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If ever there was a case to be made for the most pointless reinvention in cinematic history, then 2011’s The Thing should never be left out of the conversation.
Although it was billed as a prequel to John Carpenter and Kurt Russell’s 1982 classic, it’s ostensibly a remake in virtually every other sense of the world, with the filmmakers evidently trying to avoid igniting a firestorm by repeatedly insisting that it was a brand new story set right before, as opposed to a straightforward do-over of an indisputable all-time great of the sci-fi and horror genres.
The biggest obstacle to overcome was trying to get people to care, which they did not after The Thing failed to recoup its $35 million budget from theaters and took a pounding from critics, audiences, and fans of its predecessor all at once, never mind the insane decision to paste sketchy CGI over the animatronics and practical effects that were used on set.
At no point did it ever feel as though the film would succeed, which makes it all the more remarkable that director Matthijs van Heijningen Jr. admitted to SyFy that he was planning a sequel to his prequel that was basically a remake.
“We fantasized about a sequel. Kate would escape and would be picked up at sea and tries to warn the world at an oil platform near the South Pole. The monster would break loose on the the rig. I liked the oil rig mayhem idea. The Carpenter version was so good and a lot of fans were almost offended by the prequel and didn’t see the necessity for a follow-up. But now I fully understand that it was a bit early.”
Of course, The Thing was itself a remake of The Thing from Another World that was adapted from Who Goes There?, so it’s not as if tackling the basic thrust from a new angle was sacrilegious; it just sucked.