I'm a huge fan of John Carpenter's The Thing. I've seen the movie more times than I can remember, played through the game another dozen or so times, watched the entirety of 1951's The Thing From Another World just for comparison's sake, and even, for a time, participated in the Outpost 31 forum where we discussed, among other things, the precise order in which the members of the U. S. research station became infected/assimilated by the eponymous alien. In fact, the only piece of The Thing-related media that I've never been exposed to is the original novella Who Goes There? by John W. Campbell Jr. So I'm extremely overqualified to be reviewing the new prequel to The Thing, which is obnoxiously also titled The Thing because Kami forbid we avoid confusion when discussing the two films. From this point on I'm just going to refer to the new movie as The Thing and the old one as the original, for clarity's sake.

Being a fan, you know that this review is going to go one of two ways: either I'll love the film in spite of any glaring faults it may have, or I'll hate it for failing to live up to the original. Contrary to any impression you may have from reading anything else I've done on this site, I'm actually a very positive person who's willing to give anything a chance to stand on its own merit. Even when I reviewed Epic Mickey, Aliens vs. Predator and MadWorld, I was optimistic enough about each game to actually purchase and play it for myself before deciding it was shit. So, I like to think that I have a fairly objective viewpoint when I approach anything for review, and I'll try to keep that up as I discuss The Thing.

First of all, this is not a remake. It's a prequel covering the events at the Norwegian base in Antarctica leading up to the original film. Some people have called it unnecessary, a cash-in or have even claimed that it can't do anything that the original hasn't done already. This would be similar to claiming that the Star Wars prequels were totally unnecessary as well, but I have to argue that they could have still added something substantial to the series if they weren't fine-kernelled shit from the asshole of George Lucas himself. But, even then, we still got a couple of great new characters in Qui-Gon Jinn, Mace Windu and Darth Maul, and even Kit Fisto and Plo Koon get pretty good treatment in the Clone Wars animated series.

The Thing, on the other hand, is a very well done movie and even a capable horror film, so we can eliminate part of the unnecessary sequelitis claims right there. Now, unlike most of the reviews I've seen and read so far, I'm actually going to justify my claims before moving on, because that's how a critique actually works. If more "journalists" actually had experience with critical analysis, perhaps online reviews wouldn't be the fucking joke that they are.

The film's pacing is great, sufficiently establishing the setting and cast before jumping into the action, and even when the action starts it's not a continuous mess of shaking camera angles that run for the remainder of the film. The tempo always slows down enough for the audience to catch its breath before beginning the next standoff or chase.

The characterisation is another facet that I've seen attacked, again without any explanation to back it up. One reviewer complained that he couldn't even remember each of the characters' names by the end of the film, and that seems fair. I can name every single character from the original film by heart, so clearly they must have been better represented. Granted, I've seen it roughly seven thousand times, so maybe that reasoning is bullshit.

You're starting off with a cast of about a dozen characters and, believe it or not, it's actually bad writing to shoehorn in everybody's name if you can't work it in naturally. There was a VHS/laserdisc release of the original film that actually had a voiceover that introduced each member of the U. S. research team, but you probably didn't know that because it was intelligently cut for subsequent releases. The prequel could have done something similar, or even had each scientist step forward and give a little soliloquy about themselves, but that would have been stupid. I'd rather go the entire film without learning a character's name than have it forced into a conversation just so that I can say "Oh, no! Not Jonathan!" when someone dies.

The original film didn't spend much time on any of the characters other than MacReady before the alien revealed itself and started fucking shit up all over the base, so all you get to see of them is how they react under stress. Contrary to that, The Thing actually takes the time to establish Sander as a misogynist, Carter as a basketball fan and Kate as a woman who knows nothing about sports. Can anyone tell me anything about Childs from the original film other than that he's black and kind of a dick?

Not to say that Keith David is kind of a dick, also, but he might be.

If it sounds like I'm spending too much of this review justifying the film's existence, it's because that's exactly what is being attacked by other critics. If you hear one honest complaint about The Thing, I can guarantee that it's been prefaced by the critic's view of how the prequel never should have been made in the first place. It's like they're personally offended that The Thing exists! Topless Robot author Rob Bricken wrote off the entire movie based on the trailers alone because he saw CGI monsters in them instead of puppets. I'm sorry to break it to everyone, but the puppets, makeup and animatronics in the original were all shit, even for their time. The aliens in the Star Wars cantina were more believable, but that doesn't actually matter because it's the context that the creatures are in that's important.

One major benefit to using CGI instead of animatronics is that the alien in The Thing is actually threatening. It doesn't just stand there or hang limply from the ceiling and look gory. It runs after you, eats you or simply attaches itself to and absorbs you. No, it's not the best computer generated imagery ever produced, but you can't compare a middle-budget horror film released in October to a summer blockbuster like Rise of the Planet of the James Francos; however, that's exactly what "Movie Bob" of Escape to the Movies did, because he's an asshat with a bad speaking voice and no critical tact.

Is The Thing a perfect prequel? Pretty much, yeah. The research station looks spot-on to the original; everything that MacReady and Copper find at the Norwegian base is offered some sort of explanation; the helicopter at the end looks fucking identical to the one at the beginning of the next film; and Lars at the end even sounds like the crazed Norwegian from 1982 (spoiler alert: Lars survives, but you should fucking know that if you've seen the original), which is no small achievement considering everyone's speaking genuine Norwegian in the prequel and John Carpenter himself admitted in the director's commentary of the original that the actor at the beginning was shouting gibberish. (Addendum, 31/1/2011: New evidence has suggested that I was full of shit on this point. Check out Outpost 31's movie FAQ for more info.)

There is honestly not a single complaint about The Thing that I couldn't also levy onto the original, which is what everyone has been so adamant to negatively compare it to. I will even go so far as to say that I prefer the prequel for the simple fact that I was actually scared several times while watching it. The original is fascinating, but it's never actually scary unless you're a pussy. To assuage any complaints that I've just seen the original too many times to remember ever being scared, I've seen the prequel twice now and was just as frightened the second time in spite of knowing exactly what was going to happen. Even The Descent, which is one of the scariest modern horror movies I've seen, didn't scare me at all the second time through.

The greatest praise I can award The Thing is that, unlike every other horror film from the last decade or more, it's not afraid to show us the goddamn monster and it doesn't rely on cheap scares. The alien itself is menacing enough to keep the tension up without someone having to yell "Boo!" at you (even though that's exactly what someone does early on for comedic relief).

The Thing is one of the best movies I've seen in a long time and I hope that, if you've already had your perception tainted by cynical reviewers before getting a chance to see it for yourself, this review helps alleviate any negative bias that you've assimilated. Bad critics are even worse than the thing itself: instead of taking your identity they take away any enjoyment you might've had by not listening to them.