I always like seeing how that dog walks into the kennel. It walks in slowly, cautiously, doesn’t greet the other dogs like dogs do, just sits down, and waits. Waits patiently in such an eerie way. The goodest boi, playing an alien that is pretending to be a dog and acting so friggen well at it
@dubiousbrick4483 it hits us at a core as Humans, because for thousands of years we've seen dogs interact and it's NEVER like that. I bet even an unwitting little child would pick up on the weird behavior of that dog.
@@AmberAmber I watched this movie with my mom recently and one of the first things she said was “Aww look at the huskies!!” I knew she was NOT gonna like what happened next.
I posted above the chess thing is maybe a way to explain the end. The computer won regardless of how Mccready thought for sure he thought he would win. So when the computer claimed victory Mccready just burned it. At the end he knew the thing was on the verge of freezing everyone and winning he said fuck it burn it all and convinced everyone around him to follow his lead.
Or it's just a continuity error because nobody cared about this crap back in the early 80's? We're talking an era when VCRs were commercially available but still fairly rare; the home video market was not "a thing" (pun intended).
@@familykletch5156yeah dude. Nobody cared about their art because it was a one-off view. Composers didn't care about the pieces being good either, because nobody could leave a bad yelp review. This is legit one of the dumbest I've read.
I want to put to bed the "whiskey was kerosene" theory. During the scene where the Blair-Thing bursts out of the floor, we see that Mac has taken the remaining molotovs out of his belt and put them down next to the detonator switch, and the Blair-Thing tentacle sweeps them away. Then, during the panoramic explosion scene, we can see that Mac's hut is still intact. Finally, during the very last scene of the burning camp, we can see that Mac's hut is now burning. Therefore we can conclude that in the time lapse between the explosion and Mac sitting down in the burning wreckage, he went back to his hut, got a last bottle of JB, then set his hut on fire too.
I think neither of them being the thing makes it so much more torturing. Them just sitting out in the snow freezing to death for no reason is so much more tragic
@@CrysisFear The implication in the game was Mac was the Thing. Surviving the cold. Macthing was willing to sacrifice the boss enemy at the end of the game so he can make it to civilization.
I actually like this ending the most. There's probably another station (say, the Italian one). But both of them feel that the other one is a Thing so they don't even bother to save themselves
I think I disagree. If they are both human, then have successfully destroyed what remained of The Thing, so the bases’s destruction meant something. If one of them is the thing, then destroying the base, and their effort to make sure this doesn’t happen again means nothing because it’ll just repeat this cycle until it succeeds in spreading.
Potential counter to the analysis 45:09. By destroying the radios, Blair is making it impossible for the survivors to warn the outside about what's happening at the base. With no communication from the base, a rescue team will eventually be sent. That team will either find: a) Things pretending to be human, who can string them a story, then will be transported to civilisation. b) A load of dead bodies, which are also likely to be transported out (and will contain the Thing). So really, Blair is helping the Thing here. Suggesting he's already infected.
@@neilcook4710 its like when you're young and committed you push if you believe in something. My favourite bit of "making of" lore was the story about the assimilation effect that looked awful in real life but Botin said "trust me" knowing how it would translate to celluloid And they did and it paid off In fact if it's the effect I think it is it might be the most effective- in terms of its sheer incomprehensible ghastliness- motion effect in the movie (I find the defibrillator scene a LITTLE hokey, though more than made up for by its audacious vision)
He was so amazing… he worked so hard, doing all-nighters for months, he ended up getting very sick. The dog scene wasn’t done by Bottin because it was the final effects shot, and it had to get done while he was deadly sick in bed. He put everything he had into that film. Incredible work.
Wait a goddamn minute Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
1:19:20 I get your point, but think about it for a second: the Thing exists on a cellular level. Those organs being removed? A collection of individual Thing cells arranged to look like an organ. Removing them from the dog thing doesn't harm or kill those cells, it just moves them. Same with cutting it open. It parts cells, but doesn't necessarily damage them. Heat? Flame? That damages/destroys cells. Another explanation for the lack of reaction is that the torching of the dog and twin things placed it in such a weakened state that it simply could not react, due to lack of energy. It was focusing on regenerating, thus could not muster a defensive response for such an inconsequential act. Just some food for thought.
In my point of view cutting instanteously kills the Thing cells in that sections so it cant "react" In the burning part is the cells "semi destroyed"by indirect contact with something hot that are what's reacting
Shape shifting vs destruction on a cellular level. It checks out. Fire always seems so rudimental and basic, but it is really effective at what it does.
@@MrYelly forced oxidization of the molecules, the temperature breaking the molecules down. really hard to come up with a chemistry that could do things like a thing that's alive in which processes can happen that would also be impervious to hundreds of degrees and wouldn't burn and cook. sure prions and such can need extreme temperatures to break down but they're not really alive by themselves either. maybe the thing could learn to make an insulating sacrificial shield against fire though, but it is also just presumably sort of just imitating higher intelligence and behavior and seemingly lacks capability to innovate on its own.
Yeah, by his own theory, the Palmer thing should’ve reacted when he got cut to provide the blood sample. Since fire is the only method of giving the thing lasting damage, it makes sense that it’d only react to that
I always felt like thematically, it would make sense for them to both still be human. The main threat of the thing is eliminated, but it has sown the seeds of distrust enough that neither can be sure. Which I find very narratively satisfying. Which is also why I am perfectly happy with there being no conclusive answer. (I am aware of the comics and games; however, I believe when analyzing this question we must look at the movie in isolation)
OG blair could also have died in the noose and then the thing took over. I mean, if it can survive being utterly burned or missing a whole body and escape as a legged head, what's a little neck trauma and oxygen deprivation?
But Bennings for sure wasn't a thing until the scene where we see him become the thing, because otherwise he is the dumbest thing ever for exposing himself
Just started the vid but I wunna throw out that I've always liked the ending where neither of them are the Thing. It makes for a nice solid plug to the themes of paranoia. No neither of us is going to assimilate the other. Instead we're going to slowly die to the elements. Nobody wins.
@@PolterGibbstok now that I have watched fully I just have to say, as an autistic boy obsessed with this movie since I was 10 . . . . . . . . . You've totally convinced me! The feeling of paranoia runs so deep in this movie that I never realized that even I as the viewer was desperate to hold onto something that I can trust to be true. I never liked any of the other explanations for the ending of this movie because I trusted it too much to not betray that last bit of trust, but if anything your explanation just further proves that this movie is a psychological masterpiece. You already blew my mind with Shutter Island and I feel like a fool for ever doubting you. Well done 👏👏👏
@@sashageorges4643 But is it two humans being paranoid or two Things that have learned to be paranoid? Either the bottle passes infection and they are both Things after the end, or the bottle doesn't pass infection and they're both Humans dying from hypothermia.
@@etherealceleste now having gone through the whole video, I think both have the same affect. Paranoia is a force unto itself that should be considered as a third player to any game of chess. Win or lose, survive or die, the real winner is what you can't explain and how the fear of that forces your hand
But Mac didn’t want to survive. He made it clear to Nauls and Gary that they can’t survive. Once it’s Child’s and Mac again he goes through the we shouldn’t survive statement. The problem is The Thing won’t die because of the cold.
@@PolterGibbst We need Wyatt Russell to be in the remake, maybe MacReady had a pregnant wife and his son (Wyatt Russell) came to the arctic 40yrs later looking for clues to what happened to his father.
Wait a goddamn minute Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
One detail I'm honestly kind of shocked you didn't mention is how Mac being human fits as a narrative bookend to the movie. At the very beginning, when Mac is playing chess with the computer, what does he do when he loses? He "gives the computer a drink" and pours his alcohol into it. Compare this to the end, where after playing the Thing's game and doing all he can, it still saunters up to him in the form of Childs. He's in no shape to fight it at this point, he's lost his match, checkmate. So what does he do? He gives the Thing a drink, and laughs at the thought of having done the same thing not long ago.
Thanks you sir, the guy who made this video was too busy being pushing his silly ass theory to figure what was so obvious. He even showed Childs smoking with infected Palmer.
@@Kenshiroit Doesn't really mean much though. It's good insight, but with Death of the Author being a thing I don't always put much stock into what the director/writer says. Edit: Not that I'm purely using that to justify Mac being human. I just think works of fiction should be judged seperately from what the creator's necessarily intend.
This is the best analysis of who was assimilated by The Thing on TH-cam. For 15 years, I dismissed the 'both Childs and MacReady are the Thing' theory because it always seemed easy to disprove. Since each version of the Thing retains the memory and knowledge of its 'parent,' I thought if both were the Thing, they should recognize each other. Your case is the only one I can accept (cuz it's not based on themes or gleams) that doesn't conflict with that idea, and it blew my mind. And then your Mist video hit me upside the head. I'm stubborn about my movie theories and you opened my mind twice in one day. Liked, subscribed and WTH, joined too.
Glad to have you on board. I've got a list of theories but since they take so long I'm learning to also work on other videos I'm between. The next theory is on Tucker and Dale vs. Evil, which will also serve as the 50k special. Would have done it sooner but it took me a while to find a cabin in the woods to use for the video. But first I have to finish this Halloween Special, and it is definitely special alright. I shouldn't be laughing this hard at myself within the first couple minutes of the video.
Another interpretation that I think is interesting, what if you were the thing and didn't know? Like a dormant virus in your body, strategically wiping bits of memory and influencing your decisions and actions without you realising it, to completely taking over when it sees fit? Maybe they both are the thing, and neither one knows they are. It would be more believable when they made it back to civilization rather than them being super chummy and sure the other is the thing.
I heard Childs was the thing because there was no glint in his eye and he immediately took the drink despite knowing that’s it’s extremely unsafe to share food and drinks
Wait a goddamn minute Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
@@TheSareus and the comics are not canon. While we have a videogame that Carpenter has said he considers canon, which makes it rather clear that Childs died human, Mac survives..though it's ambiguous whether he was human or thing.
I always considered The Thing to be a rather optimistic movie. Well, optimistic about fundamental Human nature, not about the fate of Humanity in the movie. In the movie Humanity is super screwed. But those men put in a stressful situation and pushed to their breaking point ultimately decide to sacrifice themselves to give the rest of mankind a chance at survival. There is something noble in that.
Very strange take. The original story was a nihilistic take on the nihilistic story At the Mountains of Madness. The movie cranked up the nihilism to 11. And... you got... optimism??
What would have been crazy is that if both were the thing, but they both became so good at adapting they couldn't tell the other was one. That was why they both acted as if they were still human to each other.
they were testing each other for authentic imitation. If either of them failed to imitate their victims totally, the other would've had cause to flame them.
if Childs chased after Palmer and did get assimilated Mac would not know that Childs was a thing but Childs would know Mac is and after seeing Mac kill off all the other things the Childs things may be paranoid of the Mac thing trying to kill it and so the movie ends in both things being paranoid of each other in the most ultimate twist of any horror movie...
@@kahlanamnell1386 we don't really know how connected individual things are. They might be able to communicate more subtly or even have a hive mind. And both options allow for other things to be sacrificed.
1:19:00 My understanding has been that Things behave like colonies and can only manifest intelligence when there's both enough biomass for them to effectively create a brain, and enough time for them to link up the neurons for it to function effectively. A pool of cells separated from the larger intelligent colony reverts to behaving at the level of intelligence it can create, which is basically a bug reacting to stimuli. The Bennings thing had been assimilated so recently that it was still behaving on an instinctive level and wasn't able to come up with anything other than run into the cold. The Norris head-thing was recently severed and hadn't been able to rebuild its synapses, so it was somewhat intelligent but still clumsy and confused. The dog-thing had been in that state long enough to form the intelligence to lay out a plan.
I was 10 years old when this movie came out. My parents took me to a drive-in theater in Jacksonville for a double feature - The Thing and Alien. During intermission I watched Pink Floyds The Wall on another screen. I pretty much fell in love with movies that night.
I’m a youngin but alien was one of those movies that made me love old school movies. They’re just better. Prime time cinema replaced by lazy inflated budgets of today.
This is exactly it, no need to look much deeper than that. Mac passes Childs the alcohol as a test, with a kind of smirk. Childs knows what Mac was doing, takes a sip to show Mac he's not the thing. They end up laughing the off, the end.
@@gr4yf0x1983 i agree with both you of you out of fear for one another thats why mac said maybe we dont after childs says how do we survive best way to make sure it never makes it civilization honestly.
@@bieregrillsfaitdesvideos5189exactly, because the game was so good, I really liked it a lot, I'm going to believe the game is canon. But in a cinematic only perspective I also like to believe Childs is the thing because of all those details. I mean why would Childs leave is place in the end unless he's a part of the Thing and doesn't want to be in danger in case everything explodes like it did. I mean, the Thing would leave a part of itself away from danger because it was being attacked, and that part seems to be Childs at the end.
A point that I've become hung up on is that when Childs meets Mac at the end, he asks "are YOU the only one who made it?" instead of "are WE the only ones who made it?"
Funny that Mac said earlier in the movie that they couldn't let that thing freeze again for the rescue team to find it but at the end that's what he wants to do just set there and go to sleep in the cold. 🤔
Also I find it interesting that if childs was a thing why didn't he take Mac by surprise he had the drop on him it was only them two at that point so no reason for childs to keep up the act pretending to be human.
@@captainnyet9855 It doesn't. The entire scene with the dog, with it acting out of character and nothing like a dog, is proof that The Thing doesn't replicate mentality perfectly. It acts in ways a dog shouldn't, outing itself. Mac acts like he should, including his anti-sociality. Something that would actively harm the Thing's goal of spreading as much as possible. We can thus concluding Mac isn't the Thing, because he's acting counter-current to the Thing's mentality and task.
@@ZeroNumerous it acts unlike a dog because it isn't in it's interest to act like a dog; nobody suspects it of anything yet, so it can use that advantage to gain information. Once it starts taking over people it repeatedly shows itself to be capable at imitating and influencing human behavior to the point where it manages to completely avoid suspicion and also casting it on the humans in the group.
@@captainnyet9855 Except it does that by staying in the background, not by taking center stage. It refused to become the leader of the group and take control of all the weapons. That seems odd if it felt confident in its ability to perfectly replicate the humans. Instead MaCready became the leader and controller of the weapons AND organized the people to put up resistance. If Mac was the Thing at that point, then why was is engaging in actions intended to make assimilation HARDER?
