Who Goes There?

During the late winter at the remote Antarctic research station, the crew uncovers a relic buried in the ice—a crashed alien spacecraft. The discovery unsettles the station and hints at danger beyond their world. The crew begins to contemplate what they might awaken if they probe further.

In a misguided attempt to thaw the vessel's interior, they ignite a thermite charge. The magnesium hull flares into a fierce blaze, and the craft is consumed in the flames. From the debris, a single alien life-form remains entombed in the ice.

From the ice, they extract a single alien creature and bring it indoors. The life-form appears inert at first, suggesting it is dormant or in stasis. The decision to study it becomes a turning point for the base.

The thaw revives the creature, revealing a being capable of assuming the form, memories, and personality of any life it consumes. It also preserves its own body mass for future reproduction, making it a persistent and dangerous predator. The crew's cautious curiosity quickly gives way to fear as its intelligence becomes evident.

Its first act is a terrifying kill, then an imitation of Connant, the station's physicist. The crew realizes the threat is not a standard alien but a cunning organism that can mimic humans. Trust crumbles as the Thing begins to blur the line between ally and impostor.

The Thing attempts to masquerade as a sled dog, but the team detects the ruse and destroys the transformed animal midway through its change. The attempt confirms the creature's ability to masquerade as a living being. The base's safety begins to feel increasingly fragile.

Blair, the pathologist who had advocated thawing, descends into paranoia and guilt. He is quarantined in a locked cabin as suspicion grows. A harsh 'rule of four' is established, requiring three crew-watchers for every person.

Realizing the danger, the survivors decide to isolate their base, shut down airplanes and vehicles, and maintain radio silence to avoid attracting rescue or attention. They try to secure the perimeter and restrain movement to prevent the Thing from leaving. Mistrust drives tense, quiet days as they wait for the unknown threat to reveal itself.

The Thing is revealed to be telepathic, able to read minds and project thoughts, complicating every decision and eroding trust among the crew. Surfaces of alliance crumble as suspicion spreads.

A cruel experiment involving blood injections tests for a human-immunity serum using a test dog; the results are inconclusive and hint that Copper or Garry may already be the Thing. The uncertainty fuels paranoia and drives further testing.

Assistant commander McReady takes control and deduces that almost every animal, except the test dog, has become an imitation. He orders a brutal line of testing, including heating blood samples with a wire to see if they recoil. The crew's certainty collapses as the threat is revealed to be widespread.

The cook, Kinner, is murdered, and his true nature is revealed as another Thing. The realization that the threat is intimate intensifies the fear and drives the survivors to act more decisively. They proceed with elimination and containment measures.

Blood tests reveal fourteen men are Things, including Connant and Garry, leaving the survivors with almost no trusted crew. The scale of the infiltration is terrifying and forces a reevaluation of every interaction.

The final revelation comes when Blair is revealed to be a Thing; the team reaches his cabin and kills the Blair-Thing in the snow. The threat seems contained, but the sense that the creature could escape remains.

In the aftermath, the Blair-Thing had nearly finished a nuclear-powered anti-gravity device that could let the Thing escape to civilization. The base is cleared of immediate threats, but the looming possibility of outside contamination lingers.