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30 Ideas That Could Have Ruined Famous Movies

So glad these didn’t happen

30 Ideas That Could Have Ruined Famous Movies

August 17, 2023

Movies are big, complicated productions, and not every idea ends up making it into the final film for any number of reasons. As you’ll see below, sometimes that’s definitely for the best…

30

PETER JACKSON WANTED AN APE LEONARDO. Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes isn't the most yes, that makes sense sort of movie. But back when it was Jackson's project, he wanted a straight sequel to the original film series set during an ape Renaissance, complete with a chimp Leonardo da Vinci. And ape-human hybrids, because that was somehow not enough. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

29

Alien

Ash wasn't an android in the original Alien script. Не was made an android at the studio's suggestion -- originally, he was human. Which would have made his death scene play out very differently. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

28

ALIEN COULD HAVE BEEN A LAUGHABLE B-MOVIE. ALIEN The original script was rewritten to add a couple subplots and tighten some of the dialogue - and in the process, we were robbed of some awesomely ridiculous scenes. Now you'll never see the monster using a human shield against a flamethrower, or a crewmember describing someone else's beheading as horrible, like a chicken. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

27

Roy Batty's dying monologue in Blade Runner was originally very, very long. It had stuff like I've felt wind in my hair, riding test boats off the black galaxies, so Rutger Hauer rewrote it himself (he mostly just cut a lot). Не then read it out to Ridley Scott, who was instantly sold. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

26

JAWS 3 WAS ALMOST A STRAIGHT SPOOF. For the third Jaws film, Universal took the weird step of turning to National Lampoon. A script by John Hughes made it to pre- production, and Joe Dante was attached as a director. Steven Spielberg was incensed by such a travesty, so the studio backed down and made the very serious Jaws 3-D instead. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

25

Back to the Future

Back to the Future was supposed to have nuclear explosions, not a DeLorean. The initial idea was for Marty to go back from 1985 to 1952 by being in a lead-lined refrigerator at a nuclear bomb test. Thankfully, the studio suggested something cheaper and cooler-looking, like a time-traveling car. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

24

1930'S ALICE IN WONDERLAND WAS MORE ALICE IN HORRORLAND. In 1938, Walt Disney charged storyboard artist AI Perkins and art director David Hall to start working on Alice in Wonderland-and boy was their vision dark. Their imagery was nightmarish rather than whimsical, and the movie would have ended with Alice's near execution. No wonder Walt didn't go forward with this version. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

23

GET OUT BA as 22 RO RVICE The finale of Deadpool was supposed to be a huge shootout. The studio took $7 million from the budget at the last moment, forcing the filmmakers to improvise. That's why Deadpool forgets all the guns he packs, and has to storm the bad guy's lair without them. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

22

WE COULD HAVE HAD WOOKIEE FIGHTER PILOTS. Early drafts of Star Wars didn't look a lot like Star Wars. For starters, the lead was a fat, horny teenager called Annikin Starkiller (who at one point punches the princess, to boot). Then again, the fact that the Death Star is brough down by a squadron of Wookiees might have made up for it. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

21

Avengers: Infinity War could have had dragons. They were in one of the ideas batted around for the Nidavellir forge sequence. In the end, the filmmakers went with an idea involving Eitri, the King of the Dwarves (Peter Dinklage). CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

20

NEO WAS GOING TO WIN WITH THE POWER OF THE FINGER. Remember the ending of The Matrix, when Neo stops the bullets and destroys Agent Smith? In the first draft, the bullets kill him dead. That doesn't last, though: Neo promptly rises from the dead and defeats Smith by flipping him the bird and getting away in an elevator. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

19

16-JARRAH N 42 2H The magic cave in Lost was a last-minute substitute for a volcano. The show kept mentioning the inactive volcano on the island, and the finale was supposed to be set there, with magma spewing everywhere! But that was too expensive, so they came up with a glowing magic cave. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

18

WALL-E WAS TO FIGHT ALIEN BLOBS OF JELLO. were In WALL-E's first drafts, the adorable little robot is roped into a rebellion against evil, blob-like aliens called the Gels. Spoiler alert: It's eventually revealed that the Gels are humans whose bodies atrophied after centuries of living in zero-gravity. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

17

The final fight between Yon-Rogg and Carol in Captain Marvel was supposed to be a brawl. While shooting, they decided it didn't make sense that she'd be playing by his rules, so they came up with a scene where she knocks him out almost effortlessly. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

16

COMMODUS WAS GOING TO ROAST THE SENATE. Early iterations of the Gladiator script include some weird sh!t-like Commodus deciding that the senators are traitors and cooking them alive inside a brass bull (along with his own sister). Also, in this version, Maximus (here called Narcissus) lives happily ever after with his non-dead family. You know, after killing the Emperor in front of thousands. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

