Ah The Thing. One of the all-time great movies. Set on an artic base, the film was about a group of researchers who were probably struggling with cabin fever even before an alien shapeshifter infiltrated their number and starts picking them off one at a time.
The film ends with an ambiguous scenario of two survivors, MacReady and Childs who sit in burning wreckage and sip drinks together with the audience not sure if one or both of them are in actual fact the alien monster.
We can probably assume that MacReady, played by Kurt Russell, who we have followed as the main character throughout the film is still human, as we’ve seen nothing to suggest that he was got by the Thing, and in the previous scene he was successfully killing ‘the main boss’ monster in the movie.
Childs however seemed to disappear for the previous 20 minutes and when he re-emerges without awareness of the struggle the other characters had just faced it all seems to indicate that maybe he is a monster…or at least that’s what they want you to think.
There’s lots of fan theories on this one, with the biggest being that when you look at shots of both MacReady and Childs it’s noticeable that MacReady emits steam breath when he exhales where as Childs does not. Is this a clue that Childs body temperature is different and perhaps a little more alien? Was this a mistake in filming or a trick of the light? Who knows. We’ve never got the answer on it, but it would be interesting to see this explored in a possible sequel.
It would be great if a sequel brought back either Kurt Russell or Keith David as MacReady and Childs.
So, this one may be happening. I’ve seen rumours and rumblings over the last few years that something may be in development on this front. It may be a remake or a reboot, and time will tell if anything emerges.
We did get a prequel to John Carpenter’s movie in 2011, but unfortunately many overlooked it and it didn’t rock things at either the box office or with critics. The prequel was a clever idea though as it showed up what happened to the people at the other camp that Kurt Russell visited in the 1983 movie and how they ended up mutated and burned up. The problems with the prequel were that the answer to the mystery was basically exactly what the events of the first film suggested they would be with no real surprises.
The Thing was dug out of the ice and escaped and then did exactly the same things it did when it attacked MacReady. Secretly tried to kill and take over being people to blend in, fill everyone with paranoia, and get torched with fire. They even did their own take on the blood test scene to check if someone was a thing, but swapped out taking blood for checking if anyone had metal fillings in their teeth. Ultimately it was too similar, and felt rushed with the story set over a shorter amount of time than the original which didn’t allow for the same feeling of dread and paranoia to set in.
So, what would a sequel to The Thing look like all these years later? They could go with a simple rehash of sorts where a new group of characters encounter the alien lifeform known as The Thing. That is one option.
But how could they do a direct continuation? Many years have passed and if they had the same actors playing the parts from the 1980s movie they’d have to explain the time jump. Perhaps it could be that The Thing is laying dormant within one of the survivors and the other starts to suspect that the Thing is back and replicating people. Who knows?
What would you like a sequel to The Thing to look like?
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