John Carpenter's The Thing in Star Trek

[Srelex]

Let's say that recieving a distress call, the Enterprise (or a random Feddie ship, if you prefer) finds a starship or outpost devoid of all life except for what seems to be a babbling lunatic trying to kill the ship's cat, who is accidentally killed by a trigger-happy redshirt. The cat is beamed over and placed in sickbay, whereupon it starts to do its Thing thing, if you'll pardon me. Anyway, how succcessful would the Thing be in doing its 'thing' on a Feddie starship? If this scenario doesn't work, are there any other interesting alternatives?

[Norade]

I think that tricorders would detect infected people quickly phasers would stop it pretty quickly given the way they vaporize things. In all a few red shirts die and we have a fairly typical episode.

[Temujin]

Considering the Federation's piss poor safety procedures regarding standard infectious agents, I would say they would quickly be fucked barring some technobabble deus ex machina.

Given time to actually study the life form the way Blair did, they could probably adapt the Tricorders and other sensors to detect it. However I doubt a casual scan would. We've seen the bio-filters on the Transporters that are supposed to screen for infectious agents not detect or block shit. And we've seen whole crews quickly taken down by infectious agents before. While the OP isn't clear on what kind of evidence remains, the impression I get is that they wouldn't have the benefit that the Antarctic crew had of having physical remains from the Norwegian camp of some weird shit having happened and bodies to examine, otherwise they would at least have a fighting chance.

While Phasers would be better than Flamethrowers, remember that the Thing is highly intelligent. It would know what it was up against and would probably take a much less overt approach than it did in the movie until it had a large enough number of the crew assimilated.

I also doubt it would start assimilating people in sick bay. It would probably wait, like the dog did, until it could get someone alone in their quarters. Remember, it did infect at least one individual before being penned where it went apeshit. Once people began to be infected, the cat might also head into the Jefferies tubes and start picking off/assimilating crewmen doing maintenance.

[Solauren]

Who says the transporter wouldn't filter 'the Thing' out in the first place?

However, I agree, this would turn into a pretty typical Trek episode. The only question is, does James. T. Kirk manage to appeal to the creatures 'humanity', or seduce it.

And yes, I am aware of the mental images I just forced into your brain.

[LionElJonson]

Who says the transporter wouldn't filter 'the Thing' out in the first place?

However, I agree, this would turn into a pretty typical Trek episode. The only question is, does James. T. Kirk manage to appeal to the creatures 'humanity', or seduce it.

And yes, I am aware of the mental images I just forced into your brain.

Seducing it would be a Bad Idea; all it needs to do is touch you to infect you, IIRC.

[Temujin]

Who says the transporter wouldn't filter 'the Thing' out in the first place?

Because we've seen the transporter NOT detect nor filter infectious shit before, going all the way back to TOS.

• PSI 2000 virus and it's Next Gen variant.
  The DS9 aphasia virus (from Replicators, but they use biofilters as well)
  The neural parasites from TNG's "Conspiracy"

Not to mention if the Transporter was so good at filtering shit out it would be an insta-cure for all diseases, which it obviously is not.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

Yeah, I get the impression that in order for the transporter filtration system to work, it has to be set to scan for particular matter to weed it out. The Thing, if this is the first time the feddies ever encountered it, would just fall under the general umbrella of 'life' and pass right through.

I think that if the cat does get sent to sick bay, they would quickly realize something's wrong with it. Their medical science seems advanced enough that a scan would likely indicate that the thing is not a cat. Nearly perfectly mimicking a cat, but not a cat. Then again, that's if they send it to the sick bay and consider it worth giving a full scan.

If the Thing gets a foothold on the ship... chances are it would succeed in the end. If it wasn't detected in the cat and nothing's suspected, there's a decent chance that it could slowly infect the entire crew without anyone having any suspicion that something's wrong until it's too late. If it is detected and the crew start to mobilize against it, then the scenario changes a bit. If the only people infected are far lower on the chain of command, and the crew has some idea of what they're up against, I can see them coming up with proper quarantine procedures and slowly isolating the Thing. On the other hand, if it infects someone in command, or one of the engineers, things could go downhill very fast. A commander could easily give orders which spread the infection faster, while an engineer could fuck with all sorts of essential systems to ensure maximum contamination.

