Translating to Trading Cards: The Goonies Topps cards

On my never-ending quest to fill out the Goonies Wiki with information about The Goonies that’s been spread out over the furthest reaches of the internet with the loss of old fan sites, I’ve come to something pretty niche: the Topps trading cards.

In 1985, they made a set of these that described the characters and the entirety of the Goonies story, as well as some behind-the-scenes info: 86 cards in all. A sticker card came with each pack too, which were the type with the backs that form a larger image when you’ve collected them all. The Topps Pokemon cards from the 90s were similar, with sticker variants and the “puzzle picture” backs. Sadly, the Goonies set was released before the advent of the “totally rad holographic backings” that the 90s made popular.

only 90s kidz rememb... [overdoses on Surge and Fruit Gushers]

Either way, I was expecting to just type up a description and a card set list for sake of documentation. Certainly there would be nothing to really look at with trading cards.. Right?

WRONG, HERE ARE SOME THINGS.

I’m dedicated to fitting this into a single blog post, so here we go.

Some simple things to comment on here:

I mentioned this in my script dissection off-hand, but a few promotional materials refer to Richard “Data” Wang as “Ricky Roper”. The Hi-C story cards did that, and so does Data’s trading card. So far I haven’t much even figured out where this comes from. Where the hell did the name “Ricky Roper” get plucked from? Even the movie script gave him the correct name… Was there just some misinformation spread around or something?

(Also whoever designed the backs of these cards and decided that non-bold black text on bright red parts needs to get their eyes checked. Or maybe I need to get mine checked...)

There’s a few misspellings that were eventually changed to more standard ones over the years. Here we see the common “One-Eyed Willie” (instead of One-Eyed Willy) that is more or less interchangeable. There’s also “Stefanie” instead of “Stephanie”, which, unlike Willie, was in the script.

It’s just very strange to see something that was intentionally spelled as such be mixed in with something that’s a mistake lots of people make.

Also, “Devereux” instead of Devereaux, but that’s just pedantic nitpicking.

For whatever reason, Jake gets mentioned by name, but not Francis. Also pedantic nitpicking!

A CLOSER LOOK, PERHAPS?

Okay, with that out of the way, the Topps cards are… interesting. Again, we’re given some promotional/adaption material that falls between the lines of script and final product, similar to the book (which we will be getting to... later… it is a hard read and I have to take long breaks so that I don’t end up wanting to strangle myself). However, if I had to put this on a timeline… these cards come after the book, but before the final movie, as it cuts out a big chunk from the script and includes way more that falls in line with what was actually in the movie.

...and yet.

In terms of what’s included that was cut, there’s the Stop ‘N Snack scene, the octopus scene, and… the leeches and Funnybone scene. My face threatened to fold in on itself and out of reality when I came across these two in the card list. They’re both practically back-to-back and, just...

Well. At least there’s no inclusion of the gorillas.

Let’s just go at this from the top of the list (as to what’s worth talking about because I am not writing a goddamn essay about these cards, so help me god…)

If you haven't checked out my "Fourth Draft script deconstruction" essay series, well, check this out! Otherwise, you might be missing some context here.

Card 7, “Introducing Andy And Stef”, and Card 15, “Secret Of The Map”, include shots from the Stop ‘N Snack scene. The latter is interesting, because the flavor text on the back of the card has nothing to do with the scene in question…

Card 23, “Chunk’s Terrifying Discovery!”, is odd. It describes a scene involving Chunk coming back to the Lighthouse Lounge after the fact, at night, rather than him escaping from it. According to this card, that’s when he discovers the dead FBI agent, rather than with his friends, or in the back of the Jeep when he’s captured by Jake and Francis (as seen on this card…)

Card 30, “A ‘Miner’ Discovery!”, describes good ol’ Chester Copperpot as a miner rather than an explorer. This was something in the script that got changed in the final product; I commented on this in my script dissection (I will keep plugging this when it’s relevant). It’s just strange that this was left intact, when the scene in the movie, as seen on this card, has nothing that would identify him specifically as a miner.

