Slender Sickness: What Makes the Slender Man so Scary

I can safely assume that anyone who spends a fair amount of time on the Internet has encountered this big guy. There really is no escaping him. (Bad joke, ha.) He even has his own wiki.

Personally, I'm a big fan of Slendy. There are very few monsters that can genuinely creep me out, and this guy is one of them. I have spent more time than I'm willing to admit losing sleep because of a Marble Hornets entry or chickening around in Slender.

The fact that he is so very creepy is what fascinates me about the Slender Man. As a psychology fan and an anthropology student, I feel the need to do some digging. What exactly makes the Slender Man so terrifying? Why is it that grown ass men can't play a game of Slender without wanting to cry?
To answer that question, we have to first define the Slender Man. So, unlike the post of my dear DraconisTheory, we will be digging into the history of Slendy and the finer points of his popularity.

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Although he has no exact origin, The Slender Man myth is said to date back as far as 17th century Germany. In Germanic fairy tales, he was known as Der Ritter -  an exceptionally tall man dressed as a knight or a royal figure. In those times, he was meant to be a cautionary tale for children. Leave it to the Germans to come up with something so damn creepy.

See that nasty thing on the right? 

Slendy allegedly appeared again in the 1900s. This time, he was said to be a freakishly tall man in a suit who had no face. Sometimes he had tentacles, other times he did not. Sightings came from America, Canada, the UK, Germany, and Russia. Most of the reports associated with him were of missing children. Around the mid-1900s, reports came from Germany of soldiers having run-ins with the Slender Man in the forest. Similar reports came from America and Canada, where skiers and children went missing in forested areas. Around the 1980s, a series of buildings supposedly went up in flames for unknown reasons, causing several deaths. This fire became the point of origin for our modern-day Slender Man.

So how did he make it to the vast interwebz?

In 2009, Something Awful Forums launched a paranormal picture contest in which participants were required to take ordinary photos and digitally manipulate them into something creepy and sinister. Then those photographs had to be posted on a number of paranormal forums as authentic photos. An SA user by the name of Victor Surge entered two black and white photographs with a short description naming the Slender Man - a mysterious creature that stalked children.

These two photographs appeared with the following caption:

"We didn't want to go, we didn't want to kill them, but it's persistent silence and outstretched arms horrified and comforted us at the same time..." 1983, photographer unknown, presumed dead.

One of two recovered photographs from the Stirling City Library blaze. Notable for being taken the day which fourteen children vanished and for what is referred to as "The Slender Man". Deformities cited as film defects by officials. Fire at library occured one week later. Actual photograph confiscated as evidence. -1986, photographer: Mary Thomas, missing since June 13, 1986.

And so the Slender Man came to the interwebz. He quickly caught the attention of several websites, the most notable being 4chan. He spread to Unfiction Forums, Fangoria, Bungie, /x/enopedia, TVTropes, DeviantArt, SlenderNation, and Mythical Creatures Guide. This sparked the first of many pseudo-documentaries concerning the Slender Man.

The most popular video accounts come from the Marble Hornets project. This project consists of a series of entries on Youtube that are supposedly tape segments recovered by someone named Jay. These uncovered tapes contain footage of a friend that had disappeared. The tapes document both the unraveling of the friend (Alex) and Jay's search for the truth about what happened to him. In the project, Slendy is known as "The Operator". There are more than 60 videos in the series right now, and the project is still going.

(Here, I will add that I am a huge Marble Hornets fan. The series gives me the creeps, and it does the whole Blair Witch thing very well. Possibly even better than the Blair Witch Project. If you've not seen the series, I highly encourage you to go check it out.)

Other video documentations of the Slender Man have since appeared. These other projects include EverymanHYBRID, DarkHarvest00, MLAndersen0, and TribeTwelve.

Slendy makes an appearance in Marble Hornets. 