I think the reason fire hurts and cut doesnt is cause the thing isnt the object but the cells them selves. It splits it self open all the time. But when you you burn it you are destroying it at a celular level
I love a theory that assimilated people may not know they are infected until The Thing either activates (from threat) or unless the act was overt and violent. As for the ending, I prefer thinking both are human but too tired to trust each other. I will admit it is odd that Childs didn't burn MacReady immediately; he'd been on edge and untrusting for the entire movie. As The Thing, he'd know that infecting Mac is doubling its chances. Never, ever suspect Mac of being infected. Maybe that was Carpenter's point. We SHOULD suspect Mac, but being the hero, it is difficult to do so
Wait a goddamn minute Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
Why would the Thing go up to Mac, and even risk another conflict? If Child’s was the Thing, then the smart thing would be to just stay away until he freezes.
Honestly, I like that idea that they don’t know that they’re infected until the thing is in fear or dealing with a threat part of me always thought that they slowly get a simulated, depending on how they’re infected like a fit simulate you right away I feel like you automatically just become a part of but if you get like a drop of blood on you or something that it takes more time to make you a part of it
Technically they arent aware the thing assimilates everything including mannerism, memories,emotions etc. Its only when its found out it flips out and either tries to propogate to another host or flee.
What I like about this movie is that it has pretty competent characters (for such a crazy situation of course). A lot of horror movies have the characters make extremely dumb decisions.
Considering Hollywood is clearly engaged in forcing the politics it endorses, which happens to be in lockstep with what the govt promotes, on it's customers, I'd say it makes a lot of sense.
@@xiniks I was making a reference to how Hollywood is weaponized to engineer society as it always has been used that way. At some point in the last couple of decades, that engineering helped to dumb down society but in a more aggressive way than it used to be, so characters behaving or acting stupid makes sense bc well, take a look at how dumb ppl are nowadays. The films and ppl mirror each other.
One tiny mistake you've made: The ship didn't crash land. There's no debris, there's no debris trail, the hole the ship is found in is perfectly circular. It's a controlled landing. The ship looks made out of junk, but that's because it is. As demonstrated by infected Blair the Thing seems to possess a level of construction and knowledge beyond our own.
In the comics, a lot about the nature of the Thing was revealed. One of them being that they aren't always on the same page, which means they can have completely different ideas and ideologies. Because of this, a Thing's biggest fear is being cut up into pieces, and the pieces not wanting to reunite with the original biomass, becoming completely separate entities. In fact, the Thing DOES reach civilization...but the one that does is actually pretty chill. It doesn't want to absorb everyone, because doing so means the entire planet will be consumed, and thus it will starve, having to fight for resources with its own kin. The Thing doesn't want to lose itself, so it would be forced to flee the planet to not be reabsorbed...it's pretty sad.
Yeah, a portion of one of the comic runs revels that two people, a male and female are actually two parts of it that didn't exactly take over their human hosts, and allowed them to keep their memories. They become "lovers" and make a pact to only feed on necessity, lest they transform past their demi-humanity and lose all their memories and revert back to their/its true nature.
@mr.voidout4739 This 26:34 sounds awesome but I can't view it as cannon for the thing. The thing on earth is literally millions of years old, and the story doesn't have anything saying it's an alien or that it's highly intelligent, beyond imitation of it's host, be that a dog or man. It's more inclined to be that it is like a worm, it's one thing, then once split the pieces can beck e it's own thing, but prior it doesn't have it's own Brain to leadership, intelligence etc. Those comics sound great though.
@@beentheredonethat5908 The thing comics kind of unofficially run post The Thing movie time line. Macready turns up in a lot of the Comic stories or things are referred to from what the Movie would have laid as it's foundation. The comic doesn't have to say it's an alien, we already know that and we've saw the spaceship and all that. We have no idea if it's truly an alien or it's original form because it assimilates everything so the "Alien" may just be a victim of the thing organism that crash landed on Earth. The Thing is also highly intelligent based on what organism it absorbs and then can access intelligence. If the thing absorbs a scientist, it can now act with scientist knowledge moving forward IF that particular thing cells spread. A different thing cell who never been attached to a scientist doesn't have the same knowledge BUT it would have any prior knowledge from previous assimilations such as how Blair was building a spaceship which obviously is the thing's knowledge from the Alien in the ice. And the dog was acting way more intelligent than a regular dog, which dogs are already fairly intelligent. The comics don't have to re-spell out what the thing is to be canon.
I am 37 everyone looks at least 15 years older than me in this film 😂yet when I watch buffy they are meant to be 16-20 they look well older than me too
From 26:10 - I see a lot of people say this, and I think it has to do with how it's shot, but I'm fairly confident no part of the Kennel Thing escapes when the hands shoot up to the roof. The hands shoot up, bust through, and the Kennel Thing pulls itself up to the ceiling. Evidenced by the fact that Childs torches the upper corner of the kennel, and not the ground. You can then see the torched mass fall. Further argument for no part escaping is there is a shot where they clearly watch the Kennel Thing pull itself up to the ceiling - if they thought part of it escaped I'm pretty sure they would have panicked and/or started hunting for it, instead of "calmly" moving the torched body for autopsy, or going about their routines without watching over their shoulders for a bizarre mutated alien lurking around the base.
I also came here to say this. I've watched this movie so many times, watched so many videos on it, and am generally pretty obsessed. It does look like it escapes but it just hangs there before being torched. Spot on.
The Thing is capable of separating from one form to another ,so the autopsy would not be harming it. Lacerations have little to no effect. Heat does. Heat can destroy cells or at least change their state. If it's hot enough to burn ,it hurts. The chard remains were not completely cooked through. Some cells survived ,but ultimately, fire is the best weapon. Remember to cook the Thing until totally chard through when defending. The blood test makes sense.
For the gasoline theory people if you look closely molotov cocktail is without any label while macready's bottle at the end has a label Time stamp 1:26:50
@@HC-cb4ypmy brother in Christ you would not fucking reason with a flesh entity mimicking a friend/coworker AFTER KILLING THEM and then AGGRESSIVELY MURDERING/ASSIMILATING your other coworkers! You would light it on fucking fire if you had a flamethrower like they did, or you’d be an idiot. The Thing has intelligence, literally absorbing the knowledge/memories of the creatures it “consumes”. It would be on the parasitic virus creature to try and make terms with humanity, not the other way around bub.
@HC-cb4yp there's really nothing in the movie that indicates the Thing is interested in or even capable of communication. Personally I don't think it's even sapient, just imitating the intelligence of its victims
Childs accepts a drink from mcready meaning either Childs really dumb or already the thing so isn’t worried about getting infected, and Childs didn’t instantly flame mcready meaning he’s interested in infecting him next.
And mcready killed Blair thing so he wasn’t infected at that moment, it would make no sense for “mcready thing” to blow up Blair thing when the only other living person is Childs thing
@@synsol1008 exactly. It's so far fetched and complicated to try and explain why MacReady would kill blair and pass the blood test. None of MacReady's actions make sense if he's infected. The most reasonable theory is that nobody or childs is the thing.
@@rabbithearted.1094 That is why all the other theories require somebody to fully reject logic and rational thinking. Although I also think that there is that same problem with people with assert that both are human. Childs engages in actions that a paranoid HUMAN would not do.
Honestly the internal-conflict angle makes way more sense. The idea that different instances of "the thing" species may be naturally worse or better at immitating new species and that they will intentionally prune off the worse ones is good in and of itself, but it could explain that scene where it runs into the snow with the fucked up hands and waits to die in two distinct ways. First, that one just wasn't a good immitator of humans, plain and simple. Second, you're right about it being two different strains fighting eachother to assimilate. The idea that this is a species that thrives so much off of paranoia and internal conflict that *_even its own evolution_* is driven by it is just excellent narratively.
@@anonymouseniller6688 fitness meant capacity to survive to reproduce so whichever one breeds the quickest and splits into multiple entities that separately survive was the best
@@nathanlevesque7812and those that are quickly detected and destroyed are less likely to propagate effectively than those that are able to pass unnoticed.
"Palmer - slight 60s acid damage" holy shit the actor played that so good I think chekov's gun is kinda like a rule that says, if you introduce an element to the story, you must use it. It is a rule of thumb to help writers avoid false foreshadowing and also to do good foreshadowing.
Originally, Anton Chekhov was specifically talking about playwrights-the point was that it's the set department's job to handle production design, so the only reason the *writer* should be concerned with *pointing out actively* that there's a rifle hanging on the wall in Act I is if that rifle is going to be used by the end of Act III. The idea is that when it comes to the script, absolutely ecery detail given should be necessary to explain the events of the story, not just an alternative phrase for any instance of foreshadowing.
Something that wasn't mentioned or considered about Blair: I have always thought when the Dog-Thing splits in two, the section that escapes in to the ceiling, is what assimilated Blair. Considering Blair-Thing has similar claws that it had used to pull itself through the ceiling, tentacles, and A DOG'S HEAD coming out of Blair-Thing's torso. If not the split section of the Dog-Thing, then one of the dogs that ran out of the kennel, but I'm convinced it was the part that escaped. Why else would Blair-Thing have all the same characteristics of Dog-Thing as well as his own?
My friend, I think the big arms just made it hang from the ceiling. Blair became infected when he touched the Thing with his pencil then touched his lips with the same pencil immediately, you'll see when you re-watch that autopsy seen, watch Blair use pencil then putting eraser to his mouth as soon as he's done touching the dog thing. For the note, John Carpenter said that was not scripted but they left that part in and John said it's ok to believe that's when Blair became infected. On the other hand, Blair was elbow deep in that thing body, either way I knew he'd become a Thing.
Not going with the "dog-thing split in two". Nobody mentions it again. They burn all the parts very deliberately. The dog-thing was *unable* to get through the ceiling.
Part of the Thing was *able* to easily punch through the ceiling, and everyone watches it escape...You can literally see the bottom of IT rising up out of the shot. I don't think John Carpenter deliberately showed that for no reason.. The next time we see the Dog-Thing on the ground, it doesn't have arms going up to the ceiling, so clearly they went somewhere.
Wait a goddamn minute Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
This guy is the most under rated film reviewer on earth. The amount of detail and thinking outside the box while explaining his train of thought for each scene was fantastic.. Well done man...
Im kinda shocked that none of the scientist would have thought about rabies or something with the dog and why the norwegians were trying to kill it so heavily coupled with the strange behavior. I guess maybe the thought oh they are in antartica but it kinda still bothers me in some way, but hey can't have a movie with that complete kind of caution. This could also be poked at a lot since I am not as familiar with the movie.
The fact that we are still discussing this movie's plot forty years since its release really speaks not just to the power of the ideas it presents, but to just how well crafted it is. I go back and forth on the different theories myself, and I think that's ultimately what we're supposed to take away, not any one answer, but the uncertainty, ambiguity, and most of all the paranoia of not having a straight answer. Personally, I love the idea that both of them are The Thing by the end. The Thing takes on the traits of those that it absorbs, I think we're meant to understand that the alien has taken not only our best traits, but our worst ones as well, the paranoia and hostility towards our own kind, and at the end this vast, formless cosmic force that could destroy our entire world is completely helpless in the face of mankind's own lack of trust.
Well back then writers had something called originality. Today we get "How to Reboot a Film Series and Trash It At The Same Time". Sheesh I live in the wrong era.🤫
My favorite ending scenario is that MacReady is the Thing and Childs is human. The Thing burned everything knowing it will refreeze and Childs will die in the cold. Simple survival instincts. But it also plays on the audience's credibility and loyalty of Kurt Russel's character, and Carpenter's choice to show his perspective. You like his character, he is heroic, but it's a betrayal to the audience that works in a cruel way. He's a misleading narrator of the events. The perspective is the Thing's and you rooted for it.
Wait a goddamn minute Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
Very interesting. I do see that the biggest reason most people cannot accept Mac being the thing is the fact that he's painted as the hero. But the whole point of the movie is the lost of trust and paranoia and any one in the group possibly being the enemy.
It’s such an intriguing reversal of the roles. Everybody says Childs was the Thing, the last piece of the monster. But what if he was the last piece of humanity? The final nuisance for the Thing to consume?
The audience can’t be any more sure who’s the thing than Childs or Mac can be about each other at the end, and that’s the point: in any world 2 stranded men with fire and supplies could work together to survive until rescued-but not in this world, not anymore. Now even if they're both men they can no longer trust each other to survive, that new terrifying reality is why they'll both/we'll all die
I'd disagree that anyone could ever survive in this case. There is a massive storm, it is below -100F as they say, the only reason they are warm rn is because of the giant fire. They have no shelter from the cold, and once the fire is gone they have no real hope of making more as basically all of the supplies are gone, everything was blown up.
The thing might be alive though. I think both those men were human and unninfected. Now, we saw that the Thing can survive with just a piece of it still out there. For all we know, it might be the case. When people will come to see what happened, they might take with them a piece of the thing. And it will be the end.
@@Andrew-j3g5t Well... they're about to die from the cold. I think he just didn't care anymore. Alcohol can let them feel better while they are dying. I'm not a drinker myself, but in this particular situation I think I would have drink too
I've always thought both were human at the end, I could see why everyone argued for either being the thing, but if they were both infected they would know
@trentonwalker8602 But they both laughed, so that doesn't really make sense. It always came across more of a laugh because they unsrdstood they were doomed to freeze. In that situation, knowing what was inevitable, all one could feasibly do is laugh. But even that all aside the game is considered as canon, and it shows a very much dead Childs and uninfected MacReady.
What if they were both infected and just... interacting normally? We don't really know what the thing does with its own ... self/copies of itself. Maybe that's just how things act when only in the company of other things.
