10 More Movie Characters Whose Fates Are Never Resolved

Typically, it doesn't matter what comes before if the ending of a movie can't stick the landing. Who wants to invest in any story only to be let down and disappointed at the end? It taints the entire experience.

The Thing, however, simply doesn't have this problem, as John Carpenter's 1982 outing boasts one of the most iconic final scenes in cinematic history. Just Childs (Keith David) and MacReady (Kurt Russell) sitting together by the fire with a bottle, waiting. 

Throughout the movie, the titular shapeshifting alien attacks and kills everybody else in the Arctic research station, and due to its nature as being able to completely change its form with no tell whatsoever, there's no way of knowing which host it is using at any one time. This is how the film ends, with Childs and MacReady waiting, not knowing if the other has any surprises in store for them.

It was uncertain whether either of the men had been replaced by the killer creature, or if neither had. Was one of them killed by the other after the screen went black, or were they waiting up until their last breath? The idea has been revisited since, both in a Dark Horse comic series, The Thing From Another World, which had both Childs and MacReady initially survive before Childs was taken over, and The Thing video game, which showed that MacReady was the only survivor of the two. It's debatable how seriously these should be taken, and as recently as 2023, John Carpenter has suggested that he is the only one who truly knows. And no, he's not telling.