I spotted the "thing" in CLOVERFIELD ... I think

"Weird" Ed (my college roomie and filmmaking partner) has been visiting us for the past few days, and yesterday he and I went to see Cloverfield. It was his first time catching it, and my third. I went again so that I could enjoy watching his reaction but also so that I could try, again, to see if I could spot the "falling object" in the Coney Island scene that's the very last shot of the movie.

So we saw Cloverfield at the West End Cinema in Burlington (where we always used to go for movies when we were at Elon together), and "Weird" Ed liked it an awful lot. And this time, I'm pretty sure that I did see it this time. It's very fleeting. Even if you have your eyes wide open and trying not to blink, it's not easy to see at all. A very small dark object that hits the water and kicks up the foamy wake. Here's a pic of the splash.

According to the backstory that's been generated by the viral marketing for Cloverfield, this object is not the monster. Cloverfield creator J.J. Abrams says that the creature was already on Earth, that it was down on the ocean floor for thousands of years before it woke up feelin' pokey after being aroused. That thing falling out of the sky and hitting the water off Coney Island? It's supposed to be a satellite known as the "Chimpanz III" owned by the Tagruato Corporation of Japan, which makes Slusho (the soft drink that's shown a lot in Cloverfield. According to the backplot, the satellite fell and Tagruato went looking for it in addition to the secret ingredient for Slusho, which can only be found deep in the ocean. And that's how the monster was awoken and wound up coming ashore.

Sounds a bit hokey even for a sci-fi movie. But I've no doubt there are some who are disappointed that the Cloverfield monster wasn't a guy in a big rubber suit, either :-)

EDIT 4:41 p.m. EST: Looks like the Bad Robot/Paramount dudes weren't being too fanciful about falling satellites at all, since this afternoon there's now word that a U.S. spy satellite is going to come crashing down in the next few weeks and they can't figure out where it'll hit. Let us pray that it veers clear of the Coney Island vicinity :-P