COOL STUFF

Rick Baker Reveals Spielberg's 'Night Skies' Unused Alien Designs

by Ethan Anderton
May 29, 2014

For those who don't know, Steven Spielberg once flirted with the idea of a darker sequel to Close Encounters of the Third Kind, focusing on one man's encounter with a UFO. The film was called Night Skies, but was eventually abandoned and somewhat blossomed into E.T. The Extra Terrestrial following Spielberg's meeting with Melissa Mathison. But when Night Skies was still in development, make-up and special effects wizard Rick Baker (Star Wars, Harry and the Hendersons, Men in Black) was working on aliens for the film. Though we never saw the film, he's posted some of the alien designs online.

Here's a series of photos Rick Baker posted on Twitter (via The Verge), complete with his own context:

I was so excited to be working on this project,to be able to design different alien characters of the same race. pic.twitter.com/3uxwikTHRB

— Rick Baker (@TheRickBaker) May 27, 2014

Unhappy days,film shut down. I wanted to change the body of the ET,the mantis like arm placement just didn't work imo pic.twitter.com/mNMEAP9yem

— Rick Baker (@TheRickBaker) May 26, 2014

Happy days sculpting the prototype arms for the Night Skies alien back in 1980 pic.twitter.com/x2z2ftL1ll

— Rick Baker (@TheRickBaker) May 24, 2014

Here was a quick clay sketch that I did in 1980 for one of the nicer younger NIGHT Skies aliens pic.twitter.com/NKHVXrGNLu

— Rick Baker (@TheRickBaker) May 23, 2014

He does look like Edward G and the others.But painting out the top of the head, adding eyes,and small tweaks.ET"S dad pic.twitter.com/XOdbSNDmAd

— Rick Baker (@TheRickBaker) May 23, 2014

As requested The Night Skies alien. Not finished, no eyes. Cover the top of his head and tell me who he looks like. pic.twitter.com/r3PxK1T98A

— Rick Baker (@TheRickBaker) May 22, 2014

As you can see, there are some similarities between one of the designs and the taller, skinnier alien we see at the end of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. There's also that one that references E.T.'s father, though we're not sure if that's a design that was truly meant to be the senior to the cute alien from Spielberg's iconic film, or just a design that looks like him. Even one of the other designs shares some traits with the once stranded alien. It's so strange seeing the alien designs like this, mostly because Baker's work is so realistic, and it feels like these are real alien heads mounted like big game that's been hunted. Pretty cool, right?

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