I’m 100% on board with “they were both human, but couldn’t be sure that the other wasn’t, so they just watched eachother die to be sure. The laugh was both of them acknowledging that. They both knew that each couldnt be sure, and both knew that neither would take the chance”
Looks like most missed out a very significant point about The Thing : It can mimic tissue and assimilate too but it cannot do it perfectly. The PERFECT thing would replicate all wounds, injuries, external objects placed internally and above all else: IT CANNOT BE EXPRESSIVE OR EMOTE LIKE HUMANS DO, CONTEXTUALLY. Odd behaviour, insufficient emotions and robotic responses or expressions were a dead giveaway on who was the next thing. I believe it was an intentional choice by the director to breadcrumb the audience. And once you spot it, you cannot unsee it 😅 This is why Macready can NEVER be the thing because he is always and remains expressive, emotive and reacts with genuine shock/surpise/awe whenever the thing exposes itself. Sometimes even more so than the others. Which The Thing does not do well at all. Why? Because these social cues and gestures are evolution and exposure based. They need time. Which was the one disadvantage keeping it from being the 'Perfect Being'. . The end. .
I agree. The things that had to try to appear human throughout the movie, whenever they are interacted with, (until their jig is up) are passive. They usually stay in the background not saying much. When they do say something they just kind of are like "I don't know, what do you think?". Childs was one of the most outspoken, head strong, and skittish of the bunch. He wouldn't have left a room that seemed semi secure, to chase after Blair in a blizzard. He wouldn't have been so easy on Macready at the end, not trying to make sure he wasn't a thing. He wouldn't have passively looked to Macready for direction of what they should do next, without putting forward what he thought was best. He wouldn't have been satisfied with just sitting there right next to a possible thing, waiting for it's direction. Mac on the other hand, says something like "Let's just see what happens", acknowledging he is still skeptical.
@@rahulkunche7934. Just like a psychopath can imitate emotions I don't see why the thing would not be able to also. Maybe the amount of emotion shown by Mac was the thing over playing it's part.
If slow assimilation was so easy and the thing is so smart, why not use the dog to assimilate the cook (or anybody else before the crew is paranoid) and contaminate food supply without ever engaging in combat?
Your right. There was no reason for the "dog thing" to do anything at all besides lick people when it got the chance and it would be GG, unless it has to actually pierce the skin for infection to occur.
Its because it cant... Blair was infected long ago - Blair asking Clark if he was alone with the dog was to see if he was "in" as in also one of them, his response is what made Blair thing go into figuring out how to make everyone paranoid and fool everyone, Blair made a fake computer simulation to get everyone against each other - and if you go with what Carpenter himself has said "One of them is The Thing"..... he's referencing how a single piece of "Evidence" be it even completely false or not with no way to verify if its legit points to the premise of the movie - Paranoia. And who but Blair himself be able to verify if that simulation was right? Bingo - It was Blair... who's actually The Thing.
It is a good point. Beside the obvious "then no movie" maybe the Dog didn't want to keep all its eggs in one basket. Sure the humans don't have much reason to distrust it, but we see them go to the Norwegian camp to investigate and they slowly start figuring things out. Maybe it thinks there's too much of a risk to taking that long? Or it doesn't have that far thinking ahead stuff, I don't know. Does being in a dog makes it less intelligent? You figure it would know about this sort of stuff from the Norwegian camp (I don't care about the prequel). Best idea I have, it was scared being down to just one dog form and wanted to increase its numbers quickly to ensure survival, it didn't think this would be so loud and wake the whole camp.
It’s really easy to figure it out Blair is the thing by the time they check on him and he says he is fine, the lights go out and the guys see Childs go out into the storm and he’s walking very strange almost like banning a kinda stumbling a little as he walks, the door Childs was guarding is right next to a stair case down to the generator room which blows about 3 seconds after Childs walks out Blair snuck up the stairs and assimilated Childs and then killed the generator and sent Childs out into the storm to be safe or whatever but that’s what’s happens and it’s fucking pretty easy to put together idk why you guys struggle with this
Because they have to try to come up with some way to justify a theory that Childs was not infected. To justify their theory, they have to reject 2 scenes and call them continuity errors.
The concept of slow assimilation gets overlooked a lot when people talk about this movie. It doesn't even necessarily have to be controlling a host entirely. It could infect somebody and influence them in subtle ways. Maybe it just makes you feel thirsty, so you steal a drink from somebody else's bottle and infect them through saliva. There's multiple real-world species that work in similar ways.
Hey so happy you are back, I am old enough to remember the 1st movie The Thing. James Arness was The Thing. Got to stay up late on Fridays and it was usually played 3 or 4 times a year. Maybe more. I remember how scared I was watching this on Friday nights, and how all the old scary movies back in the day made it hard to sleep . Love your reviews on these movies. Be waiting for your next video.
I like to think that a Thing part broke off during all the commotion in the camp, and went out to let itself freeze as a contingency plan. So if all it's parts were destroyed in the camp(s) there is still a good chance for it to continue on by being discovered in the future and then continue to wreck havoc assimilating those that wake it up again.
That's the problem (or beauty) of this film. We are not entirely certain how the Thing works, what it can do, how infection/assimilation functions or anything really. So many of these videos rely on things they claim to know about the Thing that are actually up in the air.
@@nicksteffes5281 At a molecular level yes, the blood wasn't "enough" of the Thing to actually think outside of just survival. But given a part is big enough, like the head creature trying to hide/escape while the torso was burning, I would think an sufficiently large enough mass of the Thing, maybe an arm creature or even a hand, would have some form of sentience above just "survive" and could plan contingently. Also it seems that the Thing is represented as separate entities after one part is split from another so a part that was sloughed off would instinctively flee from the camp that was on fire and being that the Thing seems to have genetic memory it would remember that it could allow itself to freeze and be discovered later thus ensuring survival and another chance to propagate.
@@watertommyz Damn I missed the reply. What do you mean? Suppose there was a hive mind, and suppose Mac and Childs were both Things. Wouldn't they know and be doing high fives to their victory? Or in the scene with the blood? A hive mind would probably allow any other dominant Things in the vicinity to supress the blood's reaction through that shared connection. Genetic memory and hive minds are not mutually exclusive.
It’s wild this came out today. I’ve been on another Thing binge for about a week. I’ve watched it twice, and watched and rewatched tons of theory videos. About once a year this movies becomes my obsession.
@@PolterGibbst right now I’m watching the movie again with the Kurt/ John commentary I found on TH-cam. I’m really really looking forward to your video and your insights. Great stuff! Thank you.
@@Kavilion The film with the commentary is fantastic. Much better than quite a few others that's I've seen. I just hope the video does all of it justice.
Real Childs always refused alcohol and even does it during the runtime, the one at the end is the last Thing remaining: Childs was tired and keeping an eye on the outside... the door behind him is closed and the lights are off, the generator is straight downstairs compared to Childs' post. When we don't see Childs anymore, the door behind him is open and the lights are on, with positions of the Jackets being different. What actually happened is that the thing came from the generator after doing sabotage shenanigans, opened the door, snuck up straight behind Childs and gobbled him up, getting a new jacket of the same exact color. Then it went out in the cold to try and hybernate in order to survive the ordeal as back up plan, but when the explosions happen, it is drawn back cause it now definitely knows someone survived. At the end, MaCready laughs because the thing just exposed itself by drinking alcohol, something that Childs would not do. Also, the Videogame is technically canon and MacReady is indeed alive and not infected in it
I always thought it wasn’t alcohol at all, the prior scene Mac is firebombing the base. The bottles hanging on his belt were more than likely filled with gasoline or kerosene, even more on this is that Mac didn’t drink it at all.
@@45_ACP In the scene, it looks like MacReady is about to drink and doesn't look happy about drinking, which made me think he was planning to off himself with poisoned booze. Then Childs shows up & my interpretation is that MacReady doesn't trust him - and plans to share the poison.
Wait a goddamn minute Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
Two hour video analysis? Damn dude, you're a trooper! Spotted SO many small clues and ques, and challenged a lot of my assumptions and conclusions. Well done!
1:19:32 the way I head canon this is that if the thing is multiple creatures, then all doctor Birk was doing was separating them as apposed to actually harming them during his autopsy, where as the hot knife in the blood is attacking them on the individual level which would make them retaliate in a fight or flight mode.
Goong back to the Childs Thing. I saw in a Rob Ager video that he points out that the power generator room is behind Childs and in order for Blaire to reach it he'd have to go through Childs
The irony of the thing fighting versions of itself and going against it’s collectivism nature because of how well adapted to humans who are individualist by nature is an interesting theory
Who says the Thing has a collectivist nature? That is never even pointed at in the movie. We have no Idea of its social structures. Maybe they allways fight each other to further improve?
I had a biopsy today, and the constant annoying stinging is keeping me awake. I'm taking it as a sign that I need to watch this amazing video again. Keep up the amazing work! I'm looking forward to this!
Blair killed the dogs because the script needed him to: three dogs were supposed to escape and be chased down by MacReady, Childs, and Bennings. Two of them were things. They attack and eat the third dog (for nourishment rather than assimilation). This was a big chase scene with snowmobiles and flamethrower action and Bennings getting torn in half, but all that got cut, so "He's killed all the dogs" was added to the film.
I always saw it as him killing off any form of escape. He takes out the helicopter, sabotages the radios, and kills off the sled dogs for good measure. I don't think it would even be that likely to get somewhere else with just like 2 or 3 sled dogs but he was making sure. Is this not the common interpretation? I feel like I haven't seen anyone else in these comments express this.
Not really how the thing works. It assimilates based on circumstance and strategy AND sometimes just to do so. You may get assimilated sooner by showing suspicion but the goal is always tp assimilate.
The thing with the Bennings assimilation scene is that it was written really quickly and thrown in to replace Bennings' original death scene, where he was bitten in half by a dog-thing out on the ice shelf and both halfs of his body begin to get assimilated and ressurrected (it was too expensive to stage and film). Also, the dog never manages to lick Bennings in the face. Watch that scene, you'll see that Bennings never allows it to lick him, he's holding it away from his face.
The licking scene he noted that the dog licked the gloves and then he was handed a bottle after he got shot and grabbed the bottle with his dog spit gloves and drank out of it. Therefore cross dogtamination
@@BeetaroniPizza Glass is used in science experiments because it cannot contaminate anything outside of itself. Therefore, the residue of the gloves on the bottle wouldn't contaminate the drink.
Mac knew no one could survive to ensure it didn't freeze itself and survive. Then just decides to let them both freeze? Nah. Mac and possibly childs as well are infected.
1:40(ish) Re: "Heartattack". I think there's a definite case for THE THING'S assimilation accelerating massively once the human host dies- because those cells are no good to the insurgent if they start to deteriorate- or lose any integrity- which must be a risk and a big deal to the parasite, the cells being the currency for its propagation. Then on top of that it responds to the attempts to revive using defibrillator as hostile- and MAYBE THAT IS ACTUALLY A MISSED ELEMENT- that electro-convulsive shock could be very deadly to this life form (at least during/just after assimilation) and it acts defensively Again, terrific video
Worth noting in the original novella "who goes there" one of the effective weapons used against the creature is a sort of cattle prod on steroids if memory serves me correctly
For the blood test scene, Mac could have used an earlier sample of his blood that he saved when he sabotaged the blood bank/fridge. Then he burned all the blood bags in the flame thrower pit to eliminate any suspicion that his blood had been saved. This answers the why burn the blood samples question and think it fits the slow assimilation timeline for Mac.
@@PolterGibbst The kids interrupted me a few times but one site down. Good Video. The Thing is just an amazing film. Fun Fact: this film was released the same day as Blade Runner.
@@Tseuq4gninaem awesome. Had the same happen to me on different days when shooting this. 😂 That makes more sense to why it flopped in the box office. Still crazy to me, but it definitely gets its love now. Thanks by the way.
The biggest sin Clark committed in the movie is a simple one, but if he's the "dog guy" he shoulda known better - don't put a single new dog in a cage with multiple other dogs that are already established. There was no way it would've ended well, just in this case it didn't end well for ANYONE. But yeah, high chance IRL that the new dog would've been confronted by the other dogs and biting would occur. Too confined of a space, no safety from a stranger and can't sleep because of it? Yeah, it'd not be the dog's fault if it came down to them attacking each other due to escalation. Should've tethered the new dog outside of the cage so it could at least meet the other dogs with something between them. Ah well, minor detail to the film overall. I need to rewatch this. Wonder if it's on Netflix?
Wait a goddamn minute Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
I can BS some reasons for it to work. Some weird and crazy shit is going down at the camp, maybe Clark isn't remembering all the proper dog keeping procedures and junk. Also he only puts it in the cage once other people get on his ass about it. Before that he was letting it chill in the camp, maybe because he didn't know what else to do with some other random dog not from his brood. He may have just been like "Look it's in the cage now see shut the hell up" move and not something he thought through. This discussion makes me think about the space the dogs had, it seemed pretty shitty. Are they kept in cages like that in real life? Sparse, confined, and not much stuff to keep them occupied. I guess research bases in the Antarctic may not give a shit if their sled dogs are 100% happy with their living spaces.
I noticed this upon a rewatch. It's small, it might just be a trick of the camera, but during the dog scene, in the kennel, as the thing is transforming with these little red vine whips coming out of it, when macready slams the door shut on one of the tentacles, for a moment, it looks like a piece of the Thing broke off, like a lizards tail defence mechanism and it sort of swivels and dissapears out of view RAPIDLY. Like I say, maybe it's nothing, maybe it's a hidden detail that gives us an *extra* hidden Thing that infected someone off screen. The game shows us that The Thing can produce minions to some degree when they become large enough.
The idea of them both being the thing oddly makes the most sense The way both are suspicious but both just give up like its both of their goals to survive. Maybe its because they genuinely cant tell if the other is the thing at that point. They are both perfect copies. It goes wll the way back to the question. If you were a perfect imatation how would someone know? They wouldn't. Even if they were a perfect imitation themselves. Infact maybe at the end the reason he gives the bottle is a way to confirm it. Because why would he take the bottle if hes suspicious? And why would the blair thing be so reckless? With hiw smart it is. And especially how perfect the thing would be. It makes sense to think hed realize they are both things.
I've always interpreted the Thing as not directly intelligent, but with highly tuned instincts. By extension I believe that while infected, you wouldn't know that you're the Thing while it's actively mimicking you. All of it's thinking would be on the subconscious/unconscious level. You'd just feel fight or flight level unease in situation where you could be revealed, be subtly influenced to carry out it's will, and be unable to remember when it assimilates others.
