Guys, guys, guys. Alot of the things brought up, I answered in my response video. Before commenting, go watch that video. I will most likely discuss your points in that video. Thank you for your time! Update: RESPONSE VIDEO IS OUT I will be doing a response video to most of these comments, so thats why I'm not replying to all of them! Im happy to see all this passion for this classic horror movie! Love the rubtles and theories i havent considered!
there's a very little known tele-film called A Cold Night's Death (1973) that I believe may have possibly inspired the atmosphere of The Thing (1982) I'm well aware that this is a very bold statement but there are shots and elements of the film that look almost identical, it's a pretty impeccable film that's far too underrated, I'd recommend checking it out.
Wouldn't the alcohol kill single cells? Not many life forms survive long in anything over 40% alcohol. That's the one logical caveat I have, other than it would change it's Lovecraftian elements too much. Scholarly, it would be applying the late 2000s-early 2010s the hero is the villain trope to the story, but I am not going to argue that here. Otherwise, this theory is a good reinterpretation of what could have happened in the film.
@@AbrasiousProductions Yeah, but that film was probably inspired by the 1957 version of The Thing (From Outer Space). There are shots in the middle of that film that were recreated in this film.
@@americanandpinay I'm aware that The Thing (1982) is inspired by the 1951 version as well as the novel but what I'm proposing is that A Cold Night's Death (1973) inspired the film's atmosphere and some of it's cinematography
What I love about the ambiguous ending is everyone gets to take whatever ending they want and no one can take that away. I like to think Mac was The Thing.
Probably top 3 horrors of all time. Alien is there too, purely for inventing suspense horror. The other is open to opinion but for me it's Halloween. Top 3, nailed on.
@@davidstanton4716 I'm sorry do you actually think alien invented "suspense horror"? I would Google Alfred Hitchcock if I were you or if you don't like something that young maybe Google Fritz Lang's M or Google the movie Nosferatu it's a silent film. Believe It or not they've been making movies for over 100 years. I do like your top three horror films list though
It makes you think. And the theories are fascinating. Remember, the thing can take on any shape which means inherently it has no shape. It’s molecular. It “infects” others, but it is not really turning into the being it assimilates. That means every person infected is actually dead. The reason it turns into amorphous globs of horror is because it cannot hold the correct molecular structure of Earth organisms very long. Could have something to do with air, or the oxygen content of air. Antarctica oxygen level is not very high. So maybe if it got to a civilized area where there are more organisms, it could survive much longer.
@@taoist32 right, it doesn’t turn into the person, the person is turned into it. However, this animal does not have an issue with the cold and it appears to simply go to sleep if there is no prey available. It isn’t weak and it isn’t suffering from any disease. It also doesn’t quickly lose the ability to mimic earth creatures, it stays in disguise for as long as it wants to. When attacked, the bodies take damage and are disfigured, but this is not a detriment to the organism. The various body parts can simple separate and attack. In fact this organism is ridiculously over powered. All it had to do was divide itself into a bunch small animals and quickly attack the entire team. They would have no defense.
Interesting theory, but you have to exclude one major detail in order for it to work: at no point in the film does a confirmed Thing physically attack another confirmed Thing. At all. Not a single one partakes in destroying another one. Not even when Palmer noticed the Norris-head Thing. MacReady was the one that killed it, and he killed all of the others. The Thing's driving desire is to spread its influence, especially once it's been discovered. Palmer literally infected Windows because he was discovered. Also, at the beginning when the dog licked Bennings's glove that saliva would have frozen near instantly before MacReady handed him the bottle. That's also assuming that MacReady had only one bottle of Scotch there, which wouldn't really make any sense given the length of time they'd be stationed out there. And as one final hitch in the theory: why would MacReady destroy the spaceship that Blair built? Why destroy Blair-Thing at the end after everyone else had been killed? Why not infect Nauls when they were both alone in Mac's cabin? No, Mac wasn't a Thing.
Was basically coming to say this. It's definitely an interesting theory but MacReady killing other Things doesn't make sense, especially when there's no one else around.
For me, it's because the blair thing planned to either escape earth in its ship or fly to a populated area. That would have likely been picked up on radar and raise alarm. Macready thing's whole strategy is stealth, blend in. So it's really a conflict of the strategies. An argument in the things mind played out via experimentation of its parts.
Your other points make sense. But the frozen saliva debunk doesn't hold up. Because the original split head body was frozen for a while and still was able to assimilate once it warmed up inside.
I always liked the idea that neither Macready or Childs were the thing, because it feeds into the whole theme of paranoia running through the movie. Macready and Childs seemed to butt heads in almost every scene they were in together, even before the dog scene. It seems fitting for the movie that they are both human, but they trust each other so little (and each has attempted to kill the other at least once: Childs by attempting to kill Macready when he busted into the camp, Macready pointing a gun at Childs because he refused to obey him) so these two dudes that almost killed each other are stuck dying together, it's a fitting and solid end I think.
Nah, Mac was the only one that could leave at will and made it. If he wanted to infect everybody he could have easily. Of them all, he is the only one that couldn't be the thing at any given time.
WRONG. Go watch the special features on Big Trouble in Little China. John Carpenter and Kurt Russell talk about the Thing and the ending. According to Carpenter himself, neither Mcreedy and Childs are the thing. Sorry to burst your bubble
@@Ryan-wr8fxHe's been out there a while. Meaning his internal body temperature is closer to that of the outside than McCready's, whose breath lingers far longer and is still in the shot. So when Childs breathes out, it mixes and isn't readly visible. This can be easily tested by being outside this winter and comparing your own breath from when you just walk out, to that of being out for 20 minutes, and further still to being outdoors in the cold for an hour.
@Humongous420 That special feature was released well after all the debate and speculation of "who really is the Thing". This along with Carpenter's back-and-forth over the years makes him an unreliable narrator to his own work. Deliberately so. This was likely the answer given so people would stop bugging the man so he could get back to work.
Among the many problems with this theory, I think here's the biggest: The entire plot of the film makes no logical sense if MacReady is the Thing from the beginning. As evidenced by Blair's scheme at the end, the Thing (which seems to exhibit some sort of collective consciousness or at least shared memories and motives between its constituents) wants to escape the Antartic base. If MacReady, the base's chopper pilot, is assimilated long before the rest of the base is alerted to the Thing's presence, he has no reason to not just fly off. He certainly also has no reason to investigate the Norwegian base, or to be the most active character in hunting down the creature. My impression is that this is a classic case of confirmation bias; you've decided you "know" the truth and try to force all the contradictory evidence to conform with it. This is how you can take a scene as unambiguous as MacReady's "fuck you" and spin it into a cartoon conversation between him and the screeching monstrosity that just tried to kill him. EDIT: I've also just realised you misunderstood the "cheeky bitch" scene completely. MacReady's BAD at chess, he has to beat the computer by bluntly destroying it. I think the scene is to establish his character and the tension on site even before the monster, but if it foreshadows anything it's the destruction of the base to stop the Thing.
Ok, let's break this down... Unless you flipped some of the footage or didn't show the right clips, the Thing licked Bennings' left glove, and Bennings grabbed the bottle with his right hand. Even if the same glove got licked, Bennings does not touch the mouth of the bottle, but the neck, making it more difficult for someone to hypothectically come in contact with any saliva that might've been placed on the bottle. Given the flaw above, the key being picked up by MacReady is purely a hypothesis based on nothing more than the character's presence. Watching the movie from the beginning with the assumption that MacReady is the Thing, and then using any and all circumstantial evidence to prove that preconceived notion is literally confirmation bias. That said, the Smirnoff WOULD be strong evidence, if everything else said leading up to this wasn't without merit. The footage shown of the dog licking the glove opposite to the one grabbing the J&B, and the flawed assumption based on a misinterpretation of that footage, acts counter to your thesis. I'd say burning one's self to prevent them from being turned into the Thing and then turning others is as smart as Blair destroying all modes of communication and transportation to prevent the Thing from spreading. If Fuches was put into a no-win situation, I'm sure his analytical mind would rather he sacrifice himself to give the others a chance to not be turned. You make a lot of assumptions about the light in the shack, which is why you shouldn't go into the movie with assumptions and try to prove those assumptions right. Your own assumptions are forcing you to disregard MacReady saying he turned the light off. You also are willing to accept that things happen offscreen to go against was we see onscreen in the blood test scene, but automatically believe that the ripped clothes truly belonged to the avid chess player who still maintains his strategic mind even after being assimilated. There's also the possibility of MacReady maybe following Knowles' footsteps in the snow to make his way back, or any other method that also happens offscreen. Like, sure, things can happen offscreen, but in order for the movie to make sense, we need to keep our assumptions of what happens offscreen consistent with the rest of the movie. It is far more likely to assume that MacReady cut himself in front of the rest of the group for the blood test, than to assume that everyone else just buys the already suspicious MacReady totally used his own blood in that scene. Also, if "Thing MacReady" made contact with the blood from earlier, he would have assimilated that blood, which could not have been the case given what we see in the blood test scene. He would have had to use a vial or other container, which would be difficult to get everyone else who DID actually cut themselves to trust. "Why didn't Blair-Thing attack MacReady?" Because MacReady is the point-of-view character for the audience. Similar to why the xenomorph didn't kill Ripley in Alien, if Blair-Thing took MacReady, MacReady wouldn't be the main character. And assuming MacReady saying "yeah, fuck you, too!" wasn't a one-liner is again showing your confirmation bias. Why would the Things attack each other? That doesn't make as much sense as MacReady still being human. MacReady surviving a fiery explosion is actually stronger evidence of him not being the Thing, give that a heated up wire can cause such an adverse reaction to the Thing. With the J&B at the end, I refer you again to the footage we actually see in this video. We do not see Bennings grab the bottle with the same glove that was licked, therefore, we cannot assume that the bottle assimilated MacReady when you propose it did. Your entire case falls apart because the footage you show doesn't support your own conclusion. I think it's far more likely that MacReady expected a human Childs to decline drinking from the bottle out of fear of assimilation. So when "Childs" eagerly drinks, he knows Childs is the Thing trying to use the bottle to assimilate him. I commend you for being as thorough as you were, but your entire argument falls apart from the start, and only tumbles further due to confirmation bias leading you to make grander assumptions than what the film intended.
I had a similar thought when I saw the dog lick his left glove. I also feel that if fire can harm the thing, then wouldn't an alcoholic drink with a high enough alcohol content also be harmful/painful if ingested?
Honestly the biggest piece of evidence, that he wasn't a thing, is the fact that he literally had everyone else tied up and vulnerable. This was Gary, Childs, and Nauls. He literally would've had no reason to keep playing the game. It would've been a checkmate at that point.
Waited for the your blood test explanation, and your whole hypothesis falls apart there. You talked bout how we don't see MacReady collect his blood and we only see 2 collect thier blood which is Windows and Nauls, which is true. But we also don't see the blood collection of Childs, Palmer and the others but they have it seen when MacReady tests his blood and Palmer's. Not only that if MacReady was Thing at this point he has everybody tied up other then Windows, wouldn't you take advantage of this point in time and take out 1 person and infected everyone tied up. They all tried their hardest to get away from Palmer without any of them getting loose. So you would have enough time to infect everyone. Also if i were tied up I would be making a big deal if i didn't see MacReady draw blood. There are also Multiple molotov cocktails used near the end which means he had Multiple bottles you think the Bennings bottle is the only 1 in the movie they are all sharing. This video is just a lot of Narrative Bias Storytelling no logic was ever taken into consideration.
Two points you didn't cover: 1. MacReady hid audio recordings explaining what had happened so that the rescue team could find them while investigating, hopefully before the bodies were recovered and thawed. There's no reason for a Thing MacReady to do this with no other characters around to know about it. But importantly, this means a hypothetical human Mac has a backup plan in case he isn't able to kill everyone who's infected. 2. If Childs wasn't the Thing, his safest play would have been to torch MacReady because hypothetically human Childs DOESN'T have a backup plan in case the Thing freezes and is thawed by the rescue team, so rather than sitting back and letting Mac freeze (either to death as human or as a Thing), he would have torched him. This would be doubly the case if your Things fighting Things theory were true, since Thing Childs would definitely kill Thing Mac with the flamethrower. Therefore the most likely endgame is Thing Childs who believes he has already won because they will both freeze and be thawed (not knowing about Mac's backup plan) and human MacReady pretending to believe that Childs is human so that Thing Childs won't suspect that Mac has a backup plan in place.
True, tho the most likely thing is Childs waits a minute (Mac hasn't slept for 2 days and will fall asleep in a few minutes, tho it doesn't matter) attacks and assimilates mac, makes 6 dogs (he needs mac's body mass and knowledge of bases--mac is a helicopter pilot) then they run and the 6 dogs eat their way down until 1 is left (or however many) and then it starts again and they build a ship in a week (Blair built the ship in one day) and leave the planet.
@@petecoogan I think even though the thing can survive in the cold it's body can't function at a certain point, I don't think it would be able to build a ship without a place to heat up..
Really like this theory, they basically both think they won. I think mac's plan could go wrong if child assimilates him though, it seems they get the memory too while copying them so the thing could dig up the recordings. But I think there is a possibility infected child really thinks mac doesn't know so he doesn't see him as a threat and doesn't care to just have both of them freeze.
@@k0lpA it would in another camp. It makes 6 dogs and runs to the next camp. Mac knows where the camps are. Dogs run 125 miles per day in -40 degree weather.
1) It could be that thing mac did not make the audio recordings for a search team but rather for anyone else in his crew suspecting him of being the thing, if they did find one of those recordings he would be seen as trustworthy and in the clear. Another possibility for the recordings is that he did make them for a search team, but only to gain trust from them when they come there to investigate. He later decides it's too risky to leave thing bodies around since people will not want to touch them. Therefore he decides to burn down every THING and the entire base, destroying all evidence of an alien creature at all. 2) This is a little hard to explain. My best bet as to why he didn't torch Mac is that he has no reason to distrust him after he did the blood test. Plus he talks to Mac while being on guard before he sits down with him. Mac convinces him fully by saying "maybe we shouldn't make it out", at first he makes childs off guard by questioning where he was, something a normal person would do; the thing may just be like "oh hey childs" according to childs thought process. Childs being a human would not think that the thing wants to be frozen. Childs never went to the extraction site so he may just assume cold will kill it. He is also guessing if Mac is a real person or not, notice how he still does not move closer to Mac to try to assimilate, even though Mac is unarmed he keeps his distance. If there is a chance that Mac is human and childs knows this, then he may not want to torch Mac Incase one of them makes it our alive.
Actually, there is much more evidence for Childs to be the Thing; namely the coat. When Mac, Nauls and Garry leave to go after Blair and they leave Childs to man the door, you see a coat on the peg next to Childs that is identical to the one he's wearing. The next time we see that same location, the coat is gone. Also, Childs ran off into the snowstorm _before_ the generator went out, meaning that Blair-Thing had to be _inside_ the building when Childs claims he saw him outside. Occam's Razor demands we conclude that: Blair-Thing ambushed Childs after the trio left, the new Childs-Thing took that identical coat off the peg and put it on before running out into the snowstorm to find somewhere to hibernate (or maybe help ambush the survivors), while Blair-Thing sabotaged the generator. If MacReady really had been the Thing, why would he leave such an obvious clue as the long johns? Isn't it more likely that Palmer-Thing snuck out and planted the long johns to sow distrust of MacReady, the only human who's shown a calm head and rational thinking to counter its moves? And if Mac and Blair both were Things, why go at each other to the death when they could just team up against Childs? We never saw Norris-Thing or Palmer-Thing sabotaging each other. Also, having the movie's theme song play over the final scene isn't the slamdunk you think it is. It's a simple movie-making technique.
The coat is a distraction. Fools the common viewer. The MacReady Thing checks out after reviewing the sequel. Sequel? You might ask. There is a video game.
My theory about this is that neither Childs nor McCreedy are the thing because they both drink the alcohol. It's established in the movie that the thing will avoid pain at all costs. As you demonstrated in the video whiskey is a very uncomfortable thing to drink; and the fact they could drink it without freaking out means they weren't assimiliated.
@@-Zer0Dark- He didn't carry a flask did he? He kept "one last drink" to go out in style, but saw his escape at the last moment, and took the drink with him.
I think this is compelling all the way up to the blood test scene. And Not because that couldn't be Macready's blood, but because he had already won at that point. He had everyone tied up with a flamethrower on them. . . So why wouldn't he just blast them? Why would he go through the whole charade just to blow everything up anyway at the end, right in the next scene??
This correctly defeats the entire video! The fact of the matter is the film was never designed to be "figured out". The film is an allegory about paranoia no fan Theory will ever truly explain the movie because all fan theories try to prove a particular character either was or was not the thing and that answer is not knowable
@@joshsmith9572 only problem with your theory is if he’s indisputably the Thing because of the dog spit, how does he fly the helicopter twice after that? Once to the Norwegian camp and once to the spacecraft crash site..
Why if the thing wanted to return to its ship? Also one of the things was trying to build one in a shed. They don't know how to fly helicopters. Can you fly one just off rip?
I like the theory. I think the same argument could be made for the final scene where Mac is testing Childs by offering the drink. When Childs accepts the bottle, Mac knows he's a Thing and chuckles nihilistically because he knows that humanity is fucked.
Surely you can't just ignore the fact that Bennings takes a swig straight after being handed the whiskey, therefore would be infected first, except he wasn't infected.
DAMN CHILD! That is some 360 noscope right there... I tend to cling to Childs being da thang, as he not only lacks breath, but lacks the gleam in the eye, and the Benny doesnt breathe in the scene debunked here, he is yelling... The thing may not need to breathe via lungs, but if it uses the functions of the body, like making sound with mouth, it must rely on basics of the body... It cant make oral noise without relying on an inhalation to be able to yell out... You know, an empty balloon doesnt fart all over the place, you have to blow it up and let it go for it to make the funny noise and flutter about... Same with humans/thing-ed-humans... Tho, the rest of the theory does hold some water... The bottle may be aringarosa, but it aint 100% leaky, other than at mouth of the bottle, and the thing theme playing when childs takes a swig is quite the conundrum, it could be a red herring of its own, but it could also confirm that McThing is in fact the thing.. Cheers m8!