Slendy didn't stop at taking over Youtube. Oh no. He even has his own game: Slender (Parsec Productions, download it. It's free!). Now, I could be eloquent and give you a proper overview of the game. But that doesn't do it justice. So instead, I am going to give you a more realistic version. Slender is a simple enough game. You're in the woods with a flashlight. You don't know why you're in the woods. But you are. And you have to wander around in these creepy, dark woods until you find landmarks. There are eight pieces of paper posted on these landmarks. And these pieces of paper have weird, creepy shit written on them. And the whole time you're in these creepy woods looking for these stupid pieces of paper, the Slender Man is behind you, stalking you like the creepy fuck that he is. But you can't run away from him because you're either fat or a child or possibly a fat child. Whatever you are, you're not built for running and you'll make it about three yards before you have to slow down. But Slendy doesn't like to play fair, so any time you find a piece of paper you better haul ass back into the woods. Because finding paper makes Slendy stalk in hyperspeed. You can tell when he's close because you'll hear creepy ass noises and your screen gets all distorted. If it goes completely static, then congratulations: you've been caught by the Slender Man and will probably die in a horrible fashion. 

All that aside, it really is an unsettling game, and has often been compared to Amnesia: The Dark Descent for it's scare factor. Although it is a much simpler game than Amnesia, the reaction videos are just as hilarious. I highly encourage you to go watch them.

Go in the bathroom, they said. It will be fine, they said.

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So know that we know who the Slender Man is and where he came from, we need to explore how he operates before we can determine why he's so frightening. 

Old-school Slendy was very violent. He displayed highly agressive behaviors such as impaling his victims on trees, leaving them to bleed to death, or ripping out a victim's organs. Children were his sole target. 

However, the modern Slender Man is not quite as violent, but somehow much more sinister than his older counterpart. The modern Slender Man is passive aggressive toward his victims. He will stalk his target continuously, and torment the individual by repeatedly making his presence known in an invasive way - appearing inside or around the target's home, on a road during travel, at the workplace when the target is alone, or while the target is sleeping. This elimination of any safe zone tends to spark uneasiness and paranoia in the victim. However, Slendy will probably not attack for a long time. Instead, he will just continue to follow his victims and creep them the fuck out.

If targeted over an extended period of time, victims will usually experience a delve into madness. Paranoia takes over; the victim doesn't feel safe anywhere. Wild mood swings occur, and constant irritation is present. Victims suffer from "Slender Sickness", which is marked by coughing fits, coughing up blood, nausea, vomiting, bloody nose, and fever. The most prominent effect of Slender Sickness is amnesia. Victims will often awaken with no idea where they are, what they are doing, or how they got there. Memory loss can be a period of hours, days, weeks, or even months. It's undetermined whether this memory loss is a defense mechanism triggered by an encounter with the Slender Man, or the work of Slendy himself. Either way, the victim ends up with a life that is in ruins.

When a Slendy target does finally disappear, it is usually not by direct action of the Slender Man. Victims usually disappear on their own, leaving no trace behind. Victims are never found. It is uncertain where exactly the victims go, or what happens to them after they disappear. Any video documentation of an encounter with Slendy is highly distorted (another known effect of his presence), making it almost impossible to see exactly what occurs when he appears. 

Another shot of Slendy, courtesy of Marble Hornets.

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Now I can answer the question I've wanted to answer all along. Why is the Slender Man so fucking terrifying? What is it about him that makes people want to shut their laptops and never sleep again?

I have a guess. This is my "educated opinion" if you will, and I don't claim to be any sort of expert on Slendy or the complex workings of the human psyche. 

The Slender Man is scary for two reasons: 

1. He's invasive.

2. He's a plethora of uncertainties. 

Allow me to elaborate. 

We as a species like the idea of having a safe place we can retreat to. That's why we have doors that lock. So we can keep danger out of our safe place. That is also why we like groups. We like to be with other humans, because that will prevent us from being isolated in a dangerous or otherwise fear-inducing situation.We'd rather be terrified with someone else than terrified alone. But really, we'd prefer not to be terrified at all. 

