E.T. has returned home for the holidays to see his buddy Elliott.
A short film titled "A Holiday Reunion" that premiered on NBC during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade on Thursday shows the lovable alien from the 1982 classic "E.T. the Extra Terrestrial" reuniting with an adult Elliott, played by original actor Henry Thomas.
The four-minute clip shows the two children of a grown-up Elliott having their first encounter with E.T., which resembles the same way Elliott and his little sister Gertie frighteningly met the friendly alien back in the '80s.
E.T. then asks for his old friend by name, and Elliott gets E.T. all caught up on everything he's missed, while also slipping in a plug for Xfinity's internet and cable services. (Disclosure: Xfinity is the cable service from Comcast, the parent company of NBCUniversal.)
“A lot’s changed since you were here,” Elliot tells E.T. while his son explains the internet to the alien.
Elliott's kids then reenact an iconic moment from the original movie with E.T.
"The audience is going to get everything they want out of a sequel without the messy bits that could destroy the beauty of the original and the special place it has in people’s minds and hearts,” Thomas told Deadline.
E.T. director Steven Spielberg didn't create the new clip, but was consulted about it during its making, according to Deadline.
"Looking at the storyboards, I could see exactly why Steven was really behind it because the integrity of the story isn’t lost in this retelling,'' Thomas said.