The biggest problem with the theory that is the entire base of thinking MacReady is the thing is that if you look at how Bennings grips the bottle, he essentially covers the entire top part of the bottle including a good chunk of the tip where you drink out of, his mouth essentially touches the infected gloves when he takes a drink. As we already know, Bennings isn't infected until later in the movie, so that theory is literally dead in the water. Also, about the blood test. Just because it happens off screen doesn't mean it doesn't happen. MacReady is surrounded by people who have their eyes LOCKED in on him, watching every little thing he does. There is no way that MacReady did not cut himself because if he didn't then there would be an outcry from the others that he didn't do it. Theres no possible way that if he was the thing that he could get away with a sleight of hand as well as the fact that I don't believe that the Thing could fill a pocket of human blood without it being infected mainly because of the fact its neither confirmed nor denied that it can do that. Which would still allow it to be argued but for me personally, I don't believe its a thing it can do.
Interesting points. I will look more into the bennings point. And while people had eyes on him, he was the one in control of the situation. And the uncontaminated blood was tampered with, proving that someone in the group new of a form of this test. So MacReady would have had a motive to keep some for insurance. And he would have been the only one able to 'sleight of hand' human blood into the dish being as I stated, he was in control. Maybe he already had a dish put away. He's a chess player, blood was removed, he figured out how to infect people without ever getting caught, he came up with the test himself may I add. Also very quickly. While there is no on screen proof, I believe there is enough evidence of him tampering with the plan he created. And given the scenes and evidence I put forward, the simplest answer tends to be the right one. But it is just a theory
@@2DimmMedia Well, Doc was the one who came up with the first idea of a form of blood test which is why it lead to the uncontaminated blood being tampered with. MacReady only came up with his version of the blood test after seeing how the Thing acted like a separate being trying to survive when different parts were threatened. Despite being in control during the blood test, I honestly don't think if MacReady was infected he would have been able to do anything sneaky. Every single person that isn't Palmer, were not infected. When theres that many uninfected people who have their eyes locked in on you, watching every single thing you do, even the slighest movement, theres no way he'd get away with it. He could be in as much control as he wants but he can't stop peoples eyes from seeing what he doesn't want them to see.
@@2DimmMedia "I believe there is enough evidence" is not evidence. Why would a Thing suggest a test, carry it out, and expose a fellow Thing in the process; and tell Windows to torch it before torching and blowing it up. Sorry, chess strategy does not explain every action taken contrary to what a Thing would do.
@@2DimmMedia All of that is irrelevant. You are saying Macready was the Thing at the time of the blood test, then don't you think once everyone is tied up the thing could just kill everybody? I mean they are all tied up right? Then McCready could send out a distress signal and get a rescue team to take him to civilization. There would be no need to burn the place down and then freeze he could simply wait in luxury for a rescue team. Your entire video while entertaining has been debunked.
well it does, they trust macready now, the thing feels no pity over its own parts (other things) cause its all the same and there is more of it, to suggests it wouldnt blow the coverof or wouldnt kill other thing parts is kinda weird, it totally would cause it has an endgoal@@castlew4162
MacReady is not the thing. My evidence is that I like MacReady therefore he cannot be the thing. I'm sure everyone can agree on this as my case is quite solid.
Carpenter said the eye gleaming was only used for the blood test scene. Also, my favorite part of the movie is when the Thing says "It's Thingy time" and starts thinging all over the place
Ok, in regards to your proof that McReady got infected by the whiskey bottle after Bennings glove was licked, the dog licked his LEFT hand not his right hand which is the hand that is grasping the whiskey bottle after McReady leaves it with Bennings.
Actually I can prove MacReady wasn't the thing, and it's not even hard to do. MacReady is played by Kurt Russel, Kurt Russel, is the man, and is resistant to Thingery, so there ya go, he can't be Thingy'd. He escaped L.A. and New York, He escaped Alaska too.
I’m not going to say you’re right or wrong. I don’t know one way or the other. The point of the movie, and one reason why I love it, is the vagueness at the end. However you raise very interesting points and I love the effort you put into this. You make me want to go back and re-watch yet again this phenomenal movie. It’s people like you doing things with movies like this that really makes me appreciate how well cinematography was done back in the day. I highly doubt we’ll be talking about The Marvels 40 years from now.
Well thought out. I do have one significant plot hole though. Why would McReady actually perform the blood test if he was the thing? He has everyone hostage and tied up (except for windows) so why bother doing the test? If he was the thing, he would have picked Palmer to be "untied" while everyone else is captive. Then at that point, infection time. Blair is already infected at this point and the only one not in the room. The Thing is not aggressive to its own kind, so why setup a scenario to 'out' Palmer? Why even after that bother to follow through with the testing after torching Windows and Palmer? Even if cellular infection was the original plan, the Thing still goes out of its way to directly infect people even when its a risk. Its not like Windows was disinfecting the blade he used on everyone. If it was Palmer, he could have left a few cells when he cut each and every person, and not even have to perform any 'tests'.
Because it’s the perfect subterfuge to have the humans believe he is also human. Did you see how “his blood” was drawn? It’s the “weak point” of the argument, but if he was the thing he was the blood saboteur and he could have set it up. So it hold up to speculation but we need to see the unseen scene to prove or disprove.
The Childs/Macready discussion is pointless, they're both human. During the entire movie the Thing acts the same: it wastes no time in attacking someone as soon as they are alone. Keeping that in mind, for what reason would it decide to stop and have a casual conversation with a human at the end of the movie?
how is it pointless if you're wrong? lol. the scene is deliberately left open but if you use your noggin real hard you can see how macready was administering a test using the scotch, not unlike the opening scene when he gives the scotch to the "cheating bitch" computer.
@@dontcare3 How I'm wrong? I'm just pointing out what has been clearly established in the movie, instead of making stuff up. Childs has no reason to pretend to be human, according to the Thing's behavior throughout the movie and MacReady is obviously not the Thing. Both are human.
The thing needs time to assimilate. Thats why childs asks if he was the only one that made it. But when macreedy doesnt answer the question it desides to bide its time, because if someone stumbled on him while asimilataing it would be check mate.
I really like the thought you've put into it. That fact that one can find details that can support you theory speaks to how much thought Carpenter put into the film, and why it's so good. However, I don't think MacReady is The Thing for one reason: Him trying to kill the Thing monster at the end serves no purpose. If MacReady is the Thing, and he believes the rest of the group is dead, he can simply walk away and let the monster freeze. Thereby ensuring an even greater chance of it spreading once a rescue party shows up. If he thinks Childs is still alive, then leaving the monster alive improves the chances of Childs stumbling across the monster and being assimilated. MacReady could simply have walked way, if he were the thing, and still run into Childs and give him the bottle. MacReady killing the monster is a useless act with no benefit if MacReady is the thing. By burning it, he is lessening the chances of survival for the thing. not improving it. At that point, there's no point to play the chess game anymore. That said, MacCready MAY have been infected in the film, but it hadn't yet affected and consumed him by the end of the film. His actions against the monster tell me that he's still the human MacCready desperately trying the destroy the thing. I've always though the gasoline bottle theory was dumb, as you see MacReady lift the bottle up to drink when Childs approaches. I believe that MacReady smiles when Childs drinks is because Childs should know not to share the bottle. MacReady thinks Childs doesn't care about assimilation because he's already the thing.
Finally a bottle theory I agree with. I think everyone who says there’s gas in the bottle are clearly overthinking it as much as this guy in the video. It’s pretty clear to me Child’s should have known not to share a drink. To think The Thing wouldn’t notice or care it’s drinking gasoline is just asinine, if the organism can copy human speech and access memories then it wouldn’t be brain dead enough to not notice drinking gas
@@burn1none Childs IS the thing at the end. Not because of any stupid bottle theory but because he disappears for the last part of the movie and when he comes back he's wearing a gray/white jacket instead of the blue one he had the entire movie.
***3 SOLID REASONS WHY CHILDS IS THE THING:*** #1 - Childs Jacket Swap When McReady, Garry and Nauls go to give the Doc the blood test out in the shack, they leave Childs (wearing a Blue jacket) alone to guard the door. There are 3 jackets on hooks on the wall behind Childs with the colours of the jackets being Blue, Green and Beige. When the Thing kills you, it rips your clothes apart and when you see the same room several minutes later, the jacket colours have been changed to Beige, Green and Green. Note there are also other jackets hanging on the left and right of the room, thus allowing the Thing to make the swap and unknowingly return 2 ‘out of sync' colour jackets to the same wall. Childs is shown wearing a Green jacket in the final 2-minutes of the film with McReady, not his original Blue jacket when he was last seen guarding the door, hence Childs is the Thing. #2 - Childs Breathing The last 2-minutes of dialogue out in the freezing cold between McReady and Childs clearly shows the steam McReady makes as a human when he breathes. But Childs makes no steam at all when he breathes because he is non-human and either has the same temperature inside his body as outside, or is mimicking breathing, hence Childs is the Thing. NOTE: Some people point to the fact that Bennings had steam from his breath before the fuel drum was kicked on him prior to McReady throwing a flare on him to kill the Bennings Thing earlier in the film, but the Thing hadn’t fully taken over Bennings by that point (remember his hand was massive and still in the process of transforming) which means Bennings was STILL part-human (with possible normal breathing at the time) which could explain this. #3 - Childs First Drink When sitting down in the snow at the very end of the film, McReady hears a faint creek of wood behind him and half raises a bottle to his mouth. The 'drink' McReady passes to Childs is a Molotov cocktail (many Molotov’s were just thrown to set the research station on fire) and after drinking the gasoline, Childs has NO REACTION and makes NO COMMENT. A human would either not drink from the bottle because of the smell, or would spit the gasoline out immediately, but the Thing has no reference to the smell or taste of ANY fluid and as a result 'outs' itself. McReady smiles, laughs a little to himself about the Thing failing his second test (the first was the blood test) and rests his head down knowing the dire situation he finds himself in and he has been checkmated the same as the computer chess game did to him earlier on in the film, hence Childs is the Thing. Conclusion: At the end of the film McReady and the Thing are seated next to each other out in the freezing cold with McReady NOT ‘waiting to see what happens next...', but unfortunately for him, KNOWING ‘what happens next...’.
I was with you up until the Blair-Thing fight. I'm sorry, but Mac's fuck you being a literal response to the Blair-Thing's scream is absurd. Also - if both Blair and Mac are the thing in that scene, and Mac knows everyone else is out in the snowstorm, why would they not team up (or at least just not destroy each other), ESPECIALLY if - as you say - they can communicate. Any decent chess player would see that that's clearly the best move on the board at that point. Also - John Carpenter gave his blessing for The Thing video game on ps2 being a sequel to the movie, and in that game Mac shows up in a chopper to rescue the main character. So yeah - according to Carpenter, macready ≠ the thing.
@@Taz_C_W I know that. But at that point, the better move for each individual (both Mac and Blair-Thing) would have been to stick together. A single chess piece isn't as effective as two. You can pin and defend with two pieces. Like, my goal in a survival situation is my own personal survival, but I still know that my chances are astronomically improved if I work with another person.
I think that is not giving Carpenter enough credit. He would definitely do something like that just to further confuse his audience in a movie where uncertainty is the biggest factor. Does not mean I believe the theory, but Mac is not free of suspicion just because he is the main character.
I'm wondering if Carpenter knew. He might be the Thing at the end but pretty sure he wasn't up until that point. Chess has just become movie short hand for ' this protagonist is really clever'
Last night for the first time I watched 2011 Thing then immediately after I watched 1982 Thing. The amount of attention to detail from the makers of 2011 movie is amazing. The CG was so non threatening compared to the Practical effects from 1982 that sends an unnerving feeling down your back. I have a new respect for 2011 because of the well placed lore
If Mac is the Thing then the Thing plays chess poorly and makes nonsensical moves. Why would Mac need to fool anyone with the blood test? They're already restrained so why not just infect them? Why fight and kill the Blair thing after dealing with Nauls and Palmer? It serves no purpose as only Childs remains who could be lied to or just jumped pretty easily. Side Note: I'm pretty sure the computer didn't cheat. Mac accuses it of cheating and destroys it as the movie's way of revealing an important character trait. He's a sore loser and doesn't except defeat. It comes full circle when he destroys the outpost even though it's a death sentence.
@@danielgriffith8911 I understand why he destroys the outpost. I also understand that the outpost represents a metaphorical chess board. Mac flips the board over rather than allow his opponent a win. Hed rather they both lose. This is the whole point the computer game scene sets up.
When it assimilates someone it takes their intelligence as well so it would know what alcohol tasted like. It can speak English use our tools and act like the person who was taken. It definitely learns from each host.
Great assessment, bud! Laid out clear assumptions, sound logic, and walked us down the path to your conclusion with unquestionable evidence. I believe that your conclusion would have to assume that Carpenter betrayed the audience with the blood test. Your assumption appears too complex at that point and if accurate, it’s a cheap betrayal by the director - hard to believe as it’s such a pivotal scene. Regardless you’ve got me seriously considering Mac again after a decade! Great analysis and argument! The J&B and Smirnoff might just be the ‘tell’ that we all need - but the inconsistency of Mac not assimilating when he could have (all others were tied up)is either: he ain’t it; or sloppy on director (director isn’t sloppy)… or we are all missing something. Thanks for this assessment! Subbed!
It's an interesting theory, and very well put together. 2 major issues I have with the whole thing: 1: Macready is too anti-Thing to be assimilated. He leads the charge in the battle of good vs evil too often. He could be misleading the group so that they get assimilated instead, if he was truly one of them. The Things look for the survival of themselves primarily as 2Dimm suggested, but they will help each other assimilate as long as possible before they have to burn the bridges. 2: His blood test theory doesn't hold water. It is true that many important events happen off camera, but MacReady's blood not being drawn on camera is just to prevent redundancy. I wouldn't trust Mac if my blood was drawn in the room, while he got to draw it personally on his own. I don't buy it. I also don't think anyone got infected from the dog licking Benning's glove. I think once the saliva dries it loses any contamination it had, kind of like rabies or other diseases. I do think the whole gasoline theory that a lot of people have is kinda crap, a perfect replica would be able to tell the difference between gasoline and alcohol, that and some other theories like the eye gleam I'm glad he put to rest. Personally, I'm pretty optimistic about the ending, I think the two of them are human. Buuut if one of them is, my money is on Childs. Great video though!
The best part of these sorts of arguments is that Carpenter succeeded in creating the paranoia in his audience that the characters experienced. There's probably no right or wrong answer to who is the thing at any point. It's brilliant and we're never really going to know for certain. I've come to the opinion that all the dramatic and violent infections are misdirection on the part of the Thing. I agree that just one cell that gets past your immune system and skin can infect you. It is entirely likely that you may be it without being conscious of it since the Thing itself may not be a sentient species. It's very reasonable that Macready is infected early and all this chasing down of chimeric monsters is a distraction to keep the uninfected from destroying everything. I'll probably change my mind again in a year or two so kudos to the master story teller Carpenter for keeping us talking about his movie four decades later.
You also forgot the whole cut scene where MacReady said "It's Thinging time!" which they took out because he didn't go on to Thing all over the place until after the movie ended.
Interesting theory however when Macready has everyone tied up there is no reason for gaining trust or trying to manipulate them. He has everyone tied up with the business end of his flamethrower pointed at them, he could've just killed and or infected all of them right then and there, u don't need to gain trust of people u have at ur mercy!
@VortechBand killing and even more so infecting is literally what the thing does! Think about it bro it's ligit purpose is to take over the human race, again if he has everyone tied up there's no reason for manipulation or gaining trust, there's no one left to fool, the mission at hand is accomplished, it wants to take over the whole camp, Macready was not the thing my guy
It's why the movie is so good every theory leads to another conjecture, for instance if mac was the thing ,which btw I do believe he was and he himself didn't know it, why would he expose palmer, but than does one thing know another is the thing
The problem is you have to assume that at least one of the humans are paying attention when macready cuts his hand for the blood test. Otherwise someone will call it out. Childs wouldnt of accepted that. If they can make fake make blood why didnt palmer do it to? They would of found zero things... because the test would be useless. The fact that macready blows up the final thing means there is no way he is a thing. The things only come into conflict with each other when there are organisms to imitate and trick. There are other issues with your explanations but these 3 things cannot be ignored.
I don't think McCready is the Thing either, but..... The seeds of doubt have been planted. I thought it was a stupid idea until the scene in which McCready leaves Blair's hut and the camera focuses on the vodka. This could just have been done as a cool shot. It could also have been JC telling us who the Thing was. As to the blood test, maybe that Thing was sacrificing itself as part of some plan to take suspicion away from McCready.. However, the thing which makes me still think McCready is human is the battle at the end. By the time he confronts the big one everyone else is gone, there would be no reason to continue with the deception. It's a great theory though, and I have doubts now.
"MacReady is the thing from the beginning" is mutually incompatible with "We know that Copper and Garry are human because of the blood test," given that Mac also passes the same test. (Not for nothing, but it was awfully stupid of them to use the same scalpel for all of them, huh?)
Everytime I've heard the writers and crew get questioned about these theories, their response is always the same. "I don't know. We didn't even know when we were making it." So the true answer, is there is no answer.
It's called a sequel. It was a video game. Confirms Mac was the thing the whole time. His blood didn't wig out because he has carrier status and non of the things transformation abilities.
@@aaronpop0083 What? If I'm remembering correctly.... there is no mention of MacReady in the game aside from the beginning stuff with the tape and then he shows up at the end... nothing confirmed he was a Thing.
@@Evilshtt353 if you remember the plot of the game, they were trying to keep the transformation effects without the consciousness being lost too. Only reason they could do that was because Mac has carrier status. The game takes place 3 months later. Child's body is burnt to the bone. Mac only survived the cold because he's infected. Believe it or not they used to tell stories without having to spoon feed you all the information.