The Slender Man rips that comfort right out from underneath us. Most monsters have some weakness, or some way that you can escape from them. Some monsters can't go out in the sunlight. Some can only get to you when you're alone. Some can't leave the premises they're found on. Some can be killed. Some, like the monsters in Amnesia, can be hidden from.

Not Slender Man.

Slendy doesn't give a fuck where you are or what you're doing. He's there. Daytime, nighttime. Alone, or around other people. In the woods, in your house, in your workplace, in the shower. Slendy doesn't give a fuck. If you're sleeping, fucking, eating, whatever you're doing, he's fucking watching you. And nothing can stop him. Walls? Fuck that, Slender Man can teleport. And as far as anyone knows, there's no way to kill him. 

Not only does Slendy invade your personal space and make you feel completely unsafe wherever you are, he invades your body and your mind. Once you come into contact with him, you're done for. You lose your shit. You can't remember anything. And the whole time you're losing your shit and trying to remember what the fuck is going on, you're coughing up blood and trying not to puke all over the place. The only thing you can do is wander around while your entire psyche crumbles and wait until you lose your shit so much that you just disappear somewhere and you're never heard from again. 

If Slendy wants to find you, he will find you. You can't escape him. And even when he's gone, you haven't escaped. Once he's got you, he's got you for good and there's not a goddamn thing you can do about it. Game over.

The second terrifying element of Mr. Slender is the uncertainty that surrounds him. Human beings are constantly trying to figure out the world around them. We want to pick everything apart and understand why it is the way it is. How it works. What it does. If we can't figure that out, it bothers us on every level of our existence. It makes us question the very fabric of the universe if we can't make sense of something. 

Now let's think about Slendy for a second. Where did he really come from? No one knows. Why does he do what he does? No one knows. How exactly does he do it? No one knows. No one really knows anything about him other than the fact that he's tall, faceless, and drives people to madness. 

That's exactly the same reason why Hannibal Lecter is so scary. Aside from the mention of survival in Hannibal Rising, no one knows why this vastly intelligent psychiatrist eats people. He just does it. And that is fucking unsettling.

Slender Man just torments people, and that's all we really know about him. That's all we're ever going to know about him. And as humans, that creeps us out on an instinctual level. If we can't understand something, we fear it. 

Maybe he has a reason. Or maybe Slendy is just a sick fuck. Either way, the reaction he induces is one of unadulterated fear. And rightly so - he triggers two of our psyches' most sensitive points.

Now that I have thoroughly bored and/or terrified you all, have some Slender memes.

This is also what I think when Skype gets all weird on me.

No Slendy, that's okay. You can keep the juice.

SLENDERMAN VS. HOLLYWOOD

If there is one horrible, disgusting creature that wants to wrap it's tentacles around your wallet it's Hollywood. This is what happens when said creature figures it can exploit the interweb sub-culture for movie ideas:


They didn't even have the decency to make him look like something other than a homeless Ezio Auditore da Firenze.

Yes, The Tall Man. The imdb page offers the synopsis of :"When her child goes missing, a mother looks to unravel the legend of the Tall Man, an entity who allegedly abducts children." The fact they're using Jessica Biel as the hook should be evidence enough this thing is gonna blow monkey dick across the land.


I mentioned monkeys so this relevant... I think.

Why would they do this, you ask? Because Hollywood is greed in manifest and they need money, all those starving movie execs need their coffee, dammit. As for why they chose to turn a meme into a movie, your guess is as good as mine. I doubt this thing is targeted to fans of the Slenderman himself but rather the result of a prophecy that foretells of an upcoming shift of interestet towards a semi-popular idea that resulted in an accountant-bred script that was hashed out to make a quick buck. The people who made the decision to make this movie, the same breed who forced the reboot of Spiderman though for slightly different reasons, have been at this game for a long time and they can probably smell upcoming trends like my dog can smell bacon through a lead wall. I'm not saying memes are about to take a sudden leap into mainstream pop culture but... what if?

