In The Thing from Another World, the alien creature is commonly called the Thing.
The 1951 science-fiction horror film follows a United States Air Force crew and scientists at an Arctic research station after they discover a crashed spacecraft. The surviving extraterrestrial is a humanoid plant-based organism that feeds on blood and threatens the isolated team.
The film was produced by Howard Hawks and directed by Christian Nyby, although Hawks’s creative influence has led to continuing discussion about the division of directing duties. Its screenplay was adapted from John W. Campbell Jr.’s 1938 novella Who Goes There?
The title creature should not be confused with the shape-shifting organism in John Carpenter’s 1982 film The Thing. Carpenter’s movie is a separate adaptation of the same source story and uses “the Thing” as the creature’s common designation rather than a personal name.