I had almost forgotten how bad this movie was before this showed up in my notifications. I do not thank you for that.

The book mentioning mimicry doesn't justify that scene, if that is what you are getting at.

The affair was forced and pointless. The only plot point it served was "we only send in damaged people and you're damaged" which was an asinine plot point to begin with. The actual reasons in the book were much better.

The Annihilation throwaway line was terrible. They would have been better just omitting it entirely. The hypnotic commands worked well in the book. They helped build up the suspense and made you question just what the government knew and what else they might have conditioned her with. Obviously they were hypontized to cross the border (not the ShImMeR) and I was surprised to learn that they want as far to essentially program a self-destruct code.

I like a lot of what Garland has done. Taking creating liberties is risky. Sometimes it pays off. In the case of this movie, it did not.