Card 32, “Wishing Well Frenzy!”, is the card about the leeches scene. Thing is, the image on the card doesn’t even show the actual image we know to be from the scene. I can even pinpoint to about where this was taken from the movie:

Same placement by the actors, too!

It’s so weird that they were given literal shots from the movie to use on the cards, but were given wrong information in regards to the events of the movie. My guess is that they were given all this material before the movie was fully edited? A horrifying thought, because that means they must have filmed some of the questionable scenes! Again, covered in my last series of posts, but eugh. I’ll never get over this.

Card 34, “Mr. Funnybone!”, makes me sad.

Okay no, let me try again.

Card 34, “Mr. Funnybone!”, very very briefly describes the cut “Funnybone” sequence, involving the puzzle trap with a skeleton that points to a correct tunnel if you tickle his “funnybone”. Spoilers, if you haven’t read my script dissection (HINT HINT): it’s his crotch and Stef is the one who figures it out.

Funny thing is… again, we’re given a still not of the scene in question. The image here is a close-up of the skeleton fixed to the grotesque Bone Organ.

Hello, handsome.

Card 36, “Caught In Between-!”, shows the very short alternate sequence of Mikey, Data, and Mouth all nearly falling off the slippery mast between the skull cavern and the Bone Organ.

Card 58, “Battle of the Fratellis”, I think tries to cover up some loose ends… if you recall from the movie, Chunk and Sloth kind of just show up on the Inferno in pirate duds. The script gave us an explanation: looted from the “Funnybone” room in a long-removed sequence from the movie. But since that’s not there in the final cut, the card attempts to suggest that they found the stuff on the ship. It’d make sense if their arrival wasn’t so sudden… (but perhaps that was filmed and then cut as well? Hmm…)

Card 80, “The Map In Jeopardy”, shows Troy trying to light the treasure map ablaze in the Stop ‘N Snack. It’s odd placement, as card 75 and on are specifically “behind the scenes” information… and if this was back here, does that mean whoever organized this set knew this was a deleted scene? It would explain why there wasn’t really specific mention of a convenience store in the very summarized… summary of the movie. But if that was the case… why include the shots on the previous card if you knew it wasn’t in the final cut?

Card 85, “The Goonie Pledge”, is, well. The Goonies Oath. Just an example of how this was included in a lot of the promo material but not the final movie…

BONUS: THE STICKER CARDS

The sticker cards aren’t that interesting, but I wanted to point out that the two Sloth cards actually show off the original “smooth” makeup for the character!

You can check out scans of the full trading card set here, or here for the sticker card set.

Fourth Draft script deconstruction - Escape, Finale, and Final Thoughts

Enter Sloth and Chunk

I can do this. I can make it through the rest of this essay. I can do this.

As mentioned prior, we now have an explanation as to why Chunk and Sloth show up with pirate hats and swords.

For whatever reason, it’s here that Data uses his Pinchers of Peril against the Fratellis, rather than during his anger-induced retaliation. Makes more sense for it to be during that, so makes sense why they moved it to there. Sorry, my writing isn’t very on point right now, I think my brain is still broken from… before.

Something also missing here is Stef punching Mama Fratelli. It’s wholly absent, and I suppose that took the spot of Data’s Pinchers of Peril in the final product.

Truly the greatest punch in cinematic history. It’s so natural and not at all telegraphed…

Jake and Francis’ arguing is something not in the script, mostly because their entire character dynamic came from how Joe Pantoliano and Robert Davi acted together on set! Donner’s entire thing with this whole movie was doing things on the fly and letting actors suggest things, and it’s been reported that Donner let Joey Pants and Davi go hog wild with their on-screen interactions.