@@Vindictator1972the thing most likely if i had to guess either is making what it "remembers" the ship looked like or it when assimilating a host/living thing. It gains that creature or things intelligence/knowledge. Hence it basically ate recently enough due to freezing to not forget and retain this knowledge or it consumed enough human matter to elivate its thinking power over time.
I thought the rope with Blair was a fun touch to the idea that, he was infected and wanted to prevent the spread in the best way he thought of, but the Thing assimilated him completely before he could. It was always an interesting thought of "How long until you are no longer you" with this movie and it's something that never leaves my mind to this day.
i think a good way to understand just how smart The Thing is, is to realize that it perfectly imitates creatures and gains their memories, and with that being the case, it would have absorbed the mind and intelligence of countless species acrosd the entire universe. i dont think it would be a stretch to say that The Thing would likely be the most intelligent life form humanity or even the rest of the universe had ever seen
It can literally mix and match intelligences at will. It wasn't "Blair" building the ship, but Blair's human shell with a far superior alien intelligence guiding it. Whenever the Thing needs to encounter Mac in the shed, it just switches back to human Blair's brain.
@@21stcenturyhiphop i dotnj think any"thing" (badumtss),even alien, is capable of storing that amount of information in its memory...yeah i'm aware the wonders of DNA but that is a little too much to me... to not mention, a theorical question, couldnt the thign after so much assimilation of several inteligent and emotional beings along the eons start to feel bad for it? well... maybe the inteligent part of the assimilations are some "recent" thinghy...
@@exodus9001I'm saying this because I care for you, as someone who used to dwell in cultures and circles that would say "kek" you should probably just stop being around those influences
I disagree, it's inherently spaceship building intelligent, the mimicking is simply a survival tactic. The thing is closer to an Einstein Xenomorph than a multitude of intelligence merged into one soup. This would be a very different movie if that was the case.
so mac either turns into the thing after the explosion or he is not the thing, if he was the thing earlier he would have assimilated everyone at the blood sample scene, windows was being eaten and the rest were stuck to a couch lol, and after that scene he was with everyone for the rest of the movie
If Mac was a thing during the blood test scene, there was no need to assimilate right there. There is another thing in the same room that could do that, but staying low is much less risky. Yes Mac was in control in that scene, but there are too many people, so breaking out for assimilation might cause them to fight back or run, and he can't make sure he gets everyone.
@ they were tied to a chair….three tendrils stab them once and boom you are infected. They literally couldn’t run away, they were yelling for Mac to get back in there and kill windows while he is turning.
@@lordhippoguy5658In the movie this goes against the things way of thinking, there's a scene where Mac says that he knows he's human and that at least one other person must be human. He says that because the thing, even if it is in a situation like that will not voluntary reveal itself. Doing so is against its base instinct. It physically cannot even think about making that choice
@ it won’t if It doesn’t have the advantage, but if they cannot fight back and are tied to the chairs then it wins, no more hiding, no more lying, they couldn’t escape or fight back, hence why they were yelling for mac to get back in the room and burn windows, they couldn’t pick up the flamethrower right in front of them
@@lordhippoguy5658 Again your looking at it from a human perspective. Yes it's most logical but again the thing is physically incapable of revealing itself if it's not alone or revealed by another person
Paulmer is the first to get infected . A big plot hole , I found was that he shares a big cone with Child's. Nobody ever brings this up . Sharing a bottle of liquor is common for everyone to notice and does happen a few times. But I caught the scene where they are watching TV and then light up and share a joint together ? Last I checked, that would be a perfect way to pull it off and go under the radar unless you're payinf attention. Makes the most sense on who's who at the end and because Childs disappeared , so that would give some explanation. I noticed nobody ever brings it up.
@@donlowery1275 suddenly the film is littered with transfer via oral cues. Carpenter is really smart. He knew he was filling the movie with these assimilation points
@@JohnnyDay-hr1fj That's assuming that Palmer was a thing at that moment. I can't recall off the top of my head how soon after that that the blood test happens.
Without a doubt the best breakdown of this film and its hotly debated ending. I'm convinced and now want them both to be the thing purely for how well it ties all the information you're given through the film. Excellent job
@@PolterGibbst continue the videos I enjoy insight to things . others to explore . Halloween Kills . Resident Evil . Silent Hill . Jason X . Poltergeist . Lost Boys . The Shining . Langoliers . 👍👍
I don't think the ones that were infected actually knew that they were infected, MacReady included. I think The Thing is more like a Jekyll and Hyde monster in that it lays just underneath until it sees opportune moments to strike. The creature doesn't need to worry about properly mimicing human interactions if they're actually genuine right? I think it keeps engineering situations where these survivors feel that the only option to stop it is to light everything on fire, which would just attract more attention to its location, which would allow it to propagate further. It's kind of like how cordyceps will cause an ant to change its behavior, making itself an easier target for its "thing's" actual prey, birds, since birds spread cordyceps through their droppings after eating these infected ants. I wonder if the thing is truly a malevolent entity, or if it feels that it needs to do this. Clearly time and the elements aren't a threat to it, so (if not for survival) why is it "hunting" humans? We know it's intelligent, so is the end goal to gain more intelligence by assimilating various organic life? Or is there some other reason it feels this imperative to assimilate others?
@@ZenPyramid If it's perfect then it IS McCreedy and not a thing, if it's a thing then it aint gonna be bothered about a drink it would fu%$ off and lie in the snow.
It could be the thing because he breaks his own protocol of testing everybody. They both could be the thing because it's established that all it wants to do is hibernate in the snow. During the blood test scene Windows is shown using a scalpel to draw blood. Instead of disinfecting the scalpel he merely wipes it off on his pants. So after that scene anyone could potentially be infected.
Your videos are good because of your passion and patience to make them. Can’t hide that these are made with a lot of time and love.i understand how all the research takes you so much time to get them out. Just keep doing what you love! They are smart, funny and fun.
42 years and over 2 hours of a click bait video that leaves us with the summation that "The truth is, all of them (scenarios) are correct, and they can all be argued." He could have said that in the beginning, and saved me a lot of time.
Something that people miss is that Palmer is the backup pilot. Blair's actions prevent the helicopter from being used to escape, but the Thing was otherwise immediately forming a plan to escape and populate.
My thing is why did the supposed Thing Childs come back to Mac if it knew the risk it could be burnt and killed. Wouldn’t it just continue to leave and stay out of sight to ensure total survival?
Also it could’ve taken Mac by surprise just to make sure. But tbh I don’t care. I personally prefer the ending that both aren’t infected and are just going to freeze to death while being paranoid
Fun fact: The Novelization of the Thing starts off with one of the coolest sentences ever. "I AM BEING CHILDS NOW." immediately gets you excited and thrust you right into the story from the POV of the thing, and it's amazing.
Everyone asks “ who’s the thing ? “
But never “ how’s the thing ? “ :(
😂
I'll do you one better, why is the thing?
@@nibzxx I "KNOWWWW", riiiiighhhht?
#things_rights
It’s doing great! It orders donuts just like a normal human being!
@@sub-jec-tiv oh no. *i* order doughnuts- does- does that mean...? 😬
I say that Mac is not the thing. I base this on the ironclad argument that I do not want Mac to be the thing.
😂 one of the best arguments I've seen
Also he's alive in the game
@@joshuacooley1417 Now who can argue with that? 🤟🤣💀
Agreed bro 💯
@@BillMcSwain Certainly no one who appreciates authentic frontier gibberish!
I always like seeing how that dog walks into the kennel. It walks in slowly, cautiously, doesn’t greet the other dogs like dogs do, just sits down, and waits. Waits patiently in such an eerie way. The goodest boi, playing an alien that is pretending to be a dog and acting so friggen well at it
Cutest comment I've seen in aeons!!! Also? I watched this movie with my big ol' Rottie·lab - he was NOT impressed!😂❤
Seeing that scene for the first time was easily the most unsettled and then shocked a movie has made me
@dubiousbrick4483 it hits us at a core as Humans, because for thousands of years we've seen dogs interact and it's NEVER like that. I bet even an unwitting little child would pick up on the weird behavior of that dog.
@@AlwaysNerdyTV They actually had to tie the other dogs down to make them lay down for that scene, because they wanted to go greet Jed every time.
@@AmberAmber I watched this movie with my mom recently and one of the first things she said was “Aww look at the huskies!!”
I knew she was NOT gonna like what happened next.
After that chess scene breakdown I am now 100% certain. The computer is the Thing.
that computer scene was so funny dude lol
😂😂
I posted above the chess thing is maybe a way to explain the end. The computer won regardless of how Mccready thought for sure he thought he would win. So when the computer claimed victory Mccready just burned it. At the end he knew the thing was on the verge of freezing everyone and winning he said fuck it burn it all and convinced everyone around him to follow his lead.
Or it's just a continuity error because nobody cared about this crap back in the early 80's? We're talking an era when VCRs were commercially available but still fairly rare; the home video market was not "a thing" (pun intended).
@@familykletch5156yeah dude. Nobody cared about their art because it was a one-off view.
Composers didn't care about the pieces being good either, because nobody could leave a bad yelp review.
This is legit one of the dumbest I've read.
I want to put to bed the "whiskey was kerosene" theory.
During the scene where the Blair-Thing bursts out of the floor, we see that Mac has taken the remaining molotovs out of his belt and put them down next to the detonator switch, and the Blair-Thing tentacle sweeps them away.
Then, during the panoramic explosion scene, we can see that Mac's hut is still intact.
Finally, during the very last scene of the burning camp, we can see that Mac's hut is now burning.
Therefore we can conclude that in the time lapse between the explosion and Mac sitting down in the burning wreckage, he went back to his hut, got a last bottle of JB, then set his hut on fire too.
Also a perfect child’s imitation would know how kerosene would smell so he wouldn’t fall for it.
Carpenter also shut that down
Besides, Mac was *ready* to take a sip from it right before Childs comes up behind him.
Jed is not just a dog but a friggin method actor. I literally don’t understand how that dog was so good at acting lol
He's just the goodest boy lol the Brando of Baltos
No doubt. Even in the commentary they were talking about the Jed doing a lot of this on his own. Amazing Dog for an Amazing film.
It's very clear that he's a pawfessional! Have to get plenty treats!
He's a Husky. He knew he was the real star, and acted accordingly.
I would argue he's more professional than the infamous Brando. 😂🤣 @@Space_Toasty
I think neither of them being the thing makes it so much more torturing. Them just sitting out in the snow freezing to death for no reason is so much more tragic
@@funguy398 Actually Mac survives, The Thing video game is a official sequel even Carpenter makes a cameo
@@CrysisFear there is a comic about it too
@@CrysisFear The implication in the game was Mac was the Thing. Surviving the cold. Macthing was willing to sacrifice the boss enemy at the end of the game so he can make it to civilization.
I actually like this ending the most.
There's probably another station (say, the Italian one).
But both of them feel that the other one is a Thing so they don't even bother to save themselves
I think I disagree. If they are both human, then have successfully destroyed what remained of The Thing, so the bases’s destruction meant something. If one of them is the thing, then destroying the base, and their effort to make sure this doesn’t happen again means nothing because it’ll just repeat this cycle until it succeeds in spreading.
Potential counter to the analysis 45:09.
By destroying the radios, Blair is making it impossible for the survivors to warn the outside about what's happening at the base.
With no communication from the base, a rescue team will eventually be sent.
That team will either find:
a) Things pretending to be human, who can string them a story, then will be transported to civilisation.
b) A load of dead bodies, which are also likely to be transported out (and will contain the Thing).
So really, Blair is helping the Thing here. Suggesting he's already infected.
This would make sense. Blair put the baton up to his lips after the autopsy and destroying the radios would make a rescue mandatory for liability.
@@AsfgxffI heard it was just actors personal habit, and that it wasnt part of the script.
The fact that Rob Bottin was in his early 20"s when he did these INCREDIBLE effects that stand up to this day is crazy. Amazing talent.
@@neilcook4710 its like when you're young and committed you push if you believe in something. My favourite bit of "making of" lore was the story about the assimilation effect that looked awful in real life but Botin said "trust me" knowing how it would translate to celluloid
And they did and it paid off
In fact if it's the effect I think it is it might be the most effective- in terms of its sheer incomprehensible ghastliness- motion effect in the movie
(I find the defibrillator scene a LITTLE hokey, though more than made up for by its audacious vision)
He was so amazing… he worked so hard, doing all-nighters for months, he ended up getting very sick. The dog scene wasn’t done by Bottin because it was the final effects shot, and it had to get done while he was deadly sick in bed. He put everything he had into that film. Incredible work.
I feel like, nowadays, people sit around thinking their children until they’re middle-aged and then they freak out and have a midlife crisis
@@MFLimited we seem to have slowed down both maturation AND aging. Like we've elongated human development AND lifespan in the west
Wait a goddamn minute
Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala
Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
Two hours discussing something I’ve already discussed ad nauseam with those around me? YES plz
😂 I agree
Fucking hell I was just about to type that. Salut!
We are all just mere creatures of habit 😂
LOLZ!
It's why we're all here 😂
1:19:20 I get your point, but think about it for a second: the Thing exists on a cellular level. Those organs being removed? A collection of individual Thing cells arranged to look like an organ. Removing them from the dog thing doesn't harm or kill those cells, it just moves them. Same with cutting it open. It parts cells, but doesn't necessarily damage them. Heat? Flame? That damages/destroys cells. Another explanation for the lack of reaction is that the torching of the dog and twin things placed it in such a weakened state that it simply could not react, due to lack of energy. It was focusing on regenerating, thus could not muster a defensive response for such an inconsequential act. Just some food for thought.
In my point of view cutting instanteously kills the Thing cells in that sections so it cant "react"
In the burning part is the cells "semi destroyed"by indirect contact with something hot that are what's reacting
I agree with you. That is how I look at it.
Shape shifting vs destruction on a cellular level. It checks out. Fire always seems so rudimental and basic, but it is really effective at what it does.
@@MrYelly forced oxidization of the molecules, the temperature breaking the molecules down. really hard to come up with a chemistry that could do things like a thing that's alive in which processes can happen that would also be impervious to hundreds of degrees and wouldn't burn and cook.
sure prions and such can need extreme temperatures to break down but they're not really alive by themselves either. maybe the thing could learn to make an insulating sacrificial shield against fire though, but it is also just presumably sort of just imitating higher intelligence and behavior and seemingly lacks capability to innovate on its own.
