Erik M.

25th Jul 2009

The Thing (1982)

Question: Someone proposes an initial blood serum test (before Macready's heat sensitivity test), but the crew find the blood sabotaged before they can get to it. How could "The Thing" have gotten to the blood so fast, and more importantly, Garry and the Doc are the only ones said to have access to the blood. BOTH are proved by the Mac's test to be "Thing-free" - the Doc's blood is tested even though he is dead; Garry is the last man tested. How can this be?

npe1jar

Answer: Keys were dropped by Windows during Benning's transformation. You hear them drop to the floor. They could have been retrieved by anyone.

Chosen answer: The Thing is a shape shifter. It doesn't just take the form of what it assimilates, it can change its shape (eg. dog and head spider). It could easily form a thin tentacle to open a door from the inside. It's also shown to have the sheer strength to bust out.

Grumpy Scot

Answer: Gary and the Doc may have been overconfident in their being able to keep the key safe; someone or something may have taken it, done the deed while everyone was distracted, and placed it back with none being the wiser.

Erik M.

8th Aug 2005

The Thing (1982)

Question: Was the huge monster McReady encounters, and subsequently blows up, the actual "default" form of the Thing? After all, the correspondent DVD chapter is titled "The Real Thing". Yes, they do say that the Thing could've imitated millions of different lifeforms, but it must've had a form to begin with.

Answer: At the end, the large creature presented itself as an amalgam of beings it had absorbed-part Blair, part dog, and various other beings with tentacles, insect-like legs, and a worm-like body. I don't believe that we really ever see what its true form is, if it has one.

Erik M.

Answer: In the book, it was vaguely humanoid with blue rubbery skin, a head of writhing tentacles, and 3 glowing red eyes. There is a picture of it in Barlowe's Guide to Extraterrestrials by Wayne Barlowe.

Grumpy Scot

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