they’re creepy and they’re kooky

Was anyone else disappointed by the portrayal of Thing in the Addams Family feature films? In the tv series, I understood Thing to be a person (of unknown nature) who dwelt in a parallel space, intersecting with ordinary space only in the boxes. Thing frequently demonstrated the ability to ‘go’ from one box to another without passing through ordinary space between; indeed one of Thing’s regular chores was to fetch mail from the outside box and bring it to where Morticia was sitting, and another was to light Gomez’s cigar by popping out of the nearest box. None of this undignified scampering about on fingertips!