[Temujin]

I've been rereading some stuff from Outpost31, and it seems from the novelization that while the Thing makes an outwardly "perfect" copy of someone it infects, on a cellular level the Thing cells can be discerned even with a microscope.

From the FAQ:

Is Blair's computer program accurate?

A: Well, it certainly isn't accurate in the sense that a biologist would not be working on computer animations as part of his investigations, especially under the pressing circumstances like we see in the film. This scene is obviously meant to be an aid to the audience to understand the Thing's life-cycle, not a realistic portrayal of a biologist's studies.

And how well does the simulation work? Unfortunately, it leads to more questions than answers. We see dog cells being devoured, one by one, by a single Thing cell and this seems to contradict what we've already seen of the Thing's behavior. Never does the simulation show that the Thing cells divide to replace canine cells, which is what would make more sense. So, the animation should be taken with a grain of salt.

On the DVD commentary track, Carpenter comments that they "didn't get it quite right" regarding the Thing's life cycle but that "it doesn't matter." From this it may be concluded that the goal with the computer sequence was not truly accomplished, so it must therefore be regarded with skepticism.

It's clear that the Blair computer simulation was meant to replace a similar scene in the script and novel. Alan Dean Foster's description of the Thing's cells seems to be better:

Fuchs was preparing new slides, which Blair studied under the microscope. Two cells were visible through the eyepiece. They were active, neither quiescent nor dead. One looked quite normal. Its companion looked anything but.

At the moment the two were joined together by a thin stream of protoplasm. Material from the larger cell, which was long and thin, flowed into the smaller, spherical cell. As it did so the smaller cell swelled visibly, until the cell wall fractured in three places. Immediately the smaller cell assumed a flattened shape like the other and three new streams of material began to flow outward from its interior. Neither cell appeared to have lost any mass.

Blair pulled away from the eyepiece and frowned as he checked his watch. It was running in stopwatch mode. He turned it off. The resulting readout was very puzzling.

(Alan Dean Foster, The Thing, 69-70)

Of course it's possible that the cell alters its form when assimilating another cell, just like when the macroscopic Thing drops it's disguise when assimilating or defending itself. However, apparently there are other changes that could be detected.

How is a Thing able to imitate the behavior of a person so perfectly?

A: This obviously has to do with how the Thing can retain the memories and brain patterns of its victims. The most detailed description of this is found in the novel as Blair explains to the other men how a Thing could take over a dog while maintaining its canine behavior:
Blair's voice remained even, tutorial. "As you say, the body is only designed to keep so much organic material alive and functioning. Portion's of this dog's brain, for example, have been blocked off by new structures. The flow of oxygenated blood has been redirected."

"In other words," Copper said quietly, "part of its brain has been turned off."

Blair nodded. "Certain cerebral regions were dead before this animal died, having been supplanted in importance by new activity elsewhere."

"What regions were kill ... were turned off?"

"Difficult to say. There was massive parasitic invasion. Some of those which control portions of the memory, intelligence, and in particular individuality. Hard to tell with a dog, of course, be it dead or alive." He turned his gaze back to the interlocked bodies.

...

"One cell is enough. The DNA pattern of the new host is irrevocably altered. And so on and so on, each animal it takes over becoming a duplicate of the original thing."

"You been into Childs's weed, Blair?" Norris muttered.

Blair's fist slammed onto the table. "Look, I know it's hard to accept! I know it's difficult to picture an enemy you can't see. But if that stuff gets into you system, in about an hour --"

"It takes you over," Fuchs finished for him.

"It's more than that, more than you becoming a part of it. The 'you' is gone, wiped out, shunted aside permanently by a new set of cellular instructions. It retains only what it needs of the original, the way it used the memory patterns of the Norwegian dog to make certain it acted in a recognizably doglike manner."

"It licked my hand," Norris murmured, "as it was being chased by those guys in the helicopter. It came right up to me and licked my hand and whined for help."

Blair nodded. "Sure it did. It keeps anything useful. This organism is highly efficient, not wasteful. And it's clever. Much too clever for my liking."

