about playing Iron Lung<\/a>, an experience he often found bewildering. It was the most metatextual experience I\u2019ve had in the cinema since The Truman Show \u2013 but I\u2019m not sure this is what Fischbach intended.<\/p>\n

Continue reading…<\/a>
\nThe YouTube gaming star\u2019s weird and divisive adaptation of his obscure horror film is a game within a film about a game \u2013 and hints at new directions for storytelling
\n\u2022 Don\u2019t get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up here
\nSomething weird struck me early on while watching the movie Iron Lung, which has so far taken $32m at the box office, despite being a grungy low-budget sci-fi thriller adapted from an independent video game few people outside of the horror gaming community have even heard of. Set after a galactic apocalypse, it follows a convict who must buy his freedom by piloting a rusty submarine through an ocean of human blood on a distant planet. Ostensibly, he\u2019s looking for relics that may prove vital for scientific research, but what he finds is much more ghastly. So far, so strange.
\nThe film was also written, directed and financed by one person \u2013 the YouTube gaming superstar Mark \u201cMarkiplier\u201d Fischbach \u2013 who also stars. But that\u2019s not the weird part, either. The weird part is that watching the film Iron Lung feels like watching Fischbach play Iron Lung the game. Maybe it\u2019s the fact that he spends most of the movie sitting at the sub\u2019s controls, trying to figure out how to use them correctly \u2013 like a gamer would. Maybe it\u2019s that, as the film progresses, he has to solve a series of environmental puzzles linked by various codes, computer read-outs and little injections of narrative \u2013 just like in a video game. Long periods of the movie involve Fischbach trying to decide what to do next, the camera close up on his confused face. This is incredibly similar to watching his YouTube videos about playing Iron Lung, an experience he often found bewildering. It was the most metatextual experience I\u2019ve had in the cinema since The Truman Show \u2013 but I\u2019m not sure this is what Fischbach intended. Continue reading…Technology | The Guardian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The YouTube gaming star\u2019s weird and divisive adaptation of his obscure horror film is a game within a film about a game \u2013 and hints at new directions for storytelling \u2022 Don\u2019t get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up here Something weird struck me early on while watching the movie Iron Lung, which …<\/p>\n

Is surprise box-office hit Iron Lung the future of \u2018video game films\u2019?<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":21936,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21935"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21935\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}