The Goonies escape, Sloth dunks his mom overboard, and the Fratellis go to loot the ship. Here is a more descriptive version of the booby trap that sets off the collapse of the entire cavern and eventually releases the Inferno:

Willy sending himself up to posthumously pilot the ship is honestly a really cute touch. He set himself to live on forever, to sail the seas one last time, as long as someone came along to trigger the trap. I’m kind of disappointed we didn’t get this in the final product, cause it would have been really fun to watch everything slide into place. Maybe they didn’t have the time/budget to fit it in.

Compared to the movie, the script is flip-flopped on the dynamite/Sloth scenario. In The Goonies, a sole stick of dynamite clears up the rubble blocking the Goonies’ way to freedom, unfortunately resulting in a bigger rock sliding down to block the way. Sloth comes over and lifts it to let the kids escape.

In the script, Sloth’s self-sacrifice comes first. He lifts up a crumbling opening in the wall and Chunk has to sadly leave him behind. Then we have the convenient mistake of dynamite for a flare, and they blow a hole through the wall and crawl out to the beach, but not without Brand having another panic attack about being stuck in a cramped space.

Switching the two around for the final sets us up to actually feel bad that they need to leave Sloth behind. Having him leave the party before defeats the purpose of an emotional beat. Can’t really say “Sloth Love Chunk” and then have the Goonies run around and do some additional stuff, because then you immediately forget Sloth stayed behind in the first place. Good choices here on the director’s part.

The Morning Fog

Nice easter egg, Columbus. (The working title for The Goonies at one point was The Goon Kids.)

Anyway, we’re in the final stretch here. No stopping now!

Here, we have our reunion with the Goonies and their parents. For sake of just having something to call this place, I will be referring to this location as Cauldron Point, The Fictional Landmark In Ecola State Park. Just keep that in mind, considering the entire setting of the script is Cauldron Point. It’s easier for my bird brain to keep a track of, since that’s what I’m more familiar with.

We’ll be doing a little bit of jumping around here, since there’s a lot going on.

Chunk is brought hot dogs instead of Domino's Pizza during this scene. Pizza seems like it’s much easier to carry around in a location like this. If his mom pulled out a big thing of hot dogs, it would have been really weird for some reason? Maybe I’m the one being weird about this, who knows.

Here’s Stef and Mouth’s little heart-to-heart. I kind of prefer the final cut’s version, since it’s a lot more tongue-in-cheek and bantery, than this… mixed bag in the script. Plus, they both laugh about it and hug, and it feels much more amicable in general.

This isn’t really that important, just some additional dialogue between Brand and Andy, but it’s just really funny to imagine her saying that.

The arrival of Sloth and his family is… really overlooked in the script. In the movie, we get this amazing shot of product placement:

Domino’s is bulletproof! Order from us today!

In the script, they just kind of… show up. Chunk feeds Sloth a hot dog and he burps loudly cause haha burping. The rest of the Fratellis are arrested. There’s no space for anyone to really react to them coming up the coast, to the cops’ reaction to a guy like Sloth. The entire arrest takes place in a single line: “Mama and the Boys are HANDCUFFED, then put into the back of a POLICE VAN.” To have such a big part of the movie handwaved away by the end like this is… so odd. Props to the director for being like “hey uh, maybe we should give these characters a proper end”.

I regret to say this but… our favorite characters are back during the signing of the Goon Docks over to Mr. Perkins. As Irving Walsh is struggling to pen down his John Hancock, this… well… this happens…

If you just heard anyone go Super Saiyan 3 in the distance, don’t worry, that was me.

This… this is the culmination of our z-plot with the gorillas. They show up, just to fuck with the Perkins, and that’s it. The gorillas exist in the Fourth Draft script universe of The Goonies and nobody bats a fucking eye at them. Hell, everyone starts “cherring [sic], applause, and laughter”. Like, in any other scenario, gorillas on the loose would have caused mass panic!
Have I mentioned that this may have been filmed? Here, let me go grab the pictures again…

I still yearn for death!

