Films: Annihilation (2018)
Alias: Various, notably the shark-gator, the plant-deer, the bear, and the doppelganger
Type: Alien/Mutant
Location: Eldritch Location/Forest/Haunted Home
Height/Weight: Ranges from that of average humans to that of an average bear.
Affiliation: Neutral, leaning on Evil
Summary: Imagine if aliens didn't invade our world. Rather, a whole world did. Such is the case of the absolute cosmic horror that is the Shimmer. It may look pretty at first, but just you wait...it's gonna be big...
History: Arriving in a meteor, the Shimmer is an ever-expanding gateway to another world that mutates and assimilates anything that ends up there. So far, it has spread some distance across the forests of the southern U.S., and it will continue unless it is somehow stopped. And for a special team of explorers, they can never know what to expect.
Notable Kills: The bear rips off a person's jaw before getting blasted with a gun.
Final Fate: There is only one survivor from the expedition, and she ends up tangoing with a strange doppelganger implied to be the essence of the Shimmer itself. After giving the pretender a lit phosphorus grenade, she leaves the Shimmer to be destroyed, saving the Earth. However, one of two things happened. Either the doppelganger now lives in our world pretending to be her, or the human who came in came out with special powers. You decide.
Powers/Abilities: The Shimmer is ever-expanding, and though obtaining DNA can create all sorts of new creatures, most of which are hastily-mashed together animal hybrids. The bear can mimic the sounds of the dead by eating vocal cords.
Weakness: Anything conventional, though the doppelganger only stops copying moves if it's been put in a deadly situation.
Scariness Factor: 4-The Shimmer is the textbook example of a picturesque nightmare. On the surface, it appears to be a vibrant paradise befitting the Garden of Eden. But it gets so much uglier when you look at it more. People are constantly absorbed into the flora and fauna, said flora/fauna mostly consists of violent predators and infectious fungi, the whole place is trying to envelop the planet, and lest we forget, that goddamn BEAR. It puts every other movie ursine to shame.
Trivia: -This film is based off the first book in "The Southern Reach Trilogy", followed by "Authority" and "Acceptance". In it, the Shimmer is referred to as Area X, it is run by a being known as the Crawler just trying to relocate its world (unaware that it's already dead), and by the end of it all, one of the main characters has become an omnipotent eldritch abomination while another may or may not have convinced the alien force to stop terraforming the Earth.
-This film just barely survived a heaping ton of executive meddling and being screwed by the studio. Paramount pretty much seemed to want this film to die, with little advertising, a dump-month release date, and the director managing to stand his ground and prevent anyone from changing the film significantly. While it didn't turn over much of a profit in the end, it was still a critical/audience darling, thankfully.