Yeah, by his own theory, the Palmer thing should’ve reacted when he got cut to provide the blood sample. Since fire is the only method of giving the thing lasting damage, it makes sense that it’d only react to that
I always felt like thematically, it would make sense for them to both still be human. The main threat of the thing is eliminated, but it has sown the seeds of distrust enough that neither can be sure. Which I find very narratively satisfying. Which is also why I am perfectly happy with there being no conclusive answer. (I am aware of the comics and games; however, I believe when analyzing this question we must look at the movie in isolation)
I prefer the theory that they're both things, but both of them think that the other is human.
The dorkuses bringing up the comics and games are embarrassing and do not know how time works.
fuckin star wars fan ahh smh
Blair's noose makes me think he knows hes infected and tries to end it but the Thing intelligence took over...
OG blair could also have died in the noose and then the thing took over. I mean, if it can survive being utterly burned or missing a whole body and escape as a legged head, what's a little neck trauma and oxygen deprivation?
@oiy3308 mind blown 🤯
@@oiy3308also consider Norris died of a heart attack. It doesn't seem to need the host to be alive.
My theory is Blair Thing put up the noose to create the impression that he was still human.
@@Tommykey07 could be possible
The dog didn't scare Bennings when it was under the card table, it brushed up against the wound on his leg where he was shot.
good catch
But Bennings for sure wasn't a thing until the scene where we see him become the thing, because otherwise he is the dumbest thing ever for exposing himself
I heard that in the original version he told it "I only do that with humans. Sorry."
Just started the vid but I wunna throw out that I've always liked the ending where neither of them are the Thing. It makes for a nice solid plug to the themes of paranoia. No neither of us is going to assimilate the other. Instead we're going to slowly die to the elements. Nobody wins.
That's actually interesting as well.
It's definitely a good one. I love any film that leans heavy on the paranoia of the characters.
@@PolterGibbstok now that I have watched fully I just have to say, as an autistic boy obsessed with this movie since I was 10
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You've totally convinced me! The feeling of paranoia runs so deep in this movie that I never realized that even I as the viewer was desperate to hold onto something that I can trust to be true. I never liked any of the other explanations for the ending of this movie because I trusted it too much to not betray that last bit of trust, but if anything your explanation just further proves that this movie is a psychological masterpiece. You already blew my mind with Shutter Island and I feel like a fool for ever doubting you. Well done 👏👏👏
@@sashageorges4643 But is it two humans being paranoid or two Things that have learned to be paranoid? Either the bottle passes infection and they are both Things after the end, or the bottle doesn't pass infection and they're both Humans dying from hypothermia.
@@etherealceleste now having gone through the whole video, I think both have the same affect. Paranoia is a force unto itself that should be considered as a third player to any game of chess. Win or lose, survive or die, the real winner is what you can't explain and how the fear of that forces your hand
I love the idea that Mac gets assimilated, his zealous leadership position is a terrific survival strategy for the thing
But Mac didn’t want to survive. He made it clear to Nauls and Gary that they can’t survive.
Once it’s Child’s and Mac again he goes through the we shouldn’t survive statement. The problem is The Thing won’t die because of the cold.
Love this movie so much, 43 years later and people still are talking about who was The Thing at the ending.
That's why it will always be the best!
@@PolterGibbst We need Wyatt Russell to be in the remake, maybe MacReady had a pregnant wife and his son (Wyatt Russell) came to the arctic 40yrs later looking for clues to what happened to his father.
@@klaus1292if you played the ps2 game, Mcready is human and survives
Wait a goddamn minute
Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala
Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
43 years? lol. It wasn't that long ago. It's only been. Hold on... oh dear.
One detail I'm honestly kind of shocked you didn't mention is how Mac being human fits as a narrative bookend to the movie.
At the very beginning, when Mac is playing chess with the computer, what does he do when he loses? He "gives the computer a drink" and pours his alcohol into it. Compare this to the end, where after playing the Thing's game and doing all he can, it still saunters up to him in the form of Childs. He's in no shape to fight it at this point, he's lost his match, checkmate. So what does he do? He gives the Thing a drink, and laughs at the thought of having done the same thing not long ago.
Thanks you sir, the guy who made this video was too busy being pushing his silly ass theory to figure what was so obvious. He even showed Childs smoking with infected Palmer.
No childs being human makes way more sense
@@jjking8577to be fair carpenter considers the game kinda canon and childs dies human sooo
It's a good interpretation but Carpenter said childs was human, so...
@@Kenshiroit Doesn't really mean much though. It's good insight, but with Death of the Author being a thing I don't always put much stock into what the director/writer says.
Edit: Not that I'm purely using that to justify Mac being human. I just think works of fiction should be judged seperately from what the creator's necessarily intend.
Maybe the real thing was the things we made along the way.
Can’t make a thing.
@@Tribophopic If I didn't stop doing it for the cops, I ain't stopping for you , you big dope.
😂 bruh!
like macready always said “its thinging time”
@@DR.slzzzp *STOP.*
This is the best analysis of who was assimilated by The Thing on TH-cam. For 15 years, I dismissed the 'both Childs and MacReady are the Thing' theory because it always seemed easy to disprove. Since each version of the Thing retains the memory and knowledge of its 'parent,' I thought if both were the Thing, they should recognize each other. Your case is the only one I can accept (cuz it's not based on themes or gleams) that doesn't conflict with that idea, and it blew my mind.
And then your Mist video hit me upside the head. I'm stubborn about my movie theories and you opened my mind twice in one day. Liked, subscribed and WTH, joined too.
Glad to have you on board. I've got a list of theories but since they take so long I'm learning to also work on other videos I'm between.
The next theory is on Tucker and Dale vs. Evil, which will also serve as the 50k special. Would have done it sooner but it took me a while to find a cabin in the woods to use for the video.
But first I have to finish this Halloween Special, and it is definitely special alright. I shouldn't be laughing this hard at myself within the first couple minutes of the video.
Shame the presentation is so whacky. I watched this one but no more. Also, can we be sure there is only one bottle of J&B?
@@DioBrando-jm7ufFor an alcoholic like mac, you can be damn sure he isnt opening up a new bottle till he finished the last one
Another interpretation that I think is interesting, what if you were the thing and didn't know? Like a dormant virus in your body, strategically wiping bits of memory and influencing your decisions and actions without you realising it, to completely taking over when it sees fit? Maybe they both are the thing, and neither one knows they are. It would be more believable when they made it back to civilization rather than them being super chummy and sure the other is the thing.
I heard Childs was the thing because there was no glint in his eye and he immediately took the drink despite knowing that’s it’s extremely unsafe to share food and drinks
I disagree on some points, but the fact that a movie from the 80s is still sparking arguments and analysis is so cool.
Anything large that you’d like to put out as a disagreement?
Wait a goddamn minute
Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala
Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
False there are comics that continue the story and CHILDS is the Thing...
@@TheSareus and the comics are not canon. While we have a videogame that Carpenter has said he considers canon, which makes it rather clear that Childs died human, Mac survives..though it's ambiguous whether he was human or thing.
@@TheSareus at least paste it somewhere it makes sense bro😂
I always considered The Thing to be a rather optimistic movie. Well, optimistic about fundamental Human nature, not about the fate of Humanity in the movie. In the movie Humanity is super screwed. But those men put in a stressful situation and pushed to their breaking point ultimately decide to sacrifice themselves to give the rest of mankind a chance at survival. There is something noble in that.
Well, I mean, what else were they gonna do? Their radio was destroyed if I remember correctly.
@@JosephWalker-ip7pd get drunk or raid the medicine for morphine?
@@JosephWalker-ip7pd and the chess computer was fried.
Very strange take. The original story was a nihilistic take on the nihilistic story At the Mountains of Madness. The movie cranked up the nihilism to 11. And... you got... optimism??
@@t0neg0d their fate is bleak. Their reaction to that fate is not.
What would have been crazy is that if both were the thing, but they both became so good at adapting they couldn't tell the other was one. That was why they both acted as if they were still human to each other.
The individual parts fighting for survival
they were testing each other for authentic imitation. If either of them failed to imitate their victims totally, the other would've had cause to flame them.
@@michaeldavid6832that's an extrapolation based on nothing
if Childs chased after Palmer and did get assimilated Mac would not know that Childs was a thing but Childs would know Mac is and after seeing Mac kill off all the other things the Childs things may be paranoid of the Mac thing trying to kill it and so the movie ends in both things being paranoid of each other in the most ultimate twist of any horror movie...
@@kahlanamnell1386 we don't really know how connected individual things are. They might be able to communicate more subtly or even have a hive mind. And both options allow for other things to be sacrificed.
1:19:00 My understanding has been that Things behave like colonies and can only manifest intelligence when there's both enough biomass for them to effectively create a brain, and enough time for them to link up the neurons for it to function effectively. A pool of cells separated from the larger intelligent colony reverts to behaving at the level of intelligence it can create, which is basically a bug reacting to stimuli. The Bennings thing had been assimilated so recently that it was still behaving on an instinctive level and wasn't able to come up with anything other than run into the cold. The Norris head-thing was recently severed and hadn't been able to rebuild its synapses, so it was somewhat intelligent but still clumsy and confused. The dog-thing had been in that state long enough to form the intelligence to lay out a plan.
I was 10 years old when this movie came out. My parents took me to a drive-in theater in Jacksonville for a double feature - The Thing and Alien. During intermission I watched Pink Floyds The Wall on another screen.
I pretty much fell in love with movies that night.
I’m a youngin but alien was one of those movies that made me love old school movies. They’re just better. Prime time cinema replaced by lazy inflated budgets of today.
Sounds like the night of a lifetime. Everything I love even as a 20 year old
I saw the original in the theater
@ that’s awesome. How was the crowd during some of the gross scenes?
@@poplarboy7129yea how was the crowd?
I've always assumed neither one of them was the Thing and they both just died, and that's what I'm going to keep believing.
This is exactly it, no need to look much deeper than that.
Mac passes Childs the alcohol as a test, with a kind of smirk. Childs knows what Mac was doing, takes a sip to show Mac he's not the thing. They end up laughing the off, the end.
@@gr4yf0x1983 i agree with both you of you out of fear for one another thats why mac said maybe we dont after childs says how do we survive best way to make sure it never makes it civilization honestly.
@@ezraovitt2341 I always believed this theory, but John Carpenter did say in a tweet that one of them is the thing.
Mac survive and Child froze in the game, and its canon
@@bieregrillsfaitdesvideos5189exactly, because the game was so good, I really liked it a lot, I'm going to believe the game is canon. But in a cinematic only perspective I also like to believe Childs is the thing because of all those details. I mean why would Childs leave is place in the end unless he's a part of the Thing and doesn't want to be in danger in case everything explodes like it did. I mean, the Thing would leave a part of itself away from danger because it was being attacked, and that part seems to be Childs at the end.
A point that I've become hung up on is that when Childs meets Mac at the end, he asks "are YOU the only one who made it?" instead of "are WE the only ones who made it?"
Yeah, I caught that as well.
I said the same thing. I always believed that they both were the Thing.
Given that childs wasnt apart of the blowing up the base bit it makes sense that essentially he was asking about the others.
Funny that Mac said earlier in the movie that they couldn't let that thing freeze again for the rescue team to find it but at the end that's what he wants to do just set there and go to sleep in the cold. 🤔
Also I find it interesting that if childs was a thing why didn't he take Mac by surprise he had the drop on him it was only them two at that point so no reason for childs to keep up the act pretending to be human.
Either the thing imitated so perfectly MacReady that it himself became anti social, or Mac wasn't the thing.
The thing imitates perfectly.
@@captainnyet9855 It doesn't. The entire scene with the dog, with it acting out of character and nothing like a dog, is proof that The Thing doesn't replicate mentality perfectly. It acts in ways a dog shouldn't, outing itself. Mac acts like he should, including his anti-sociality. Something that would actively harm the Thing's goal of spreading as much as possible. We can thus concluding Mac isn't the Thing, because he's acting counter-current to the Thing's mentality and task.
@@ZeroNumerous it acts unlike a dog because it isn't in it's interest to act like a dog; nobody suspects it of anything yet, so it can use that advantage to gain information.
Once it starts taking over people it repeatedly shows itself to be capable at imitating and influencing human behavior to the point where it manages to completely avoid suspicion and also casting it on the humans in the group.
Macready was not likely to be infected because the thing would not show them the blood trick nor pass the trick.
@@captainnyet9855 Except it does that by staying in the background, not by taking center stage. It refused to become the leader of the group and take control of all the weapons. That seems odd if it felt confident in its ability to perfectly replicate the humans. Instead MaCready became the leader and controller of the weapons AND organized the people to put up resistance. If Mac was the Thing at that point, then why was is engaging in actions intended to make assimilation HARDER?
I think the reason fire hurts and cut doesnt is cause the thing isnt the object but the cells them selves. It splits it self open all the time. But when you you burn it you are destroying it at a celular level
I agree, it makes sense. Also, fire doesn't kill it but it disables it at least temporarily That's why the patri dish test is still viable.
I love a theory that assimilated people may not know they are infected until The Thing either activates (from threat) or unless the act was overt and violent.
As for the ending, I prefer thinking both are human but too tired to trust each other. I will admit it is odd that Childs didn't burn MacReady immediately; he'd been on edge and untrusting for the entire movie. As The Thing, he'd know that infecting Mac is doubling its chances.
Never, ever suspect Mac of being infected. Maybe that was Carpenter's point. We SHOULD suspect Mac, but being the hero, it is difficult to do so
Wait a goddamn minute
Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala
Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
I agree.
Why would the Thing go up to Mac, and even risk another conflict? If Child’s was the Thing, then the smart thing would be to just stay away until he freezes.
Honestly, I like that idea that they don’t know that they’re infected until the thing is in fear or dealing with a threat part of me always thought that they slowly get a simulated, depending on how they’re infected like a fit simulate you right away I feel like you automatically just become a part of but if you get like a drop of blood on you or something that it takes more time to make you a part of it
Technically they arent aware the thing assimilates everything including mannerism, memories,emotions etc. Its only when its found out it flips out and either tries to propogate to another host or flee.