@@Evilshtt353 there's plenty of information but if your that dense you need them to spell it out for you then maybe the thing isn't the type of movie you should consider yourself a fan of.
Is incredible how this movie keep us talking even decades after it release. Personally i find these theories every interesting but even more the final atmosphere where there is no more thing threat but feels kinda the same, the menace never rest so you can not trust anyone.
Major holes in your logic: 1. MacReady made a recording to document what really happened there. An infected MacReady would not have done so as it would want it's existence a secret, not known. 2. An infected MacReady would have contaminated the knife everyone used to cut themselves with for the blood test. The blood would have passed the test, meanwhile the now infected hosts would begin to change but without suspicion because they just passed the blood test. The rest of the movie from then on would be pointless, as he would have already won by simultaneously infecting everyone unknowingly. 3. Following your assertion that it can transmit via saliva, then MacReady would have simply LICKED the silverware, bowls, cups, coffee pot ect in the kitchen and simply waited for everyone to eat breakfast/lunch/dinner. The movie would have been over 100x faster than it played out. Hell, spit one good loogey in the water supply and doom the entire place. He could then simply sit, and play chess for a day, while everyone changed around him. Checkmate.
@@theslay66 I had more (like how he claims MacReady was already infected while he's playing chess, but the infected dog hadn't even made it to their camp yet.) I was just using the criteria he laid out to illustrate his flawed logic.
@@alexandersears8538 He didn't say he was infected while he was playing chess. He said MacReady was established to be a chess player. It's a Chekov's Gun scenario. The Thing replicates the personality of the people it assimilates, meaning it would also get the personality trait of being a chess player, and theoretically the skills to go along with that.
@@stifflered No you didnt hear him. He explicitly said he believes MacReady was already a Thing when he was playing Chess and thats why he poured his drink into the computer. Re-watch. Ill wait.
the bloodtest literally proves who is and isnt infected tho. therefore mcready is NOT the first infected, let alone infected at all by the time of the test. if he gets infested at all, its not until the end of the movie
But they do not show him on FILM giving blood he has the flamethrower in hand would anyone dare question him if he didn't give blood in front of them ? Why would Childs (The Thing) not just fry Mac at the end ?
Just to clarify the Thing replicates/assimilates other lifeforms on a Cellular level, not a molecular level, you should use "Cellular" in place of the term "Molecular"
I always thought the whole point of the end is that neither of them are infected, but they're still going to die out there because they each think the other is the thing. They survived the monster but it still killed them by killing their ability to trust each other.
I like this ending. But in my follow up I say that an ending where they are both the thing and still don't trust eachother is more poetic. The alien wins but the human paranoia also won
I do think this is a compelling argument, but I feel like there's still a lot of evidence to it not being MacReady. Firstly, I do think it's great that there's so many arguments that can be made to point out how MacReady is suspicious, but, at the same time, it's important to remember that EVERY character has a lot of evidence behind their actions. The issue with this theory is, it's still never addressed *why* MacReady betrayed the other Thing forms, 'nor does it explain why it cooperated with others and strategized/kept it's cool, and why it decided to give a bottle to Childs instead of assimilating him directly; something we clearly see can happen when Dr. Blair did the funny face grab. After all, the reason why they torched the research base was *because* the humans were losing, and they wanted to stop it's spread. It doesn't make sense why MacReady Thing would go out of it's way to sabotage their efforts when the other Things were all cooperating in some way. MacReady Thing essentially turned what was a slam dunk victory into a defeat, for no discernible reason. I don't know, that just doesn't quite add up to me.
@@luxj.9451 1). Right, but that's what all the other Things were doing, too, all the way back to the Dog itself at the very beginning of the movie, so that isn't really a trait unique to MacReady himself. Every other Thing, including Blair, only got hyper aggressive once they were cornered. MacReady had numerous examples of him being cornered yet he never did anything the other Things did, which is odd, because they're all on the same page, with a similar intelligence to one another. 2). Again.... That doesn't explain why he decided to have it be JUST him. He could've assimilated other characters and had multiple bodies. He didn't have to be deceptive to the people AT the base once the Things had already won, because there was no outside communication. They're all shapeshifters after all, and they could have easily had multiple bodies play dead. They already did it in the movie during the autopsy scene that resulted in biting off the arms of that one doctor. There was numerous points where he could have assimilated other people, have them become Things, and have them all be in on it for the long con, too. That's what the Things WERE doing, but if MacReady was the Thing, he betrayed his Thing Team and gave themselves less hosts to infect the rest of the world with, killing all other Things and having himself be the only host allowed. He explicitly put him and his Thing Team at a disadvantage. (Also fun fact, there actually are animals that can be woken up from being frozen in a Tundra! The Bdelloid Rotifer is one, which was woken up after being frozen in ice for thousands of years! Tardigrades also can. Wood Frogs also hibernate by quite literally freezing through the Winter, only to wake up once the temperatures rise and the frogs thaw out!) 3). Well, remember, he was trying to escape because he had nothing else to do. Throughout the movie he tried deceiving them into letting him out of his cabin numerous times. Once they just sorta left him in the shed to die, he started formulating an escape plan and started creating a shuttle or craft to bust out of there. He WOULD have been assimilating others if he was allowed to freely roam the base, which was what he was wanting. So, to put it another way, if the MacReady Thing's end-game was to play the long con and escape, like what you thought Blair's was, he could've just froze himself near MacReady's cabin when they already thought MacReady was dead, and waited for the long con. Everyone was already going to die at that point. So there was no reason for MacReady to go back and kill everyone including the other Things through exceptional deception. All the other Things were waiting out the storm and letting all the humans die themselves, too. Like with the huge creature at the end not revealing itself until MacReady decided to kill it (for some reason). If they were prepping for the long con, MacReady literally ruined that plan. So it just doesn't make much sense to me why this would be the case.
Suspicion. If the base remained intact, would he be carefully observed, blood tested, studied closely and monitored when a rescue team arrives? What if he blends in, appears to require medical attention, and rejects the mutant versions as hostile to the ultimate goal - assimilating the world? Notice how the Things were still human in appearance. They mimic their hosts down to the heart conditions. So too, the Thing mimics the host’s attitude. “If you do not appear human, and stay human, then I will destroy you.” The Thing mimics MacReady’s ideas and rejects the mutant’s collective philosophical disposition. Thereby, hiding as a Thing without mutating. You can see this in blood test. Completely human until dead giveaway. Then transforms into a mutant.
@@shaynefowley5689 If a rescue team WAS arriving, then, yes, that would make sense, but the issue is that the communication lines were cut entirely, and the whole point of destroying the base was so that the Things couldn't escape and cause more problems. Blowing up the base actively hindered the plans of The Thing, not helped them. Especially considering he also sabotaged all the different forms of Thing Escape that were occurring. For example, why did he kill the doctor thing and prevent him from escaping by destroying his craft, instead of teaming up against one of the last humans with the Doctor in a 2v1? Also, after blowing up the base, why didn't the Thing just immediately assimilate or kill Child's? They were all alone after all, so if MacReady was the thing, there was no reason to be concealing his Thingness anymore. It just doesn't make sense as to why he would be a Thing unless he was deliberately self sabotaging. Also, I don't necessarily think they inherit the personalities and ideals of their hosts. I think they LEARN what their host thinks and the way that they talk, but they don't actually inherit their personalities. Every single character that was confirmed to be a Thing, including the Dog, was very noticeably strange and off-putting when they were a Thing. MacReady doesn't really do anything like that.
@@xweert711 what is Childs holding in his hands at the end of the movie? If The Thing survives the Norwegian camp, what are the chances a rescue team will investigate their camp? And if a team arrives, do you want them to know how the process works? This is why MacReady erases the recordings. The Thing realizes it cannot leave any clues.
Here's two things you can't debunk due to them both being a canon to the movie. One) The Thing comics from 1991 was a continuation of the 1982 movie where MacReady and Childs survives the events of the first movie but so does the thing. The Comics follows them trying to take it down with a group of soldiers in first part, second part follows the men trying take it down and finally when they landed in Chile, at some point Childs is infected and trying to frame MacReady. There was another spin off where MacReady is still hunting down the Thing down. The 2) is the Video Game, where you're playing a Special Force Soldier trying to figure out what happened at the outpost. You find the frozen body of Childs but no MacReady. I think the game was trying use this as a Red Herring in the beginning. Towards the end of game, MacReady does appear and not infected while he pilots the Helicopter while you finally kill the Thing. Either way. At point the Comics were considered the True Sequel to the movie, making both Childs and MacReady towards the end of the movie Humans. It was only later in the mini series comics was Childs turned into a Thing. The Current and Accepted Sequel even by Mr. Carpenter himself where Childs froze to death and MacReady helping the Player Character finally finish off the Thing. You either didn't do the research or you didn't want to because it'd disprove your theory but you really didn't prove anything in the end. Nice Video though.
seems feasible that this could've been the way carpenter intended it to end but the studio got involved and made him change the ending. further works of 'canon' not written by the author of the original short story nor Lancaster, but greenlit by some universal executive doesn't necessarily mean the movie wasn't shot to hint at MacReady being The Thing as alluded to in this video. if there's no Kurt Russell there's no potential for a hit sequel.
No. Fun theory though. This is one of the reasons why this is such a great movie. It's so tight and yet so loose, people can come up with the craziest theories. The main problem with your theory is that many of MacReady's actions don't make sense if he's the Thing from the start. But still a fun theory. Side note, I have always hated the J&B gas theory. The thing can talk. Mimic accents. It can do things that make it seem like it has the ability to assimilate knowledge to at least a limited degree. So it would react if it drank gas. And none of that even accounts for just how harsh drinking gas would be. The Thing isn't immune to pain. The fumes and the chemicals burning would make him react. The gas in the bottle theory has always been bad.
Hmm...I don't know, Man. There's a bit of a hitch in your theory about how McCready gets infected from the bottle. Like you said, the moment the dog licks his glove and he subsequently gets shot, can't be the moment of initial infection for Bennings. Because we see Bennings get attacked and absorbed by the creature later in the film. It also couldn't have been the moment McCready got infected from the bottle. Or that the bottle got contaminated. Keep in mind that, when Bennings gets shot, the exact same glove the dog licked is the one he puts to his open bullet wound in that moment. McCready then rushes over to him, and hands him the bottle of liquor. If there weren't enough alien salivary cells on Bennings' glove to infect him when he puts it to an OPEN BULLET WOUND, then why should we think there'd be enough to left on the bottle to infect McCready when he drinks from it? The Thing wouldn't have needed to attack Bennings later in the film, if it got him when the dog licked his hand. Because it would've infected Bennings the moment he put his contaminated hand to his bleeding leg. Edit: Also, now that I think about it...Due to the creature's visceral reaction when it comes into contact with extreme heat or fire, and all of the creature's cells reacting that way no matter how far away they are from one another, there's no way McCready could've been the Thing and also been goin' around burning all the infected with the flamethrower. Hell, if he got infected that early in the movie, there's no way his body wouldn't have reacted during the blood test.
If MacCready was the thing there never would have been a blood test. There would have been a proposed blood test, then everyone tied to a chair, then McCready/Thing would have killed everyone, movie over, theory debunked!
No because Macready was talking to Fukes when Windows dropped the keys so he couldn’t have grab the keys. And I wanted to see more analysis on the scene when the dog entered the mystery room and see if there could be line ups that would prove whose room it was. Great theory but flawed. Plus John Carpenter wouldn’t make it so obvious using Macreads clothes. He would have wanted us to go straight to that idea and then prove us wrong.
Before I see the video I should tell you that almost nothing macready does benefits the thing, why would he burn Palmer thing if he could just let him assimilate everyone else? Why would he kill Blair-Gary-nauls-thing if he was a thing? And his blood disappearing really means nothing, as it could just be a continuity error like childs coats being changed. But I think this is a nice video to watch, and you deserve a lot more views for this because it can mark a pretty good discussion
my answer wouldbbe it's playing the long game. technically ever cell of the thing is the thing so it was willing to lose a few "limbs" in the process as a diversion to ensure it makes it in the long run. i'm not saying this theory is exactly what happened, it's just a fun thought experiment to me, but that's the answer to that question.
It was never explained to the audience or the characters how 'The Thing' thinks; just how it assimilates and only that. It is entirely possible there is one 'main Thing' and the rest are just runoff/offspring of sort. Everyone it showed that blatantly got infected started to work on a more basic level of cognition, and also independent of each other. There's an old trope that the most dangerous vampire (the head one) hides in plain sight, and is the person you least suspect. Inspiration could have been drawn from that, and it would have been genius to create an army of derpy soldiers, just to inevitably help kill them and win favor with the survivors in hopes of being rescued and brought back to civilization. I'm still on the fence about this theory, but it's a fun mental exercise. The biggest thing winning me over is how the camera really focuses on MacReady giving people alcohol, like that's supposed to be important for some reason.
Of all the people in the movie you knew MacReady was never a Thing. Never. From start to finish of the film you could be sure he was human. If he was a Thing he had multiple instances where he would have won. The blood scene where he tied everyone up except for Windows. In just that scene he could have wiped everyone out if he was a Thing. They were all tied up and he could have just grabbed Windows first.
I mean, this theory takes a whole bunch of assumptions that all need to be correct in order to work, while Childs being the thing at the end only takes one single assumption... But anyway. MacReady could have done something to trick us with his blood off-screen, but he also could have NOT done anything to trick us off-screen. His blood passing the test is the biggest problem with this theory, and the only "evidence" there is for it is just shrugging and saying, 'Well, you can't prove something DIDN'T happen off-screen'. The rest of the points as to why you think he's the thing are pretty sound, but this one here is arguable the most important one--the one where the movie itself is showing us "Hey look here's proof he's not the thing"--and you have a complete lack of evidence against it. Also, I really do feel that our introduction to MacReady playing chess makes much more sense the other way around, with MacReady foreshadowing himself and the chess game foreshadowing the thing. MacReady isn't just playing chess, he's playing chess against a *computer*--he's playing a game where the whole point is that's impossible to win--and yet despite knowing this he'd rather just destroy the computer than let it win. This perfectly foreshadows his character in the finale, where he explicitly points out to the other remaining characters that there's no more getting out of this alive--the game they're playing is impossible to win--so the only option they have left is to blow up and burn down the entire "board". And the last scene we get, MacReady hands Childs the bottle of the same scotch he was drinking at the beginning, and Childs drinks some. Childs is the "computer" that MacReady couldn't beat and poured the scotch into.
It's a fun theory. My question is if he was the thing, why didn't he shoot Windows and torch everyone when they were tied up and helpless during the blood test scene.
At the beginning, the husky "tries" to lick Bennings gloved hand, but as we find out later, it needs to go through clothing and in the beginning, it looks like it only manages to lick the front of his glove - unable to get to his palm, so it doesn't connect with the bottle. The devil is in the detail. At 1::26::43, we see Childs at the door and window of the main entrance and ordered to look out for Blair. The coats are in this order from left to right: Navy blue Dark green Olive green Beige Three pairs of boots, all standing straight, first pair pointing inwards towards the wooden bench. At 1::29::34, Childs has left the room and left the door wide open. Presumably the Blair Thing took him. The coats are in this order from left to right: Olive green Dark green Dark green Beige What happened to the navy blue coat and why was the olive green switched with the dark green coat? Three pairs of boots, first pair facing outwards away from the wooden bench, middle pair has one boot knocked over. Looks like a scuffle has occurred and been hastily corrected. At 1::29::51, we see Nauls watch what looks like Childs leave the main entrance for no reason and wander into the darkness. Then the generator cuts out. Childs has definitely been infected and the Blair Thing that infected him has cut the power from the generator which was to the left of the main entrance, down a flight of stairs to a grey door. At the end of the movie, only Childs and MacReady make it out alive, but on or off set, we see no concrete evidence that MacReady is the Thing, just as there is no evidence that the scotch whiskey is petrol or that the Thing doesn't exhale hot air. We can only work with what Carpenter has shown us.
I was ready to believe you but there's one thing that kinda goes against your theory grain. Macready all alone and he begins a tape recorder account of what's been happening. What would be the point of Macready/Thing doing that? Everything else you pointed out makes too much sense but there is that.
Well, the more important factor is if he is the thing, then why in the hell is the “Macready Thing” protecting his team members? It would be best to either A, just in the helicopter and head out to start working on turning the general public. Or B, stay off camera for long extended points in time finishing up working on its ship and leave heading out to another world with living beings and start infecting them then it’s rinse, wash, and repeat afterwards.
Because he can manipulate you thru his recordings from his perception (him being the thing ) Which could also possibly lead anyone who finds the recordings ..to max ready aka the thing .
Good video. I like how the information is organized, and I find the arguments around the bottles really persuasive. However, the chess scene actually proves the opposite of what's stated in the video. If McCreedy was a good tactical thinker, and one that thinks ahead, he wouldn't have lost. It also reveals some details about his character: Firstly, he can't admit when he makes a mistake--instead of accepting that he made some disadvantageous moves, he claims the computer "cheated" (which a computer cannot do, unless programmed to do so...which it would not have been). Secondly, it shows that he can't accept defeat, that he'd rather destroy the game than lose. The point of the scene wasn't to show us he's smart, but to show us that if he can't win, he'll do everything in his power to make sure his opponent can't win either--that he'll choose a stalemate over defeat...foreshadowing the moment where he's sitting with Childs and gives him the bottle.
The point of the scene with MacReady shorting out the computer is meant to show that he does not "play by the rules". He's not a tactical genius, that's why he lost to the computer. The Thing is likely much smarter than MacReady (having assimilated multiple scientists), but MacReady thinks outside the box and can cheat.
Wait a minute, the whole point of that scene was that the computer won through an impossible move. The computer cheats and that instigates Mac's next move.
I have posted on another comment about this but it foreshadows his stubborness and competitiveness. He does like to lose and killed the pc at the cost of his own pleasure so he beat it and yes i hadnt thought of ou tof the box thinking too. At the end he without hesitation is going to sacrifice all of them to make sure he knows he has won and beaten the thing. Stubbornness and radical thinking saves the day
The film's cinematographer Dean Cundey explained that the light in the eyes distinction was ONLY used for the blood testing scene, so it doesn't apply to the dog or the grotesque Norris-assimilated version of the thing.