I hate the cartoony version of The Goonies so, so, so much. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love cartoony humor, but it just doesn’t work with this story, especially the final product we received. Could you imagine if we still have everything in the final? The weird sexual stuff? The weird storytelling choices? The gorillas? I frankly couldn’t see this version of the movie becoming any sort of cult classic or positively-reviewed movie. I think this would have absolutely bombed. It’s a goddamn miracle this movie got out with the reception it received. It’s not perfect, of course, but… gorillas, people. We could have had gorillas. Count your blessings.

We don’t even get a chance to rest, readers. So, let’s pull that pin involving the marble bag out. We know in the final movie that the Goonies managed to smuggle out a series of gems because Mikey had his marble bag. We’ve got the three core elements in the movie: set-up, reminder, payoff. This script has set-up and reminder, but… no payoff.

Why is there no payoff, you ask?

You are indeed reading this correctly. Sloth just sort of burps up a bunch of gems, including a “HUGE, SPARKLING DIAMOND”. All that mention of the marble bag? There was no purpose for it. It was just sort of… there. Sloth keeps burping a bunch until all the gems are up out of his stomach. It’s… such a weird, unpleasant way to get the jewels to save the Goon Docks. Maybe if this was animated it would come off as being less gross, but uh, this would have needed to be filmed and, frankly, nobody would have wanted to watch this.

That aside, it’s still just so strange that, as this was written, there was this planting for the marble bag and just… it got forgotten somehow at the end? I mean, I get forgetting some things, but that’s what revisions are for and let’s not forget this is the Fourth Draft. And even then, the name is misleading, because there are seven listed redrafts on the front page of the document.

Nobody much notices Sloth spewing out precious gems, save for Chunk. It requires Rosalita to say “don’t sign” in Spanish over and over, which… look, in the final movie? She’s the one who sees the treasure. She gets so overcome with finding them she rambles and desperately tries to interject to tell Irving Walsh not to sign the document. Here? It’s just… more contrivance to put drama in the scene. Chunk or Sloth or anyone else who may have seen this happen could have spoken up about “oh, hey, we’ve got treasure to save the Goon Docks now!”

But now that everyone knows about the jewels, uh… the movie just kind of ends? Yeah. There’s no triumphant tearing up of the document - a late addition to the movie, it seems, as it’s shot the same way some of the last-minute Burbank scenes were.

The Sheriff comes over and gives Chunk a hard time until we see the Inferno sailing across the Pacific Ocean, off to god knows where.

Oh yeah, this happens too! The cartoony atmosphere of the whole script makes a lot of this feel so disingenuous. The Goonies - at least, the final version of The Goonies - is a pretty cozy thing. It’s very much the movie that you grew up with that you go to on a nice rainy day. You crawl under the blankets, turn on the movie, and chill out. I keep saying this, but I say it for a reason: The Goonies has that grounded realism that carries a special magic with it. As a kid, you feel like an adventure like this is possible, and as an adult, it gives off a nostalgic warmth.

This kind of thing would fly in an animated movie, the sudden “haha, gottem!” moment with the last shot and a fadeout. Not so much in a live action movie.

While this image exists, I can’t be certain this was ever filmed. The outfit is either one Sean Astin wore off-camera, or in another deleted scene that is not present on the script, which involves a get-together at the Walsh residence after the events of the movie. The two production stills that exist from this scene do not give a proper look at Mikey’s outfit, and while the jacket does match up, there’s no way to match them together 100%.

So, it’s possible we’ll never know if this was actually filmed or if Astin was goofing off behind the scenes.

Cut to the Inferno sailing away. Roll credits.

What to even say?

I’d say this goes without question but: the Fourth Draft script for The Goonies is… not good. It does not hold up, especially in comparison to the final cut. And perhaps that’s an unfair comparison to make. After all, this was most likely done by Chris Columbus without a whole lot of editing on the part of Dick Donner.

