The inherent irony in giving a remake shit for having the gall to redo an incredibly well-liked, undeniably classic remake hasn’t been lost on anyone covering this movie, from what I can tell. So I think the shit given to this 2011 The Thing has been based on reasonable facts and the actual footage we’ve seen… most of which sucks.
It boils down to this:
A) It pretends to be a prequel, but shares a title and clearly replicates many of the beats and the same iconic imagery (the dogs, flamethrower, etc). This is dumb.
B) The cast is generally prettier and seems generally younger than the original cast. This is not dumb, but suggests typical Hollywood tinkering.
C) All the footage looks like and has been cut like extremely cliche, bland modern horror. This is dumb, and suggests typical Hollywood tinkering.
Case in point, the first TV spot for the film (which I caught thanks to LatinoReview):
That’s a mere few seconds to go, but it’s building on an impression started by the first trailer, and the re-shoot-rife production itself. And man that awful explosion of the creature out of the block of ice….
This whole thing piles on even more irony as I really liked the last remake I saw. I can argue all day about how the film was sharply reinterpreted and molded to fit into an interesting filmmaker’s oeuvre, but at the end of the day it’s no less fair to give The Thing its day in court. I’m gonna –I’m sure we’re all gonna– but that doesn’t mean I won’t be a bit grumbly walking in.
Your thoughts on this ad and The Thing footage so far?
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16 comments
I really want it to be good, but the Resident Evil-esque CG block-escaping scene does look really bad.
I know one thing: if it’s terrible, I’m gonna love reading Nick’s eventual evisceration of it knowing how much he loves Carpenter’s.
It’s actually grown on me, so I don’t agree with the hate. YET.
Looks fine to me. I don’t see the hubub. Here’s hoping for a Kurt Russell cameo(which will never happen :()
Part of me wants to scream HERESY, the other part thinks MEW is adorable with her red nose. I’m on the fence, dammit.
Wow, awful. I feel like saying, more, but that about covers it.
The dogs HAVE to be in this movie. That’s how the next movie starts – the Thing comes to the camp in the form of the dog, straight from the Norwegian camp. So they HAVE to be in the prequel. You HAVE to have the Thing killing people in Antarctica, so of course it’s going to be similar shit. Of course they’re going to have to use similar tools that you would actually have in Antarctica. Seriously, I can’t understand why anyone would complain about the similarities, especially the dogs. THE DOGS ARE MANDATORY INCLUSIONS.
Maybe someone can educate me, but why are flamethrowers apparently standard issue for Atarctic expeditions? Are those the “in case of monster” flamethrowers? Or are they really there just because the last version of the film had them?
I also don’t see the vitrol directed towards this film. I have yet to see anything that makes this look too bad, and if something like Rise of the Planet of the Apes is any indication, it’s that Hollywood is capable of remaking/reimagining a beloved film/series. I will give it the benefit of the doubt. The only thing that concerns me is the younger cast, that to me is a little dopey, since the original Thing was filled with older unattractive character actors but that’s to be expected in this day and age, I guess.
RISE/APES was an exception, not the rule.
I don’t know about being “standard issue,” but it’s not that weird. Basically the same logic as to why you’d have a flamethrower on your farm – for land management purposes. In the arctic sense, that means cutting through ice buildup, especially for getting down to the ground for burying survey equipment, digging trenches, etc. (These days it’s frequently a remote-controlled robot that does any arctic-based flamethrowing.)
LOL “IN CASE OF OUTER_SPACE FROZEN MONSTERS: BREAK GLASS
Okay we know that if it is a prequel then a Shepard will have to run off and infect U.S.31…but they might also just re-shoot the whole kennel scene from 1982 with anonymous cgi instead of Rob Bottin’s foam rubber…which might mean the whole thing will be SyFy Channel-quality remake with a bunch of kids who grew up singing and dancing in The Hoop-De-Doo Musical Revue in the Tomorrow-land Terrace.
If that sounds interesting to you there is a popular line of young adult horror novels and movies that you should check out.
Aw…come on, do “Fuck this Thing”!
Maybe it’s the Metallica fan in me that’s sad you didn’t name the article “The Thing That Should Not Be”.
Face The Thing That Should Not Be!!!
Anybody else expect,”Immigrant Song,” around the :20 mark?
I’m with Nick on this, actually. This isn’t going to be Carpenter’s The Thing. It’s going to be its own, well, thing.
And from the little I’ve seen it looks as though it could be a fun, creepy time at the movies.
Could, of course, being the operative word here.
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