Those who've read some of the film related coverage on Bits of News, might have come away with the impression that I'm not overly fond of remakes. And they'd be as right as Jessica Alba in a thong bikini.

Hollywood's remake madness usually takes two forms: 1) They do the do over on an absolute classic, trashing whatever made the original great, and turn it into an absolute plate of dingo's kidneys.

These are the sorts of remakes that requires large helpings of thorazine to get through. A recent example would be the abominable once again without feeling of "The Wicker Man", starring Nicolas Cage.

2) They basically "cover" the previous film in that bad pub band sort of way, going for a slightly degraded carbon copy of the earlier film. A recent example of this totally superfluous shot by shot remake way of doing things is the remake of "The Omen", which quite rightly sank with nary a plop.

Rare are the cases where a sequel/prequel/remake can match, or even better, the original. They're quite simply bad news.

So the rumours that started floating on the breeze a while ago that Universal were going ahead with a prequel (more recently the word used is "remake") to John Carpenter’s H.P Lovecraft inspired Antarctic horror gem "The Thing" (which, in point of fact, itself is one of those examples of a remake that betters the 1951 original, based on John W. Campbell Jr. 1938 short story "Who Goes There?"), my first reaction was to snort derisively.

But now the trade mag Variety reports this little nugget of info that might make this a must-see:

Kurt Russell having a rather crappy
day in Antarctica

Script will be written by "Battlestar Galactica" exec producer Ronald D. Moore. The 1982 original dealt with a shape-shifting creature from outer space that terrorizes researchers at an Antarctic facility.

Strike partners Marc Abraham and Eric Newman will produce and the company will co-finance the remake, to which Universal owned the rights. David Foster, who produced the original film, will exec produce.
[...]
The producers said they consider the new film to be more "a companion piece" to the Carpenter film than a note-for-note remake.

Now, I'll give anything Ronald D. Moore is involved in a chance. And seeing what he did with the brilliant remake of the 70s cheese fest featuring robotic dogs, "Battlestar Galactica", I find myself actually looking forward to this one.