36 years later, the grossest sci-fi thriller of the ’80s just got a huge upgrade

In his first starring role, Steve McQueen closes the monster movie drive-in classic with words that have become even more terrifying since the film’s release in 1958: “As long as the North Pole stays cold.” His teenage hero echoes the words of the authorities describing the temporary solution to their town’s monster problem. They fly the creature – a pulsating jelly-like creature from space that grows larger with each new victim it eats and seems to be vulnerable only to extreme cold – to the Arctic to keep it frozen, because they don’t know how to destroy it . It. It’s a disturbingly short-sighted solution, one that offers less and less comfort as climate change continues to accelerate.

Chuck Russell and Frank Darabont’s 1988 remake The Blob tackles that threat more directly and with far more cynicism, making the titular blob a symbol for the unstoppable mess that corporate greed, reactionary politics, and jingoistic aggression have made of the world. You can’t kill the Blob, but you can keep it on ice for a while… as long as the Arctic stays cold.

Now, with the release of a new SteelBook 4K Blu-ray edition of The Blob (1988) from Shout Factory, there’s never been a better time to enjoy this sci-fi classic. Here’s why it’s still worth checking out.

Brian (Kevin Dillon) is the remake’s teen hero, a small-town outcast who is ignored by most people (including his own mother) but always on the radar of the local police. He becomes embroiled in a conspiracy theory with his classmate Meg (Shawnee Smith) after they take a homeless man to the hospital with a strange slime on his hand. The slime comes from a glowing rock that falls from the sky, but this is not a random meteorite.

While the 1958 Blob was an alien organism that crash-landed on Earth, the 1988 Blob is much more sinister. The remake’s monster is a secret government experiment, a new form of biological warfare that has taken on a terrifying life of its own amid America’s quest to outrun the Russians at all costs. Brian and Meg are engaged in a war of their own on multiple fronts: against the adults in town who want them to do as they’re told, against the government agents who want them to shut up and stop asking questions, and against the evil. experimental menace working its way through their city.

The key to a good horror remake is combining the current with the timeless; reworking a concept that explores a universal fear so that you can interrogate newer, more pressing fears. It is no coincidence that American horror cinema produced its best remakes – all of which deal with alienation, distrust, betrayal and abuse of power – in the fifteen years after Watergate. Premiered just four years after the resignation of President Richard Nixon, 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers is the clearest example of horror cinema recontextualizing Atomic Age horror for a post-Watergate world. But perhaps the most celebrated remake of this era (after its long-awaited but well-deserved critical reappraisal) is John Carpenter’s. The thing. Rob Bottin’s special effects for the gruesome alien creature are as stunning today as they were when the film was released in 1982, and Carpenter’s direction from Bill Lancaster’s screenplay (with phenomenal work from cinematographer Dean Cundey) makes the film a masterclass in paranoia.

The Blob And The thing have an interesting relationship with each other. Both have ominously amorphous names. The essence of the former can only be slowed with ice, the latter with fire. Plus, it’s a remake of 1951 The thing from another worldCarpenter’s film also pays tribute to the original version of The Blob; MacReady’s (Kurt Russell) computer chess game is a nod to George Karas’s chess agent in The BlobAnd The thing‘s Blair (A. Wilford Brimley) throws a gun after running out of bullets, just as young Danny (Keith Almoney) throws his pop gun at the Blob. In turn, Tony Gardner’s special effects were in the 1988 version of The Blob take a few cues from Bottin’s work The thingespecially in the way the newer, meaner Blob attacks and integrates its victims. Gardner’s work more than stands alone, however, creating some of the most indelible images of horror as the film lingers on the characters’ pain and fear.

The BlobHis focus on suffering is by no means sadistic or unnecessary. Rather, it is an indictment of the power-hungry political decisions that have caused the slow death of an entire city due to a combination of climate change and Reaganomics. Shots of empty streets show storefronts with signs urging no one in particular to stock up for the ski season. The most popular topics of conversation before the Blob are published are the weather and the city’s economic woes (it’s an unusually warm October and the lack of snow in recent years has decimated tourist revenues).

Many of the death scenes reflect the terrible economic reality of the city (and America). The hospital staff ignores the homeless man with the mucus on his hand because he has no health insurance – the admitting nurse (Margaret Smith) snorts, “Does he have the Blue Cross?” – giving the biological weapon time to devour half his body. When the plunger that restaurant worker George (Clayton Landey) keeps next to the sink doesn’t work, he reaches into the clogged drain and sees the Blob waiting to pull him through. He folds it like a closed umbrella in a sickening and devastating situation. effects series. It’s the ultimate injustice: George is dragged down the pipes at his dead-end job where nothing works right by a nasty government experiment that works all too well.

The temporary nature of the solution The BlobThe end of 1958 becomes more troubling by the day, and the 1988 version takes an even more pessimistic view of humanity’s chances. The disturbing Reverend Meeker (Del Close) is always lurking, ready to condemn someone for missing Sunday services or proclaim that the Blob is a prophecy come true. He collects a few pieces of the frozen goo he discovers in the restaurant’s freezer, and the film’s finale sees him leading a tent revival, promising a congregant that the “Day of Reckoning” will come very soon as he takes the jar with the pulsating monster inside. It is a clear criticism of evangelical political movements like the Moral Majority, and its closing words – “The Lord will give me a sign” – add layers of menace to the already terrifying story of people fighting back against the damage caused by authority figures who are driven by ego, greed and the thirst for power.

Horror remakes can add new context to enduring stories and highlight ways to understand and deal with new iterations of universal fears. The 1988 remake of The Blob is the perfect example of a remake done right. His cynicism was well deserved in an era of growing concerns about climate change, economic inequality, blurred boundaries between church and state, and governments targeting and lying to their citizens. The increased violence of the special effects merely reflected the socio-political reality of the dangers being warned about. The Blob was an essential addition to horror cinema in 1988. It’s just as relevant today, and it will be relevant when the Arctic is no longer cold.