(Alan Dean Foster, The Thing, 81, 82-83)

So yeah, if kitty gets a checkup they're going to realize something is amiss, though they may not realize the danger until it's too late. Either way, Sickbay is going to quickly turn into a horror show. Starfleet has shown they just aren't proactive enough in preventing these kinds of situations.

[Xon]

The thing is however, it would be trivial for them to contain it once they actually realise that it is a threat if it is limited to a small area.

Even a fairly weak forcefield would stop if cold and it isn't like this thing is the Beast from Homeworld:Cataclysm so it isn't going to eat through the walls.

[Simon_Jester]

I'm not familiar with any of the movies about The Thing, but I am familiar with the original story by John Campbell that those movies were derived from...

Based on my recollection, it would probably be easy for the Trekkers to spot the fake cat in sickbay and contain it there. If they fail to do so, it will be difficult for them to stop the infection from spreading throughout the ship- perhaps as difficult as it was for our Antarctic heroes.

[Temujin]

Well that's assuming they have it already safely contained, scan it and are able to quickly come to the conclusion that the differences are potentially dangerous, and then throw a containment field around it, and not go: "oh look, a genetic abnormality, lets run a few more tests." Meanwhile it starts eating Ensign Ricky's or Nurse Ogawa's face.

*I wouldn't want to be the poor smuck holding the cat while the Doc runs the medical tricorder over it. Even a normal cat can be paws of fury. Just ask Riker.

[Junghalli]

Seducing it would be a Bad Idea; all it needs to do is touch you to infect you, IIRC.

That's purely speculation by the characters in the movie (or rather extrapolation from thereof, the actual speculation was it could be passed by ingestion of small quantities of Thing material), and I'd be inclined to disbelieve it. If it could actually take you over in such an undetectable manner it would make no sense for it to resort to the massive and obvious tentacle rapes we see it actually doing, it would just contaminate everyone's food or sting them and inject some Thing cells into them. I think it's more plausible that it needs a fairly invasive procedure to take somebody over.

[Joe Momma]

This was pretty much the plot to the TNG episode Aquiel, though the introduction didn't point so obviously at the animal in the episode (the station was devoid of all life except for the dog with no trigger-happy lunatic in sight).

Like the Thing, the coalescent organism is described as mimicking targets down to the cellular level. This is sufficient to fool all of the extensive scans of the station conducted as the crew tries to figure out what happened and to avoid triggering the bio-filters of the transporter. Despite several days of tests, Crusher is unable to figure out what's up with the cellular residue she found from the organism (which was left behind in a failed assimilation attempt) until she accidentally touches it and it mimics her hand. Given these failures to detect the coalescent organism despite having prior knowledge of the life form (they had been encountered by the Federation before), it seems unlikely the tricorders and sensors would be up to detecting the similarly camouflaged but completely unfamiliar Thing.

If the coalescent organism in Aquiel reproduced by infecting its targets rather than destroying each new target when assuming its form and it had been as aggressive in spreading itself as the Thing was, the Ent-D crew would have been completely fucked. The dog was brought back to Enterprise and left unsupervised in Geordi's quarters for days. It would have had ample opportunity to infect isolated individuals by visiting them in their private quarters, catching them working alone while on-duty, etc.. The only thing that saved the crew in Aquiel was that the organism went weeks between assimilating new hosts and picked a downright retarded time to attack Geordi. The Thing would have probably just waited until the first time Geordi fell asleep in his quarters and then infected him without a struggle.

[Temujin]

Forgot about that episode, but that's another good example that demonstrates lax Federation procedures in the face of unknown phenomena.

[Joe Momma]

Putting the Thing into that episode rather than having them encounter it as in the OP would be even worse. The Rocha duplicate went undetected for weeks and transferred from his original deep space outpost in the Triona system to the relay station, meaning he was also on at least one starship as well. If the Thing had been given that much freedom...it would have been the neural parasite conspiracy all over again, except this time with an alien that had much better mimicry and camouflage skills -- the neural parasites didn't gain the knowledge of those they took as hosts and left their frigging spines sticking out the back of their victims' heads and look how far they got before being detected. And the Things wouldn't have a convenient single point of vulnerability like the mother that the parasites were all dependent on.

