00:00Iron Lung debuted at number two in North America with a massive $17.8 million haul,
00:05and the internet is losing it. As one fan put it, by all accounts, Iron Lung is number one.
00:11Disney barely managed to beat an independent filmmaker. Since late November, Disney has held
00:15an iron grip on the box office with its hits like Zootopia 2, Avatar 3, and Marvel's Fantastic Four.
00:21That was the wall Markiplier ran into as Disney's Send Help, directed by horror legend Sam Ramey,
00:27took the spot. But here's the wild part. Send Help cost $40 million to produce,
00:33Iron Lung cost just $3 million, and Mark was only $1.2 million away from toppling the House of Mouse,
00:40leading fans to say, I don't think people understand how historic this weekend was.
00:45And for anyone who doesn't know the creator. I'm number one, right? I milked it a lot. I said it.
00:49It was very funny. I knew the Sam Ramey's movie was going to pass me eventually by the end of the
00:53weekend. But I was like, haha, I'm number one. Markiplier, or Mark Fishback, is a gaming icon
00:58with 38 million subscribers. His directorial debut, Iron Lung, is a direct adaptation of the 2022 cult
01:05classic indie game, where you're a convict trapped in a tiny, rusty submarine nicknamed the Iron Lung.
01:11And like the game, the movie shows Mark forced to navigate an ocean of blood on a desolate moon
01:16after a cosmic event called the Quiet Rapture caused every star-inhabitable planet in the universe
01:21to vanish. It was not designed for this depth, so you will be welded inside and a forward window
01:26will be closed. There is no time for training. It's basically a game walkthrough where Mark is
01:31the star player. And Mark personally contacted the game's creator, David Shizmanski, in 2022 to secure
01:37the rights directly, bypassing Hollywood middlemen to ensure total creative control. Meaning Mark didn't
01:43just star in it, he wrote, directed, and completely self-funded the $3 million budget. And that gamble paid
01:50off. The film grossed a massive $21.7 million worldwide in its opening weekend. And despite
01:56early industry confusion, where Iron Lung was briefly missing from major charts, the film now
02:01sits at number two, soundly beating Amazon's Melania documentary. As one viewer commented,
02:07going to that movie felt like I was going to support a friend's film, and support they did.
02:11Reports state Mark originally planned for just 50 theaters, but demand was so high that fans flooded
02:17theaters with calls. One exhibitor even asked Mark's team to, quote, turn off the bots, only to find
02:22out they weren't bots, just fans. And by opening night, the film was playing in over 3,000 locations.
02:28And Mark didn't go light on production. The film actually broke the world record for the most fake
02:33blood used in a horror movie, using over 80,000 gallons, surpassing the 2013 Evil Dead record of 50,000.
02:40Even non-horror fans are showing up with one saying,
02:42I'd give it a solid 7 out of 10, which is pretty good for a first-time director.
02:47But online critics are split at 44% on Rotten Tomatoes, with the audience score sitting at a
02:52massive 89%. But to celebrate, Mark went live on Sunday visibly emotional, confirming he turned
02:58down major studios to keep this independent.
03:00And it's not to shut out Sam Raimi, it's kind of to shut out Disney for winning like 10 weeks in a row.
03:06Maybe they could only win nine weeks in a row in the one weekend that Iron Long is here,
03:10it could, you know. And maybe if that could inspire someone to keep making films, that'd be pretty cool.
03:17Mark called it a hero moment, and the community agrees. One stated,
03:21it's showing that the story of David and Goliath is still something that holds today.
03:24And according to Mark, he's now giving his entire crew a big bonus from the profits,
03:29proving you don't need a studio to change the game.
03:31So did you see Iron Long this weekend and spot the creator of the game's cameo?
03:35Let us know in the comments and follow what's trending for more digital news.
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