Okay, If anyone else has made these connections before I have not seen. So here are some fun parallels.
The Thing About the End
Here’s the theory, if we assume Old Coke/Classic Coke is the real end and New Coke is the fake end/fake season, then we can assume the original The Thing is the real end and John Carpenter’s The Thing is the fake end. As Lucas in season 3 made said analogy “It’s like Carpenter’s The Thing. The original is the classic, no question about it, but the remake… Sweeter. Bolder. Better.” The two films are very different, in fact Carpenter said he didn’t consider his film a remake of the 1951 version and it was more based on the original novella ‘Who Goes There?’ By John W. Campbell. I compiled a list of some similarities and discrepancies between the two films, and what they could mean. As well as a few peculiar details.
Both films start with a game, in The Thing From Another World, the characters are playing poker, where in John Carpenter’s The Thing, MacReady is playing chess alone. This is the first detail to the isolationist nature of the characters compared to the 1951 film. What connects this to Stranger Things is the chess imagery. Which symbolizes a greater force at work, a puppet master. This is demonstrated in season four as One describes his own method of setting up the actions of others while he attributes the strategy to Brenner. The chess imagery in The Thing (1982) more refers to it as a game between players, the strategy of man against Thing up until the final checkmate with Mac and Childs. The final scene is almost a parallel to the opening scene, where Mac shorts out the game before he can lose.
The machine is specifically named a Chess Wizard. In season five Mike continues to emphasize that Will is not a Wizard. When Will is described as a Wizard it is contradicted, but who is also referred to as a Wizard? Vecna, the character most associated with chess imagery.
Mike is the only character in the episode shown to be alone as the end of his story. There is a physical chess board in the Rec Room in Carpenters’s film, so the isolation theme continues as it communicates that MacReady chooses to play the game alone. The interesting thing though is that a can of Coke is placed right beside the board.
The signal out has interference at first in the original film, but it clears and they are able to receive messages. In John Carpenter’s film, the signal is lost the entire duration, the server room is even destroyed. This fits very well with the theme of signals and interference in Stranger Things. It could be implied here that interference was messing with the signal and then at a point was completely cut, maybe the ominous bold line between volume one and two. So in the real end, the interference will fade and the signals will continue. Signals in this instance are analogous with romantic feelings, specifically those between Mike and Will.
Which leads me to one of the most important differences between the films. A difference that struck me halfway through watching, The Thing From Another World has a romance plot, and John Carpenter’s The Thing does not. In fact, The Thing (1982) is commonly spoken about as an allegory for the fear of homosexuality. In the 1951 film, the first scene between the love interests, Captian Hendry asks to start over again with the woman he likes, Nikki Nicholson (Nikki, interesting), whom he has forgotten his last interaction with. “You told me?” “Don’t you remember?” “No.” “Right after dinner. You were telling me all about a night in San Francisco.” There is a theme of forgetting one’s love in films used as inspiration for the season, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind to name an example, and Will has a birthday that somehow everyone forgot. The parallels continue. In a later scene in which the pair is flirting they say the lines “I know. Yesterday I’d said it was crazy.” “I’d say it’s crazy now.” “Many people think so, too.” Everything circles back to crazy together.
The Thing (1982) is about paranoia and the inherent distrust of the concept of an other. This is a clear cut way to interpret the story. But just like its amorphous physicality, the nature of the Thing alludes to much more. Namely it exists as an allusion to the HIV AIDS epidemic, this has been confirmed by Carpenter as a major inspiration for the blood test scene. So the Thing therefore also represents the fear of homosexuality. This allusion aligns with the nature of the setting, 12 men stationed on a secluded outpost, distrust running rampant through them as they are wary of who could be infected. The Thing overtakes the men in a private setting when possible, referring to the intimacy of the act. The Thing itself represents both AIDS and homosexuality as per the continued references to blood and cross contamination. The crew is afraid of this unknown infecting their party, they are afraid of becoming infected themselves. The fear of homosexuality aligns very well with Stranger Things, which also features allusions to AIDS (Henry having a completely unique blood type, I love you #bobgate), as Mike’s fear of his own homosexuality prevails in episode eight.