What I like about this movie is that it has pretty competent characters (for such a crazy situation of course). A lot of horror movies have the characters make extremely dumb decisions.
Great take. I'm impressed how they make the doubt keep going!
Considering Hollywood is clearly engaged in forcing the politics it endorses, which happens to be in lockstep with what the govt promotes, on it's customers, I'd say it makes a lot of sense.
@@TheGoldenDragon_ I’m not sure what your comment has to do with has to do with this?
@@xiniks I was making a reference to how Hollywood is weaponized to engineer society as it always has been used that way. At some point in the last couple of decades, that engineering helped to dumb down society but in a more aggressive way than it used to be, so characters behaving or acting stupid makes sense bc well, take a look at how dumb ppl are nowadays. The films and ppl mirror each other.
@@xiniks I wrote you a reply but yt won't let me post it.
One tiny mistake you've made: The ship didn't crash land.
There's no debris, there's no debris trail, the hole the ship is found in is perfectly circular. It's a controlled landing. The ship looks made out of junk, but that's because it is. As demonstrated by infected Blair the Thing seems to possess a level of construction and knowledge beyond our own.
In the comics, a lot about the nature of the Thing was revealed. One of them being that they aren't always on the same page, which means they can have completely different ideas and ideologies. Because of this, a Thing's biggest fear is being cut up into pieces, and the pieces not wanting to reunite with the original biomass, becoming completely separate entities. In fact, the Thing DOES reach civilization...but the one that does is actually pretty chill. It doesn't want to absorb everyone, because doing so means the entire planet will be consumed, and thus it will starve, having to fight for resources with its own kin. The Thing doesn't want to lose itself, so it would be forced to flee the planet to not be reabsorbed...it's pretty sad.
Oh damn. That's pretty good writing
Yeah, a portion of one of the comic runs revels that two people, a male and female are actually two parts of it that didn't exactly take over their human hosts, and allowed them to keep their memories. They become "lovers" and make a pact to only feed on necessity, lest they transform past their demi-humanity and lose all their memories and revert back to their/its true nature.
@mr.voidout4739 This 26:34 sounds awesome but I can't view it as cannon for the thing. The thing on earth is literally millions of years old, and the story doesn't have anything saying it's an alien or that it's highly intelligent, beyond imitation of it's host, be that a dog or man.
It's more inclined to be that it is like a worm, it's one thing, then once split the pieces can beck e it's own thing, but prior it doesn't have it's own Brain to leadership, intelligence etc.
Those comics sound great though.
THANK YOU for having ACTUALLY READ the comics so sick of people speculating about this shit when it's literally written down for zero room to debate.
@@beentheredonethat5908 The thing comics kind of unofficially run post The Thing movie time line. Macready turns up in a lot of the Comic stories or things are referred to from what the Movie would have laid as it's foundation. The comic doesn't have to say it's an alien, we already know that and we've saw the spaceship and all that. We have no idea if it's truly an alien or it's original form because it assimilates everything so the "Alien" may just be a victim of the thing organism that crash landed on Earth.
The Thing is also highly intelligent based on what organism it absorbs and then can access intelligence. If the thing absorbs a scientist, it can now act with scientist knowledge moving forward IF that particular thing cells spread. A different thing cell who never been attached to a scientist doesn't have the same knowledge BUT it would have any prior knowledge from previous assimilations such as how Blair was building a spaceship which obviously is the thing's knowledge from the Alien in the ice. And the dog was acting way more intelligent than a regular dog, which dogs are already fairly intelligent. The comics don't have to re-spell out what the thing is to be canon.
The craziest thing about the whole movie is that Clark is 24
What. 😐
@@Barbershopgossip seriously ? The dude looks like 44
you mean the actor? he was like 40 afaik EDIT: oh I see now xD lmao
Well Blair was like 50 instead of like 83.
I am 37 everyone looks at least 15 years older than me in this film 😂yet when I watch buffy they are meant to be 16-20 they look well older than me too
From 26:10 - I see a lot of people say this, and I think it has to do with how it's shot, but I'm fairly confident no part of the Kennel Thing escapes when the hands shoot up to the roof. The hands shoot up, bust through, and the Kennel Thing pulls itself up to the ceiling. Evidenced by the fact that Childs torches the upper corner of the kennel, and not the ground. You can then see the torched mass fall. Further argument for no part escaping is there is a shot where they clearly watch the Kennel Thing pull itself up to the ceiling - if they thought part of it escaped I'm pretty sure they would have panicked and/or started hunting for it, instead of "calmly" moving the torched body for autopsy, or going about their routines without watching over their shoulders for a bizarre mutated alien lurking around the base.
I also came here to say this. I've watched this movie so many times, watched so many videos on it, and am generally pretty obsessed. It does look like it escapes but it just hangs there before being torched. Spot on.
Man, this movie is so good. You know it came out on the SAME DAY as Blade Runner? what a great weekend for sci fi
The Thing is capable of separating from one form to another ,so the autopsy would not be harming it. Lacerations have little to no effect. Heat does. Heat can destroy cells or at least change their state. If it's hot enough to burn ,it hurts.
The chard remains were not completely cooked through. Some cells survived ,but ultimately, fire is the best weapon.
Remember to cook the Thing until totally chard through when defending.
The blood test makes sense.
For the gasoline theory people if you look closely molotov cocktail is without any label while macready's bottle at the end has a label
Time stamp 1:26:50
it's a ridiculous theory anyway that Mac would have a fake liquor bottle in case a thing showed up pretending to be a friendly. That's 4D level chess.
Exactly! Thank you! I thought i was the only one who noticed that ❤
I was always surprised there wasn't a scene where when they knew one of them was the thing, they didn't try to negotiate with it.
It was in comic books that went on with a story.
Every time the thing was discovered it just burst out in hostility
@@usuario15965 But they didn't even try to reason with it...
@@HC-cb4ypmy brother in Christ you would not fucking reason with a flesh entity mimicking a friend/coworker AFTER KILLING THEM and then AGGRESSIVELY MURDERING/ASSIMILATING your other coworkers! You would light it on fucking fire if you had a flamethrower like they did, or you’d be an idiot. The Thing has intelligence, literally absorbing the knowledge/memories of the creatures it “consumes”. It would be on the parasitic virus creature to try and make terms with humanity, not the other way around bub.
@HC-cb4yp there's really nothing in the movie that indicates the Thing is interested in or even capable of communication. Personally I don't think it's even sapient, just imitating the intelligence of its victims
Childs accepts a drink from mcready meaning either Childs really dumb or already the thing so isn’t worried about getting infected, and Childs didn’t instantly flame mcready meaning he’s interested in infecting him next.
And mcready killed Blair thing so he wasn’t infected at that moment, it would make no sense for “mcready thing” to blow up Blair thing when the only other living person is Childs thing
@@synsol1008 exactly. It's so far fetched and complicated to try and explain why MacReady would kill blair and pass the blood test. None of MacReady's actions make sense if he's infected. The most reasonable theory is that nobody or childs is the thing.
@@rabbithearted.1094 That is why all the other theories require somebody to fully reject logic and rational thinking. Although I also think that there is that same problem with people with assert that both are human. Childs engages in actions that a paranoid HUMAN would not do.
Honestly the internal-conflict angle makes way more sense. The idea that different instances of "the thing" species may be naturally worse or better at immitating new species and that they will intentionally prune off the worse ones is good in and of itself, but it could explain that scene where it runs into the snow with the fucked up hands and waits to die in two distinct ways. First, that one just wasn't a good immitator of humans, plain and simple. Second, you're right about it being two different strains fighting eachother to assimilate.
The idea that this is a species that thrives so much off of paranoia and internal conflict that *_even its own evolution_* is driven by it is just excellent narratively.
Yes and its very logical. Survival of the fittest
@@anonymouseniller6688 fitness meant capacity to survive to reproduce
so whichever one breeds the quickest and splits into multiple entities that separately survive was the best
@@nathanlevesque7812and those that are quickly detected and destroyed are less likely to propagate effectively than those that are able to pass unnoticed.
"Palmer - slight 60s acid damage" holy shit the actor played that so good
I think chekov's gun is kinda like a rule that says, if you introduce an element to the story, you must use it. It is a rule of thumb to help writers avoid false foreshadowing and also to do good foreshadowing.
Originally, Anton Chekhov was specifically talking about playwrights-the point was that it's the set department's job to handle production design, so the only reason the *writer* should be concerned with *pointing out actively* that there's a rifle hanging on the wall in Act I is if that rifle is going to be used by the end of Act III.
The idea is that when it comes to the script, absolutely ecery detail given should be necessary to explain the events of the story, not just an alternative phrase for any instance of foreshadowing.
Something that wasn't mentioned or considered about Blair: I have always thought when the Dog-Thing splits in two, the section that escapes in to the ceiling, is what assimilated Blair. Considering Blair-Thing has similar claws that it had used to pull itself through the ceiling, tentacles, and A DOG'S HEAD coming out of Blair-Thing's torso. If not the split section of the Dog-Thing, then one of the dogs that ran out of the kennel, but I'm convinced it was the part that escaped. Why else would Blair-Thing have all the same characteristics of Dog-Thing as well as his own?
My friend, I think the big arms just made it hang from the ceiling. Blair became infected when he touched the Thing with his pencil then touched his lips with the same pencil immediately, you'll see when you re-watch that autopsy seen, watch Blair use pencil then putting eraser to his mouth as soon as he's done touching the dog thing.
For the note, John Carpenter said that was not scripted but they left that part in and John said it's ok to believe that's when Blair became infected.
On the other hand, Blair was elbow deep in that thing body, either way I knew he'd become a Thing.
Yeah I feel like the preexisting tunnels between the shed and dog kennel pretty much confirms this
@@Holy_Wraithnope. Blair didn't touch his lip. Watch it carefully
@@valx7586no tunnels from the shed to the kennels
Nope. Jed to Norris to palmer to Blair. So both Norris and Palmer had dog in their thing past. No part escaped.
“To connect more with them, the thing decides to open up.”
Got to be the best description I’ve ever heard of that scene 😂
Not going with the "dog-thing split in two".
Nobody mentions it again. They burn all the parts very deliberately.
The dog-thing was *unable* to get through the ceiling.
It's very easy to miss, but the part that was on the ceiling fell off engulfed in flames when they showed the full-scene shot
@@juanausensi499 The part that fell was the "worm mouth thing" that sprouted and lunged at Childs before getting fried.
Part of the Thing was *able* to easily punch through the ceiling, and everyone watches it escape...You can literally see the bottom of IT rising up out of the shot. I don't think John Carpenter deliberately showed that for no reason.. The next time we see the Dog-Thing on the ground, it doesn't have arms going up to the ceiling, so clearly they went somewhere.
@@abstruseoni Sure? I need to watch that scene again
Wait a goddamn minute
Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala
Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
This guy is the most under rated film reviewer on earth. The amount of detail and thinking outside the box while explaining his train of thought for each scene was fantastic.. Well done man...
Im kinda shocked that none of the scientist would have thought about rabies or something with the dog and why the norwegians were trying to kill it so heavily coupled with the strange behavior. I guess maybe the thought oh they are in antartica but it kinda still bothers me in some way, but hey can't have a movie with that complete kind of caution. This could also be poked at a lot since I am not as familiar with the movie.
Those damn rabid penguins, always biting my damn dogs!
How could a dog possibly contract rabies in Antarctica?
I thought about this but the dog didn't act like it had rabies
The fact that we are still discussing this movie's plot forty years since its release really speaks not just to the power of the ideas it presents, but to just how well crafted it is. I go back and forth on the different theories myself, and I think that's ultimately what we're supposed to take away, not any one answer, but the uncertainty, ambiguity, and most of all the paranoia of not having a straight answer. Personally, I love the idea that both of them are The Thing by the end. The Thing takes on the traits of those that it absorbs, I think we're meant to understand that the alien has taken not only our best traits, but our worst ones as well, the paranoia and hostility towards our own kind, and at the end this vast, formless cosmic force that could destroy our entire world is completely helpless in the face of mankind's own lack of trust.
Well back then writers had something called originality. Today we get "How to Reboot a Film Series and Trash It At The Same Time". Sheesh I live in the wrong era.🤫
My favorite ending scenario is that MacReady is the Thing and Childs is human. The Thing burned everything knowing it will refreeze and Childs will die in the cold. Simple survival instincts. But it also plays on the audience's credibility and loyalty of Kurt Russel's character, and Carpenter's choice to show his perspective. You like his character, he is heroic, but it's a betrayal to the audience that works in a cruel way. He's a misleading narrator of the events. The perspective is the Thing's and you rooted for it.
Wait a goddamn minute
Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala
Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
Very interesting. I do see that the biggest reason most people cannot accept Mac being the thing is the fact that he's painted as the hero. But the whole point of the movie is the lost of trust and paranoia and any one in the group possibly being the enemy.
@@JohnnyDay-hr1fjguess the fact carpenter said mac is human is the reason ppl believing he is human
@@F-Andre. I remember him saying he couldn't decide if he was human or not.
It’s such an intriguing reversal of the roles. Everybody says Childs was the Thing, the last piece of the monster. But what if he was the last piece of humanity? The final nuisance for the Thing to consume?
The audience can’t be any more sure who’s the thing than Childs or Mac can be about each other at the end, and that’s the point: in any world 2 stranded men with fire and supplies could work together to survive until rescued-but not in this world, not anymore. Now even if they're both men they can no longer trust each other to survive, that new terrifying reality is why they'll both/we'll all die
I'd disagree that anyone could ever survive in this case. There is a massive storm, it is below -100F as they say, the only reason they are warm rn is because of the giant fire. They have no shelter from the cold, and once the fire is gone they have no real hope of making more as basically all of the supplies are gone, everything was blown up.
The thing might be alive though. I think both those men were human and unninfected.
Now, we saw that the Thing can survive with just a piece of it still out there.
For all we know, it might be the case.
When people will come to see what happened, they might take with them a piece of the thing. And it will be the end.
It’s child’s.
He drinks the alcohol at the end .
He wasn’t a drinker at all remember
@@Andrew-j3g5t Well... they're about to die from the cold.