It’s crude and weirdly sexual, there’s lots of tone problems, there’s plot elements that get glossed over, the writing isn’t great save for a few one-liners… it’s a big mess, and it’s a big wonder that The Goonies managed to captivate audiences even to modern times. Despite the movie being very of its time with fashion and music, the story of a group of kids hunting down pirate treasure to save their home from being sold to a jackass is something that anyone can relate to. The script is so very alienating, in all of the things I’ve just listed.

The first time I found this and read it, I was more or less horrified. In a way, it’s proof that, sometimes, ignorance is bliss. After all, if I hadn’t gone searching for a script, not the official one, I wouldn’t have ended up writing this long-as-fuck essay on the subject.

And yet… I feel like I’ve learned a lot about the movie after spending my time doing this. Piecing together what was dropped, what was rewritten, and trying to figure out why, helped me understand the production of the movie just that much better.

If you’ve stuck around with me for this whole thing, I genuinely appreciate it (and apologize profusely for, now, you have to carry this knowledge with you too). These essays take forever to write, and this is the first time I’ve attempted something like this, but they’re quite fun! I hope it’s just as fun to read as it is to write.

I leave with you the Fourth Draft script. Do with this what you will. 

My next project of this caliber involves the novelization by David Kahn. This will be less a side-by-side comparison, but more an expanded, alternate look at the story and characters, which I think will be exciting! I’ve never really seen anyone discuss the novel at length and I’m willing to take a crack at it.

Unfortunately, it is based on the script! I will never escape this thing until my very last breath...

Fourth Draft script deconstruction - On the Inferno

A Pile Of Shit

We’re not off to a great start on the Inferno. So, I’m going to talk about something else! It’s a well-known piece of trivia that the Inferno, One-Eyed Willy’s ship, was life-size. All the interior shots on the ship were actually done on the ship and that is extremely cool. Unfortunately, when it came time to dismantle the sets, nobody wanted to claim the ship. And so, it was destroyed, which is a damn shame.

Now, many sites say that the ship’s materials were recycled down south of Burbank, at Disneyland, for use with the ships in Pirates of the Caribbean. I don't believe this to be true.

The sites that report this give no sourcing of this information. But in the official Souvenir Magazine, it says the following:

Our biggest challenge came with the actual rigging. The Bounty was in Los Angeles Harbor and the rigger came up and spent some time educating us. At the same time, the people at Disneyland decided to do new rigging on their Pirates of the Caribbean ship, the Columbia. So we were able to get a lot of rigging off their ship to use on ours.

I managed to sneak something about Disney park history into this. A present from me to myself!

Those familiar with the Disney theme parks may find this story… puzzling. The Columbia, full name Sailing Ship Columbia, is not a ship in Pirates of the Caribbean - that would be the Wicked Wench (usually erroneously referred to as the Black Pearl following the 2006 POTC movie refurbishment). The Sailing Ship Columbia is an attraction that is a physical ship that sails around the Rivers of America. And because it is an actual working ship (that sails on a track, of course), this would require real, true sailing materials over the static, not moving on a track Wicked Wench.

Because of this, and because an official source misnames the Wicked Wench as the “Columbia”, we can safely assume and say that the materials were graciously given by Disney to help build the ship, all materials intended for the Sailing Ship Columbia. It’s easy to assume that a movie like The Goonies would have had their Disneyland connection through Pirates of the Caribbean, but it’s actually not!

Okay, okay. I suppose we’re here to talk about The Goonies, huh? Someday I’ll write that Goonies Go To Disneyland fanfic and that’ll be that.

Anyways. Differences in the script. Instead of Data falling through the floor of the Inferno, he gets stuck in a ventilator. When everyone tries to help him out, they instead pull the whole thing out. I don’t suppose it’s even worth giving an opinion on this since it’s such a small detail that doesn’t really matter (but I prefer the final over the script).

