TheThing'11 Thumbs up from someone who watched the first one EXTENSIVELY
now 2 weeks ago i did a detailed watching of TheThing'82, and I was already a fan. I got to know the movie pretty tightly, and this movie was a joy to watch. Its aimed at specifically The Thing nerds though, so unless you watched the first one like a hawk and dissected the **** out of it much of the information is lost on you. I mean I was wondering when the axe on the wall was going to show up, and I wanted to know how it got there. As far as quality goes it was missing some elements the first one had, and it had some things going for it that the first one didn't.
From previews I had expected them to play up the language barrier a bit more, but they didn't. Which was too bad. The paranoia factor didn't reach '88 levels. It wasn't like Inglorious Bastards which really did play up languages. Also, from what other reviewers in this thread were saying they said the thing was much more visible more often, but really no the creatures only appeared about as many times as the 88 movie from the way I was counting. I thought the special effects were allright, they weren't top notch, but they were passable. There were 2 shots that looked particularly bad. Also, I couldn't tell where the practical effects were because they must have been CG altered to the point they just looked like CG. Im not a CG hater though, so that type of thing isn't going to take me out of the story for very long.
I also re-watched the first half of the thing'82 again, and it changes how you feel about the beginning. Now I feel really sad for the Norwegian at the beginning of Thing'82, i know who he is, as he is filled out now. Now its really easy to hate on this movie, but what I really want to know is how does John Carpenter feel about it. He had said in commentary he felt really bad when the director of The Thing from Another Planet dissed his work, and he also said the problem with filming a movie is you can't enjoy it from the same perspective as the audience. This is a movie I will definitely buy on DVD or Blu Ray. Its funny it seems like its going to have exactly the same fate as the 82 version, poor reviews, poor box office. The Thing however has been known to just grow some legs long after you thought it was dead and continue to keep on existing.
Now I want to know what happens to Kate in her snowcat, and whats going to happen when she gets to the Russian camp. Also, funny thing John Carpenter had planned on making a sequel, and he was going to use Frostbite as the reason Childs and MacReady looked older. it would be great if that coalesced.