10 Bizarre First Drafts Of Famous Movies

5. Alien - A Tentacled Creature Attacks A Ship Full Of Men

That Alien is an absolute classic goes without saying. It was the movie that made director Ridley Scott's name, its genre-blending mix of sci-fi and horror led to three sequels and a prequel (with another on the way) as well as countless lesser imitators. Alien's original form was not as far removed from the final one as some others on this list, but it did have some vital differences. The simplistic yet effective title Alien was not there from the start, the script by Dan O'Bannon and Ronald Shusett was instead laughably called Starbeast. The title was not the only aspect that was terribly named. The all male crew were aboard the spaceship Snark, with barely credible monikers like Chaz Standard and Cleave Hunter. The alien was not the Xenomorph we've come to know and, er, love. The Starbeast in question was a horrific, tentacle-covered monstrosity that probably would not have been able to pull off the creepy stealthiness that made Alien so memorable. It did die in an explosion in space at the end, though, so people would have remembered that. A later version of the script changed the ending so that after the alien had killed the entire crew (including Ripley, whose character existed by that point) it would sit back in a chair and begin recording an entry in the ship's log, while imitating Ripley's voice. Presumably someone pointed out that Aliens that can talk are less scary than silent killers. The ending was changed, and a sci-fi phenomenon was born.