[metternich1815]

I voted for "thumbs down", but that does not accurately indicate my feelings on the film. I thought it was an enjoyable picture and it was interesting to have seen what happened at the Norwegian camp. With that being said, it could have been so much better.

First, I feel that they did not explore the alien as much as they could have. I was really disappointed by their exploration of the alien ship as well. Since the Norwegians first discovered the alien, they could have discovered things about the alien that the American station did not. One of the main purposes of a prequel is to explore topics such as these in greater detail than the original film. It seemed to have been wasted potential in this regard.

Second, the whole idea of Americans being called to the camp seemed completely illogical. This was only done, in my opinion, so that some of the characters could speak English. I think either one they should have done the entire film in Norwegian or two entirely in English, but the Americans should not have been in the film at all. Personally, I favor the former approach. That would have been quite unique for an American film to have been shot in Norwegian. Even with the existing setup, I felt that the language differences were not explored very well. Again, more wasted potential, in my opinion.

Third, the film seemed to be a rehashing of the original film. The original film is an untouchable masterpiece. This needs to be recognized before making the film. Nothing will ever result in this film comparing to the original. It seemed to me though that the filmmakers tried to redo much of what had already been done in Carpenter's film. I think they should have tried to do things that the original did not do. Some scenes were almost exactly the same as in the original film. As often happens when films do this, it just seems like it copies the original instead of trying to establish itself as a separate work. For this reason, many people actually think it is a remake of John Carpenter's the Thing.

Fourth, the film overutilized the showing of the creature. One of the things that made the original so brilliant was that, while the creature was shown, it was done at key moments that made them effective. The prequel showed them almost constantly, which reduces their overall effect. Related to this point, unfortunately, the creatures looked terrible. The original was a masterpiece of special effects, while the prequel relied much too heavily on terrible CGI. This just further ruins their effect. A similar point, was that the film relied much too heavily on "jump scares" in the place of suspense. Some of the best scenes in the original were so great because of the suspense.

These are my main criticism of the film. I feel the film is entertaining and I do watch it from time-to-time, but there was so much wasted potential. The film may never of been able to compare to Carpenter's film, but it should have at least attempted to try new things instead of just rehash Carpenter's masterpiece.