I think he just didn't care anymore. Alcohol can let them feel better while they are dying.
I'm not a drinker myself, but in this particular situation I think I would have drink too
@@Andrew-j3g5t And the real Childs was distrustful of everyone, but now all of sudden he's going to share a bottle he just saw Mac drinking from?
The fact that this analysis ran for longer than the actual film itself is amazing… I’m looking forward to watching this!
I've always thought both were human at the end, I could see why everyone argued for either being the thing, but if they were both infected they would know
I always thought Macreadys laugh was a sign he knew Childs was infected
@@VulgarBeyondSteel That's completely fair
@trentonwalker8602 But they both laughed, so that doesn't really make sense. It always came across more of a laugh because they unsrdstood they were doomed to freeze. In that situation, knowing what was inevitable, all one could feasibly do is laugh.
But even that all aside the game is considered as canon, and it shows a very much dead Childs and uninfected MacReady.
What if they were both infected and just... interacting normally? We don't really know what the thing does with its own ... self/copies of itself. Maybe that's just how things act when only in the company of other things.
I’m 100% on board with “they were both human, but couldn’t be sure that the other wasn’t, so they just watched eachother die to be sure. The laugh was both of them acknowledging that. They both knew that each couldnt be sure, and both knew that neither would take the chance”
Looks like most missed out a very significant point about The Thing : It can mimic tissue and assimilate too but it cannot do it perfectly. The PERFECT thing would replicate all wounds, injuries, external objects placed internally and above all else: IT CANNOT BE EXPRESSIVE OR EMOTE LIKE HUMANS DO, CONTEXTUALLY.
Odd behaviour, insufficient emotions and robotic responses or expressions were a dead giveaway on who was the next thing. I believe it was an intentional choice by the director to breadcrumb the audience. And once you spot it, you cannot unsee it 😅
This is why Macready can NEVER be the thing because he is always and remains expressive, emotive and reacts with genuine shock/surpise/awe whenever the thing exposes itself. Sometimes even more so than the others. Which The Thing does not do well at all. Why? Because these social cues and gestures are evolution and exposure based. They need time. Which was the one disadvantage keeping it from being the 'Perfect Being'. . The end. .
I agree. The things that had to try to appear human throughout the movie, whenever they are interacted with, (until their jig is up) are passive. They usually stay in the background not saying much. When they do say something they just kind of are like "I don't know, what do you think?".
Childs was one of the most outspoken, head strong, and skittish of the bunch. He wouldn't have left a room that seemed semi secure, to chase after Blair in a blizzard. He wouldn't have been so easy on Macready at the end, not trying to make sure he wasn't a thing. He wouldn't have passively looked to Macready for direction of what they should do next, without putting forward what he thought was best. He wouldn't have been satisfied with just sitting there right next to a possible thing, waiting for it's direction.
Mac on the other hand, says something like "Let's just see what happens", acknowledging he is still skeptical.
@@Liamitis123This is a really good point!
@@rahulkunche7934. Just like a psychopath can imitate emotions I don't see why the thing would not be able to also. Maybe the amount of emotion shown by Mac was the thing over playing it's part.
Thank you!
Norris was emoting just fine, five seconds before his STOMACH BECAME A T-REX MOUTH.
The NOT end
If slow assimilation was so easy and the thing is so smart, why not use the dog to assimilate the cook (or anybody else before the crew is paranoid) and contaminate food supply without ever engaging in combat?
It is a good point, huh
Your right. There was no reason for the "dog thing" to do anything at all besides lick people when it got the chance and it would be GG, unless it has to actually pierce the skin for infection to occur.
Its because it cant... Blair was infected long ago - Blair asking Clark if he was alone with the dog was to see if he was "in" as in also one of them, his response is what made Blair thing go into figuring out how to make everyone paranoid and fool everyone, Blair made a fake computer simulation to get everyone against each other - and if you go with what Carpenter himself has said "One of them is The Thing"..... he's referencing how a single piece of "Evidence" be it even completely false or not with no way to verify if its legit points to the premise of the movie - Paranoia.
And who but Blair himself be able to verify if that simulation was right? Bingo - It was Blair... who's actually The Thing.
It is a good point. Beside the obvious "then no movie" maybe the Dog didn't want to keep all its eggs in one basket. Sure the humans don't have much reason to distrust it, but we see them go to the Norwegian camp to investigate and they slowly start figuring things out. Maybe it thinks there's too much of a risk to taking that long? Or it doesn't have that far thinking ahead stuff, I don't know. Does being in a dog makes it less intelligent? You figure it would know about this sort of stuff from the Norwegian camp (I don't care about the prequel).
Best idea I have, it was scared being down to just one dog form and wanted to increase its numbers quickly to ensure survival, it didn't think this would be so loud and wake the whole camp.
Because the Thing wasn't sure what language the second crew spoke.
It’s really easy to figure it out Blair is the thing by the time they check on him and he says he is fine, the lights go out and the guys see Childs go out into the storm and he’s walking very strange almost like banning a kinda stumbling a little as he walks, the door Childs was guarding is right next to a stair case down to the generator room which blows about 3 seconds after Childs walks out Blair snuck up the stairs and assimilated Childs and then killed the generator and sent Childs out into the storm to be safe or whatever but that’s what’s happens and it’s fucking pretty easy to put together idk why you guys struggle with this
Because they have to try to come up with some way to justify a theory that Childs was not infected. To justify their theory, they have to reject 2 scenes and call them continuity errors.
The concept of slow assimilation gets overlooked a lot when people talk about this movie. It doesn't even necessarily have to be controlling a host entirely. It could infect somebody and influence them in subtle ways. Maybe it just makes you feel thirsty, so you steal a drink from somebody else's bottle and infect them through saliva. There's multiple real-world species that work in similar ways.
Yeah, every day in corpo sheeetheads stearling your food. Everyone infected with an assholism
Your Shutter Island video was incredible. Been waiting for your next big project. Happy to see this upload.
Hey so happy you are back, I am old enough to remember the 1st movie The Thing. James Arness was The Thing. Got to stay up late on Fridays and it was usually played 3 or 4 times a year. Maybe more. I remember how scared I was watching this on Friday nights, and how all the old scary movies back in the day made it hard to sleep . Love your reviews on these movies. Be waiting for your next video.
This is the shutter island video what are you talking about?
@@TheEnemyOfDawnSorry Marshall, this isn’t the shutter island video. We’ve been trying to get this idea into your head for the past 9 months.
I like to think that a Thing part broke off during all the commotion in the camp, and went out to let itself freeze as a contingency plan. So if all it's parts were destroyed in the camp(s) there is still a good chance for it to continue on by being discovered in the future and then continue to wreck havoc assimilating those that wake it up again.
That's the problem (or beauty) of this film. We are not entirely certain how the Thing works, what it can do, how infection/assimilation functions or anything really. So many of these videos rely on things they claim to know about the Thing that are actually up in the air.
Given the blood test, every part of the thing has a strong survival instinct. I don't think it's likely
@@nicksteffes5281 At a molecular level yes, the blood wasn't "enough" of the Thing to actually think outside of just survival. But given a part is big enough, like the head creature trying to hide/escape while the torso was burning, I would think an sufficiently large enough mass of the Thing, maybe an arm creature or even a hand, would have some form of sentience above just "survive" and could plan contingently. Also it seems that the Thing is represented as separate entities after one part is split from another so a part that was sloughed off would instinctively flee from the camp that was on fire and being that the Thing seems to have genetic memory it would remember that it could allow itself to freeze and be discovered later thus ensuring survival and another chance to propagate.
@@armandowillem
Ugh...hive mind
@@watertommyz
Damn I missed the reply. What do you mean? Suppose there was a hive mind, and suppose Mac and Childs were both Things. Wouldn't they know and be doing high fives to their victory? Or in the scene with the blood? A hive mind would probably allow any other dominant Things in the vicinity to supress the blood's reaction through that shared connection. Genetic memory and hive minds are not mutually exclusive.
Your outfit makes me feel like my auto mechanic took me aside and shared an in-depth Thing conspiracy theory while his buddies are fixing my Toyota
It’s wild this came out today. I’ve been on another Thing binge for about a week. I’ve watched it twice, and watched and rewatched tons of theory videos. About once a year this movies becomes my obsession.
I know how you feel. Probably why this video took me so long to make. 😂😅
@@PolterGibbst right now I’m watching the movie again with the Kurt/ John commentary I found on TH-cam. I’m really really looking forward to your video and your insights. Great stuff! Thank you.
@@Kavilion The film with the commentary is fantastic. Much better than quite a few others that's I've seen.
I just hope the video does all of it justice.
@Pol0 😊0pterGibbst
Real Childs always refused alcohol and even does it during the runtime, the one at the end is the last Thing remaining:
Childs was tired and keeping an eye on the outside... the door behind him is closed and the lights are off, the generator is straight downstairs compared to Childs' post. When we don't see Childs anymore, the door behind him is open and the lights are on, with positions of the Jackets being different. What actually happened is that the thing came from the generator after doing sabotage shenanigans, opened the door, snuck up straight behind Childs and gobbled him up, getting a new jacket of the same exact color. Then it went out in the cold to try and hybernate in order to survive the ordeal as back up plan, but when the explosions happen, it is drawn back cause it now definitely knows someone survived. At the end, MaCready laughs because the thing just exposed itself by drinking alcohol, something that Childs would not do. Also, the Videogame is technically canon and MacReady is indeed alive and not infected in it
My theory is that MacReady poisoned the booze & laughs because Childs drinks with him.
I always thought it wasn’t alcohol at all, the prior scene Mac is firebombing the base. The bottles hanging on his belt were more than likely filled with gasoline or kerosene, even more on this is that Mac didn’t drink it at all.
@@45_ACP In the scene, it looks like MacReady is about to drink and doesn't look happy about drinking, which made me think he was planning to off himself with poisoned booze. Then Childs shows up & my interpretation is that MacReady doesn't trust him - and plans to share the poison.
Wait a goddamn minute
Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala
Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
Childs was human in the game. He froze to death.
Two hour video analysis? Damn dude, you're a trooper! Spotted SO many small clues and ques, and challenged a lot of my assumptions and conclusions. Well done!
Video starts at 1:28:37
1:19:32 the way I head canon this is that if the thing is multiple creatures, then all doctor Birk was doing was separating them as apposed to actually harming them during his autopsy, where as the hot knife in the blood is attacking them on the individual level which would make them retaliate in a fight or flight mode.
Who in the hell is Dr. Birk?
@@hogbone7 Dr.Blair, sorry
@@hogbone7doctor Barnes
Goong back to the Childs Thing. I saw in a Rob Ager video that he points out that the power generator room is behind Childs and in order for Blaire to reach it he'd have to go through Childs
The irony of the thing fighting versions of itself and going against it’s collectivism nature because of how well adapted to humans who are individualist by nature is an interesting theory
Humans aren’t individualists by nature
Who says the Thing has a collectivist nature? That is never even pointed at in the movie. We have no Idea of its social structures. Maybe they allways fight each other to further improve?
@@nettewilson5926OK commie
@@Hosenbisla I just always interpreted them as an assimilation maxing hivemind based species that is of one mind.
@@nettewilson5926 I disagree
I had a biopsy today, and the constant annoying stinging is keeping me awake. I'm taking it as a sign that I need to watch this amazing video again. Keep up the amazing work! I'm looking forward to this!
Hell yeah, dude.
Blair killed the dogs because the script needed him to: three dogs were supposed to escape and be chased down by MacReady, Childs, and Bennings. Two of them were things. They attack and eat the third dog (for nourishment rather than assimilation).
This was a big chase scene with snowmobiles and flamethrower action and Bennings getting torn in half, but all that got cut, so "He's killed all the dogs" was added to the film.
It's funny how we build up an entire mythos on a decision made by the film maker just because of circumstances
I always saw it as him killing off any form of escape. He takes out the helicopter, sabotages the radios, and kills off the sled dogs for good measure. I don't think it would even be that likely to get somewhere else with just like 2 or 3 sled dogs but he was making sure.
Is this not the common interpretation? I feel like I haven't seen anyone else in these comments express this.
Clark was never suspicious that the dog was the thing, so it never needed to assimilate him.
Not really how the thing works. It assimilates based on circumstance and strategy AND sometimes just to do so. You may get assimilated sooner by showing suspicion but the goal is always tp assimilate.
Clark is 24!? He came out of the womb looking 18.
😂 no doubt. I was surprised by most of the ages in this.
It sounds ridiculous but when I’m looking at pictures of myself, I looked the same at 26 and 16.
In both pictures I looked 36.
@@PolterGibbst I was shocked that Windows was supposed to be 21. He looked 31.
MacCready never had the makings of a varsity Thing monster.
Whatever happened to the strong, silent type?
@ the dog trainer Clark, whateva happened there
@@ITGOES80808he turned out to be a goddamn thing! >:0
Thing? I DONT WANNA EVER HEAR THAT WORD IN THIS OFFICE EVER AGAIN
@ those thing monsters, they’re not all bad.
The thing with the Bennings assimilation scene is that it was written really quickly and thrown in to replace Bennings' original death scene, where he was bitten in half by a dog-thing out on the ice shelf and both halfs of his body begin to get assimilated and ressurrected (it was too expensive to stage and film).
Also, the dog never manages to lick Bennings in the face. Watch that scene, you'll see that Bennings never allows it to lick him, he's holding it away from his face.
The licking scene he noted that the dog licked the gloves and then he was handed a bottle after he got shot and grabbed the bottle with his dog spit gloves and drank out of it. Therefore cross dogtamination
Dogtamination your funny.@@BeetaroniPizza
@@BeetaroniPizza Disagree. The Thing requires considerable focus for assimilation, that was established in the movie.
@@BeetaroniPizza Glass is used in science experiments because it cannot contaminate anything outside of itself. Therefore, the residue of the gloves on the bottle wouldn't contaminate the drink.
What I’ve learned by the end of this video… is from the thing’s perspective, this whole movie is a clumsy workplace comedy.
The Thing itself does provide what is widely considered to be the movie's funniest moment.
@@bingerz237what moment?
Definitely from the things perspective...
@@NUCLEAR-FIRES Palmer reacting to the Norris-thing head crawling away.
