Universal has released a new poster from its upcoming thriller The Thing. Acting as a prequel to John Carpenter's 1982 film of the same name, The Thing stars Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Scott Pilgrim vs. the World), Joel Edgerton (Warrior), and Eric Christian Olsen (Fired Up!). The pic is directed by Matthijs van Heijningen Jr. and centers on a group of scientists who discover an alien spacecraft (and its ill-intentioned pilot) buried beneath the ice of Antarctica.Hit the jump to check out the sheet which does its part to prove that ice and super-long fingers are a scary combination. The Thing hits theaters later this year on October 14th. Also, in case you missed them when they ran last year, click here to check out Steve's The Thing set visit as well as his on-set interviews with Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Joel Edgerton, Eric Christian Olsen, Matthijs Heijningen Jr., and co-star Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje. Finally, make sure to stay tuned for The Thing trailer which should be hitting soon as evidenced by the poster release.Here's the new teaser poster [click to view in hi-res]:Here's the official synopsis for The Thing:

Antarctica: an extraordinary continent of awesome beauty.  It is also home to an isolated outpost where a discovery full of scientific possibility becomes a mission of survival when an alien is unearthed by a crew of international scientists.  The shape-shifting creature, accidentally unleashed at this marooned colony, has the ability to turn itself into a perfect replica of any living being.  It can look just like you or me, but inside, it remains inhuman.  In the thriller The Thing, paranoia spreads like an epidemic among a group of researchers as they’re infected, one by one, by a mystery from another planet.

Paleontologist Kate Lloyd (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) has traveled to the desolate region for the expedition of her lifetime.  Joining a Norwegian scientific team that has stumbled across an extraterrestrial ship buried in the ice, she discovers an organism that seems to have died in the crash eons ago.  But it is about to wake up.

When a simple experiment frees the alien from its frozen prison, Kate must join the crew’s pilot, Carter (Joel Edgerton), to keep it from killing them off one at a time.  And in this vast, intense land, a parasite that can mimic anything it touches will pit human against human as it tries to survive and flourish.

The Thing serves as a prelude to John Carpenter’s classic 1982 film of the same name.  Directed by Matthijs van Heijningen, the thriller is produced by Strike Entertainment’s Marc Abraham and Eric Newman (Dawn of the Dead).