The Thing From Another World does not have these themes, one of the most significant differences between the films is the Thing does not shapeshift or contaminate the crew in the original. Because of this the film is absent of the themes of paranoia and the fear of being infected, corrupted, and imitated. The only possible reference in the 1951 film to the Thing as a metaphor for the fear of homosexuality is an off handed comment where Hendry refers to the Thing as “our boyfriend”. Overall I believe the shapeshifting and infectious nature of the Thing in Carpenter’s film could refer to a portion of the cast of characters in Stranger Things being not who they seem. Particularly in later episodes and the finale, where there is the possibility of Mike being the only remaining character while the rest are imitations. This would parallel the end of The Thing where MacReady and Childs sit together by the burning outpost, but Mac is the only human left.
Continuing with the AIDS allusions, the blood test scene is the most related to this and Palmer in this scene is revealed to be the Thing. Which aligns with the subtle queer coding of his character. Namely the grey handkerchief he keeps in his back left pocket. This leads me to my next point which is that Eddie Munson IS Palmer. Palmer’s denim vest has multiple patches and “Barbarians California” on the back, with two axes crossed in an x. Assumed to be a biker gang but it still applies to D&D. His hair was supposed to be long according to the script. He is the “druggie” of the crew, he lights a joint before he speaks for the first time. I cannot stress enough how much he resembles Eddie, in his death even he is flung against the ceiling in a manor that is so similar to Chrissy’s death in season four I basically saw it overlayed in my mind while watching. What all that means, no fucking clue.
In The Thing From Another World, the crew uses an airplane, where in John Carpenter’s film there are only helicopters. Now this could be irrelevant, but the phrase “land the plane” has been used often in interviews while talking about how they want to execute the end of the series. There are a lot of helicopters featured in the fifth season. Stranger Things even has an expansion for Microsoft Flight Simulator from “Hawkins Helicopter Tour Company.”
This is where it gets good. In the 1982 film, there is a game show playing on a television at 25:58 “One, door number two, and door number three, and I think that a Dawn Screen here has got the one to trade in the most, I went to you first. you brought your friend Anna, you’ve been consulting Anna all through the show anyhow, you can consult her one more time.” Palmer then says “I know how this one ends.” And switches the tape.
The game show is Let’s Make a Deal, it was hosted by Monty Hall and the Monty Hall problem spawned from it, a question of probability. If you were given the choice between three doors, chose one, and then a different wrong door was opened, would you change your original answer? The probability of the correct door being the original choice is 1/3 and the probability of the other unopened door being correct is 2/3. I could not find the episode itself so I don’t know which door she chose, but I was able to find that the episode takes place sometime during the 1976 season. Let’s Make a Deal also featured an elusive fourth door that was on the show from 1984-1986.
The tape is cut short so the audience doesn’t get to see the door chosen. This detail specifically is interesting as a reference to the problem with the doors in the Stranger Things epilogue, where the third door is hidden. It is implied that Mike chooses the second door, but factoring in the Monty Hall problem, maybe that doesn’t have to be his final choice. Maybe the tape was cut short before we could even see the choice made.
Broken windows are a detail in both versions of The Thing, as well as the continued mention of doors. This reminds me of a few things: the saying about how “when a door closes, a window opens”, the distinct absence of the third door in the epilogue, and the one way sign pointing to the window in Mike’s imaginary dorm. The Thing escapes out of a window at one point in the 1951 film.
In The Thing From Another World a plot point is established that is absent from the 1982 film. This is the discovery that the Thing is building an army. Something that would be expected in Stranger Things after Nancy’s Vecna vision, is the army she describes. But just like Carpenter’s film, the finale has no mention of an army.