They're starving.

The Slenderman is a legendary meme and I won't go into the back story of the character here; however, if you're interested, MemeBase offers a thorough description of how the guy came to be and how the Internet blew him up into the modern mythological, web-based powerhouse he is today. If you don't feel like sifting through all that crap here's my description: He is a faceless, skinny, tall, pale dude in a suit with tentacles (sometimes), and has a thing for stealing kids and standing creepily in the background.

He was photo bombing before it was cool.

To me he can be seen as a metaphor for the average American's fear of the government, a faceless entity with many arms preying upon children and the unwary. He has no apparent rules to where he can be and he is always watching his victims day and night, even in their own homes. He is frequently portrayed in wooded areas distanced from civilization which could also be symbolic of the tendrils of man pushing out the nature-based monsters of the past and extending into the wild, leaving no place untouched. He is a modern day boogie man, a representation of our society's fears and paranoia and there is no safe place from his grasp. I find this all very ironic considering the commercialization that is actually happening to him as represented by the release of this movie, and thus proving once again how Hollywood loves to rape the good out of everything.

I couldn't resist.

If you're truly craving a Slenderman film-based narrative I suggest the pretty decent Marble Hornets series on YouTube. It's told from the first person, shaky-cam perspective of a college student who's trying to track down his friend who is apparently being stalked by the elusive Slenderman for unknown reasons, though in this series the monster is referred to as 'The Operator' but who gives a shit? It's still Slender and it's worth a watch, especially if you're into the Paranormal Activity/Blair Witch style of storytelling.

This is a screen from Marble Hornets.

But that's that. Who knows, maybe I'm just talking out of my ass (not surprising) and needed something to post this week. Regardless, here is a small Slenderman gallery I've dug up from various sources around the web. Take a gander and try to get some sleep tonight (click the picture to enlarge).

The Splendidman

Fun.

Buzz Slenderman

Hint: Look left.

This is the most disturbing to me.

Ha. Nostalgia.

I don't...

Slenderhitcher

BATTLE OF THE CENTURY

Style.

Daw.

Maybe he's just trying to recapture his youth... GEDDIT?!

:D

More creepiness.

My people will call your people.

Slenderman by Tim Burton

Dr. Octoslendamang

No smiles in the slender parade.

His true motivation.

Completely irrelevant but this randomly came up during my search and I had to share.

What? A Girl? On Raptor Inc.?

Oh yes. A female has been added to the team, and a redhead at that. I’m Auverin – the newest and palest face at Raptor Inc.

This is how I wear a Raptor Inc. t-shirt:

I don’t really like to talk about myself a lot because I am weird and awkward and I tend to leave important things out…mostly I forget to warn people that I am weird and awkward. But you have been warned, so now I can get to the important stuff.

I am indeed 100% female, and the very lucky girlfriend of DraconisTheory (as mentioned in a recent news post, I believe). I’m a starving college student. Well, not starving, but I’ve had popcorn as a meal more than once this week. I write, I paint, I play music. And I do game on occasion. I wouldn’t say I’m avid enough to beat any of these guys at anything, But I do play enough to kick some ass in RPGs and occasionally give DraconisTheory a spear to the face.

I can’t quite say what sorts of things I am going to post, because once again I am rather odd and prone to act on a whim. I can say that I am helping out with a brand new project that will be rather expansive. As it was said earlier in the month, the project is still in a conceptual stage, but I am its writer, and therefore I am held responsible if it never gets done. So that will be my job for the next few months. Getting that shit finished. Somewhere in there I might actually post something relevant. Who knows?

I don’t have anything else of merit to say, so I’m just going to end this awkwardly and abruptly.

Tschau.

