8 Intriguing-Sounding Sequels That Should Never Have Been Cancelled

5) E.T.: Nocturnal Fears

If Steven Spielberg’s gooey, family-friendly confection E.T. never did anything for you but induce rage, then chances are you would’ve preferred Nocturnal Fears instead. This project, a sequel to E.T., mutated out of the story for Spielberg’s unmade Night Skies, a proposed film about significantly less cuddly extraterrestrials terrorizing a family of farmers and killing their livestock.

Though ideas from Night Skies were used in the ‘Berg-produced Poltergeist, the plot would have been much more closely followed in Nocturnal Fears. In it, Elliott and friends were to be kidnapped by evil aliens, prompting them to attempt to contact E.T. in a bid for help. Essentially, this would have been the Return to Oz of the E.T. franchise: a dark, horror-tinged follow-up to a beloved family classic.

Spielberg eventually changed his mind about the project, however, and put a stop to pre-production on the movie. It sort of makes sense: Spielberg was deep in his blockbuster phase around the time Nocturnal Fears was being shopped around, and the prospect of turning the looks on E.T.-loving cinema-goers from joy to horror probably didn’t make much commercial sense.