Now I want to see a hi-speed video of a large group of Things and Borg assimilating one another in a continuous cycle, set to the Benny Hill theme song.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

Seducing it would be a Bad Idea; all it needs to do is touch you to infect you, IIRC.

That's purely speculation by the characters in the movie (or rather extrapolation from thereof, the actual speculation was it could be passed by ingestion of small quantities of Thing material), and I'd be inclined to disbelieve it. If it could actually take you over in such an undetectable manner it would make no sense for it to resort to the massive and obvious tentacle rapes we see it actually doing, it would just contaminate everyone's food or sting them and inject some Thing cells into them. I think it's more plausible that it needs a fairly invasive procedure to take somebody over.

I'm pretty certain the tentacle-rape only occurred when the Thing needed to take someone over in a very short period of time. Otherwise the transformation would take a number of hours as the body's taken over cell by cell. For instance there's whats-his-name whose stomach turned into a mouth and head turned into a spider. It was fairly obvious he was infected and feeling the effects of it, but it didn't fully take him over until after he was injured.

Something else I also thought of: The Thing tends to stay undercover until it's pretty obvious it's been detected, then go all out for pure survival. In the kitty scenario, it would likely remain cute and cuddly until it noticed the people around it running extra scans. Once it's certain they've seen through the facade, it will drop everything and try to infect everyone around it, much like what happened with the dogs in the movie.

[Junghalli]

I'm pretty certain the tentacle-rape only occurred when the Thing needed to take someone over in a very short period of time. Otherwise the transformation would take a number of hours as the body's taken over cell by cell.

I don't see how it had urgent need to take over those dogs as quickly as possible, nobody suspected what it was at that point, but it risked exposing itself by subjecting them to a massive tentacle rape anyway. If it could have just assimilated them by biting them and injecting a few Thing cells into their blood or something like that it would have made more sense to do so. Likewise the burned thing that took over hands guy (I forget what his name was) would almost certainly have succeeded if it infected him by some more subtle method, but instead it subjected him to a massive tentacle rape that left him with weird red shit for hands afterward (granted in that case having been so badly damaged it might have been operating entirely on instinct with no reasoning at all). I think the idea that it needs an invasive procedure to take over people makes more sense, given the idea that it doesn't is purely theorizing by people who don't know what it's capable of and would logically go with the assumption that makes it more dangerous on the principle that it's better safe than sorry.

For instance there's whats-his-name whose stomach turned into a mouth and head turned into a spider. It was fairly obvious he was infected and feeling the effects of it, but it didn't fully take him over until after he was injured.

I interpreted that as his heart condition acting up under the stress (he revealed himself when they tried to shock him after he had a heart attack, after all).

[ThomasP]

Remember when they were all tied up on the couch for Macready's blood test, and that one guy started changing -- the Thing picked up the radio guy and had him in its mouth for a minute or so. When it dropped him, he was all covered with gunk in the corner and it was implied (by Mac torching him and the creepy noises the body made) that he was on his way to being transformed.

That didn't seem to be quite as overt as the tentacle-rape, but being bitten into and slimed could be taken as massively invasive, I guess. For some reason that scene struck me as being more like it slobbering all over him, though.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

I don't see how it had urgent need to take over those dogs as quickly as possible, nobody suspected what it was at that point, but it risked exposing itself by subjecting them to a massive tentacle rape anyway. If it could have just assimilated them by biting them and injecting a few Thing cells into their blood or something like that it would have made more sense to do so.

The dogs sure as hell noticed. Long before the Thing started transforming, they were already growling and barking at it. My first assumption when I saw that scene was that while the transformation is visually perfect (at least on a macroscopic level), it can't replicate scents accurately enough to fool a dog's nose, and the dogs regarded it as an unknown, possibly threatening intruder. Once they started growling and barking, the Thing likely realized they would either attack it, or raise enough hell to draw human attention onto it, and panicked a little, trying to throw the infection as far and wide as possible.

Likewise the burned thing that took over hands guy (I forget what his name was) would almost certainly have succeeded if it infected him by some more subtle method, but instead it subjected him to a massive tentacle rape that left him with weird red shit for hands afterward (granted in that case having been so badly damaged it might have been operating entirely on instinct with no reasoning at all).

