12 Things That Were Really To Blame For Hollywood's Biggest F*ck Ups

7. A Dodgy Puppet Lead To ET's Cell Phone/Gun Switch

Nobody likes special editions. Anybody who claims otherwise is either insane, or else they're on the studio payroll. And yet with advances in special effects technology €“ as well as ever-lowering costs for such effects €“ it's become the go-to method of kicking a dead horse, allowing directors to go over their old movies, jazz them up a little, and then re-release them to a nostalgic audience, so they can make some easy money without going through all the hard work of actually producing something new. Not doubt buoyed by the tinkering of his mate George Lucas, Steven Spielberg decided the 20th anniversary of his sci-fi children's classic ET was the right time to fix some of the effects, mainly pertaining to the titular extraterrestrial. Great though the film is, watching the original puppet used for the alien in the 1982 release does look a bit ropey today. Which is what lead to Spielberg working on a special edition in the first place €“ he just wanted to make up for the low budget he was working on at the time. Except that lead to one of the biggest f*ck ups in Hollywood history, as €“ for some unfathomable reason €“ he decided to mess with the iconic, climactic scene in the film. Elliot and his pals manage to spring ET from his federal prison, bundle him into their bicycle basket and fly off, with the US government in hot pursuit. Said pursuit involves wielding guns and, yes, kinda pointing them at kids €“ something which Spielberg replaced with walkie talkies. A bunch of feds aiming with walkie talkies. If he hadn't already started doing the CGI thing with the alien, that never would've happened, mark our words.