Childs is The Thing, MacReady is not. From start to finish of the movie, The Things only purpose in existence is to survive. In the final scene, MacReady has given up &completely accepts his fate that he will not survive. Literally not a trait The Thing possesses
Things can survive being frozen. So the argument he gave in and accepted freezing makes less sense if he is a human and more sense if he is a thing thats ready to go into hibernation.
Another point you can make regarding MacCready thing turning on Blair thing. While Blair thing is pissed and confused why he's being turned on you could see it like chess when you would sacrifice a piece in order to make sure that the king stays out of check. In both scenarios, you have to make an assumption on how to make sure your king is alive for the next move and MacCready thing would have made the right call, since had he and Blair thing teamed up, Childs, who still had a flamethrower, would have took them both out. Edit: so I went and watched the movie again with this theory in mind and found an example that supports this. Once they all suspect MacCready to be assimilated everyone wants to lock him out in the snow. That is all except for Palmer who is more than likely assimilate at this point. In fact he's the most eager to open the door and blast MacCready. What better way to draw attention away from yourself than to be so human you take out your own kind
I actually was thinking the same thing, he had to sacrifice his own kind so he could continue his ruse and as long as one thing survives then the species can easily repopulate.
The theory is contingent on Mac swapping labels and getting new blood. The main problem i see with the theory is thing would be undermining itself by not working with Blair-thing to spread.
In all seriousness this is a great video, super funny and totally identify with The Thing being the favourite child. I love this theory , and how passionately you presented it lol
If the Thing assimilated MacReady through the J&B bottle and molecular transfer, and not through a physical attack like it did Bennings, why would it be necessary for MacReady's clothing to be shredded and tattered? The Thing rips off the clothes during assimiliation because it can't replicate them. But if the process of assimiliation is internal and slower, why would the clothing be damaged? I actually think finding MacReady's torn jumpsuit and patch is a mark against your theory.
But if the thing can molecularly assimilate to you, why would McCready‘s clothes be off if he was assimilated from the jump microscopically? This movie is ending was meant to be ambiguous. There is no right or wrong.
The one weird thing that makes me agree with this is what MaCready said at the end of the movie... "Lets just wait here a while and see what happens" Well... him and Childs will freeze, which is exactly what The Thing wanted...
The theory that McCready is the Thing is at least sound. All you need is means and motive. He interacted with all the relevant characters and used a means of delivering the infection. If he is the Thing, and any Thing had access to the blood, then all the samples are suspect and the scene provides no actionable or firm evidence. Which throws open a lot of theories, to be fair. I also like the idea that every scene is intentional from a talented director. Putting the bottle in the opening scene all the way to the final scene is just about so obvious that we all wrote it off as product placement and didnt think twice about it. The reality is too much happens off screen and nothing is for sure, which just again reinforces that the Thing could be any one or all of the characters at any point in time and the mystery truly is just subjective. Its not even sure that a Thing would know another Thing if it saw one and all of them could have been the Thing playing the game out to the end as a completely selfish act of singular survival just to be sure.
Going to point out facts here. We actually don't know how the thing turns people into the thing because it is done off screen. The Thing is an intelligent being that cheats like the computer was the foreshadowing. If the thing can easily pass its genetics through saliva, it would of effected everyone easily. So that means that the body needs to be dead to turn or another alternative way to do so. This is why the thing is being strategic throughout the movie. Now if you pay attention to the personality changes before and after they become the thing shows that they are the thing. Throughout the movie Macready personality doesn't change and he stays true to himself.
It's so wild that the scene where Fucs says they should prepare their own meals and eat only from cans didn't stand out to me at all. Until now. Your theory, as far as I'm concerned, was proven at that moment! I have the DVD of the movie and the next time I watch it I'll be thinking of it quite differently. P.S. You are an adorable nut! Every time you went off script, like after drinking the J&B, you were charming as F_CK and funny too! Nice job.
Thank you very much! And yeah, with the idea of Mac being the thing, it kind of makes it a whole new movie when watching it with that in mind! I hope you enjoy the movie even more now!
During the blood test, MacReady destroyed Palmer, burned Windows, and had everyone else tied up. If MacReady was the Thing, don't you think he would of infected the three people tied up? After that he wins!!!!!! But nooooooooooooooooo. Mac is human and continues the blood test. DEBUNKED!!!!!!!!!
Thats assuming that the McCready thing is the smartest thing and and saw the other things as inferior. Who's to say the thing is just one entity with a singular personality. How did it crash land to begin with, was there mutiny amongst the things. Is the movie about a game of chess between the things, the humans are just the pawns????? Think... think... think...
Okay. So, He gets Nolls up to his shack, alone, doesn't try to assimilate him. Didn't dispose of the evidence where as someone else might have planted it too frame him, makes a lot more sense. And of course all the trouble Mac goes through in order to prevent the thing from escaping makes no sense. Now you have this interesting theory that he was infected right from the get go? Maybe? The dog/licked gloves plunged into the snow pretty quickly, can't tell me one thing is fine and the other doesn't wash it but okay moving on.. Mac goes with Doc on a chopper flight too the Norwegian base at this time Mac is already infected right? Doesn't infect Copper whilst they are alone, instead brings back more corpses to be examined, if he did the due diligence, he'd have infected Copper at the base, came back with NO evidence of what might've happened and everyone on base would be non the wiser. - Thus guaranteeing 3 Thing monsters on base with everyone else completely unaware of them, their existence etc, waiting out the Storm nice and warm. Sorry man I appreciate the effort on this one but it doesn't hold water.
There is an argument to be made that Blair and McCready were competing to infect the others throughout the movie and that the Smirnoff bottle was a test to confirm that Blair was the other Thing.
@@corymorse4271 Exactly what I was thinking! I think the dog was a natural leader, and the only other natural leader was McCready, and they both had opposing ideas of how to reach their end-goal, infecting the world.
So used to theories that I can immediately shoot down, thanks for one that I actually can't! It also seems so obvious the way you break it down! The Blair and Fuchs evidence along w/the seemingly obvious "red herring" of his ripped long johns and Mac's blood sample being taken off screen....it all makes perfect sense!
Interesting theory I've never considered. A few more points to support your theory after watching the film again: 1. The scene before Mac goes and talks with Fuchs, he makes the audio recording. You could argue that he was doing this recording to give himself credibility if someone else discovers the outpost. Typically in movies or video games, people record audio logs as their final sign-off just before doing something that may result in them getting killed (like Mac getting caught killing Fuchs). In the recording, he talks about the shredded clothes with the name missing, saying "it could be anybody. Nobody trusts anyone now". He then thinks about it and re-records the message at this part saying vaguely "i've done everything I can". Maybe him saying this is forecasting that he knows he'll be the last man standing and doesn't want to raise suspicion about everyone else being dead or missing. If he left the recording as "it could be anybody's", that means that he himself could have been the Thing and could draw suspicion to him when he realizes he may have left evidence behind, hence why he deleted it. With his sign-off, he says "RJ MacReady, Helicopter Pilot". This seems unnatural. If this is an official, government research outpost, others would know whose stationed there, and a simple "MacReady, out." would have been sufficient to identify himself in a recording. It's almost as if the Thing was taking what evidence they found to try to build rapport and read what was on the tag ("RJ MacReady") and also the equipment he had in his shack to know he was the pilot and then repeated it. 2. Right after the recording scene, Mac looks around before entering Fuch's office, making sure no one saw him enter. Fuchs clutches his flask when Mac enters and it is also shown in a close-up just before the power goes out, possibly the director's intention to emphasize how paranoid Fuchs was about sharing any drinks and why Mac had to get rid of him. OR another theory is that Fuchs was secretly working on a chemical in the flask that could kill the Thing or possibly an antidote to prevent assimilation. In which case would explain why he was so protective of it and even more reason why Mac wanted to get rid of him. 3. The scene when Nauls, Windows, and MacReady go to search for Fuchs, they are nearly back in the station when Windows notices Fuchs' dead body. You can see MacReady looking around behind them as Windows walks up to the body, probably to make sure no one else is watching. It's also at this point Mac "notices" the light is on in his station. Maybe at this point he realizes it's an opportunity to try to isolate Nauls and assimilate another. Why else would Mac draw attention to his shack and want someone to go with him if he knew his name tag or other evidence was left there? Or maybe he realized that he left the light on by mistake and by bringing someone with him to check it out raises less suspicion. He sends Windows back inside because he wouldn't be able to infect both at the same time. Obviously, the assimilation did not work, as Nauls returns with the clothing with Mac's name. It's only after this time that Mac begins acting paranoid with the dynamite and flamethrower, accusing everyone else of being the Thing, assuming because he knows he was caught. 4. This theory is reaching a bit more, but the blood test scene. They know fire will kill the Thing, but Mac seems confident that his test will work and tells everyone that the Thing will interact with a "hot needle" to survive and will reveal itself. He doesn't make it sound like it's just a wild theory, but knows that it's going to work - how would he know this unless he was the Thing? If it were just a theory, you'd think they would hold a blow torch to the blood to try to replicate it. But his confidence here with just the hot wire is telling. Also, another stretch of a theory, but maybe Mac's flamethrower wasn't really having a "malfunction" and he wanted to wait and see if the thing would quickly assimilate everyone so he held off on getting it going. When he sees that the Thing is taking a while to transform, he then decides to activate it, as if he remained idle the whole time, people would be even more suspicious of how he was quick to shoot his colleague moments earlier but then held off on killing the Thing. The reason for the test is to 1, show everyone he's "not the thing" and take attention away from him, and 2, use the opportunity to summon the Thing to take over others since they were all tied down in a closed room (remember how the dog tried to assimilate all the other dogs when they were locked in a room together?).
Another thing I noticed - when the group chases down Bennings in the snow and catches him morphing, he focuses his attention on Mac the entire time. The Thing howls and stares directly at him, almost like a cry for help from the creature towards Mac.
I was really impressed with this. I'm not certain I agree, but I think you make a very compelling argument. And the focus on the use of the bottle throughout the film seems very relevant. Personally, I believe it is intentional by Carpenter for the ending to be ambiguous, and even for these hints and red herrings to be found without clear answer. But this is a very strong theory that even many other well established and thoughtful critics and fans have missed (looking at Rob Ager/Collative Learning). I think it's telling how ready people are to view one or the other of the two survivors as the Thing.... when in fact, there are actually 4 possible endings, each dependent on the viewer's assumptions and prejudices. Childs could be the thing, or Macready could be... OR both of them could be uninfected, or perhaps by the end with that bottle, both are infected. The paranoia and uncertainty, and the mistrust of our fellow human, that's the point.
“Are you telling me that The Thing movie poster is R.J. MacReady is The Thing and we didn’t think about it the entire time?” _”Yes and I’m tired of pretending it’s not.”_
This whole debate on childs and mac is kinda missing the forest for the trees. They were at odds for the whole movie and in the end, they have to accept they’re going to die with someone they are resentful and suspicious of. It doesn’t really matter if one of them is the thing.
16:41 MacReady tests his own blood and it is shown that he's not a Thing, just as everyone else is tested. So you have to either dismiss the blood test or come up with some other way to claim MacReady was the Thing. Now, the whole point of the ending of the film, is for you to not know who is the Thing or if there even is still a Thing left. Carpenter is only angered when people ask who is the Thing at the end of the film, and there are certain moments in the film designed to throw you off and make you think something that isn't true. Early on, when the dog first goes into a person's room, we see a shadow, and the shadow looks similar to two different people but mainly it looks like Windows. The person actually sitting there wasn't one of the actors, it was a stage hand and was wearing a coat to make their shadow look like it might be one of the characters, even though it's not. MacReady was not a Thing at any point before the large explosion and the ending scene of the film. After that, it doesn't matter, you're left to wonder but never really know. One possible ending for the film, was a scene during the day with the camp burned down and destroyed, and then you see a dog running away from the camp, ending the film just as it began. With the Thing surviving and running through the snow, trying to find a way to escape Antarctica.
There was a video that goes over the infection timeline. It showed the shadow in detail and even if it was none of the acters it looks like Norris (the part sticking out at the neck is the most telling part).
A lot of these rebuttals I agree with and some I don’t, but the biggest thing for me is the thing attacking itself/its own kind. That doesn’t make sense for it to do, so why would Macready be the one to come up with the blood test and then force the blood test on everyone while being infected KNOWING it would expose Palmer. In addition, why would Macready blow up the Blair Nauls thing at the end when it’s the one that infected Blair to begin with? Again, the only time we see the thing attack itself or other things is if you assume Macready is the thing, in which it flamethrowers a few of them. Even when it’s forced into a situation like Palmer was, he didn’t help kill Norris or anything, he just played along in being shocked. One other quick thing about the blood test, logically you could argue that if everyone gave blood in view of everybody then they would point out that Macready had to do so as well. And if you want to argue that the thing could retract its cells from the blood being taken or something, then you would have to say that Palmer could have and should have as well. These things in addition to other comments I feel make this theory impossible but still a fun one nonetheless. Excited to see your response!
The reason why I think Mac isn't the thing is cause he laughs. he shows emotion, everyone is very animated until they are assimilated. They all have a personality, after they are just kind of dulled down.
This has been well documented in the movie as each person has a loud or more beaming personality and once infected their personality is duller and more sedated like. They don't remain loud or boisterous. Look at Windows for example and Dr. Blair becomes very sullen and recluse.
A new one I thought that debunks the theory of Macgready being the thing (especially from the beginning) is he had them all tied up for the test except for windows. The thing could've easily assimilated windows in a 1v1 because windows is the weakest one there. I think the movie makes a point to show windows is kinda the wimpy guy. He literally freezes up and it gets him killed. He wouldn't know what hit him if he was 1v1 with Macgready. macgready would then assimilate the other 3 that are tied up and aren't already assimilated. Then the thing would've won because at this point, blaire is already the thing. Macgready wouldn't even need the blood test if he were the thing, he already had them all tied up and at him mercy lol.
@@joshsmith9572 especially if you keep the “sequel” in mind. That being the video game adaptation of the thing. It actually was really good and it’s ending is even better just like this with this theory in mind, in fact I think if anything it honestly gives it merit as well. I don’t wanna go into spoilers but if you play it or look it up you will see what I mean.
He's indisputably infected from the dog spit glove. It also explains everything else. Also Carpenter had nothing to do with the "sequel" comic books lol
Guys, guys, guys. Alot of the things brought up, I answered in my response video. Before commenting, go watch that video. I will most likely discuss your points in that video. Thank you for your time!
Update: RESPONSE VIDEO IS OUT
I will be doing a response video to most of these comments, so thats why I'm not replying to all of them! Im happy to see all this passion for this classic horror movie! Love the rubtles and theories i havent considered!
there's a very little known tele-film called A Cold Night's Death (1973) that I believe may have possibly inspired the atmosphere of The Thing (1982) I'm well aware that this is a very bold statement but there are shots and elements of the film that look almost identical, it's a pretty impeccable film that's far too underrated, I'd recommend checking it out.
Wouldn't the alcohol kill single cells? Not many life forms survive long in anything over 40% alcohol. That's the one logical caveat I have, other than it would change it's Lovecraftian elements too much. Scholarly, it would be applying the late 2000s-early 2010s the hero is the villain trope to the story, but I am not going to argue that here. Otherwise, this theory is a good reinterpretation of what could have happened in the film.
@@AbrasiousProductions Yeah, but that film was probably inspired by the 1957 version of The Thing (From Outer Space). There are shots in the middle of that film that were recreated in this film.
@@americanandpinay I'm aware that The Thing (1982) is inspired by the 1951 version as well as the novel but what I'm proposing is that A Cold Night's Death (1973) inspired the film's atmosphere and some of it's cinematography
What I love about the ambiguous ending is everyone gets to take whatever ending they want and no one can take that away. I like to think Mac was The Thing.
The fact that people are still coming up with theories about this movie made in 1982 really shows the Brilliance of it
nah, shows how lazy people that say they love this movie actually are.
Probably top 3 horrors of all time. Alien is there too, purely for inventing suspense horror. The other is open to opinion but for me it's Halloween. Top 3, nailed on.
@@davidstanton4716 I'm sorry do you actually think alien invented "suspense horror"? I would Google Alfred Hitchcock if I were you or if you don't like something that young maybe Google Fritz Lang's M or Google the movie Nosferatu it's a silent film. Believe It or not they've been making movies for over 100 years.
I do like your top three horror films list though
It makes you think. And the theories are fascinating. Remember, the thing can take on any shape which means inherently it has no shape. It’s molecular. It “infects” others, but it is not really turning into the being it assimilates. That means every person infected is actually dead. The reason it turns into amorphous globs of horror is because it cannot hold the correct molecular structure of Earth organisms very long. Could have something to do with air, or the oxygen content of air. Antarctica oxygen level is not very high. So maybe if it got to a civilized area where there are more organisms, it could survive much longer.
@@taoist32 right, it doesn’t turn into the person, the person is turned into it.
However, this animal does not have an issue with the cold and it appears to simply go to sleep if there is no prey available. It isn’t weak and it isn’t suffering from any disease. It also doesn’t quickly lose the ability to mimic earth creatures, it stays in disguise for as long as it wants to.
When attacked, the bodies take damage and are disfigured, but this is not a detriment to the organism. The various body parts can simple separate and attack.
In fact this organism is ridiculously over powered. All it had to do was divide itself into a bunch small animals and quickly attack the entire team. They would have no defense.
A compelling theory. However I can't help but notice your entire theory is invalidated by the fact that you own funko pops. Have a nice day.
