The Two Endings The Thing (1982)
The Thing's released ending — MacReady and Childs in the snow at the burning camp, the bottle of J&B passed between them, the held two-shot — was not Bill Lancaster's original ending. The screenplay's original final scene had MacReady alone at the burning camp and the malamute from the opening pursuit running into frame; the closing image was a shot of the dog's eyes glowing in the dark. The released ending was reshot in late post-production after a test screening produced a hostile audience response to the dog-Thing button.
Lancaster's original ending
The original screenplay's final scene was structurally a closure on the film's opening shot. The malamute that had run across the ice in beat 1 — the dog the Norwegian helicopter was chasing — was the Thing's first imitation, and the original ending returned the dog to the frame in beat 40 to complete the structural arc. The closing image was the dog's eyes glowing in the dark at the edge of the burning camp. The scene argued that the Thing had survived: the malamute was the original Thing, the malamute had been at the camp through every event of the film, the malamute was now leaving for the rest of the world.
"Bill's screenplay had the dog in the last shot. The dog was the Thing the whole time. The dog had been at the camp watching the men since the first frame. That was the ending Bill wanted." — Stuart Cohen, on the producer's blog The Original Fan (2010s)
The dog-chase test ending
A second alternative ending was filmed at one point in production: an extended chase sequence in which MacReady, alive at the burning camp, sees the dog running away across the ice and gives pursuit on a snowmobile. The dog-chase ending was abandoned during editing for tonal reasons — it was too generic an action closure for what had been an unusually quiet final act — and was never tested with audiences. The dog-chase footage has appeared on some home-video releases as a deleted-scenes extra.
The released ending
The released ending was reshot over a few days in late post-production. The scene as released — Childs walking out of the storm, the bottle passed, the held two-shot — replaces both the original dog-Thing button and the dog-chase pursuit with a deliberately ambiguous wind-down in which the camera holds on two men neither of whom can be verified as human. The reshoot was Carpenter's choice, made over Lancaster's mild objection.
"I shot Bill's ending. I shot the dog-chase ending. I shot the two-shot. The two-shot was the one I knew was right when I saw it. The dog-Thing button is a horror-genre closure. The two-shot is the film's argument." — John Carpenter, The Hollywood Reporter (2022)
What changed in the wind-down
The most-discussed change between Lancaster's screenplay and the released wind-down is the choice of who walks out of the storm. Lancaster's original draft had the dog. The released film has Childs. The choice replaces the unambiguous reveal that the Thing has survived (the dog is the Thing) with the open question that has driven forty years of fan discussion (is Childs the Thing? is MacReady the Thing? is either of them human?). See The Open Ending Debate.
"The two-shot is the most important single editorial choice in the picture. The dog ending closes the film. The two-shot leaves it open. The film I cut is the film that is open. That is the film." — Todd Ramsay, editor on The Thing, Cinefantastique (1982)
The audience-test history
The released ending was developed in part as a response to test-audience feedback. A late preview cut in May 1982 had shown the dog-chase pursuit ending; the audience response was mixed and the genre-closure feel of the chase was specifically cited as a weakness. Carpenter and Cohen reshot the wind-down with the two-shot in early June 1982 — three weeks before the film's June 25 release — and the two-shot is what made the picture.
Lancaster's response
Lancaster has been quoted as accepting the change in the released film. He preferred his original ending in principle but acknowledged Carpenter's argument that the two-shot was structurally a better closure than the dog-Thing button.
"I had written the dog. John shot the dog. John also shot the two-shot. He showed both to me, and I told him: shoot what you think is right. He shot what was right. The two-shot is what was right." — Bill Lancaster, Cinefantastique (1982)
Where the alternate endings appear on home video
The dog-chase pursuit footage has appeared on the 2004 Universal Collector's Edition DVD and on some international Blu-ray releases as a deleted-scenes extra. Lancaster's original dog-Thing button has not been released on home video — the production never shot a final close-up of the dog's glowing eyes, and the screenplay's last image therefore exists only as a script direction. See Physical Media Releases (The Thing).