A more major change comes with everyone exploring the lower levels of the ship. Here, not much really happens before our ragtag heroes discover the hidden passage. There’s no argument about “where’s the gold, Mikey?”, there’s no last booby trap that even reveals the way.

The flow of the plot in the script is so vastly different from in the movie. In the movie, there are hitches along the way, points in time where our characters step back and think “is this treasure even real?” There’s not much of it in the script; many times, the Goonies will quickly solve a puzzle and continue on like it’s nothing.

I’ve mentioned it before, but the final movie has this strange groundedness to it. Part of the reason I think I enjoy the movie so much is that, even though this is a fake story, it almost feels believable. Lots of stuff about the booby traps and whatnot makes it feel like those stories on the news every handful of months about a little girl pulling a sword out of a local lake. Pirate ship left untouched for centuries, still intact, never to be found because of the wild story that left it to be marooned in a cave? Highly unlikely… and yet. Maybe possible.

Something also interesting with this bit is that we finally know what the gold writing on the planks guarding the way into the treasure room says:

This might only be interesting to me though because, for the longest time, I could have sworn syndicated showings of the movie had a part with reading the gold writing. From a lot of my research into it, though, this apparently was never a part of the movie. I guess that’s just my own Mandela Effect of this movie. Instead of “hey wait wasn’t there an octopus scene”, it’s “hey wait don’t they read the gold text”. Priorities.

Mikey climbs up into the room containing Willy and his treasure. Now, in the movie, he gets a little moment to himself, which is nice, considering the obsession with Willy is his and his alone. Having that little minute or two to have him finally “meet” One-Eyed Willy is special to watch, the weight of the scene is very… well, Spielberg. Perhaps he directed this scene.

In the script, the rest of the Goonies follow him up instantly, rid of anything that made the scene special in the final cut.

“Hey Mikey, why the fuck are you talking to that skeleton like it’s real? HOLY SHIT LOOK AT ALL THIS TREASURE, WHO CARES IF THAT’S WILLY, LET’S TAKE THIS AND GO!”

A curious detail omitted from the movie is this:

Willy was asthmatic too. Honestly, I wish this was in the final cut, because it just ties him to Mikey even more. What were the odds that they shared this in common? One-Eyed Willy is a Goonie because he’s missing an eye, but this connection honestly makes it feel even more special. Perhaps they thought it was too contrived to have them both be asthmatics?

A curious piece of dialogue in The Goonies makes me think that this was left on the cutting room floor: a floating “We have a lot in common, huh Willy?” over a shot of One-Eyed Willy’s skull. The way the edit cuts away on that dialogue with no explanation is curious. There’s also a prop Mikey picks up as the other approach to look at all the Rich Stuff… but I can’t quite make out what this is meant to be. It almost looks like a knife… but… perhaps this could be the old inhaler intended to link the old pirate captain with the leader of the Goonies.

You can sort of see it here, it’s the silvery looking thin in his arms, under the balance.

I suppose this is a mystery we’ll never know (unless someone who worked on the movie wants to hit me up and shed some light on this, hint hint).

Last thing of note: the marble bag is specifically brought up. There’s nothing about this to be said… yet. We will be returning to this in a bit, so just keep this in mind.

Showdown on the Inferno

It’s odd with the changes from script to film. Nearly none of the original product placement makes it way through rewrites (most likely to sponsorships not being struck with the brands in question), and many lines have been workshopped or cut out by the final product. But here, we can see the Hardy Boys reference was intended to be in here all this time. Nothing much to say about this, I just thought it was a neat thing.

Previously mentioned are Data’s various inventions that weren’t in the movie. One that wasn’t mentioned before was the “Intimidator”, which is shown off here. The gadget is meant to make his jacket and clothes puff up through a series of bladders in them; his shoes lift a few inches off the floor; the whole thing makes him grow in size, to, well, intimidate his enemies. Of course, this doesn’t go anywhere as planned.