😂😂
Lmao poor guy
😅 I own a lot of funkos. Lol😢
Hater 😂
Cris Parker with 3C Film owns walls full of Funko’s. He just hit 600K subs and is an established reviewer..but you right😂
Interesting theory, but you have to exclude one major detail in order for it to work: at no point in the film does a confirmed Thing physically attack another confirmed Thing. At all. Not a single one partakes in destroying another one. Not even when Palmer noticed the Norris-head Thing. MacReady was the one that killed it, and he killed all of the others. The Thing's driving desire is to spread its influence, especially once it's been discovered. Palmer literally infected Windows because he was discovered. Also, at the beginning when the dog licked Bennings's glove that saliva would have frozen near instantly before MacReady handed him the bottle. That's also assuming that MacReady had only one bottle of Scotch there, which wouldn't really make any sense given the length of time they'd be stationed out there. And as one final hitch in the theory: why would MacReady destroy the spaceship that Blair built? Why destroy Blair-Thing at the end after everyone else had been killed? Why not infect Nauls when they were both alone in Mac's cabin? No, Mac wasn't a Thing.
Was basically coming to say this. It's definitely an interesting theory but MacReady killing other Things doesn't make sense, especially when there's no one else around.
For me, it's because the blair thing planned to either escape earth in its ship or fly to a populated area. That would have likely been picked up on radar and raise alarm. Macready thing's whole strategy is stealth, blend in. So it's really a conflict of the strategies. An argument in the things mind played out via experimentation of its parts.
it makes sense, since it makes no sense to esacpe to freedom with the escape team maybe and having a fleshmountain with you@@alexs1640
Your other points make sense. But the frozen saliva debunk doesn't hold up. Because the original split head body was frozen for a while and still was able to assimilate once it warmed up inside.
@@alexs1640Maybe the Mac-thing was like "there can only be one." Or "Im Dirty Dan".😅
I always liked the idea that neither Macready or Childs were the thing, because it feeds into the whole theme of paranoia running through the movie. Macready and Childs seemed to butt heads in almost every scene they were in together, even before the dog scene. It seems fitting for the movie that they are both human, but they trust each other so little (and each has attempted to kill the other at least once: Childs by attempting to kill Macready when he busted into the camp, Macready pointing a gun at Childs because he refused to obey him) so these two dudes that almost killed each other are stuck dying together, it's a fitting and solid end I think.
I thing if they both were the thing but adopted the paranoia of the humans, it would be more poetic. I talk about that in the follow up video.
Nah, Mac was the only one that could leave at will and made it. If he wanted to infect everybody he could have easily. Of them all, he is the only one that couldn't be the thing at any given time.
WRONG. Go watch the special features on Big Trouble in Little China. John Carpenter and Kurt Russell talk about the Thing and the ending. According to Carpenter himself, neither Mcreedy and Childs are the thing. Sorry to burst your bubble
That's a fact I pull out to blow people away.
Also, Mcreedy survives canonically and goes on to have one other encounter with an alien species.
@@Ryan-wr8fxHe's been out there a while. Meaning his internal body temperature is closer to that of the outside than McCready's, whose breath lingers far longer and is still in the shot. So when Childs breathes out, it mixes and isn't readly visible.
This can be easily tested by being outside this winter and comparing your own breath from when you just walk out, to that of being out for 20 minutes, and further still to being outdoors in the cold for an hour.
@Humongous420 That special feature was released well after all the debate and speculation of "who really is the Thing". This along with Carpenter's back-and-forth over the years makes him an unreliable narrator to his own work. Deliberately so. This was likely the answer given so people would stop bugging the man so he could get back to work.
Technically the bottle infected him but idk maybe it was just a plot hole
He's gone back and forth on that for years. There's no definitive answer.
Among the many problems with this theory, I think here's the biggest:
The entire plot of the film makes no logical sense if MacReady is the Thing from the beginning. As evidenced by Blair's scheme at the end, the Thing (which seems to exhibit some sort of collective consciousness or at least shared memories and motives between its constituents) wants to escape the Antartic base. If MacReady, the base's chopper pilot, is assimilated long before the rest of the base is alerted to the Thing's presence, he has no reason to not just fly off. He certainly also has no reason to investigate the Norwegian base, or to be the most active character in hunting down the creature.
My impression is that this is a classic case of confirmation bias; you've decided you "know" the truth and try to force all the contradictory evidence to conform with it. This is how you can take a scene as unambiguous as MacReady's "fuck you" and spin it into a cartoon conversation between him and the screeching monstrosity that just tried to kill him.
EDIT: I've also just realised you misunderstood the "cheeky bitch" scene completely. MacReady's BAD at chess, he has to beat the computer by bluntly destroying it. I think the scene is to establish his character and the tension on site even before the monster, but if it foreshadows anything it's the destruction of the base to stop the Thing.
Ok, let's break this down...
Unless you flipped some of the footage or didn't show the right clips, the Thing licked Bennings' left glove, and Bennings grabbed the bottle with his right hand. Even if the same glove got licked, Bennings does not touch the mouth of the bottle, but the neck, making it more difficult for someone to hypothectically come in contact with any saliva that might've been placed on the bottle.
Given the flaw above, the key being picked up by MacReady is purely a hypothesis based on nothing more than the character's presence.
Watching the movie from the beginning with the assumption that MacReady is the Thing, and then using any and all circumstantial evidence to prove that preconceived notion is literally confirmation bias. That said, the Smirnoff WOULD be strong evidence, if everything else said leading up to this wasn't without merit. The footage shown of the dog licking the glove opposite to the one grabbing the J&B, and the flawed assumption based on a misinterpretation of that footage, acts counter to your thesis.
I'd say burning one's self to prevent them from being turned into the Thing and then turning others is as smart as Blair destroying all modes of communication and transportation to prevent the Thing from spreading. If Fuches was put into a no-win situation, I'm sure his analytical mind would rather he sacrifice himself to give the others a chance to not be turned.
You make a lot of assumptions about the light in the shack, which is why you shouldn't go into the movie with assumptions and try to prove those assumptions right. Your own assumptions are forcing you to disregard MacReady saying he turned the light off.
You also are willing to accept that things happen offscreen to go against was we see onscreen in the blood test scene, but automatically believe that the ripped clothes truly belonged to the avid chess player who still maintains his strategic mind even after being assimilated. There's also the possibility of MacReady maybe following Knowles' footsteps in the snow to make his way back, or any other method that also happens offscreen. Like, sure, things can happen offscreen, but in order for the movie to make sense, we need to keep our assumptions of what happens offscreen consistent with the rest of the movie.
It is far more likely to assume that MacReady cut himself in front of the rest of the group for the blood test, than to assume that everyone else just buys the already suspicious MacReady totally used his own blood in that scene. Also, if "Thing MacReady" made contact with the blood from earlier, he would have assimilated that blood, which could not have been the case given what we see in the blood test scene. He would have had to use a vial or other container, which would be difficult to get everyone else who DID actually cut themselves to trust.
"Why didn't Blair-Thing attack MacReady?" Because MacReady is the point-of-view character for the audience. Similar to why the xenomorph didn't kill Ripley in Alien, if Blair-Thing took MacReady, MacReady wouldn't be the main character. And assuming MacReady saying "yeah, fuck you, too!" wasn't a one-liner is again showing your confirmation bias. Why would the Things attack each other? That doesn't make as much sense as MacReady still being human. MacReady surviving a fiery explosion is actually stronger evidence of him not being the Thing, give that a heated up wire can cause such an adverse reaction to the Thing.
With the J&B at the end, I refer you again to the footage we actually see in this video. We do not see Bennings grab the bottle with the same glove that was licked, therefore, we cannot assume that the bottle assimilated MacReady when you propose it did. Your entire case falls apart because the footage you show doesn't support your own conclusion. I think it's far more likely that MacReady expected a human Childs to decline drinking from the bottle out of fear of assimilation. So when "Childs" eagerly drinks, he knows Childs is the Thing trying to use the bottle to assimilate him.
I commend you for being as thorough as you were, but your entire argument falls apart from the start, and only tumbles further due to confirmation bias leading you to make grander assumptions than what the film intended.
I had a similar thought when I saw the dog lick his left glove. I also feel that if fire can harm the thing, then wouldn't an alcoholic drink with a high enough alcohol content also be harmful/painful if ingested?
Honestly the biggest piece of evidence, that he wasn't a thing, is the fact that he literally had everyone else tied up and vulnerable. This was Gary, Childs, and Nauls. He literally would've had no reason to keep playing the game. It would've been a checkmate at that point.
Literally
Waited for the your blood test explanation, and your whole hypothesis falls apart there. You talked bout how we don't see MacReady collect his blood and we only see 2 collect thier blood which is Windows and Nauls, which is true. But we also don't see the blood collection of Childs, Palmer and the others but they have it seen when MacReady tests his blood and Palmer's. Not only that if MacReady was Thing at this point he has everybody tied up other then Windows, wouldn't you take advantage of this point in time and take out 1 person and infected everyone tied up. They all tried their hardest to get away from Palmer without any of them getting loose. So you would have enough time to infect everyone. Also if i were tied up I would be making a big deal if i didn't see MacReady draw blood. There are also Multiple molotov cocktails used near the end which means he had Multiple bottles you think the Bennings bottle is the only 1 in the movie they are all sharing. This video is just a lot of Narrative Bias Storytelling no logic was ever taken into consideration.
Two points you didn't cover: 1. MacReady hid audio recordings explaining what had happened so that the rescue team could find them while investigating, hopefully before the bodies were recovered and thawed. There's no reason for a Thing MacReady to do this with no other characters around to know about it. But importantly, this means a hypothetical human Mac has a backup plan in case he isn't able to kill everyone who's infected. 2. If Childs wasn't the Thing, his safest play would have been to torch MacReady because hypothetically human Childs DOESN'T have a backup plan in case the Thing freezes and is thawed by the rescue team, so rather than sitting back and letting Mac freeze (either to death as human or as a Thing), he would have torched him. This would be doubly the case if your Things fighting Things theory were true, since Thing Childs would definitely kill Thing Mac with the flamethrower. Therefore the most likely endgame is Thing Childs who believes he has already won because they will both freeze and be thawed (not knowing about Mac's backup plan) and human MacReady pretending to believe that Childs is human so that Thing Childs won't suspect that Mac has a backup plan in place.
True, tho the most likely thing is Childs waits a minute (Mac hasn't slept for 2 days and will fall asleep in a few minutes, tho it doesn't matter) attacks and assimilates mac, makes 6 dogs (he needs mac's body mass and knowledge of bases--mac is a helicopter pilot) then they run and the 6 dogs eat their way down until 1 is left (or however many) and then it starts again and they build a ship in a week (Blair built the ship in one day) and leave the planet.
@@petecoogan I think even though the thing can survive in the cold it's body can't function at a certain point, I don't think it would be able to build a ship without a place to heat up..
Really like this theory, they basically both think they won. I think mac's plan could go wrong if child assimilates him though, it seems they get the memory too while copying them so the thing could dig up the recordings. But I think there is a possibility infected child really thinks mac doesn't know so he doesn't see him as a threat and doesn't care to just have both of them freeze.
@@k0lpA it would in another camp. It makes 6 dogs and runs to the next camp. Mac knows where the camps are. Dogs run 125 miles per day in -40 degree weather.
1) It could be that thing mac did not make the audio recordings for a search team but rather for anyone else in his crew suspecting him of being the thing, if they did find one of those recordings he would be seen as trustworthy and in the clear.
Another possibility for the recordings is that he did make them for a search team, but only to gain trust from them when they come there to investigate. He later decides it's too risky to leave thing bodies around since people will not want to touch them. Therefore he decides to burn down every THING and the entire base, destroying all evidence of an alien creature at all.
2) This is a little hard to explain. My best bet as to why he didn't torch Mac is that he has no reason to distrust him after he did the blood test. Plus he talks to Mac while being on guard before he sits down with him. Mac convinces him fully by saying "maybe we shouldn't make it out", at first he makes childs off guard by questioning where he was, something a normal person would do; the thing may just be like "oh hey childs" according to childs thought process. Childs being a human would not think that the thing wants to be frozen. Childs never went to the extraction site so he may just assume cold will kill it. He is also guessing if Mac is a real person or not, notice how he still does not move closer to Mac to try to assimilate, even though Mac is unarmed he keeps his distance. If there is a chance that Mac is human and childs knows this, then he may not want to torch Mac Incase one of them makes it our alive.
Actually, there is much more evidence for Childs to be the Thing; namely the coat. When Mac, Nauls and Garry leave to go after Blair and they leave Childs to man the door, you see a coat on the peg next to Childs that is identical to the one he's wearing. The next time we see that same location, the coat is gone.
Also, Childs ran off into the snowstorm _before_ the generator went out, meaning that Blair-Thing had to be _inside_ the building when Childs claims he saw him outside. Occam's Razor demands we conclude that: Blair-Thing ambushed Childs after the trio left, the new Childs-Thing took that identical coat off the peg and put it on before running out into the snowstorm to find somewhere to hibernate (or maybe help ambush the survivors), while Blair-Thing sabotaged the generator.
If MacReady really had been the Thing, why would he leave such an obvious clue as the long johns? Isn't it more likely that Palmer-Thing snuck out and planted the long johns to sow distrust of MacReady, the only human who's shown a calm head and rational thinking to counter its moves?
And if Mac and Blair both were Things, why go at each other to the death when they could just team up against Childs? We never saw Norris-Thing or Palmer-Thing sabotaging each other.
Also, having the movie's theme song play over the final scene isn't the slamdunk you think it is. It's a simple movie-making technique.
The coat is a distraction. Fools the common viewer. The MacReady Thing checks out after reviewing the sequel. Sequel? You might ask. There is a video game.
Ur sum kinda dummy. I feel sorry for ur lil screwy kids.@@shaynefowley5689
Child's play.
My theory about this is that neither Childs nor McCreedy are the thing because they both drink the alcohol. It's established in the movie that the thing will avoid pain at all costs. As you demonstrated in the video whiskey is a very uncomfortable thing to drink; and the fact they could drink it without freaking out means they weren't assimiliated.
It wasn't alcohol. It was gasoline. The bottles were molotov cocktails.
McCreedy gave it to Childs as a test.
While i agree with the base behind your theory, that neither of them are the thing, Im like 70% certain Mcreedy swapped the drinks for gasoline.
@@-Zer0Dark- gasoline would have the same effect
@@-Zer0Dark- He didn't carry a flask did he? He kept "one last drink" to go out in style, but saw his escape at the last moment, and took the drink with him.
@@-Zer0Dark- we...must...rewatch...movie....FOLLOW THE ALCOHOL!!!!!!!!
I think this is compelling all the way up to the blood test scene. And Not because that couldn't be Macready's blood, but because he had already won at that point. He had everyone tied up with a flamethrower on them. . . So why wouldn't he just blast them? Why would he go through the whole charade just to blow everything up anyway at the end, right in the next scene??
Right. Why wouldn't he just lick all of their faces like a husky!?
...because he wasn't a thing, clearly.
This correctly defeats the entire video! The fact of the matter is the film was never designed to be "figured out". The film is an allegory about paranoia no fan Theory will ever truly explain the movie because all fan theories try to prove a particular character either was or was not the thing and that answer is not knowable
If the thing was Macgready, especially from the beginning, he would've taken the helicopter out ASAP to go to a more densely populated area.
He's indisputably infected from the dog spit in his bottle.
Like the Thing knows how or where to fly a helicopter across fn Antarctica lol naw
Better to create a small army first
@@joshsmith9572 only problem with your theory is if he’s indisputably the Thing because of the dog spit, how does he fly the helicopter twice after that? Once to the Norwegian camp and once to the spacecraft crash site..
Why if the thing wanted to return to its ship? Also one of the things was trying to build one in a shed. They don't know how to fly helicopters. Can you fly one just off rip?
If MacReady was the Thing, wouldn’t he have just assimilated them all once he tied them down?
Great point. I still like the theory but this is hard to argue against. That whole sequence becomes the most unnecessary game of 4D chess ever
I like the theory. I think the same argument could be made for the final scene where Mac is testing Childs by offering the drink. When Childs accepts the bottle, Mac knows he's a Thing and chuckles nihilistically because he knows that humanity is fucked.
Surely you can't just ignore the fact that Bennings takes a swig straight after being handed the whiskey, therefore would be infected first, except he wasn't infected.
DAMN CHILD! That is some 360 noscope right there... I tend to cling to Childs being da thang, as he not only lacks breath, but lacks the gleam in the eye, and the Benny doesnt breathe in the scene debunked here, he is yelling... The thing may not need to breathe via lungs, but if it uses the functions of the body, like making sound with mouth, it must rely on basics of the body... It cant make oral noise without relying on an inhalation to be able to yell out... You know, an empty balloon doesnt fart all over the place, you have to blow it up and let it go for it to make the funny noise and flutter about... Same with humans/thing-ed-humans...
Tho, the rest of the theory does hold some water... The bottle may be aringarosa, but it aint 100% leaky, other than at mouth of the bottle, and the thing theme playing when childs takes a swig is quite the conundrum, it could be a red herring of its own, but it could also confirm that McThing is in fact the thing..
Cheers m8!
The biggest problem with the theory that is the entire base of thinking MacReady is the thing is that if you look at how Bennings grips the bottle, he essentially covers the entire top part of the bottle including a good chunk of the tip where you drink out of, his mouth essentially touches the infected gloves when he takes a drink. As we already know, Bennings isn't infected until later in the movie, so that theory is literally dead in the water.
Also, about the blood test. Just because it happens off screen doesn't mean it doesn't happen. MacReady is surrounded by people who have their eyes LOCKED in on him, watching every little thing he does. There is no way that MacReady did not cut himself because if he didn't then there would be an outcry from the others that he didn't do it. Theres no possible way that if he was the thing that he could get away with a sleight of hand as well as the fact that I don't believe that the Thing could fill a pocket of human blood without it being infected mainly because of the fact its neither confirmed nor denied that it can do that. Which would still allow it to be argued but for me personally, I don't believe its a thing it can do.
