Some mild spoilers below…
Earlier this spring, I had a chance to see about 20 minutes of SUPER 8 and talk a little bit with JJ Abrams afterward. At his request, the conversation was informal and not recorded for the site. But one of the questions I asked at the time was whether he and his crew had an internal name for the quote-unquote monster in the film (Abrams had, up until that point, be referring to it as “the thing”), not unlike how Spielberg called his great white shark “Bruce.” At the time, Abrams admitted they had a name but didn’t want to reveal what it was or why just yet. But now we know…
It turns out Abrams called the monster “Cooper” and that also explains another mystery: why STAR TREK actor Bruce Greenwood was credited at the end of the film.
Greenwood is listed in the credits having played Cooper and now we know why. The actor performed the motion capture work for the monster in the film. Greenwood got the call last year from Abrams and worked in secret with a small crew in Los Angeles to shape some body and facial movements for the monster. Hopefully some of this footage will make the DVD/Blu-ray of the film and we’ll see how Cooper was designed and constructed.
All this doesn’t explain why John Krasinski was also listed in the credits but maybe that’s staying in JJ’s mystery box.