"You gotta be fucking kidding..."
Impossible for MacReady to be the Thing because he gives the same reaction he gave to the computer when he lost. A very human reaction.
You mean he laughs, and gives the cheater alcohol?
@SLRModShop Yes, but also because the director is trying to convey a metaphor, and it can't make sense if MacReady is the antagonist/ The Thing.
Mac knew no one could survive to ensure it didn't freeze itself and survive. Then just decides to let them both freeze? Nah. Mac and possibly childs as well are infected.
This is genuinely one of the best movies. Period. Such an underrated masterpiece.
1:40(ish) Re: "Heartattack". I think there's a definite case for THE THING'S assimilation accelerating massively once the human host dies- because those cells are no good to the insurgent if they start to deteriorate- or lose any integrity- which must be a risk and a big deal to the parasite, the cells being the currency for its propagation.
Then on top of that it responds to the attempts to revive using defibrillator as hostile- and MAYBE THAT IS ACTUALLY A MISSED ELEMENT- that electro-convulsive shock could be very deadly to this life form (at least during/just after assimilation) and it acts defensively
Again, terrific video
Worth noting in the original novella "who goes there" one of the effective weapons used against the creature is a sort of cattle prod on steroids if memory serves me correctly
@@eryqsummerlott9828 ooooh THIS just got interesting....
For the blood test scene, Mac could have used an earlier sample of his blood that he saved when he sabotaged the blood bank/fridge. Then he burned all the blood bags in the flame thrower pit to eliminate any suspicion that his blood had been saved. This answers the why burn the blood samples question and think it fits the slow assimilation timeline for Mac.
You best believe I will be watching every second of this video in one sitdown.
Let's Go!
@@PolterGibbst The kids interrupted me a few times but one site down. Good Video. The Thing is just an amazing film. Fun Fact: this film was released the same day as Blade Runner.
@@Tseuq4gninaem awesome. Had the same happen to me on different days when shooting this. 😂
That makes more sense to why it flopped in the box office. Still crazy to me, but it definitely gets its love now.
Thanks by the way.
The bleakest possible ending would be Mac and Childs killing each other and neither was The Thing.
The biggest sin Clark committed in the movie is a simple one, but if he's the "dog guy" he shoulda known better - don't put a single new dog in a cage with multiple other dogs that are already established. There was no way it would've ended well, just in this case it didn't end well for ANYONE. But yeah, high chance IRL that the new dog would've been confronted by the other dogs and biting would occur. Too confined of a space, no safety from a stranger and can't sleep because of it? Yeah, it'd not be the dog's fault if it came down to them attacking each other due to escalation. Should've tethered the new dog outside of the cage so it could at least meet the other dogs with something between them. Ah well, minor detail to the film overall. I need to rewatch this. Wonder if it's on Netflix?
Wait a goddamn minute
Are you telling me Americans social security numbers have been hacked ive been trying to get 500 000 social security numbers so i can sway the American ballot for people voting from other countries for the DEMOCRATS SO THEY CAN FALSELY win this next election for kamala
Are you telling me its already been done GODDAMNIT
I can BS some reasons for it to work. Some weird and crazy shit is going down at the camp, maybe Clark isn't remembering all the proper dog keeping procedures and junk.
Also he only puts it in the cage once other people get on his ass about it. Before that he was letting it chill in the camp, maybe because he didn't know what else to do with some other random dog not from his brood. He may have just been like "Look it's in the cage now see shut the hell up" move and not something he thought through.
This discussion makes me think about the space the dogs had, it seemed pretty shitty. Are they kept in cages like that in real life? Sparse, confined, and not much stuff to keep them occupied. I guess research bases in the Antarctic may not give a shit if their sled dogs are 100% happy with their living spaces.
@@jamesdulak3108 Then again, it's antarctica. Not much other a place for the dogs to be. They're sled dogs, this is how sled dogs are usually treated.
I noticed this upon a rewatch. It's small, it might just be a trick of the camera, but during the dog scene, in the kennel, as the thing is transforming with these little red vine whips coming out of it, when macready slams the door shut on one of the tentacles, for a moment, it looks like a piece of the Thing broke off, like a lizards tail defence mechanism and it sort of swivels and dissapears out of view RAPIDLY.
Like I say, maybe it's nothing, maybe it's a hidden detail that gives us an *extra* hidden Thing that infected someone off screen. The game shows us that The Thing can produce minions to some degree when they become large enough.
maybe it was just a piece of the puppet that broke off
The idea of them both being the thing oddly makes the most sense
The way both are suspicious but both just give up like its both of their goals to survive. Maybe its because they genuinely cant tell if the other is the thing at that point. They are both perfect copies. It goes wll the way back to the question. If you were a perfect imatation how would someone know? They wouldn't. Even if they were a perfect imitation themselves. Infact maybe at the end the reason he gives the bottle is a way to confirm it. Because why would he take the bottle if hes suspicious? And why would the blair thing be so reckless? With hiw smart it is. And especially how perfect the thing would be. It makes sense to think hed realize they are both things.
I've always interpreted the Thing as not directly intelligent, but with highly tuned instincts.
By extension I believe that while infected, you wouldn't know that you're the Thing while it's actively mimicking you. All of it's thinking would be on the subconscious/unconscious level. You'd just feel fight or flight level unease in situation where you could be revealed, be subtly influenced to carry out it's will, and be unable to remember when it assimilates others.
It has a space ship...that indicates a high level of intelligence.
Space ship wasn't the thing. It just infected and killed the crew.
@@AlvorRealthen why does it keep trying to make a space ship when it pops up elsewhere?
@@Vindictator1972the thing most likely if i had to guess either is making what it "remembers" the ship looked like or it when assimilating a host/living thing. It gains that creature or things intelligence/knowledge. Hence it basically ate recently enough due to freezing to not forget and retain this knowledge or it consumed enough human matter to elivate its thinking power over time.
The Thing > "Smart like an Octopus" 🤣
I thought the rope with Blair was a fun touch to the idea that, he was infected and wanted to prevent the spread in the best way he thought of, but the Thing assimilated him completely before he could. It was always an interesting thought of "How long until you are no longer you" with this movie and it's something that never leaves my mind to this day.
A being that can take 100% of you over while leaving you in control just to hide is very unnerving.
i think a good way to understand just how smart The Thing is, is to realize that it perfectly imitates creatures and gains their memories, and with that being the case, it would have absorbed the mind and intelligence of countless species acrosd the entire universe.
i dont think it would be a stretch to say that The Thing would likely be the most intelligent life form humanity or even the rest of the universe had ever seen
It can literally mix and match intelligences at will. It wasn't "Blair" building the ship, but Blair's human shell with a far superior alien intelligence guiding it. Whenever the Thing needs to encounter Mac in the shed, it just switches back to human Blair's brain.
@@21stcenturyhiphop i dotnj think any"thing" (badumtss),even alien, is capable of storing that amount of information in its memory...yeah i'm aware the wonders of DNA but that is a little too much to me... to not mention, a theorical question, couldnt the thign after so much assimilation of several inteligent and emotional beings along the eons start to feel bad for it? well... maybe the inteligent part of the assimilations are some "recent" thinghy...
Check out Peter Watts' "The Things"
It has a fantastic take on this concept, best Thing 'fanfic' ever kek
@@exodus9001I'm saying this because I care for you, as someone who used to dwell in cultures and circles that would say "kek" you should probably just stop being around those influences
I disagree, it's inherently spaceship building intelligent, the mimicking is simply a survival tactic. The thing is closer to an Einstein Xenomorph than a multitude of intelligence merged into one soup. This would be a very different movie if that was the case.
so mac either turns into the thing after the explosion or he is not the thing, if he was the thing earlier he would have assimilated everyone at the blood sample scene, windows was being eaten and the rest were stuck to a couch lol, and after that scene he was with everyone for the rest of the movie
If Mac was a thing during the blood test scene, there was no need to assimilate right there. There is another thing in the same room that could do that, but staying low is much less risky.
Yes Mac was in control in that scene, but there are too many people, so breaking out for assimilation might cause them to fight back or run, and he can't make sure he gets everyone.
@ they were tied to a chair….three tendrils stab them once and boom you are infected. They literally couldn’t run away, they were yelling for Mac to get back in there and kill windows while he is turning.
@@lordhippoguy5658In the movie this goes against the things way of thinking, there's a scene where Mac says that he knows he's human and that at least one other person must be human. He says that because the thing, even if it is in a situation like that will not voluntary reveal itself. Doing so is against its base instinct. It physically cannot even think about making that choice
@ it won’t if It doesn’t have the advantage, but if they cannot fight back and are tied to the chairs then it wins, no more hiding, no more lying, they couldn’t escape or fight back, hence why they were yelling for mac to get back in the room and burn windows, they couldn’t pick up the flamethrower right in front of them
@@lordhippoguy5658 Again your looking at it from a human perspective. Yes it's most logical but again the thing is physically incapable of revealing itself if it's not alone or revealed by another person
Paulmer is the first to get infected . A big plot hole , I found was that he shares a big cone with Child's. Nobody ever brings this up . Sharing a bottle of liquor is common for everyone to notice and does happen a few times. But I caught the scene where they are watching TV and then light up and share a joint together ? Last I checked, that would be a perfect way to pull it off and go under the radar unless you're payinf attention. Makes the most sense on who's who at the end and because Childs disappeared , so that would give some explanation. I noticed nobody ever brings it up.
Hhhhmmmmmmmm interesting
@@donlowery1275 suddenly the film is littered with transfer via oral cues.
Carpenter is really smart. He knew he was filling the movie with these assimilation points
MYSTERY FLASHLIGHT IS THE KEY TO ALL THIS
Mac is not "The Thing" because at every chance it got, the Thing was trying to kill Mac, instead of assimilate.
Or maybe it's because the 2 things were fighting each other over whoes the superior thing. The Mac thing was the winner.
@@sharicamonet9675. Pure nonsense doesn't prove a thing.
@@anthonytuccillo6274. Palmer pointing out norris's head shows that they can and will turn on each other to gain trust.
@@JohnnyDay-hr1fj exactly!
@@JohnnyDay-hr1fj That's assuming that Palmer was a thing at that moment. I can't recall off the top of my head how soon after that that the blood test happens.
Without a doubt the best breakdown of this film and its hotly debated ending. I'm convinced and now want them both to be the thing purely for how well it ties all the information you're given through the film. Excellent job
"HAHA FINALLY!!"
*Fish from spongebob voice*
🤣
CHOCOLATE!!!!!!!
@@Steel-toad-Jack 🔥🤣🤣🤣🤣
Not exploding GIR from Invader Zim?
@@PolterGibbst
continue the videos I enjoy
insight to things .
others to explore .
Halloween Kills .
Resident Evil .
Silent Hill .
Jason X .
Poltergeist .
Lost Boys .
The Shining .
Langoliers .
👍👍
I don't think the ones that were infected actually knew that they were infected, MacReady included. I think The Thing is more like a Jekyll and Hyde monster in that it lays just underneath until it sees opportune moments to strike. The creature doesn't need to worry about properly mimicing human interactions if they're actually genuine right? I think it keeps engineering situations where these survivors feel that the only option to stop it is to light everything on fire, which would just attract more attention to its location, which would allow it to propagate further. It's kind of like how cordyceps will cause an ant to change its behavior, making itself an easier target for its "thing's" actual prey, birds, since birds spread cordyceps through their droppings after eating these infected ants.
I wonder if the thing is truly a malevolent entity, or if it feels that it needs to do this. Clearly time and the elements aren't a threat to it, so (if not for survival) why is it "hunting" humans? We know it's intelligent, so is the end goal to gain more intelligence by assimilating various organic life? Or is there some other reason it feels this imperative to assimilate others?
Ok, if Mac was the thing, why would it have a bottle of JB... It doesnt know Childs is alive... It doesnt need or want to drink.
...it's a perfect assimilation of McCready, so it still likes JB....
@@ZenPyramid If it's perfect then it IS McCreedy and not a thing, if it's a thing then it aint gonna be bothered about a drink it would fu%$ off and lie in the snow.
@@andymouse Exactly!
It could be the thing because he breaks his own protocol of testing everybody. They both could be the thing because it's established that all it wants to do is hibernate in the snow. During the blood test scene Windows is shown using a scalpel to draw blood. Instead of disinfecting the scalpel he merely wipes it off on his pants. So after that scene anyone could potentially be infected.
@andymouse you assume that the thing cant assimilate memory which the movie shows it does. Mac liked JB therefore thing Mac would also like JB.
No I'm not wrong about the ending.
You're wrong about the ending.
So there.
😂 you got me
Your videos are good because of your passion and patience to make them. Can’t hide that these are made with a lot of time and love.i understand how all the research takes you so much time to get them out. Just keep doing what you love! They are smart, funny and fun.
A two hour discussion video covering one of my favorite horror films?
I am HERE FOR IT
42 years & we're still no closer....
42 YEARS!!!!!!
42 years and over 2 hours of a click bait video that leaves us with the summation that "The truth is, all of them (scenarios) are correct, and they can all be argued." He could have said that in the beginning, and saved me a lot of time.
@@Nickyeyes 😂😂😂😂
@@NickyeyesI thought he was a bullshitter
Something that people miss is that Palmer is the backup pilot. Blair's actions prevent the helicopter from being used to escape, but the Thing was otherwise immediately forming a plan to escape and populate.
My thing is why did the supposed Thing Childs come back to Mac if it knew the risk it could be burnt and killed. Wouldn’t it just continue to leave and stay out of sight to ensure total survival?
Also it could’ve taken Mac by surprise just to make sure. But tbh I don’t care. I personally prefer the ending that both aren’t infected and are just going to freeze to death while being paranoid
Fun fact: The Novelization of the Thing starts off with one of the coolest sentences ever. "I AM BEING CHILDS NOW." immediately gets you excited and thrust you right into the story from the POV of the thing, and it's amazing.
Isn't that Peter Watts' "The Things"?
Personally I take it as canon cause it's so extremely dope but I'm not sure if most people do.
That wasn't the novelization.
That's fanfic, not a novelization of the movie. Still, it's a very good fanfic that any The Thing fans need to read.
@@exodus9001 ...completely agree, i regard it as canon as well...