The Thing (2011) review: Boo! Scared you?

I know comparisons to this movie are a bit unfair but let's be honest.. This movie wants to be in that category.  This is a direct prequel to John Carpenter's The Thing made back in 1982.  The Thing is one of my favorite movies from the 1980s.  I wasn't really looking forward to this movie because it's really pointless.  For those who haven't seen the 1982 movie, it begins in the Antartic with a Norweigan man shooting at a dog running away.  This whole movie is the story of the Norweigans and their encounter with The Thing. 

There isn't any way for me to write this review without discussing why it is weaker than the 1982 movie.  But I will say that as a movie independant of the 1982 The Thing, this movie still sucks.  As a horror movie it has far too many boo scares.  Boo scares are not scary.  They just aren't.  Being startled is different from scary.  What made the 1982 movie so scary was that you never knew who The Thing was.  And it was smart about that.  This movie was just annoying.  Whenever anyone is remotely suspicious of someone being The Thing, it will just lash out and attack.  It never did that in the 1982 movie.

Also, we see The Thing far too much.  In the 1982 movie the only time we see it would be in dark shadows and always in some kind of transition phase.  In this movie we always see it as this weird spider looking thing.  And it looks rediculous.  The CG just makes it look weird.  It's an alien that is all mouth.  I know it sounds wierd but it's so much more scary when I didn't know what it really looked like.  It's such a great mystery.  Not only could it be anyone, but even if it were to be in it's true form, would you know it? 

In the 1982 movie, The Thing had an agenda.  It was building a spaceship and was going to fly off.  In this movie, I'm not really sure what it was trying to do.  Many times it was doing things that guaranteed that it would not get away.  One scene in perticular was on the helicopter.  It probably wouldn't have been found out if it would've stayed calm and maintained it's cover but instead when the helicopter was going to land, it just freaked out and killed anyone in sight. 

This was a weak movie saddling itself with being in the same universe as a classic sci-fi/horror movie relying on CG effects and B+ actors.  Just watch the 1982 movie.  It's amazing.