Am I gonna get fired if I watch this?

A classic. It's silly to compare the 2 versions since Carpenter's film was true to the original novella (a shape shifting alien) and had the advantage of advanced special FX. Hawk's movie set a standard for 50's sci-fi that few matched and tapped in on America's fear of the Red scare. Where most 50's alien movies tended to be low budget, schlocky B-movies, The thing maintained high production values, good cinematography and a ground breaking musical score by Dimitri Tiomkin, one of cinema's most famous composers. His use of the theramin (used by The Beach Boys on Good Vibrations) came to epitomize eery, sci-fi music. Hawk's style of realistic, fast paced dialogue that often overlapped influenced many future directors (including Carpenter). He's been called "the greatest American director who is not a household name" and In 2001, the United States Library of Congress declared The Thing from another world "culturally significant" and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry. And though the film cites Christian Nyby as director, it's a matter of record that Hawks did indeed direct the film, letting Nyby, the film's editor take the credit.
Despite it's flaws it's still holds up as entertaining and engaging. A must see for any sci-fi afficiando.