Interesting points. I will look more into the bennings point. And while people had eyes on him, he was the one in control of the situation. And the uncontaminated blood was tampered with, proving that someone in the group new of a form of this test. So MacReady would have had a motive to keep some for insurance. And he would have been the only one able to 'sleight of hand' human blood into the dish being as I stated, he was in control. Maybe he already had a dish put away. He's a chess player, blood was removed, he figured out how to infect people without ever getting caught, he came up with the test himself may I add. Also very quickly. While there is no on screen proof, I believe there is enough evidence of him tampering with the plan he created. And given the scenes and evidence I put forward, the simplest answer tends to be the right one. But it is just a theory
@@2DimmMedia Well, Doc was the one who came up with the first idea of a form of blood test which is why it lead to the uncontaminated blood being tampered with. MacReady only came up with his version of the blood test after seeing how the Thing acted like a separate being trying to survive when different parts were threatened.
Despite being in control during the blood test, I honestly don't think if MacReady was infected he would have been able to do anything sneaky. Every single person that isn't Palmer, were not infected. When theres that many uninfected people who have their eyes locked in on you, watching every single thing you do, even the slighest movement, theres no way he'd get away with it. He could be in as much control as he wants but he can't stop peoples eyes from seeing what he doesn't want them to see.
@@2DimmMedia "I believe there is enough evidence" is not evidence. Why would a Thing suggest a test, carry it out, and expose a fellow Thing in the process; and tell Windows to torch it before torching and blowing it up. Sorry, chess strategy does not explain every action taken contrary to what a Thing would do.
@@2DimmMedia All of that is irrelevant. You are saying Macready was the Thing at the time of the blood test, then don't you think once everyone is tied up the thing could just kill everybody? I mean they are all tied up right? Then McCready could send out a distress signal and get a rescue team to take him to civilization. There would be no need to burn the place down and then freeze he could simply wait in luxury for a rescue team. Your entire video while entertaining has been debunked.
well it does, they trust macready now, the thing feels no pity over its own parts (other things) cause its all the same and there is more of it, to suggests it wouldnt blow the coverof or wouldnt kill other thing parts is kinda weird, it totally would cause it has an endgoal@@castlew4162
MacReady is not the thing.
My evidence is that I like MacReady therefore he cannot be the thing.
I'm sure everyone can agree on this as my case is quite solid.
Carpenter said the eye gleaming was only used for the blood test scene. Also, my favorite part of the movie is when the Thing says "It's Thingy time" and starts thinging all over the place
“It’s clobbering time!”
Different Thing.
Ok, in regards to your proof that McReady got infected by the whiskey bottle after Bennings glove was licked, the dog licked his LEFT hand not his right hand which is the hand that is grasping the whiskey bottle after McReady leaves it with Bennings.
Actually I can prove MacReady wasn't the thing, and it's not even hard to do. MacReady is played by Kurt Russel, Kurt Russel, is the man, and is resistant to Thingery, so there ya go, he can't be Thingy'd. He escaped L.A. and New York, He escaped Alaska too.
not to mention he also escaped Gilligan's Island 😛 when he was young.
Me and Kurt Russell were both Born on March 17th. So next time you celebrate St. Patrick's day, think of Kurt Russell.
I’m not going to say you’re right or wrong. I don’t know one way or the other. The point of the movie, and one reason why I love it, is the vagueness at the end.
However you raise very interesting points and I love the effort you put into this. You make me want to go back and re-watch yet again this phenomenal movie.
It’s people like you doing things with movies like this that really makes me appreciate how well cinematography was done back in the day. I highly doubt we’ll be talking about The Marvels 40 years from now.
You know a movie is an all time great when someone who wasn’t born in 1982 spends 40 minutes discussing it in detail. Good work 2Dimm!
Thank you! And yes, this movie is well ahead of its time!
Well thought out. I do have one significant plot hole though. Why would McReady actually perform the blood test if he was the thing? He has everyone hostage and tied up (except for windows) so why bother doing the test? If he was the thing, he would have picked Palmer to be "untied" while everyone else is captive. Then at that point, infection time. Blair is already infected at this point and the only one not in the room. The Thing is not aggressive to its own kind, so why setup a scenario to 'out' Palmer? Why even after that bother to follow through with the testing after torching Windows and Palmer? Even if cellular infection was the original plan, the Thing still goes out of its way to directly infect people even when its a risk. Its not like Windows was disinfecting the blade he used on everyone. If it was Palmer, he could have left a few cells when he cut each and every person, and not even have to perform any 'tests'.
Yes, the blood test, and how carbon-based cells can't survive in alcohol is the biggest hole in the hypotheses of this video.
@@steelcitypicturesbut the thing isn't carbon based
@@pointysidedownthe thing has to be carbon based or else it wouldn't be able to assimilate carbon based lifeforms.
Because it’s the perfect subterfuge to have the humans believe he is also human.
Did you see how “his blood” was drawn?
It’s the “weak point” of the argument, but if he was the thing he was the blood saboteur and he could have set it up. So it hold up to speculation but we need to see the unseen scene to prove or disprove.
Sacrifice your pawns first ,every other thing is a pawn and on the board!!!
The Childs/Macready discussion is pointless, they're both human. During the entire movie the Thing acts the same: it wastes no time in attacking someone as soon as they are alone. Keeping that in mind, for what reason would it decide to stop and have a casual conversation with a human at the end of the movie?
how is it pointless if you're wrong? lol. the scene is deliberately left open but if you use your noggin real hard you can see how macready was administering a test using the scotch, not unlike the opening scene when he gives the scotch to the "cheating bitch" computer.
@@dontcare3 How I'm wrong? I'm just pointing out what has been clearly established in the movie, instead of making stuff up. Childs has no reason to pretend to be human, according to the Thing's behavior throughout the movie and MacReady is obviously not the Thing. Both are human.
Interesting observation.
The thing needs time to assimilate. Thats why childs asks if he was the only one that made it. But when macreedy doesnt answer the question it desides to bide its time, because if someone stumbled on him while asimilataing it would be check mate.
I really like the thought you've put into it. That fact that one can find details that can support you theory speaks to how much thought Carpenter put into the film, and why it's so good.
However, I don't think MacReady is The Thing for one reason: Him trying to kill the Thing monster at the end serves no purpose. If MacReady is the Thing, and he believes the rest of the group is dead, he can simply walk away and let the monster freeze. Thereby ensuring an even greater chance of it spreading once a rescue party shows up. If he thinks Childs is still alive, then leaving the monster alive improves the chances of Childs stumbling across the monster and being assimilated. MacReady could simply have walked way, if he were the thing, and still run into Childs and give him the bottle. MacReady killing the monster is a useless act with no benefit if MacReady is the thing. By burning it, he is lessening the chances of survival for the thing. not improving it. At that point, there's no point to play the chess game anymore.
That said, MacCready MAY have been infected in the film, but it hadn't yet affected and consumed him by the end of the film. His actions against the monster tell me that he's still the human MacCready desperately trying the destroy the thing.
I've always though the gasoline bottle theory was dumb, as you see MacReady lift the bottle up to drink when Childs approaches. I believe that MacReady smiles when Childs drinks is because Childs should know not to share the bottle. MacReady thinks Childs doesn't care about assimilation because he's already the thing.
Finally a bottle theory I agree with. I think everyone who says there’s gas in the bottle are clearly overthinking it as much as this guy in the video. It’s pretty clear to me Child’s should have known not to share a drink. To think The Thing wouldn’t notice or care it’s drinking gasoline is just asinine, if the organism can copy human speech and access memories then it wouldn’t be brain dead enough to not notice drinking gas
@@burn1none Childs IS the thing at the end. Not because of any stupid bottle theory but because he disappears for the last part of the movie and when he comes back he's wearing a gray/white jacket instead of the blue one he had the entire movie.
@@anitaremenarova6662 yeah I agree
***3 SOLID REASONS WHY CHILDS IS THE THING:***
#1 - Childs Jacket Swap
When McReady, Garry and Nauls go to give the Doc the blood test out in the shack, they leave Childs (wearing a Blue jacket) alone to guard the door. There are 3 jackets on hooks on the wall behind Childs with the colours of the jackets being Blue, Green and Beige.
When the Thing kills you, it rips your clothes apart and when you see the same room several minutes later, the jacket colours have been changed to Beige, Green and Green. Note there are also other jackets hanging on the left and right of the room, thus allowing the Thing to make the swap and unknowingly return 2 ‘out of sync' colour jackets to the same wall.
Childs is shown wearing a Green jacket in the final 2-minutes of the film with McReady, not his original Blue jacket when he was last seen guarding the door, hence Childs is the Thing.
#2 - Childs Breathing
The last 2-minutes of dialogue out in the freezing cold between McReady and Childs clearly shows the steam McReady makes as a human when he breathes. But Childs makes no steam at all when he breathes because he is non-human and either has the same temperature inside his body as outside, or is mimicking breathing, hence Childs is the Thing.
NOTE: Some people point to the fact that Bennings had steam from his breath before the fuel drum was kicked on him prior to McReady throwing a flare on him to kill the Bennings Thing earlier in the film, but the Thing hadn’t fully taken over Bennings by that point (remember his hand was massive and still in the process of transforming) which means Bennings was STILL part-human (with possible normal breathing at the time) which could explain this.
#3 - Childs First Drink
When sitting down in the snow at the very end of the film, McReady hears a faint creek of wood behind him and half raises a bottle to his mouth.
The 'drink' McReady passes to Childs is a Molotov cocktail (many Molotov’s were just thrown to set the research station on fire) and after drinking the gasoline, Childs has NO REACTION and makes NO COMMENT. A human would either not drink from the bottle because of the smell, or would spit the gasoline out immediately, but the Thing has no reference to the smell or taste of ANY fluid and as a result 'outs' itself.
McReady smiles, laughs a little to himself about the Thing failing his second test (the first was the blood test) and rests his head down knowing the dire situation he finds himself in and he has been checkmated the same as the computer chess game did to him earlier on in the film, hence Childs is the Thing.
Conclusion:
At the end of the film McReady and the Thing are seated next to each other out in the freezing cold with McReady NOT ‘waiting to see what happens next...', but unfortunately for him, KNOWING ‘what happens next...’.
Better theory than the video.
@@dannythompson1948 - Thank you Brother, I did spend a bit of time formatting the comment...
I was with you up until the Blair-Thing fight. I'm sorry, but Mac's fuck you being a literal response to the Blair-Thing's scream is absurd. Also - if both Blair and Mac are the thing in that scene, and Mac knows everyone else is out in the snowstorm, why would they not team up (or at least just not destroy each other), ESPECIALLY if - as you say - they can communicate.
Any decent chess player would see that that's clearly the best move on the board at that point.
Also - John Carpenter gave his blessing for The Thing video game on ps2 being a sequel to the movie, and in that game Mac shows up in a chopper to rescue the main character. So yeah - according to Carpenter, macready ≠ the thing.
He did speak on each individual entity of the thing having fighting towards its own survival
@@Taz_C_W I know that. But at that point, the better move for each individual (both Mac and Blair-Thing) would have been to stick together. A single chess piece isn't as effective as two. You can pin and defend with two pieces.
Like, my goal in a survival situation is my own personal survival, but I still know that my chances are astronomically improved if I work with another person.
MacReady was never the Thing, that's why the audience sees the film from his point of view
I think that is not giving Carpenter enough credit. He would definitely do something like that just to further confuse his audience in a movie where uncertainty is the biggest factor. Does not mean I believe the theory, but Mac is not free of suspicion just because he is the main character.
Check out The Thing video game. You will be shocked as the video game is considered cannon. Guess who is dead and who is alive surviving hibernation.
I'm wondering if Carpenter knew. He might be the Thing at the end but pretty sure he wasn't up until that point.
Chess has just become movie short hand for ' this protagonist is really clever'
Last night for the first time I watched 2011 Thing then immediately after I watched 1982 Thing. The amount of attention to detail from the makers of 2011 movie is amazing. The CG was so non threatening compared to the Practical effects from 1982 that sends an unnerving feeling down your back. I have a new respect for 2011 because of the well placed lore
If Mac is the Thing then the Thing plays chess poorly and makes nonsensical moves.
Why would Mac need to fool anyone with the blood test? They're already restrained so why not just infect them?
Why fight and kill the Blair thing after dealing with Nauls and Palmer? It serves no purpose as only Childs remains who could be lied to or just jumped pretty easily.
Side Note:
I'm pretty sure the computer didn't cheat. Mac accuses it of cheating and destroys it as the movie's way of revealing an important character trait. He's a sore loser and doesn't except defeat. It comes full circle when he destroys the outpost even though it's a death sentence.
you dont get that destroying the outpost was his way to make sure this creature didnt make it OUT of that outpost?
Mac CANT be the Thing at the beginning, the dog hasnt been taken in yet. So yes, character development.
@@danielgriffith8911 I understand why he destroys the outpost. I also understand that the outpost represents a metaphorical chess board. Mac flips the board over rather than allow his opponent a win. Hed rather they both lose. This is the whole point the computer game scene sets up.
When it assimilates someone it takes their intelligence as well so it would know what alcohol tasted like. It can speak English use our tools and act like the person who was taken. It definitely learns from each host.
All true, what is your point?
Great assessment, bud! Laid out clear assumptions, sound logic, and walked us down the path to your conclusion with unquestionable evidence. I believe that your conclusion would have to assume that Carpenter betrayed the audience with the blood test. Your assumption appears too complex at that point and if accurate, it’s a cheap betrayal by the director - hard to believe as it’s such a pivotal scene. Regardless you’ve got me seriously considering Mac again after a decade! Great analysis and argument! The J&B and Smirnoff might just be the ‘tell’ that we all need - but the inconsistency of Mac not assimilating when he could have (all others were tied up)is either: he ain’t it; or sloppy on director (director isn’t sloppy)… or we are all missing something. Thanks for this assessment! Subbed!
It's an interesting theory, and very well put together. 2 major issues I have with the whole thing:
1: Macready is too anti-Thing to be assimilated. He leads the charge in the battle of good vs evil too often. He could be misleading the group so that they get assimilated instead, if he was truly one of them. The Things look for the survival of themselves primarily as 2Dimm suggested, but they will help each other assimilate as long as possible before they have to burn the bridges.
2: His blood test theory doesn't hold water. It is true that many important events happen off camera, but MacReady's blood not being drawn on camera is just to prevent redundancy. I wouldn't trust Mac if my blood was drawn in the room, while he got to draw it personally on his own. I don't buy it.
I also don't think anyone got infected from the dog licking Benning's glove. I think once the saliva dries it loses any contamination it had, kind of like rabies or other diseases. I do think the whole gasoline theory that a lot of people have is kinda crap, a perfect replica would be able to tell the difference between gasoline and alcohol, that and some other theories like the eye gleam I'm glad he put to rest. Personally, I'm pretty optimistic about the ending, I think the two of them are human. Buuut if one of them is, my money is on Childs. Great video though!
John Carpenters OFFICIAL word on the ending is that ONE of them is the thing... he was recorded saying it...
If it's not in the movie, I don't take it for gospel@@killergameshit4529
The best part of these sorts of arguments is that Carpenter succeeded in creating the paranoia in his audience that the characters experienced. There's probably no right or wrong answer to who is the thing at any point. It's brilliant and we're never really going to know for certain. I've come to the opinion that all the dramatic and violent infections are misdirection on the part of the Thing. I agree that just one cell that gets past your immune system and skin can infect you. It is entirely likely that you may be it without being conscious of it since the Thing itself may not be a sentient species. It's very reasonable that Macready is infected early and all this chasing down of chimeric monsters is a distraction to keep the uninfected from destroying everything. I'll probably change my mind again in a year or two so kudos to the master story teller Carpenter for keeping us talking about his movie four decades later.
You also forgot the whole cut scene where MacReady said "It's Thinging time!" which they took out because he didn't go on to Thing all over the place until after the movie ended.
The first argument here based in reality lmao
Interesting theory however when Macready has everyone tied up there is no reason for gaining trust or trying to manipulate them. He has everyone tied up with the business end of his flamethrower pointed at them, he could've just killed and or infected all of them right then and there, u don't need to gain trust of people u have at ur mercy!
Maybe the creature doesn't want to burn (or even kill in general) bodies, because it needs them for food or for spreading around?
@VortechBand killing and even more so infecting is literally what the thing does! Think about it bro it's ligit purpose is to take over the human race, again if he has everyone tied up there's no reason for manipulation or gaining trust, there's no one left to fool, the mission at hand is accomplished, it wants to take over the whole camp, Macready was not the thing my guy
It's why the movie is so good every theory leads to another conjecture, for instance if mac was the thing ,which btw I do believe he was and he himself didn't know it, why would he expose palmer, but than does one thing know another is the thing
If MacReady was the thing, he wouldn't have blown up the big Thing monster at the end.
Course he would. That monster was never going to blend in.
Not true, Things betray each other. Palmer betrayed Norris by pointing at the spider head.
The part that got me during the film. Is when MacReady cuts everyone's thumb for the blood test. But he doesn't sterilize the scalpel after each cut.😷
They wipe it on jeans. That counts! 😂
The problem is you have to assume that at least one of the humans are paying attention when macready cuts his hand for the blood test. Otherwise someone will call it out. Childs wouldnt of accepted that.
If they can make fake make blood why didnt palmer do it to? They would of found zero things... because the test would be useless.
The fact that macready blows up the final thing means there is no way he is a thing. The things only come into conflict with each other when there are organisms to imitate and trick.
There are other issues with your explanations but these 3 things cannot be ignored.
I don't think McCready is the Thing either, but..... The seeds of doubt have been planted.
I thought it was a stupid idea until the scene in which McCready leaves Blair's hut and the camera focuses on the vodka. This could just have been done as a cool shot. It could also have been JC telling us who the Thing was.
As to the blood test, maybe that Thing was sacrificing itself as part of some plan to take suspicion away from McCready..
However, the thing which makes me still think McCready is human is the battle at the end. By the time he confronts the big one everyone else is gone, there would be no reason to continue with the deception. It's a great theory though, and I have doubts now.
Aaah so mcreedy tried to blow himself up at the end of the movie....absolut bs!!!
You're entitled to your opinion no matter how wrong it is
"MacReady is the thing from the beginning" is mutually incompatible with "We know that Copper and Garry are human because of the blood test," given that Mac also passes the same test. (Not for nothing, but it was awfully stupid of them to use the same scalpel for all of them, huh?)