Damnation & Redemption: A Look Back at Fallout

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Today, I'd like to have a look back on one of my favorite game franchises; Fallout.
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 Fallout Background Info

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On October 23rd, 2077, the Great War started and ended, lasting only two hours. No one knows who attacked first but every country responded at once, dropping nuclear warheads and bathing the world in atomic fire. Before the Great War, a nuclear holocaust was in plain sight and was fast approaching. Hundreds of large underground bunkers were built and called Vaults. The Vaults were built by Vault-Tec, a scientific corporation with a dark agenda hidden behind a friendly exterior, built them. The Vaults were really controlled scientific experiments, though they did provide shelter from the radioactive blasts. The Democratic nations and the Reds were at each other's throats and the world had reached its breaking point.

The United States had annexed Canada as China invaded Alaska. With quick timing, the US retook Alaska but had problems on the homefront. Soldiers were falling out of the ranks and riots were rampant. The soldiers that went AWOL were sent to military prisons while the President and his secretive military organization, the Enclave, retreated to an Oil Rig for safety. A plague breaks out as the F.E.V. (Forced Evolution Virus, a biological chemical that mutates genetic data in organisms) is leaked and the world goes up in fear.

At this time, Captain Roger Maxson and his men kill the researchers they were assigned to protect after finding out they were doing horrible experiments on military prisoners. Maxson and his men desert the army and move civilians into the research base they were guarding. After the bombs stopped falling, the research station was unharmed. Maxson led his men and their families to a fallout shelter in what is known as "the Exodus". The years passed and this group became known as the Brotherhood of Steel, an organization dedicated to retrieving technology and storing it. They didn't believe people were responsible enough to have it after the events of the Great War.

Life went on and the Wastleland remained. Vaults opened and people spilled out, those left outside that had survived set up settlements, and factions formed. In California, the NCR (New California Republic) formed and set up a democracy. In the Midwest, a faction based off the Roman Empire formed, known as Caesar's Legion. They gathered slaves and conquered all in their path. Splinter chapters of the Brotherhood of Steel showed up across the country and the Enclave spread across the United States. All manner of people roamed the wastes. Raiders and settlers, Vault dwellers and soldiers, traders and mercenaries. Though purged in atomic heat, the Wasteland held many new creatures, products of mutation from the radiation and the F.E.V. that lingered in the air. Men lived, fought, traded, worked, survived, and died under an uncaring sun.

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Fallout

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The place where it all began. Set in a world that mixes the 50's style, futuristic technology, and Cold War fear of nuclear conflict, Fallout came out in 1997 as a spiritual successor to the 1988 game Wasteland. Taking place around southern California in 2161, 84 years after a nuclear conflict known as The Great War, Fallout stars the "Vault Dweller" on his quest to find a water chip for his home within 150 days, yet the game has a 500 day time limit. His home happens to be number 13 of the Vaults. Fallout brought something new to the RPG table, the S.P.E.C.I.A.L. (Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, Luck) system. Your base S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stats reflect the skills you may have and your interactions with the world. The game was a new experience, based on exploration and time managing. It was fun and definitely not forgettable.

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Fallout 2

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The sequel to Fallout, Fallout 2 brought improvement to the series. It brought many more items, improved AI, better companions, a more expansive story and world, karma, and large scale effect of player's actions. You start in the town of Arroyo, started by the Vault Dweller in Oregon. As the grandchild of the Vault Dweller, you play the "Chosen One", chosen to find the Garden of Eden Creation Kit (G.E.C.K.) to help rebuild the town to ideal conditions. During this, the Enclave has reared its head for the first time since the Great War and has surpassed the Brotherhood of Steel in technological sophistication. You are given your grandparent's Vault suit, Pip-Boy, a flask, and some cash as you set off. As you play, you begin to uncover the Enclave's sinister plots and deeds and you take it upon yourself to fight them. Fallout 2 contained some silly content, but also came with much more than Fallout and came without that timed quest. For that, Fallout 2 was a great experience.