15

We almost got to see Cap's severed head in Avengers: Endgame. One idea had Thanos toss the head, with the mask still on, to a living Captain America. The Russos say it was pretty cool, and they ditched it just because they couldn't figure out how to get to that point. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

14

NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD WAS CONCEIVED AS AN ALIEN INVASION MOVIE. George Romero kickstarted the zombie genre -which, over 50 years later, still refuses to die. The original treatment, however, was about flesh-eating aliens. Eventually Romero ditched the alien angle and, taking some inspiration from Richard Matheson's/ Am Legend, turned the baddies into living corpses. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

13

The gag where Deadpool thinks he's blocked Cable's bullets with his sword, but then realizes he didn't block any, wasn't supposed to be in Deadpool 2. The stunt team came up with the idea, but director David Leitch thought it was too funny for a serious scene. Ryan Reynolds thought it was hilarious, though, so it went in. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

12

BACK TO THE FUTURE COULD HAVE BEEN A BIG COCA-COLA AD. Coca-Cola In the first drafts, Professor Brown is a failure who could never get any of his inventions to work, until Marty stumbles upon what he has been missing: Соса-Соӏа! The sugary drink turns out to be the perfect chemical mixture to power the time machine. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

11

In David Fincher's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Nils Bjurman was supposed to be clothed in Lisbeth's revenge scene. Fincher asked people he knew who'd been through sexual abuse if Lisbeth would strip his clothes off, and they said no. So they shot the scene with him clothed - but that felt like a cop-out, so they reshot it. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

10

BEETLEJUICE WAS ALMOST A MURDERER. Everyone's favorite bio-exorcist was initially less about exorcising the living and more about making them stop living at all. The movie wasn't planned as a whimsical comedy, but as straight horror. The protagonist was supposed to be much more villainous, up to and including him almost mauling a nine-year-old girl to death. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

9

In Deadpool 2, the X-Force would originally get blown up by landing on a minefield. The filmmakers couldn't come up with a good reason for the plane flying over a minefield, so they wrote a different death for each member of the team. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

8

WANT TO SEE BATMAN WITH A GIANT MAGNET? YOU COULD HAVE! Before Tim Burton was brought onto the project, Batman was going for a weird blend of dark and campy. It was the story of a brooding, intense hero, and it was also all about fun gadgets. At one point, Batman uses a giant horseshoe magnet to draw a jetpacking goon into the Batmobile's trunk. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

7

Freddy vs. Jason could have shown us Freddy raping Jason as a child. That scene, which ends with Freddy drowning Jason so he wouldn't tell anyone, was in script drafts for four years. It only kind-of shows up in the final movie, as the dream sequence in which Freddy is a camp counselor and drowns Jason. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

6

Spider-Man

A PROFESSOR SPIDER- OCTOPUS WAS SERIOUSLY CONSIDERED. DAGOSTING PRK Before Sam Raimi took over, Spider-Man went through a lot of hands, including James Cameron's. In an early script, Professor Octopus is bitten by the same radioactive spider as Peter Parker and also calls himself Spider-Man. And he has a sidekick. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

5

The original ending for Men in Black was a philosophical debate between Will Smith and the Edgar bug. Director Barry Sonnenfeld was (understandably) nervous about that not being exciting enough, so a new, action-packed ending was written at the last minute. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

4

BIRDMAN WAS ORIGINALLY THE SETUP FOR A JOKE ABOUT JOHNNY DEPP. Birdman's ending is ambiguous and poignant -but it could have easily been a dumb joke about Johnny Depp being a has-been. After Michael Keaton's story wrapped up, the same plot would have started over again, this time with Depp as the protagonist. Luckily, the studio couldn't secure him. CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

3

In Star Trek: The Motion Picture, the first version of the scene in which Spock decides to enter the inner sanctum of V'ger looked totally different. As originally shot, it was a corny, fake-looking spacewalk scene with actors obviously hanging from wires. So VFX director Richard Trumbull re-shot it as a scene about energy and infinity. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

2

RETURN OF THE JEDI ORIGINALLY FEATURED AN UNDEAD OBI-WAN. In the first script, Luke travels to a lava planet to confront Vader-and Obi-Wan Kenobi joins him. Yup, Luke's old mentor decides to come back to life to help. Apparently Jedi can stop being dead whenever they want to. And then Yoda comes back as well! CRACKED.COM — Source: 18 Famous Movies That Were Nearly Awful

1

The Blair Witch Project

The Blair Witch Project could have ended with Mike hanging from a noose or crucified by rope and wood. Those are the endings the filmmakers shot when the studio gave them the money to shoot a new ending that gives some closure. But neither idea worked out, so they stuck with their very first choice: a puzzling shot of Mike standing in a corner. CRACKED.COM — Source: 14 Iconic Scenes That Were Originally Supposed To Play Out Very Differently

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