Everytime I've heard the writers and crew get questioned about these theories, their response is always the same.
"I don't know. We didn't even know when we were making it."
So the true answer, is there is no answer.
It's called a sequel. It was a video game. Confirms Mac was the thing the whole time. His blood didn't wig out because he has carrier status and non of the things transformation abilities.
@@aaronpop0083 What? If I'm remembering correctly.... there is no mention of MacReady in the game aside from the beginning stuff with the tape and then he shows up at the end... nothing confirmed he was a Thing.
@@Evilshtt353 if you remember the plot of the game, they were trying to keep the transformation effects without the consciousness being lost too. Only reason they could do that was because Mac has carrier status. The game takes place 3 months later. Child's body is burnt to the bone. Mac only survived the cold because he's infected. Believe it or not they used to tell stories without having to spoon feed you all the information.
@@aaronpop0083 So no actual information. Got it.
@@Evilshtt353 there's plenty of information but if your that dense you need them to spell it out for you then maybe the thing isn't the type of movie you should consider yourself a fan of.
Carpenter himself said Mac wasn't infected....
nuff said
My problem with this theory is that why didn't Thing MacReady just assimilate the other mfs when they were tied up?
Is incredible how this movie keep us talking even decades after it release. Personally i find these theories every interesting but even more the final atmosphere where there is no more thing threat
but feels kinda the same, the menace never rest so you can not trust anyone.
Major holes in your logic: 1. MacReady made a recording to document what really happened there. An infected MacReady would not have done so as it would want it's existence a secret, not known. 2. An infected MacReady would have contaminated the knife everyone used to cut themselves with for the blood test. The blood would have passed the test, meanwhile the now infected hosts would begin to change but without suspicion because they just passed the blood test. The rest of the movie from then on would be pointless, as he would have already won by simultaneously infecting everyone unknowingly. 3. Following your assertion that it can transmit via saliva, then MacReady would have simply LICKED the silverware, bowls, cups, coffee pot ect in the kitchen and simply waited for everyone to eat breakfast/lunch/dinner. The movie would have been over 100x faster than it played out. Hell, spit one good loogey in the water supply and doom the entire place. He could then simply sit, and play chess for a day, while everyone changed around him. Checkmate.
On top of that, it doesn't make sense that he's both trying to infect everyone, but effectively fights against (and kills) the infected ones.
@@theslay66 I had more (like how he claims MacReady was already infected while he's playing chess, but the infected dog hadn't even made it to their camp yet.) I was just using the criteria he laid out to illustrate his flawed logic.
@@alexandersears8538 He didn't say he was infected while he was playing chess. He said MacReady was established to be a chess player. It's a Chekov's Gun scenario. The Thing replicates the personality of the people it assimilates, meaning it would also get the personality trait of being a chess player, and theoretically the skills to go along with that.
@@stifflered No you didnt hear him. He explicitly said he believes MacReady was already a Thing when he was playing Chess and thats why he poured his drink into the computer. Re-watch. Ill wait.
Good points
the bloodtest literally proves who is and isnt infected tho. therefore mcready is NOT the first infected, let alone infected at all by the time of the test. if he gets infested at all, its not until the end of the movie
But they do not show him on FILM giving blood he has the flamethrower in hand would anyone dare question him if he didn't give blood in front of them ?
Why would Childs (The Thing) not just fry Mac at the end ?
Just to clarify the Thing replicates/assimilates other lifeforms on a Cellular level, not a molecular level, you should use "Cellular" in place of the term "Molecular"
I always thought the whole point of the end is that neither of them are infected, but they're still going to die out there because they each think the other is the thing. They survived the monster but it still killed them by killing their ability to trust each other.
I like this ending. But in my follow up I say that an ending where they are both the thing and still don't trust eachother is more poetic. The alien wins but the human paranoia also won
I do think this is a compelling argument, but I feel like there's still a lot of evidence to it not being MacReady.
Firstly, I do think it's great that there's so many arguments that can be made to point out how MacReady is suspicious, but, at the same time, it's important to remember that EVERY character has a lot of evidence behind their actions. The issue with this theory is, it's still never addressed *why* MacReady betrayed the other Thing forms, 'nor does it explain why it cooperated with others and strategized/kept it's cool, and why it decided to give a bottle to Childs instead of assimilating him directly; something we clearly see can happen when Dr. Blair did the funny face grab.
After all, the reason why they torched the research base was *because* the humans were losing, and they wanted to stop it's spread. It doesn't make sense why MacReady Thing would go out of it's way to sabotage their efforts when the other Things were all cooperating in some way. MacReady Thing essentially turned what was a slam dunk victory into a defeat, for no discernible reason.
I don't know, that just doesn't quite add up to me.
I was about to say this but you have done a great job so yee I feel the same
@@luxj.9451 1). Right, but that's what all the other Things were doing, too, all the way back to the Dog itself at the very beginning of the movie, so that isn't really a trait unique to MacReady himself. Every other Thing, including Blair, only got hyper aggressive once they were cornered. MacReady had numerous examples of him being cornered yet he never did anything the other Things did, which is odd, because they're all on the same page, with a similar intelligence to one another.
2). Again.... That doesn't explain why he decided to have it be JUST him. He could've assimilated other characters and had multiple bodies. He didn't have to be deceptive to the people AT the base once the Things had already won, because there was no outside communication. They're all shapeshifters after all, and they could have easily had multiple bodies play dead. They already did it in the movie during the autopsy scene that resulted in biting off the arms of that one doctor. There was numerous points where he could have assimilated other people, have them become Things, and have them all be in on it for the long con, too. That's what the Things WERE doing, but if MacReady was the Thing, he betrayed his Thing Team and gave themselves less hosts to infect the rest of the world with, killing all other Things and having himself be the only host allowed. He explicitly put him and his Thing Team at a disadvantage.
(Also fun fact, there actually are animals that can be woken up from being frozen in a Tundra! The Bdelloid Rotifer is one, which was woken up after being frozen in ice for thousands of years! Tardigrades also can. Wood Frogs also hibernate by quite literally freezing through the Winter, only to wake up once the temperatures rise and the frogs thaw out!)
3). Well, remember, he was trying to escape because he had nothing else to do. Throughout the movie he tried deceiving them into letting him out of his cabin numerous times. Once they just sorta left him in the shed to die, he started formulating an escape plan and started creating a shuttle or craft to bust out of there. He WOULD have been assimilating others if he was allowed to freely roam the base, which was what he was wanting.
So, to put it another way, if the MacReady Thing's end-game was to play the long con and escape, like what you thought Blair's was, he could've just froze himself near MacReady's cabin when they already thought MacReady was dead, and waited for the long con. Everyone was already going to die at that point. So there was no reason for MacReady to go back and kill everyone including the other Things through exceptional deception. All the other Things were waiting out the storm and letting all the humans die themselves, too. Like with the huge creature at the end not revealing itself until MacReady decided to kill it (for some reason). If they were prepping for the long con, MacReady literally ruined that plan. So it just doesn't make much sense to me why this would be the case.
Suspicion. If the base remained intact, would he be carefully observed, blood tested, studied closely and monitored when a rescue team arrives? What if he blends in, appears to require medical attention, and rejects the mutant versions as hostile to the ultimate goal - assimilating the world? Notice how the Things were still human in appearance. They mimic their hosts down to the heart conditions. So too, the Thing mimics the host’s attitude. “If you do not appear human, and stay human, then I will destroy you.” The Thing mimics MacReady’s ideas and rejects the mutant’s collective philosophical disposition. Thereby, hiding as a Thing without mutating. You can see this in blood test. Completely human until dead giveaway. Then transforms into a mutant.
@@shaynefowley5689 If a rescue team WAS arriving, then, yes, that would make sense, but the issue is that the communication lines were cut entirely, and the whole point of destroying the base was so that the Things couldn't escape and cause more problems. Blowing up the base actively hindered the plans of The Thing, not helped them. Especially considering he also sabotaged all the different forms of Thing Escape that were occurring. For example, why did he kill the doctor thing and prevent him from escaping by destroying his craft, instead of teaming up against one of the last humans with the Doctor in a 2v1? Also, after blowing up the base, why didn't the Thing just immediately assimilate or kill Child's? They were all alone after all, so if MacReady was the thing, there was no reason to be concealing his Thingness anymore. It just doesn't make sense as to why he would be a Thing unless he was deliberately self sabotaging.
Also, I don't necessarily think they inherit the personalities and ideals of their hosts. I think they LEARN what their host thinks and the way that they talk, but they don't actually inherit their personalities. Every single character that was confirmed to be a Thing, including the Dog, was very noticeably strange and off-putting when they were a Thing. MacReady doesn't really do anything like that.
@@xweert711 what is Childs holding in his hands at the end of the movie? If The Thing survives the Norwegian camp, what are the chances a rescue team will investigate their camp? And if a team arrives, do you want them to know how the process works? This is why MacReady erases the recordings. The Thing realizes it cannot leave any clues.
If MacReady was The Thing he would not have made the recording in his personal tape log lamenting his situation.
Here's two things you can't debunk due to them both being a canon to the movie. One) The Thing comics from 1991 was a continuation of the 1982 movie where MacReady and Childs survives the events of the first movie but so does the thing. The Comics follows them trying to take it down with a group of soldiers in first part, second part follows the men trying take it down and finally when they landed in Chile, at some point Childs is infected and trying to frame MacReady. There was another spin off where MacReady is still hunting down the Thing down. The 2) is the Video Game, where you're playing a Special Force Soldier trying to figure out what happened at the outpost. You find the frozen body of Childs but no MacReady. I think the game was trying use this as a Red Herring in the beginning. Towards the end of game, MacReady does appear and not infected while he pilots the Helicopter while you finally kill the Thing. Either way. At point the Comics were considered the True Sequel to the movie, making both Childs and MacReady towards the end of the movie Humans. It was only later in the mini series comics was Childs turned into a Thing. The Current and Accepted Sequel even by Mr. Carpenter himself where Childs froze to death and MacReady helping the Player Character finally finish off the Thing. You either didn't do the research or you didn't want to because it'd disprove your theory but you really didn't prove anything in the end. Nice Video though.
seems feasible that this could've been the way carpenter intended it to end but the studio got involved and made him change the ending. further works of 'canon' not written by the author of the original short story nor Lancaster, but greenlit by some universal executive doesn't necessarily mean the movie wasn't shot to hint at MacReady being The Thing as alluded to in this video. if there's no Kurt Russell there's no potential for a hit sequel.
No. Fun theory though.
This is one of the reasons why this is such a great movie. It's so tight and yet so loose, people can come up with the craziest theories. The main problem with your theory is that many of MacReady's actions don't make sense if he's the Thing from the start. But still a fun theory.
Side note, I have always hated the J&B gas theory. The thing can talk. Mimic accents. It can do things that make it seem like it has the ability to assimilate knowledge to at least a limited degree. So it would react if it drank gas. And none of that even accounts for just how harsh drinking gas would be. The Thing isn't immune to pain. The fumes and the chemicals burning would make him react. The gas in the bottle theory has always been bad.
Hmm...I don't know, Man. There's a bit of a hitch in your theory about how McCready gets infected from the bottle. Like you said, the moment the dog licks his glove and he subsequently gets shot, can't be the moment of initial infection for Bennings. Because we see Bennings get attacked and absorbed by the creature later in the film. It also couldn't have been the moment McCready got infected from the bottle. Or that the bottle got contaminated. Keep in mind that, when Bennings gets shot, the exact same glove the dog licked is the one he puts to his open bullet wound in that moment. McCready then rushes over to him, and hands him the bottle of liquor. If there weren't enough alien salivary cells on Bennings' glove to infect him when he puts it to an OPEN BULLET WOUND, then why should we think there'd be enough to left on the bottle to infect McCready when he drinks from it? The Thing wouldn't have needed to attack Bennings later in the film, if it got him when the dog licked his hand. Because it would've infected Bennings the moment he put his contaminated hand to his bleeding leg.
Edit: Also, now that I think about it...Due to the creature's visceral reaction when it comes into contact with extreme heat or fire, and all of the creature's cells reacting that way no matter how far away they are from one another, there's no way McCready could've been the Thing and also been goin' around burning all the infected with the flamethrower. Hell, if he got infected that early in the movie, there's no way his body wouldn't have reacted during the blood test.
I thought that as well. Good point.
If MacCready was the thing there never would have been a blood test. There would have been a proposed blood test, then everyone tied to a chair, then McCready/Thing would have killed everyone, movie over, theory debunked!
If the PS2 game is cannon McCready is human ,child's died
If MacReady was the thing, why would he fight the thing, especially at the end of the movie?
I am the outlier, i was scrolling really fast and caught a glimpse of the thumbnail and was like “was that The Thing?” and by God i was right
No because Macready was talking to Fukes when Windows dropped the keys so he couldn’t have grab the keys. And I wanted to see more analysis on the scene when the dog entered the mystery room and see if there could be line ups that would prove whose room it was. Great theory but flawed. Plus John Carpenter wouldn’t make it so obvious using Macreads clothes. He would have wanted us to go straight to that idea and then prove us wrong.
Before I see the video I should tell you that almost nothing macready does benefits the thing, why would he burn Palmer thing if he could just let him assimilate everyone else? Why would he kill Blair-Gary-nauls-thing if he was a thing? And his blood disappearing really means nothing, as it could just be a continuity error like childs coats being changed. But I think this is a nice video to watch, and you deserve a lot more views for this because it can mark a pretty good discussion
Thank you! I'll look into that point also. Love the idea!
my answer wouldbbe it's playing the long game. technically ever cell of the thing is the thing so it was willing to lose a few "limbs" in the process as a diversion to ensure it makes it in the long run. i'm not saying this theory is exactly what happened, it's just a fun thought experiment to me, but that's the answer to that question.
It was never explained to the audience or the characters how 'The Thing' thinks; just how it assimilates and only that. It is entirely possible there is one 'main Thing' and the rest are just runoff/offspring of sort. Everyone it showed that blatantly got infected started to work on a more basic level of cognition, and also independent of each other. There's an old trope that the most dangerous vampire (the head one) hides in plain sight, and is the person you least suspect. Inspiration could have been drawn from that, and it would have been genius to create an army of derpy soldiers, just to inevitably help kill them and win favor with the survivors in hopes of being rescued and brought back to civilization.
I'm still on the fence about this theory, but it's a fun mental exercise. The biggest thing winning me over is how the camera really focuses on MacReady giving people alcohol, like that's supposed to be important for some reason.
this, i actually think its totally what happened tho, dimm really persuaded me on that, other will believe in other theories thats fine.@@horseheadkid
I'm still of the opinion that neither of them are the thing and they're just two dudes sitting and freezing to death together
Of all the people in the movie you knew MacReady was never a Thing. Never. From start to finish of the film you could be sure he was human. If he was a Thing he had multiple instances where he would have won. The blood scene where he tied everyone up except for Windows. In just that scene he could have wiped everyone out if he was a Thing. They were all tied up and he could have just grabbed Windows first.
It's a game of chess bro
@@UniuleExactly a game of chess & bros explanation of everyone being tied up would have been a check-mate 🤙
I mean, this theory takes a whole bunch of assumptions that all need to be correct in order to work, while Childs being the thing at the end only takes one single assumption... But anyway.
MacReady could have done something to trick us with his blood off-screen, but he also could have NOT done anything to trick us off-screen. His blood passing the test is the biggest problem with this theory, and the only "evidence" there is for it is just shrugging and saying, 'Well, you can't prove something DIDN'T happen off-screen'. The rest of the points as to why you think he's the thing are pretty sound, but this one here is arguable the most important one--the one where the movie itself is showing us "Hey look here's proof he's not the thing"--and you have a complete lack of evidence against it.
Also, I really do feel that our introduction to MacReady playing chess makes much more sense the other way around, with MacReady foreshadowing himself and the chess game foreshadowing the thing. MacReady isn't just playing chess, he's playing chess against a *computer*--he's playing a game where the whole point is that's impossible to win--and yet despite knowing this he'd rather just destroy the computer than let it win. This perfectly foreshadows his character in the finale, where he explicitly points out to the other remaining characters that there's no more getting out of this alive--the game they're playing is impossible to win--so the only option they have left is to blow up and burn down the entire "board". And the last scene we get, MacReady hands Childs the bottle of the same scotch he was drinking at the beginning, and Childs drinks some. Childs is the "computer" that MacReady couldn't beat and poured the scotch into.
It's a fun theory. My question is if he was the thing, why didn't he shoot Windows and torch everyone when they were tied up and helpless during the blood test scene.
or even suggest the blood test at all. it was all mccready's idea that he got when they torch fuchs
At the beginning, the husky "tries" to lick Bennings gloved hand, but as we find out later, it needs to go through clothing and in the beginning, it looks like it only manages to lick the front of his glove - unable to get to his palm, so it doesn't connect with the bottle. The devil is in the detail.
At 1::26::43, we see Childs at the door and window of the main entrance and ordered to look out for Blair. The coats are in this order from left to right:
Navy blue
Dark green
Olive green
Beige
Three pairs of boots, all standing straight, first pair pointing inwards towards the wooden bench.
At 1::29::34, Childs has left the room and left the door wide open. Presumably the Blair Thing took him.
The coats are in this order from left to right:
Olive green
Dark green
Dark green
Beige
What happened to the navy blue coat and why was the olive green switched with the dark green coat?
Three pairs of boots, first pair facing outwards away from the wooden bench, middle pair has one boot knocked over. Looks like a scuffle has occurred and been hastily corrected.
At 1::29::51, we see Nauls watch what looks like Childs leave the main entrance for no reason and wander into the darkness. Then the generator cuts out. Childs has definitely been infected and the Blair Thing that infected him has cut the power from the generator which was to the left of the main entrance, down a flight of stairs to a grey door.
At the end of the movie, only Childs and MacReady make it out alive, but on or off set, we see no concrete evidence that MacReady is the Thing, just as there is no evidence that the scotch whiskey is petrol or that the Thing doesn't exhale hot air. We can only work with what Carpenter has shown us.
