E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial influenced The Iron Giant

Brad Bird worked on the same lot and in the same tradition, and the films rhyme deliberately: a lonely boy with an absent father hides an enormous secret in the shed, feeds it, teaches it to speak, and then has to protect it from government men who arrive in convoy. Both end with a sacrifice and a departure rather than a victory. Bird's change is the giant's own choice, which E.T. never has to make.