Submitted by darthvirgin t3_yhyyzj in movies
darthvirgin OP t1_iuglypz wrote
Reply to comment by Douglasqqq in The Thing (1982) -- the scene with MaReady checking on Blair in the cabin by darthvirgin
Agreed, but it’s not super clear how the assimilation process works, and there are other characters who it evidently mimicked quite perfectly as they’re doppelgängers in multiple scenes.
WR_MouseThrow t1_iugpk7i wrote
It's not super clear but I think you can infer that the assimilated have a good handle on human behaviour, and that Blair put the noose out as a not-very-subtle threat of "let me back in before I kill myself" (whether he was already assimilated at the time or not).
Froegerer t1_iui23hd wrote
They make it sound like you somehow keep your consciousness until it decides takes over. Like it assimilates everything but the brain or part of the brain so the host has no idea and makes it impossible to identify without something like a janky hot wire blood test. Some character said something like, "you could be one of those things and not even know it!".
Badloss t1_iui8xb9 wrote
I don't think that's what's going on. I think The Thing is perfectly emulating the person, if you were assimilated then you are dead and your consciousness is gone.
I think the characters are just wrong when they say that, or they're imperfectly trying to describe how good the mimcry is
SplinterPizza t1_iuil07m wrote
If you perfectly replicated the Human brain inside a computer... Would it think it's conscious? His point still stands.
Badloss t1_iuimitz wrote
It doesn't, because that's not what the thing is doing.
The thing has access to the host's memories and instincts and uses them to perfectly imitate the host. I disagree that it's building a functional simulation of the host's consciousness to do that
SplinterPizza t1_iuiocdo wrote
>The thing has access to the host's memories and instincts and uses them to perfectly imitate the host. I disagree that it's building a functional simulation of the host's consciousness to do that
Sure but the point is we only know what the film shows us. And it's pretty clear the what it mimics is a perfect representation of a human. It has the memories of the person it devours. Now for the extrapolation on that, If it's mimicking down to the Neurons then it stands to reason it can mimic the mind of the person.
It understands what a noose is. It understands what Alcohol tastes like. The characters in the film make a salient point that maybe you wouldn't even know you were a mimic.
Badloss t1_iuir2ed wrote
Yeah I mean of course we're all speculating. I just disagree that the mimics don't know they're mimics. I think they know exactly what they are and just know exactly how to fake being human.
There's actually a great example of what you're talking about in the Dune books though. The Tleilaxu invent perfect Face Dancers that completely replicate their target and then the mimicry is so perfect that the copy believes it's the original and they lose control of them
Sadatori t1_iugqez8 wrote
Since the Thing knew how to build a spaceship, that meant it retains the knowledge of the beings it assimilates so it would know what a noose is as well, but I still absolutely love how it completely ignores the noose while talking and absolutely love the movie and how we can still try and get more out of it to this day
striker907 t1_iugudwk wrote
I don’t think the spaceship thing confirms that personally. I saw that as knowledge possessed by the “original being” or form of the Thing, considering it crash landed onto Earth with a similar-looking ship.
Am I wrong? It’s all a guess
BOEJlDEN t1_iugxvvs wrote
I assumed that the ship was piloted by a completely separate alien species that was infected by the Thing. I don’t think that was the Thing’s ship
MattyKatty t1_iuh3buz wrote
It's ambiguous in the 1982 version. It was meant to be shown in the 2011 prequel but then they CGI'd over it.
CMelody t1_iujl3me wrote
That was my thought, too. Blair figured out pretty quickly that the Thing had to be isolated before it assimilated all life on Earth.
After they realized the same, I think the aliens in the ship crashed on purpose on what they thought was a backwater planet with no sentient life to quarantine the Thing where it could do no harm.
dudinax t1_iugxnfl wrote
I always thought the implication was the thing caused the crash. Didn't they find a body in the wreck? I suspect that's not the thing's true form.
badger81987 t1_iuirxs6 wrote
It probably doesn't really have one, kind of like The Builders in The Expanse. Pure parasites.
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