This bit was actually filmed, as documented in the Souvenir Magazine, including a little anecdote on how J. Michael Riva achieved these effects and some production stills of it in action. The reason for its replacement with the simple Pinchers of Peril and the suction cup belt blaster tool are unknown, of course. Perhaps it was replaced to help the movie feel grounded and less cartoonish. (Doesn’t explain the sound effects with punching out the Fratelli brothers, though…)

Also mentioned in the script is his “optional bully buster”, which just seems to be everything in his arsenal used at once. So, less lost invention and more last-resort mode.

Last thing to touch on is a little detail: originally, Mama Fratelli drops her pistol after the suction cup thing electrocutes her and Data, rather than a simple “oops we’ve bumped into each other” situation.

The kiss between Brand and Andy comes right after her plunge overboard in the script. In the movie, it comes after Chunk and Sloth’s arrival, after Sloth takes down his brothers, after everyone’s jumped overboard to get away. Either way, the situation about Andy kissing Mikey is much more comical here, rather than handwaved away by her to kiss Brand.

You might think this is some sort of complaint, but uh, the kiss is really weird. Kerri Green didn’t even much like the idea in the first place, as she (18) wasn’t happy to be kissing a young Sean Astin (13). It’s weird! We overlook this a lot but it’s really weird!  Sure, Andy maybe 16 and not 18, but it’s… weird. It’s just weird!

Something left on the cutting room floor is also in this script: while Stef and Mouth are pushed up to the edge of the plank, she offers to share her breath with him, as she’s “Champion of that underwater stuff”. This was filmed, as there exists production stills of the very short scene. It’s also referenced at the end of the movie, as Mouth thanks her for offering to save his life - if you’ve ever wondered what that was meant to refer to, well, there you go!

A smaller version of this is in the Souvenir Magazine.

Enter Sloth and Chunk.

End me. Literally end me. Just put my head to the pedestal, take out that big fancy axe of yours, and do me in. Just decapitate me in one fell swoop--wait why are you running? Fuck, what’s that noise? Oh my god is that a dragon?

Take Photoshop away from me. Please.

Fourth Draft script deconstruction - The Bone Organ and the Blasted Octopus

Play Them Bones

The Goonies finds a giant waterfall, with an old boat mast as a makeshift bridge across the gap. The Fratellis catch up to them and they have no choice but to cross over the precarious, slippery log.

But wait! First Mikey has to be a little shit!

I’ll give this credit in that at least Mikey doesn’t make some weird comment about Andy. Still weird though!

Not much else is different up to the extravagant Bone Organ. The order in which the Goonies nearly fall is different, but that’s not really that important to, oh who am I kidding, here’s a comparison you guys probably didn’t care about but I want to document this!

Script	Movie
Mikey	Mouth
Mouth	Brand
EVERYONE	Data

The EVERYONE is a little vague, but there’s multiple wrong notes in the script, at which all the Goonies have to scramble around to avoid standing above where the floor is going to fall. This may have been changed from a technical standpoint, since the room the organ is kept in is, honestly, pretty small, and having like five kids run around the place would have been cramped and awful to film.

When the whole place falls apart, everyone escapes out the water slide. But in the script, Mikey was meant to, erm, somehow “step on yet another note”?, which makes the whole place fall apart. Again, more focus on Mikey rather than the Goonies as a cohesive group. So, instead of the tense moment of Andy snagging the map back from the organ while the Fratellis take aim, the tense moment consists of Brand helping save his brother from falling down the giant hole he’s made.

We skipped over a few things about this sequence, so let’s go back a little.

This bit with Data nearly falling off the mast and into the water may have evolved into a bit that was filmed and cut from the final product, involving Mikey and Mouth coming to help Data get away after he uses his Slick Shoes. Like the Fratelli brothers, they also slip on the water and nearly fall off.

This was filmed!

