Steven Spielberg briefly considered making a sequel to E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial in the early 1980s. No wonder; the movie became the highest-grossing film ever after it opened in 1982, a record it held for over a decade. The concept for E.T. II: Nocturnal Fears would have supposedly shown “Elliott and his friends getting kidnapped by evil aliens and follow their attempts to contact E.T. for help.” Eventually, Spielberg decided that making a sequel would make the original less special, and the project never happened.

Now, almost 40 years later, E.T. and his old pal Elliott finally reunited — in a new commercial for Xfinity. It stars the original Elliott, Henry Thomas, all grown up and with a family of his own. E.T. returns to Earth and gets to hang out for a few days with Elliott’s wife and kids before heading back to his own home and family.

Watch the commercial here:

They did a very nice job of making the new CGI E.T. look and move like the clunky (but so lifelike) practical E.T. puppet designed by Carlo Rambaldi. As unbelievable as it is to say it, this four-minute spot is genuinely moving. I credit John Williams’ soaring orchestral music for most of the emotional impact. His theme for E.T. could make a commercial for a cable television packages heartwarming! One wonders what it costs to get the rights to make such a commercial, particularly if some of the rights holders refused to even make an actual sequel once upon a time.

Gallery — Sequels That Claimed to Be the Final Film, and Weren’t:

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