This seems familiar. “After one market research screening, Carpenter queried the audience on their thoughts, and one audience member asked, "Well what happened in the very end? Which one was the Thing ...?" When Carpenter responded that it was up to their imagination, the audience member responded, "Oh, God. I hate that."” Is an excerpt from the marketing section on the Wikipedia page on The Thing. Sounds remarkably familiar to how much of the finale is up to interpretation according to interviews from the Duffers. Not only that but, when asked about the ambiguous end, Carpenter said “Now, I do know, in the end, who the Thing is, but I cannot tell you.” He swore to take the secret to his grave. And what did the Duffers say about the ambiguous end for El? Only they and Millie know. The biggest question that’s left ambiguous in the end, is answered in the same manner by both directors.
The film was promoted on Late Night with David Letterman, Stranger Things has been promoted on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. Reception to the 1982 film was very negative at first, people said it “featured sloppy continuity, lacked pacing, and was devoid of warmth or humanity.” The characters, besides MacReady, were criticized as flat and lacking in characterization. Several reviews took note of the distinct lack of camaraderie, how the crew do not band together in order to survive, as well as the lack of romance. It was a colossal failure and caused John Carpenter’s career and reputation to plummet as he was signed off and bought off of directing contracts because The Thing did so poorly.
The actor Kenneth Tobey, Captain Hendry from the 1951 film, criticized The Thing and said its effects "were so explicit that they actually destroyed how you were supposed to feel about the characters ... They became almost a movie in themselves, and were a little too horrifying." He called it “Carpenter’s most unsatisfying film to date.” To say it was poorly received would be an understatement.
If the interpretation is that Vecna succeeded and all the characters are dead or dying, and there’s no hope for new episodes or Mike waking up, that’s pretty bleak. Even in the basic interpretation of the end where the characters become who they never wished to become and Mike’s greatest fear comes true and it is all real, devastating. Disheartening, unsatisfying, and disappointing, like the 1982 film is when compared to The Thing From Another World.
The Thing (1982) gained a cult following only after its release on home video. Maybe a reference to how volume two and three could be seen in a different light once the real end is released. Some people have even attributed the terrible reception to the film to the recession at the time, which is another interesting parallel to Stranger Things.
Both films have very interesting closing lines. In The Thing From Another World the last line is “Every one of you listening to my voice, tell the world, tell this to everybody wherever they are, watch the skies. Everywhere. Keep looking. Keep watching the skies.” This is the journalist encouraging the world and the audience to stay curious and vigilant, a satisfying conclusion as his story on the Thing was continuously denied publication throughout the film. In Carpenter’s The Thing their story ends with them, the Thing is not discovered by the public. This could be in reference to Mike and Will’s romance being suppressed and undiscovered by the general audience in episode eight of Stranger Things. The last line in The Thing is spoken by MacReady “Why don’t we just wait here a little while, see what happens.” Carpenter’s closing line is pretty reminiscent of Vance Goodman’s closing remarks for the WSQK “don’t be afraid of the quiet, sit with it. It knows you better than you think.”
To me these lines both seem connected to Stranger Things in that there is the encouragement to wait and be patient to see what happens, and the imploring to keep looking for things that may not be what they seem.
One of my favourite connections, Carpenter’s The Thing is very detailed, there are enough details to surmise the true ending. Theories have sparked about the order of infiltration and who the Thing was in the end. Theories that are supported by details in the film. When analyzing the end, it becomes clear that Childs is the Thing and this is because his pants change colour (Remind you of anything?) and the replica jacket he is seen with goes missing. This implies he changed clothes and was taken over, leaving MacReady as the last human at the outpost. I feel like I don’t have to point out the connection here.
Fun fact, an alternate ending had MacReady rescued and tested, where he is found not to be infected. There are four alternate endings in total, some were even filmed.
Another fun fact. The board game STAY ALIVE falls on Windows as he dies, and is also seen in The Crawl.
There is also a pinball machine in the Rec Room, right below the clock. As well as a pinball video game made for The Thing
That’s the best of it, sorry for the mess, thank you for reading.