Fun Patrol

Letters to Monsters: The Thing

by Justin Teerlinck

Dear Thing,

I appreciate the fact that imitation is "the high­est form of flattery" but in your case, I believe you've taken it too far. First off, allow me to con­vey how much I sympathize with your situation. It must have been extremely difficult to crash land your space craft into the Antarctic ice over 100,000 years ago and sit there and get all frozen. I imagine that you must have experienced some difficult feelings of boredom, frustration and anxiety. I do not know how you manage those difficult feelings on your home world, Thing, but here on Earth you chose to lash out against Kurt Russell and his skeleton crew of scientists and roller skaters. Does that seem fair to you?

Secondly, Kurt Russell was clearly out of line when he exclaimed, "Fuck you too!" You never said anything mean to him! Kurt Russell clearly had some issues before he met you, and he would have afterwards as well—had you let him live. I cannot imagine how much words like that hurt you. I would ask you myself, but throughout much of the film you appeared to be mostly non-verbal. Yet, I want to say that I think Mr. Russell may have been expressing some legitimate feelings of anger because you did turn one of the crew member's stomach into a giant, gnashing mouth and then ate off Doc's arms after he was trying to perform CPR. Thing, that is just simply not a scenario that medical doctors train for, and frankly I believe Doc probably felt like less than a whole person when you vio­lently de-limbed him. I'd ask Doc how he feels about that, but as you well know Doc died a few minutes later.

Still, "an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind," as Gandhi once said. I don't know if your planet has ever heard of Gandhi or Martin Luther King. If not, I really suggest you look them up. They had some insightful things to say regarding not flailing at others with your greasy tentacles just because some­body did something to you first. If your home world has Wi-Fi, I suggest using Wikipedia as a resource to learn about great men and women who use peace as an agent of social change. And if you disagree with the fact of an article you read, Wiki­pedia also allows you to craft thoughtful, editorial changes. Wikipedia: an online encyclopedia by the people, for the peo­ple. Thing, it just can't get any better than that.

Well Thing, I do hope you've learned from this experi­ence. You single-thing-edly wiped out both the Norwegian base and the Americans. The next time you wake up from your long, frozen slumber I pray that you will use words instead of weapons, and hugs instead of severing limbs. I pray for you, Thing.

Kindest regards,

Justin Moreau Teerlinck, Film Goer

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