I'm going with the 'badly damaged and desperate' theory. It was alone in the room with the guy, and the transformation would have gone off without a hitch if whatshisname radioman hadn't unexpectedly come back for the keys.

I think the idea that it needs an invasive procedure to take over people makes more sense, given the idea that it doesn't is purely theorizing by people who don't know what it's capable of and would logically go with the assumption that makes it more dangerous on the principle that it's better safe than sorry.

Well, then what about the guy who was only revealed during the blood-test? It was pretty obvious that he was the one who had been transformed the longest and spent the most time 'under cover'. Re-watching the movie, you can see plenty of points where he deliberately increases the paranoia between other team-members, and uses his host's already accepted mild insanity as a cover for some of the stuff he does. Going back even earlier in the movie, we have the scene where the infected dog goes into a room and startles someone we can only see the shadow of. I think it's pretty reasonable to assume that the dog bit that man, just enough to transfer some of the cells over and start a slow transformation.

I interpreted that as his heart condition acting up under the stress (he revealed himself when they tried to shock him after he had a heart attack, after all).

Could be. Then again it could also be that it interpreted the medical procedures as being too much of a risk of discovery and tried to act quickly.

[Junghalli]

That didn't seem to be quite as overt as the tentacle-rape, but being bitten into and slimed could be taken as massively invasive, I guess. For some reason that scene struck me as being more like it slobbering all over him, though.

It may be that there's a certain critical mass of Thing tissue that's needed to retain intelligence, and something small just wouldn't be enough. The blood sample was still "aware" enough to move away from something hot, but that doesn't necessarily mean it was enough to be a viable Thing all on its own. Alternately considering as I remember the Thing had the guy's head down its throat so it could easily have been subjecting him to some heavily invasive face-raping.

The dogs sure as hell noticed. Long before the Thing started transforming, they were already growling and barking at it. My first assumption when I saw that scene was that while the transformation is visually perfect (at least on a macroscopic level), it can't replicate scents accurately enough to fool a dog's nose, and the dogs regarded it as an unknown, possibly threatening intruder. Once they started growling and barking, the Thing likely realized they would either attack it, or raise enough hell to draw human attention onto it, and panicked a little, trying to throw the infection as far and wide as possible.

Possible.

Well, then what about the guy who was only revealed during the blood-test? It was pretty obvious that he was the one who had been transformed the longest and spent the most time 'under cover'. Re-watching the movie, you can see plenty of points where he deliberately increases the paranoia between other team-members, and uses his host's already accepted mild insanity as a cover for some of the stuff he does. Going back even earlier in the movie, we have the scene where the infected dog goes into a room and startles someone we can only see the shadow of. I think it's pretty reasonable to assume that the dog bit that man, just enough to transfer some of the cells over and start a slow transformation.

I always just assumed that it tentacle-raped him while nobody was around. Seems just as plausible, we know from a couple of other attacks that the procedure can be done relatively quietly.

[NecronLord]

For the record, Which Enterprise are we talking about here? Because I'd have far more faith in Kirk's crew than Picard's to get it sorted.

[Temujin]

For instance there's whats-his-name whose stomach turned into a mouth and head turned into a spider. It was fairly obvious he was infected and feeling the effects of it, but it didn't fully take him over until after he was injured.

I interpreted that as his heart condition acting up under the stress (he revealed himself when they tried to shock him after he had a heart attack, after all).

That was Norris, and yes, he did have a heart condition. I'm going to just quote some of Outpost 31's FAQ again since they do a pretty good job at explaining stuff from the novelization and behind the scenes.

What's up with Norris clutching at his chest?

A: According to the script and book, Norris has an incipient heart condition that everyone knows about. This is backed up by Carpenter's statement on the audio commentary on the Collector's DVD, wherein he states in the first moments of Norris's discomfort that they are "establishing Norris's heart condition." To further this point, it is a fact that those who are stationed in the Antarctic undergo considerable physical examination, and it is highly unlikely that someone with a heart condition would be allowed the assignment without all his comrades knowing about it.