Something missing from the script that’s in the movie is Data’s run-in with the Fratelli brothers, knocking them back down the slippery rocks with the hidden boxing glove in his jacket. Honestly, the reason I wanted to spent a little time talking about this is because, for the longest time, even as a child, I was confused as to why this bit was the only part of the movie that had stock cartoon noises and sped-up footage. I could never piece it together, on any of my rewatches, until reading this script.

As previously set up, the script is far more cartoonish and comical than the final version of The Goonies. Of course, this begs the question as to why the editor put in this part, but here’s a bit that is in the script:

This happens while the Fratellis are moving through the room with the previous puzzle trap. That was cut from the final product, but Donner must have liked the slapstick of it, and decided to keep it in as a moment for Data’s inventions to shine.

The cartooniness of it does match up with the Fourth Draft’s take on the story, and so does this bit with the skeleton punching Jake… but I suppose I still can’t explain the origins of the sound effects. It horrifies me to wonder if the whole movie was intended to have them all throughout. Yeesh.

Eight Arms To Hold You

I’m sad to say that the water slide scene, something that pretty much everyone looks at and says “man that must have been fun to ride down”, is a paragraph long in the Fourth Draft script. I guess there’s not much you can say about “and then the Goonies go down an unrealistic water slide”.

Before we get to the Main Event of this part, let’s get the side scenes with Sloth and Chunk out of the way. You know how in the movie they randomly show up on the ship decked out in pirate stuff?

“No… Captain Chunk!”

Well, turns out that Chunk and Sloth were meant to come across the “touch the skeleton’s bone boner” room and loot the area! This of course means that room must have existed in the movie version, which means that was filmed and I don’t even wanna think about that. (Though, there’s absolutely no sign of such thing in the movie, so either they made some changes along the way or they found a different way to get pirate stuff or okay maybe I’m considering this too much…)

Either way, mystery solved. Kind of.

Because of their run-in with leeches earlier, Brand is concerned about leeches in the lagoon they fell into off the slide. Makes sense. So, Data pulls out a raft and attempts to inflate it, only for it to explode. This is… only half-pointless to include, because it does casually set up for how fragile the cavern is, which is a nice little touch.

And here we come to the most well-known piece of trivia about The Goonies: the octopus scene. So many other pop culture sites and top-five list YouTube videos document this, so I’m not much going to explain the scene. In short, from Sean Astin’s mouth: “the octopus sucked”.

A cute line here is from Stef, who references a popular song by Cyndi Lauper, who contributed two songs to the soundtrack (“The Goonies ‘R’ Good Enough” and the often ignored “What A Thrill”).

What’s not so cute is the specifics of the octopus groping at Stef and Andy. Eugh. I get this is a script and it needs to detail what’s happening on screen but just… come on, have some decency. These are kids!

Frankly the only other interesting thing to note is the song choice: “Burning Down The House” by Talking Heads. Something I’ve been glossing over is how the Fourth Draft script calls for specific songs, ones that were not used in the final cut. For documentation’s sake, here is a list of songs used in the script alongside the songs that were actually used. It’s a short list but I wanted to curate this somewhere!

Scene	Script	Movie
Andy's cheerleading practice	Tina Turner - "Better Be Good To Me"	The Bangles - "I Got Nothing"
Leaving the Walsh residence	Bruce Springsteen - "Cover Me"	Cyndi Lauper - "The Goonies 'R' Good Enough"
Octopus scene	Talking Heads - "Burning Down The House"	Goon Squad - "Eight Arms To Hold You"

Either way, Data shoves his little Walkman into the octopus’ mouth and it proceeds to “comic[ally] dance” dance away. With the final version, the octopus just sort of… leaves. I chalk it up to the puppet not being able to articulate breakdancing away.

This scene is… yeah. It plain sucks. The practical effects are cool but, man are they hokey. I love me a good dated effect, but the octopus is really embarrassing to look at. There’s a reason it was removed from the theatrical cut. In case you haven’t seen this deleted scene, here’s a video of it: