Talk:The Thing (1982 film)

Reception section is too negative?

This is such a bizarre article. What century was it written in? Nowadays The Thing is considered a classic horror movie. You can consistently find it on best-horror-movie lists. Here it's #13 at IGN. It has an 8.2/10 on IMDB. Anyway, I'm just wondering about the awkwardness of this article. The Reception section should be more of a redemption story. Right now it doesn't seem entirely accurate, at least not 2023. 98.156.185.48 (talk) 02:25, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

It's literally discussed in Legacy. DonQuixote (talk) 04:05, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

The convention in film articles is that 'Reception' documents the reception of the film at the time of release, when that differs substantially from later views. This is valuable for putting the film in historic context. Walkersam (talk) 21:33, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Sequels section expanded

As was stated the page Who Goes There? according to these two sources John Carpenter may be involved in a sequel to this film. So should that be included in the sequels section? 0Detail-Attention215 (talk) 20:00, 4 February 2024 (UTC)

You mean one source, which looks dubious and states that Carpenter said "I don’t know if there will be, there may be a Thing 2."? Both are the same link. ภץאคгöร 20:13, 4 February 2024 (UTC)

Sorry I thought I copied the other one it’s this here sorry. 0Detail-Attention215 (talk) 20:31, 4 February 2024 (UTC)

Even with the second source and following the first source through to it's origin at The Hollywood Reporter, it's basically just rumor and hearsay and Wikipedia is not a news site. Unless there are serious talks reported this doesn't seem something worth mentioning, it's been four years since they said they were remaking The Thing based on Who Goes There? and there hasn't been an update since. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 21:48, 4 February 2024 (UTC)

Then why do I even bother with this kind of stuff. Since it means absolutely nothing. 0Detail-Attention215 (talk) 00:01, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure why it means nothing, it's just not a very detailed piece of news at the moment in time. If we mention every time someone discusses a Thing sequel then it's going to be a long section. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 10:22, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Filming locations

My recent edit changing the filming location from "in Juneau" to "near Juneau" was reverted by @Darkwarriorblake with the comment "Sourced", but it seems the sources were not checked. One cite on this passage (GamesRadar+ 2008) claims shooting was "above Juno[sic]," and the other (Freer 2016) does not mention Juneau or shooting locations at all, and neither are particularly high quality.

I changed the language because sources elsewhere on the page explicitly identify the primary shooting location as being in Alaska, but nearer to Stewart, BC. After reviewing all the relevant cites in greater depth these are what I find.

GamesRadar+ 2008 quotes Carpenter with "We shot in Alaska above Juno in the Alaskan ice fields. Then we came back here to Los Angeles, then we went back up to British Columbia – so it was quite a shoot."

Hemphill 2017 quotes Cundey: "A scout found a place outside of Stewart, British Columbia, which was the last ice-free port up the coast of Canada."

Abrams 2016: "Masur: We stayed at a town called Stewart in British Columbia. We weirdly had to drive from British Columbia through Alaska, and then through Alaska to get to the set." ... "David: It took about an hour and a half to drive up the mountain to the set."

Cohen 2011b appears to be a primary source from producer Stuart Cohen: "John made the decision to cast Kurt on the day we left to film the initial ice field sequences above Juneau in early June, 1981. There he also shot the footage of Mac flying to the Norwegian Camp and the flying saucer ( the helicopter pilot filling in )[...]"

Beresford 2017: "Once the cast was assembled, they headed off to the set in British Columbia. After flying from Los Angeles to Vancouver and then on to Prince Rupert in British Columbia, bad weather forced the cast to take a six-hour bus ride for the final leg of the trip."

Corrigan 2017: not mentioned.

Freer 2016: not mentioned.

Swires 1982b: dead link.

It seems clear from the sources which quote cast and crew that the primary on-location shoot was some distance into Alaska from Stewart, BC. The 27-mile (43 km) figure may be from the dead Swires 1982b, but it does generally jive with the "hour and a half drive" assuming it was through difficult conditions.

Cohen and Carpenter's quotes seem also to support that some second unit footage was shot nearer to Juneau, but I can't see any reason why anything would be shot *in* Juneau.

My initial edits were based on a generous assumption that the language citing Juneau was referring in a general sense to the primary location, which you could argue is in the 'Juneau area,' but I see now that it was more likely confusion due to the fact that some footage does seem to have been shot nearer to Juneau. The text claiming principal photography took place in Juneau, however, is simply wrong, as this was not principal photography, and was not *in* the city of Juneau.

Unless someone can point to some contradicting sources I missed, I will correct all these passages and clean up the cites (Corrigan 2017 in particular seems to be failing verification everywhere it is used, and I suspect was SEO spam). I'll leave the distance figure for now and flag the Swires cite in hopes that someone else can locate a copy to verify against. Walkersam (talk) 21:49, 8 April 2024 (UTC)