Another theory that has gone around is that the chest-clutching was the result of Norris being in the final stages of assimilation. This seems to be based on the idea that Norris was not the first assimilated, that there is no heart condition, and that a Norris-thing would have no reason to "fake" a heart condition when nobody is around to see. This simply doesn't hold up to the available facts, especially when considering that the Thing, when imitating an organism, imitates it perfectly - including its defects. Were it to "repair" such a heart condition, it would risk drawing attention to itself.

There is little visual accountability for what an organism, being taken over from the inside, appears as. We see this most clearly with Windows, after he is mauled by Palmer-Thing, who appears as a bloody "glurping" mess as he is reconstituted by Thing cells. It is doubtful that a Thing nearing completion in this way would have been appearing for a great deal of time as an otherwise normal human, but suddenly wracked by chest pain from the completion of the assimilation process.

I'm pretty certain the tentacle-rape only occurred when the Thing needed to take someone over in a very short period of time. Otherwise the transformation would take a number of hours as the body's taken over cell by cell.

I don't see how it had urgent need to take over those dogs as quickly as possible, nobody suspected what it was at that point, but it risked exposing itself by subjecting them to a massive tentacle rape anyway. If it could have just assimilated them by biting them and injecting a few Thing cells into their blood or something like that it would have made more sense to do so.

Regarding the kennel scene:

Why did the dog-Thing attack the kennel when it did?

A: The way the final film was cut, you can't help but get the impression that the dog-Thing attacked very shortly after Clark left the kennel. This would be somewhere close to 7 PM on the first day, since that's the time seen on the Rec Room wall clock as Bennings complains about the "mutt." But this opens up the issue of why did the kennel attack happen when it did. Didn't the dog-Thing run a great risk of getting detected if many of the men, especially Clark, were still up and about?

Careful analysis of the film demonstrates that the kennel attack was originally planned to occur early in the morning after Clark had caged the dog-Thing, when all the men had gone to sleep. Here are a few considerations:

(1) The script clearly places the kennel attack many hours after the dog-Thing was caged. It even gives a precise time: 4:30 AM. In the script everyone but Mac is asleep. Mac happens to be in the Rec Room with his inflatable "friend" watching the Norwegian video tapes. And, according to the script, the only reason why the dog-Thing's attack gets foiled is because Mac happened to be awake to hear it. Everyone else was sound asleep and were not awakened by the noise. Instead, it was Mac who awoke them.

(2) The scene with Mac & his inflatable "friend" was indeed shot for the film. The Deleted Scenes pictures prove it. Since this scene was supposed to occur prior to the kennel attack, this is good proof the attack wasn't originally meant to happen until later on.

(3) Clark wears different clothing when he cages the dog-Thing than when we see him coming back to find out what the noise is all about. This is mentioned as a blooper in the Goofs section, but this is not a goof if we consider the original script story! In the script, Mac comes and wakes up Clark and tells him to quiet down the dogs. Clark then has to get dressed. This easily accounts for the difference in Clark's attire.

(4) Here's something even more subtle. Clark plays pool with Nauls when Bennings complains about the "mutt." So you would expect Nauls to be hanging around the Rec Room when the alarms sound apparently just a few minutes later. But we actually see Nauls coming out of one of the rooms in the sleeping quarters wearing only a t-shirt and underwear. You can see him trying to put on some pants. This is completely consistent with the script which has Nauls being slightly awakened by the dogs' barking, but then immediately returning to sleep, only to be truly awakened a little bit later by the alarms.

So, why did the dog-Thing attack the kennel when it did? The answer is really quite simple. The film's shooting of that scene had originally meant to put the attack in the early morning. In other words, the dog-Thing had waited until it thought all the men were sound asleep. It was only afterwards, during the editing process, that the intervening time was cut out and "left on the editing room floor." In spite of how the film was cut, it's best to interpret the timing of the kennel attack as taking place very early in the morning when all the men, except Mac, were sound asleep.

Well, then what about the guy who was only revealed during the blood-test? It was pretty obvious that he was the one who had been transformed the longest and spent the most time 'under cover'. Re-watching the movie, you can see plenty of points where he deliberately increases the paranoia between other team-members, and uses his host's already accepted mild insanity as a cover for some of the stuff he does. Going back even earlier in the movie, we have the scene where the infected dog goes into a room and startles someone we can only see the shadow of. I think it's pretty reasonable to assume that the dog bit that man, just enough to transfer some of the cells over and start a slow transformation.

