{"id":404035,"date":"2026-02-02T15:42:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-02T15:42:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/404035\/"},"modified":"2026-02-02T15:42:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T15:42:07","slug":"iron-lung-review-youtuber-markiplier-crash-lands-with-big-screen-sci-fi-horror-movies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/404035\/","title":{"rendered":"Iron Lung review \u2013 YouTuber Markiplier crash lands with big-screen sci-fi horror | Movies"},"content":{"rendered":"

William Goldman\u2019s old showbiz maxim continues to apply that nobody knows anything. Independently financed horror movie Iron Lung has been smuggled into multiplexes without the usual promotional hoopla, where it was keenly awaited by the massed followers of its Hawaiian writer-director-star Mark Fischbach, better known as YouTube<\/a> gaming legend Markiplier. Many of us have long sensed culture is making a decisive break with the analogue in favour of the (perhaps terminally) online and Fischbach\u2019s film makes that paradigm shift not just visible but visceral; it feels not unlike spending 12 hours on Twitch with all the curtains closed.<\/p>\n

Though Markiplier is approaching the horror genre from a notionally fresh angle \u2013 by adapting Dave Szymanski\u2019s eponymous space-submarine sim<\/a> \u2013 he lands on the narratively rusty idea of an astronaut straying beyond his depth; this is Moon in dimmer light<\/a>. Beset by ominous rumbles and mounting doubts about the state of mankind, the begrimed and squalid craft singlehandedly piloted by Fischbach\u2019s straggle-haired convict Simon is indistinguishable from the average teenage bedroom. Our hero staggers round this intergalactic deathtrap completing vaguely specified missions \u2013 ram this, repair that, download something or other \u2013 like a harassed dad ticking off his Sunday to-do list. In this, Simon proves more proficient than Fischbach\u2019s offscreen self, who is either stumped by or oblivious to the film\u2019s fundamental issues.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Hopes that Iron Lung is a new Dark Star<\/a> are soon sunk by the depressive tone, leaden pacing and near-total absence of spectacle; this is basically a radio-play script that insistently has to tell, because this barebones production has nothing much to show. (The achievement, chiefly entrepreneurial, is almost admirably perverse: Markiplier steering people towards content that makes Solaris seem like Con Air.) Even if you have a major case of Main Character Syndrome to centre yourself for two-plus hours while relegating your co-stars to voices off, Fischbach holds steady before the camera; more money and bigger sets will doubtless come his way. But he can\u2019t pull off the dramatic heavy lifting required to convert a short film\u2019s worth of plot into a watchable feature. At least MrBeast\u2019s stunts get him outside.<\/p>\n

Iron Lung is in cinemas now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"William Goldman\u2019s old showbiz maxim continues to apply that nobody knows anything. Independently financed horror movie Iron Lung…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":404036,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[96,2839,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-404035","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-movies","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/404035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=404035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/404035\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/404036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=404035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=404035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=404035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}