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Fallout 3

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The third game in the series and first developed by Bethesda, Fallout 3 continued Fallout's original style. Often characterized as "Oblivion with guns", this comes from the fact it uses the same engine and gameplay mechanics as Bethesda's fourth Elder Scrolls title. The game brought Fallout into the third dimension and was a dramatic change. The point-and-click system and turn based combat were replaced by an over-the-shoulder view and real time fighting. The auto-travel map was replaced by a seamless exterior world. The VATS (Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System) introduces itself as a throwback to the old combat style of the previous two games. It freezes time and allows you to auto-aim at body parts, giving you a certain chance to hit or miss. The game also moves to the East coast in the Capital Wasteland, Washington D.C. As a survivor from Vault 101, you go amongst the world in search of your father and then get wrapped up in much more than anticipated. This game was a welcome change of pace, combing Fallout with the system of Oblivion, another of my favorite game series.

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Fallout: New Vegas
 
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The second Bethesda published Fallout game was developed by Obsidian Entertainment and was heavier on inspiration from Fallout 2. With a much larger game complete with many more items, factions, and quests, it is easy to see how it draws from Fallout 2 (especially with the "Wild Wasteland" perk that makes events happen that tend to be pop-culture references, much like Fallout 2's random encounters.) Featuring the power struggle between the NCR and Caesar's Legion, you play as a simple courier that was in the wrong place at the wrong time. A quest for revenge becomes a quest for power as you determine the fate of post-apocalyptic Las Vegas. To me, this is the best Fallout game yet. It didn't have the drive of Fallout, the open-endedness of Fallout 2, or the tone of Fallout 3, yet it brought something else. It combined the best of all the games into an outstanding title and my choice Bethesda game. Good show, Fallout: New Vegas, good show.

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Closing

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Wait, aren't you going to do Tactics and Brotherhood of Steel? No. Though I do like the Midwestern Brotherhood of Steel, I never played Tactics. Also let's just pretend Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel doesn't exist. Like it was a bad dream. In fact, its not even canon so to hell with it. Bad game anyway. So, in conclusion, I thank Fallout for its contributions not only to RPGs as an industry, but its contributions to me. It expanded my horizons in a genre sense and a creative sense. Oh what the world would be like without Fallout... nothing but fantasy RPGs and that's no fun. Need a little purgation to have a good time. Well, that's it for me. Until next time folks. See you in the wastes.

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The Way of Progress

my current setup

My focus right now (other than my day job and relationship issues) is to keep some momentum going in the old creativity department and pump out some new projects while I'm waiting for the movie to sit and mellow out in my head.

The first project was some music composition, I made one song I may use in the movie and then called it quits so I can focus on piano lessons using my dandy new keyboard that already has a bad key (who needs D? pfft) and do a bit of writing of the prose variety.

http://soundcloud.com/draconistheory/the-town

I have in the works a short story that will hopefully get people interested in the movie and provide a bit of background into the mythos of the tale itself, all those spooky entities and stuff floating about needed a bit more flesh on their spectral bones, not unlike the companion books that came out with the Harry Potter series and the mini series of videos released before Alan Wake.

We may be completely lacking in fan base and production value but it doesn't mean we can't pretend to be pr0! So I'll keep you going as that progresses and hope to have something neat to show you guys soon (if you even exist).

The Thing (2011) Review

THE PROLOGUE! (feel free to scroll down to the actual review)
John Carpenter's The Thing (1982) is one of my favorite movies of all time. A team of American scientists trapped in the most desolate place on earth with a creature that is trying to kill and replicate them causing paranoia and terror to spread like herpes on Jersey Shore. The formula is perfect, the characters are believable and the creature effects set a standard for the movie industry.