Palmer's considered to be among the first actually assimilated, and he does seem to play a lot of head games through out the movie. He even points out the Norris Thing Spider Head as it tries to get away, when he was likely already assimilated. That whole scene with the dog and shadow has led to loads of debate and controversy among fans.

Whose shadow was on the wall?

A: This is the biggest and easily most contested issue in the entire film, and it’s been fascinating to observe how the debate has progressed over time. There can be only three candidates here: Norris, Palmer, and Blair -- with most people immediately ruling out Blair because of his baldness. This leaves it up for grabs between Norris and Palmer.

There was a day when virtually any Thing fan would’ve fingered the geophysicist Norris as the first American the Thing assimilates. This was primarily because of the hair style suggested in the shadow as well as the silhouette’s large size. Norris struck most people as the one who best matched these characteristics.

But in recent times Todd Cameron, a major mover and shaker in the worldwide community of Thing fans, after having viewed The Thing on the big screen, started a significant shift in the opinions of the film’s followers. Todd pointed out that the chin and neck of the silhouette are too tight to belong to the chubby Norris. Also, the sheer size of the shadow is explained if we think of the person as sitting some distance from the wall (or quite close to the light source). In this case, even a skinny dude like Palmer would end up looking big. But what really clinched it for Todd was the way the shadow is shown turning to face the dog-Thing. There’s a certain point, it was claimed, when the shadow has the unmistakable outline of Palmer’s hair and head.

In the wake of Todd’s dramatic turnabout on the issue, Thing fans have been forced to do a thorough re-evaluation of the matter. It is remarkable to now see the two sides fairly evenly split. What was once an issue believed to be essentially resolved is now a hot topic for impassioned debate. As of this writing, the question of Whose Shadow Was on the Wall? is approaching 200 responses on Outpost31’s Discussion Board. Both sides have constructed elaborate and sophisticated arguments, and the discussion shows no sign of slowing down.

Interestingly enough, John Carpenter himself was asked this very question during a question and answer session at a Film Festival. His reply was that the shadow didn’t belong to any of the actors but was that of a stand-in just for the sake of getting the shot. Well, needless to say, virtually no Thing fan believes this. People point out that Carpenter has not had the best reputation for recalling events from 20 years ago. Besides, would you reveal the secret to what is arguably the greatest mystery of your film career?

This story is far from over. It will be very interesting to see in the future if the opinions of Thing fans continue to change. The Palmer side has steadily gained adherents. Will it continue to do so? The Norris side has supporters that are just as enthusiastic and are just as convinced. Will it remain as strong it is? Stayed tuned. Only time will tell. (FYI: The actual shadow was not a cast member at all but stuntman Dick Warlock.)

[Temujin]

For the record, Which Enterprise are we talking about here? Because I'd have far more faith in Kirk's crew than Picard's to get it sorted.

Well per the OP its open, and could actually be any Federation ship, even Voyager. But yeah, Kirk's Enterprise was the most competent of the bunch, so if anyone is likely to survive it's them.

[Skylon]

For the record, Which Enterprise are we talking about here? Because I'd have far more faith in Kirk's crew than Picard's to get it sorted.

Well per the OP its open, and could actually be any Federation ship, even Voyager. But yeah, Kirk's Enterprise was the most competent of the bunch, so if anyone is likely to survive it's them.

There's also a lot more things on the Ent-D to imitate as pets are rampant, not to mention young children.

Troi may be helpful (I know, I know....*GASP* and *LOL*) in this situation as she could likely sense any malevolent thoughts by the Thing, and of course the crew can always count on Data not being the Thing.

[Temujin]

Having a telepath on board would definitely make things (no pun intended) interesting, as would Data being immune from assimilation. If not discovered right away, assimilating (or just killing) the Dr and any telepaths on board would be one of the Thing's priorities, as would somehow disposing of Data.

Considering the OP referred to a cat, I figured if the Ent D, Data's cat Spot would be a likely candidate for assimilation. However, it already seems to be some sort of changeling.