I was ready to believe you but there's one thing that kinda goes against your theory grain. Macready all alone and he begins a tape recorder account of what's been happening. What would be the point of Macready/Thing doing that? Everything else you pointed out makes too much sense but there is that.
Well, the more important factor is if he is the thing, then why in the hell is the “Macready Thing” protecting his team members?
It would be best to either A, just in the helicopter and head out to start working on turning the general public.
Or B, stay off camera for long extended points in time finishing up working on its ship and leave heading out to another world with living beings and start infecting them then it’s rinse, wash, and repeat afterwards.
Because he can manipulate you thru his recordings from his perception (him being the thing )
Which could also possibly lead anyone who finds the recordings ..to max ready aka the thing .
Good video. I like how the information is organized, and I find the arguments around the bottles really persuasive. However, the chess scene actually proves the opposite of what's stated in the video. If McCreedy was a good tactical thinker, and one that thinks ahead, he wouldn't have lost. It also reveals some details about his character: Firstly, he can't admit when he makes a mistake--instead of accepting that he made some disadvantageous moves, he claims the computer "cheated" (which a computer cannot do, unless programmed to do so...which it would not have been). Secondly, it shows that he can't accept defeat, that he'd rather destroy the game than lose. The point of the scene wasn't to show us he's smart, but to show us that if he can't win, he'll do everything in his power to make sure his opponent can't win either--that he'll choose a stalemate over defeat...foreshadowing the moment where he's sitting with Childs and gives him the bottle.
Yea baby!!!!!!
The point of the scene with MacReady shorting out the computer is meant to show that he does not "play by the rules". He's not a tactical genius, that's why he lost to the computer. The Thing is likely much smarter than MacReady (having assimilated multiple scientists), but MacReady thinks outside the box and can cheat.
Wait a minute, the whole point of that scene was that the computer won through an impossible move. The computer cheats and that instigates Mac's next move.
I have posted on another comment about this but it foreshadows his stubborness and competitiveness. He does like to lose and killed the pc at the cost of his own pleasure so he beat it and yes i hadnt thought of ou tof the box thinking too.
At the end he without hesitation is going to sacrifice all of them to make sure he knows he has won and beaten the thing. Stubbornness and radical thinking saves the day
I was not MacReady for this
Why did this kill me 🤣
(*≧▽≦)ﾉｼ))
Wakka Wakka
You win the internet today
Sigh.
OK that was kinda funny.
The film's cinematographer Dean Cundey explained that the light in the eyes distinction was ONLY used for the blood testing scene, so it doesn't apply to the dog or the grotesque Norris-assimilated version of the thing.
Exactly. True fans know these things, lol.
Childs is The Thing, MacReady is not. From start to finish of the movie, The Things only purpose in existence is to survive. In the final scene, MacReady has given up &completely accepts his fate that he will not survive. Literally not a trait The Thing possesses
Childs isnt the thing
i agree its not mac but childs is questionable for me
Things can survive being frozen. So the argument he gave in and accepted freezing makes less sense if he is a human and more sense if he is a thing thats ready to go into hibernation.
Good case, better than gasoline in the bottle the thing obviously has the persons memories which means it would know smells and taste
Another point you can make regarding MacCready thing turning on Blair thing. While Blair thing is pissed and confused why he's being turned on you could see it like chess when you would sacrifice a piece in order to make sure that the king stays out of check. In both scenarios, you have to make an assumption on how to make sure your king is alive for the next move and MacCready thing would have made the right call, since had he and Blair thing teamed up, Childs, who still had a flamethrower, would have took them both out.
Edit: so I went and watched the movie again with this theory in mind and found an example that supports this. Once they all suspect MacCready to be assimilated everyone wants to lock him out in the snow. That is all except for Palmer who is more than likely assimilate at this point. In fact he's the most eager to open the door and blast MacCready. What better way to draw attention away from yourself than to be so human you take out your own kind
thats deep man.....at that point the Thing is playing chess against its own species......damn.
@@Yousaf_Yunes It has to survive, by any means. :O
I actually was thinking the same thing, he had to sacrifice his own kind so he could continue his ruse and as long as one thing survives then the species can easily repopulate.
MacReady litterally tests his own blood too?????
The theory is contingent on Mac swapping labels and getting new blood. The main problem i see with the theory is thing would be undermining itself by not working with Blair-thing to spread.
In all seriousness this is a great video, super funny and totally identify with The Thing being the favourite child. I love this theory , and how passionately you presented it lol
Thank you! I really appreciate that!
If the Thing assimilated MacReady through the J&B bottle and molecular transfer, and not through a physical attack like it did Bennings, why would it be necessary for MacReady's clothing to be shredded and tattered? The Thing rips off the clothes during assimiliation because it can't replicate them. But if the process of assimiliation is internal and slower, why would the clothing be damaged? I actually think finding MacReady's torn jumpsuit and patch is a mark against your theory.
But if the thing can molecularly assimilate to you, why would McCready‘s clothes be off if he was assimilated from the jump microscopically? This movie is ending was meant to be ambiguous. There is no right or wrong.
The one weird thing that makes me agree with this is what MaCready said at the end of the movie...
"Lets just wait here a while and see what happens"
Well... him and Childs will freeze, which is exactly what The Thing wanted...
The theory that McCready is the Thing is at least sound. All you need is means and motive. He interacted with all the relevant characters and used a means of delivering the infection.
If he is the Thing, and any Thing had access to the blood, then all the samples are suspect and the scene provides no actionable or firm evidence. Which throws open a lot of theories, to be fair.
I also like the idea that every scene is intentional from a talented director. Putting the bottle in the opening scene all the way to the final scene is just about so obvious that we all wrote it off as product placement and didnt think twice about it.
The reality is too much happens off screen and nothing is for sure, which just again reinforces that the Thing could be any one or all of the characters at any point in time and the mystery truly is just subjective. Its not even sure that a Thing would know another Thing if it saw one and all of them could have been the Thing playing the game out to the end as a completely selfish act of singular survival just to be sure.
I noticed the possible symbolism of the bottles but never articulated it like you have here. Good job.
Going to point out facts here. We actually don't know how the thing turns people into the thing because it is done off screen. The Thing is an intelligent being that cheats like the computer was the foreshadowing. If the thing can easily pass its genetics through saliva, it would of effected everyone easily. So that means that the body needs to be dead to turn or another alternative way to do so. This is why the thing is being strategic throughout the movie. Now if you pay attention to the personality changes before and after they become the thing shows that they are the thing. Throughout the movie Macready personality doesn't change and he stays true to himself.
It's so wild that the scene where Fucs says they should prepare their own meals and eat only from cans didn't stand out to me at all. Until now. Your theory, as far as I'm concerned, was proven at that moment! I have the DVD of the movie and the next time I watch it I'll be thinking of it quite differently.
P.S. You are an adorable nut! Every time you went off script, like after drinking the J&B, you were charming as F_CK and funny too! Nice job.
Thank you very much! And yeah, with the idea of Mac being the thing, it kind of makes it a whole new movie when watching it with that in mind! I hope you enjoy the movie even more now!
During the blood test, MacReady destroyed Palmer, burned Windows, and had everyone else tied up. If MacReady was the Thing, don't you think he would of infected the three people tied up? After that he wins!!!!!! But nooooooooooooooooo. Mac is human and continues the blood test. DEBUNKED!!!!!!!!!
Thats assuming that the McCready thing is the smartest thing and and saw the other things as inferior. Who's to say the thing is just one entity with a singular personality. How did it crash land to begin with, was there mutiny amongst the things. Is the movie about a game of chess between the things, the humans are just the pawns????? Think... think... think...
Okay. So, He gets Nolls up to his shack, alone, doesn't try to assimilate him. Didn't dispose of the evidence where as someone else might have planted it too frame him, makes a lot more sense.
And of course all the trouble Mac goes through in order to prevent the thing from escaping makes no sense. Now you have this interesting theory that he was infected right from the get go? Maybe? The dog/licked gloves plunged into the snow pretty quickly, can't tell me one thing is fine and the other doesn't wash it but okay moving on..
Mac goes with Doc on a chopper flight too the Norwegian base at this time Mac is already infected right? Doesn't infect Copper whilst they are alone, instead brings back more corpses to be examined, if he did the due diligence, he'd have infected Copper at the base, came back with NO evidence of what might've happened and everyone on base would be non the wiser. - Thus guaranteeing 3 Thing monsters on base with everyone else completely unaware of them, their existence etc, waiting out the Storm nice and warm.
Sorry man I appreciate the effort on this one but it doesn't hold water.
Blair infected himself on camera while investigating the alien corpse. He touched it with a pencil then touched that same pencil to his mouth.
There is an argument to be made that Blair and McCready were competing to infect the others throughout the movie and that the Smirnoff bottle was a test to confirm that Blair was the other Thing.
@@corymorse4271 Exactly what I was thinking! I think the dog was a natural leader, and the only other natural leader was McCready, and they both had opposing ideas of how to reach their end-goal, infecting the world.
So used to theories that I can immediately shoot down, thanks for one that I actually can't! It also seems so obvious the way you break it down! The Blair and Fuchs evidence along w/the seemingly obvious "red herring" of his ripped long johns and Mac's blood sample being taken off screen....it all makes perfect sense!
Childs has a jacket change after he takes off in the snow and cones back.
Interesting theory I've never considered. A few more points to support your theory after watching the film again:
1. The scene before Mac goes and talks with Fuchs, he makes the audio recording. You could argue that he was doing this recording to give himself credibility if someone else discovers the outpost. Typically in movies or video games, people record audio logs as their final sign-off just before doing something that may result in them getting killed (like Mac getting caught killing Fuchs). In the recording, he talks about the shredded clothes with the name missing, saying "it could be anybody. Nobody trusts anyone now". He then thinks about it and re-records the message at this part saying vaguely "i've done everything I can". Maybe him saying this is forecasting that he knows he'll be the last man standing and doesn't want to raise suspicion about everyone else being dead or missing. If he left the recording as "it could be anybody's", that means that he himself could have been the Thing and could draw suspicion to him when he realizes he may have left evidence behind, hence why he deleted it. With his sign-off, he says "RJ MacReady, Helicopter Pilot". This seems unnatural. If this is an official, government research outpost, others would know whose stationed there, and a simple "MacReady, out." would have been sufficient to identify himself in a recording. It's almost as if the Thing was taking what evidence they found to try to build rapport and read what was on the tag ("RJ MacReady") and also the equipment he had in his shack to know he was the pilot and then repeated it.
2. Right after the recording scene, Mac looks around before entering Fuch's office, making sure no one saw him enter. Fuchs clutches his flask when Mac enters and it is also shown in a close-up just before the power goes out, possibly the director's intention to emphasize how paranoid Fuchs was about sharing any drinks and why Mac had to get rid of him. OR another theory is that Fuchs was secretly working on a chemical in the flask that could kill the Thing or possibly an antidote to prevent assimilation. In which case would explain why he was so protective of it and even more reason why Mac wanted to get rid of him.
3. The scene when Nauls, Windows, and MacReady go to search for Fuchs, they are nearly back in the station when Windows notices Fuchs' dead body. You can see MacReady looking around behind them as Windows walks up to the body, probably to make sure no one else is watching. It's also at this point Mac "notices" the light is on in his station. Maybe at this point he realizes it's an opportunity to try to isolate Nauls and assimilate another. Why else would Mac draw attention to his shack and want someone to go with him if he knew his name tag or other evidence was left there? Or maybe he realized that he left the light on by mistake and by bringing someone with him to check it out raises less suspicion. He sends Windows back inside because he wouldn't be able to infect both at the same time. Obviously, the assimilation did not work, as Nauls returns with the clothing with Mac's name. It's only after this time that Mac begins acting paranoid with the dynamite and flamethrower, accusing everyone else of being the Thing, assuming because he knows he was caught.
4. This theory is reaching a bit more, but the blood test scene. They know fire will kill the Thing, but Mac seems confident that his test will work and tells everyone that the Thing will interact with a "hot needle" to survive and will reveal itself. He doesn't make it sound like it's just a wild theory, but knows that it's going to work - how would he know this unless he was the Thing? If it were just a theory, you'd think they would hold a blow torch to the blood to try to replicate it. But his confidence here with just the hot wire is telling. Also, another stretch of a theory, but maybe Mac's flamethrower wasn't really having a "malfunction" and he wanted to wait and see if the thing would quickly assimilate everyone so he held off on getting it going. When he sees that the Thing is taking a while to transform, he then decides to activate it, as if he remained idle the whole time, people would be even more suspicious of how he was quick to shoot his colleague moments earlier but then held off on killing the Thing. The reason for the test is to 1, show everyone he's "not the thing" and take attention away from him, and 2, use the opportunity to summon the Thing to take over others since they were all tied down in a closed room (remember how the dog tried to assimilate all the other dogs when they were locked in a room together?).
Another thing I noticed - when the group chases down Bennings in the snow and catches him morphing, he focuses his attention on Mac the entire time. The Thing howls and stares directly at him, almost like a cry for help from the creature towards Mac.
I was really impressed with this. I'm not certain I agree, but I think you make a very compelling argument. And the focus on the use of the bottle throughout the film seems very relevant. Personally, I believe it is intentional by Carpenter for the ending to be ambiguous, and even for these hints and red herrings to be found without clear answer. But this is a very strong theory that even many other well established and thoughtful critics and fans have missed (looking at Rob Ager/Collative Learning).
I think it's telling how ready people are to view one or the other of the two survivors as the Thing.... when in fact, there are actually 4 possible endings, each dependent on the viewer's assumptions and prejudices. Childs could be the thing, or Macready could be... OR both of them could be uninfected, or perhaps by the end with that bottle, both are infected. The paranoia and uncertainty, and the mistrust of our fellow human, that's the point.
“Are you telling me that The Thing movie poster is R.J. MacReady is The Thing and we didn’t think about it the entire time?”
_”Yes and I’m tired of pretending it’s not.”_
Crazy of you to bring that up
This whole debate on childs and mac is kinda missing the forest for the trees. They were at odds for the whole movie and in the end, they have to accept they’re going to die with someone they are resentful and suspicious of. It doesn’t really matter if one of them is the thing.
the heart of the matter. you get it.
16:41 MacReady tests his own blood and it is shown that he's not a Thing, just as everyone else is tested. So you have to either dismiss the blood test or come up with some other way to claim MacReady was the Thing. Now, the whole point of the ending of the film, is for you to not know who is the Thing or if there even is still a Thing left. Carpenter is only angered when people ask who is the Thing at the end of the film, and there are certain moments in the film designed to throw you off and make you think something that isn't true.
Early on, when the dog first goes into a person's room, we see a shadow, and the shadow looks similar to two different people but mainly it looks like Windows. The person actually sitting there wasn't one of the actors, it was a stage hand and was wearing a coat to make their shadow look like it might be one of the characters, even though it's not. MacReady was not a Thing at any point before the large explosion and the ending scene of the film. After that, it doesn't matter, you're left to wonder but never really know.
One possible ending for the film, was a scene during the day with the camp burned down and destroyed, and then you see a dog running away from the camp, ending the film just as it began. With the Thing surviving and running through the snow, trying to find a way to escape Antarctica.
There was a video that goes over the infection timeline. It showed the shadow in detail and even if it was none of the acters it looks like Norris (the part sticking out at the neck is the most telling part).
A lot of these rebuttals I agree with and some I don’t, but the biggest thing for me is the thing attacking itself/its own kind. That doesn’t make sense for it to do, so why would Macready be the one to come up with the blood test and then force the blood test on everyone while being infected KNOWING it would expose Palmer. In addition, why would Macready blow up the Blair Nauls thing at the end when it’s the one that infected Blair to begin with? Again, the only time we see the thing attack itself or other things is if you assume Macready is the thing, in which it flamethrowers a few of them. Even when it’s forced into a situation like Palmer was, he didn’t help kill Norris or anything, he just played along in being shocked.
One other quick thing about the blood test, logically you could argue that if everyone gave blood in view of everybody then they would point out that Macready had to do so as well. And if you want to argue that the thing could retract its cells from the blood being taken or something, then you would have to say that Palmer could have and should have as well. These things in addition to other comments I feel make this theory impossible but still a fun one nonetheless. Excited to see your response!
The reason why I think Mac isn't the thing is cause he laughs. he shows emotion, everyone is very animated until they are assimilated. They all have a personality, after they are just kind of dulled down.
This has been well documented in the movie as each person has a loud or more beaming personality and once infected their personality is duller and more sedated like. They don't remain loud or boisterous. Look at Windows for example and Dr. Blair becomes very sullen and recluse.
A new one I thought that debunks the theory of Macgready being the thing (especially from the beginning) is he had them all tied up for the test except for windows. The thing could've easily assimilated windows in a 1v1 because windows is the weakest one there. I think the movie makes a point to show windows is kinda the wimpy guy. He literally freezes up and it gets him killed. He wouldn't know what hit him if he was 1v1 with Macgready. macgready would then assimilate the other 3 that are tied up and aren't already assimilated. Then the thing would've won because at this point, blaire is already the thing. Macgready wouldn't even need the blood test if he were the thing, he already had them all tied up and at him mercy lol.
I gotta be honest, if he was the thing it makes the movie 100x better.
Exactly
@@joshsmith9572 especially if you keep the “sequel” in mind. That being the video game adaptation of the thing. It actually was really good and it’s ending is even better just like this with this theory in mind, in fact I think if anything it honestly gives it merit as well. I don’t wanna go into spoilers but if you play it or look it up you will see what I mean.
The fact that you’re so CONFIDENTLY wrong is disconcerting.
🤣🤣🤣
yeah, theres actual sequel material that shows this is wrong. i dont even need to watch the video thanks to the title LOL
He's indisputably infected from the dog spit glove. It also explains everything else. Also Carpenter had nothing to do with the "sequel" comic books lol
@@joshsmith9572 nope. Not infected. The ending is confirmed several times over. They were two humans waiting to die in the cold.
He's not wrong. The video game is the canonical sequel and confirms that Mac was the thing the whole time.