When I learned that a prequel was in the works I got that:
"excited/scared feeling. Like 98% excited, 2% scared. Or maybe it's more - It could be two - it could be 98% scared, 2% excited but that's what makes it so intense, it's so - confused. I can't really figure it out." -Oscar (Armageddon)
I didn't want to set my sights too high and get stabbed in the back like Hollywood has a tendency to do but I allowed myself to hope. When I started reading articles talking about all the practical effects and the interior of the space ship I had a geekasm. The female role left me feeling dubious, but what the hell, WHY NOT?! It's gotta get pretty lonely out there in Antarctica, am I RIGHT LLLLLLADIES!? Nothing against female leads but in a movie such as this it's just a distraction. Anyway, I went to see the movie with my heart in my hands and hoping Universal would not snatch it from me and take a dump on it but instead cause it to erupt from terror and icky nasty alien glee.

MEH

THE REVIEW! (minor spoiler alert)
The Thing (2011) is decent movie. It's not good, and it's not awful. It is a modern director's tribute to John Carpenter's classic that was very aware that it could never come close to the movie it was honoring; but tried anyway.

OVERVIEW: A team of Norwegian scientists tracking a mysterious signal find a space ship in the ice, they find a frozen alien nearby and get a hold of an American paleontologist (Winstead) with experience digging out ice age animals to come to Antarctica and dig up the ET. Once all the characters are assembled on top of the alien space ship, the first thing that becomes apparent is that there are no ugly women in Antarctica. All two of them.

They dig up the alien and bring it back to base and OH NO the main scientist guy turns out to be a dick and wants a tissue sample from the alien despite the protests by our friendly neighborhood American paleontologist hot chick and wouldn't you know it the alien gets thawed out and death ensues.

THE TRAILER (LINK)

GOOD STUFF: The story keeps you interested through the end and it's a lot of fun if you're a fan of the 1982 film to see how the two films get tied together; the axe in the wall, the frozen body with it's throat cut, the creature that RJ and Doc find burnt in the ice outside of the camp are all there and explained. The ship is impressive and you get to go inside where a mad-crazy game of Tetris is going on (you'll see) and the base is faithfully recreated and the acting is pretty good.

The original original

BAD STUFF: The female lead is dubious and boring, not at all like the hard boiled RJ MacReady and her purpose seems to just be a place holder even though you're forced to spend most of your time with her instead of getting to know the other characters so when they die you don't really care because they are all place holders as well. Several scenes are brought right over from the 1982 flick which classifies it as a remake/prequel (remaquel, sounds Latin) only in less interesting ways. There are plot holes abound but you don't really notice them until the movie is over because it does keep you engaged to the end. There are some twists but the movie relies too much on shock scares to create the same level of paranoia in the original. Some characters make decisions that make no sense and it fails to explain how two men survive a helicopter crash with a massive alien on board with no fire. The creature itself also makes a lot of stupid decisions like NOT kill Winstead when it had several opportunities. OH, and if you like impaling than you have found your home! Impaling is EVERYWHERE! What is it with horror movies and impaling? Have you noticed that impaling is like the go-to for a death? And they're always through center of body mass, never through the face, or the side, or the hip, always through the sternum like they're SEAL team 6.

PRODUCTION: The creature effects are good if not great but become a little too reliant on CGI later on in the film which blows as the 1982 is so well known for it's practical effects; even the Norwegian helicopter is digital. Shaky cam is rampant, especially in a lot of the dialogue and if there's one trend I despise in Hollywood film making it's over used shaky cam. You don't feel like the characters are in Antarctica so much as on set; they don't get cold, in fact they don't even wear jackets a good bit of the time and run around outside like they're on vacation in Miami. For a place where the mean annual temperature is −57°C (−70°F) that's pretty ridiculous. To be fair the director had no idea what he was doing. He makes commercials. Considering this though, he did a good job for what he knew.

WANT

CONCLUSION: This movie is worth watching, but not a worthy installment to The Thing franchise. Think of it as a companion piece and nothing else. If you're looking a more satisfying accompaniment to John Carpenter's classic then I suggest the 2002 video game if you can find it.

The Thing (2011) gets a 3/5

SECOND OPINION

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IMAGE

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7.5/10