6. "The Octopus Was Very Scary" - The Goonies
At the end of probably the greatest kid adventure movie of the 1980s, Mikey, Mouth, Data, Chunk, and the rest of the gang are reunited with their parents and excitedly explain their exploits to a makeshift assemblage of reporters. Then, out of nowhere, Data (played by Ke Huy Quan) says, "The octopus was very scary!" Whatchu talkin' 'bout, Data? We remember the Cyclopsian pirate skeleton, the grotesque man-child with an unnatural fondness for Baby Ruth, and the inexplicably placed waterslide, but there was no octopus. Or
was there? As it turns out, in a deleted scene, there actually once was. A terrible, terrible deleted scene. At first, it was always presumed that Data was just over-exaggerating or lying, as kids are want to do, but that didn't real fit with Data's status as the scientist of the group. So it wouldn't really make sense for Data to basically lie. Mouth? Sure. But not Data. The deleted scene in question happens right after the aforementioned waterslide but right before the also aforementioned pirate ship. Before the kids can reach the ship, an octopus that looks like the rejected version from the finale of Popeye pops out of the water and "menaces" the group, as threateningly as a fake, rubber octopus can. The kids are initially frightened, but then they remember their secret weapon, a 1980s Walkman, which is somehow waterproof. Data plays a cheesy song from the movie's soundtrack on the ancient device and places it inside the creature's beak-like mouth, which causes the creature - and this is no exaggeration - to breakdance. Needless to say, the scene was wisely omitted, because it would make the movie even more of a cartoon than it already was. Now, admittedly, The Goonies was never cinema verite, but a giant octopus that just happened to still be living in that cave since, what, One-Eyed Willie was alive a hundred years before? Nice cut, Richard Donner.