Long awaited sequels are always destined to be a no-win scenario no matter what. If you make something that is close to the spirit of the original and hit the same beats, people will complain that it’s not original and more of the same stuff. If you make something that does something drastically different from the original and hit beats you don’t expect, people will complain that it’s not the original and went too much against the grain. There are certainly exceptions to that, most recently with Top Gun: Maverick, but it’s mostly only that….exceptions. Then comes long awaited sequels like Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (I better not type his name a third time!), which not only draws a fine line between being similar and different to the original at the same time but also tries to throw every single idea that it can at you to let you know why it took as long for it did to come out. And the results usually tends to be…..all over the map.
What makes Beetlejuice Beetlejuice stand out more than other legacy sequels out there is how it’s strengths and flaws isn’t strictly due to the over amount of fan service and callbacks itself contains (which there definitely are) but more of the newer elements that it’s tries to tackle in there to make this 36-year long anticipated sequel an enjoyable if not incredibly uneven ride. While Tim Burton and Michael Keaton certainly feel right at home in their respective roles as director and Beetlejuice himself respectively, it’s the amount of new characters and subplots that make Beetlejuice Beetlejuice stick out in both the best and worst ways possible.
Premise: Three generations of the Deetz family return home to Winter River after an unexpected family tragedy. Still haunted by Beetlejuice (Michael Keaton), Lydia’s (Winona Ryder) life soon gets turned upside down when her rebellious teenage daughter (Jenna Ortega) discovers a mysterious portal to the afterlife. When someone says Beetlejuice’s name three times, the mischievous demon gleefully returns to unleash his very own brand of mayhem.
There are plenty of things that stand out throughout the course of Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. You have Tim Burton trying to go back in time to the 1980s, delivering the same dark fantasy horror comedy thrills he did back in those glory days, you have Michael Keaton slipping back into the role of the title character like he never left it, you have an entire supporting cast both old and new that bring a certain level of energy to this completely energized world that Burton himself created. However, the main thing that stands out is the number of new elements the film wants to tackle to make the sequel stand out equally or even better than the original but can never make the time to do all of them justice.
You have Lydia about to get married while still being haunted by her past involving Beetlejuice and conflicting with her mother, you have Beetlejuice himself being haunted by his own past with the emergence of his ex-wife Delores, you have Lydia’s daughter being forced to come to her senses that ghosts are real along with hanging out with a new boy in town, and you even have a ghost detective, who was once a B movie star, trying to stop all of the madness that is happening on screen. There are ton of different story elements and characters that come together and Beetlejuice Beetlejuice tries to do every single one of these elements justice….with very mixed results.
The big occurring problem is how little each one of these subplots connect one another, almost feeling like four different episodes of a Beetlejuice series crammed into one overarching movie. Because of that, every so often one of these subplots ends up getting tossed in the closet completely to focus on the other ones, only reappearing when the movie says so.
You have a grand introduction with Monica Bellucci’s Delores who then completely disappears to the sideline for the majority of the middle act to focus on other problems that Beetlejuice and other characters are facing. You have Willem Dafoe chewing up the scenery with his side villain character, only for that to not be very relevant until the last third of the movie. You have a love interest for Jenna Ortega’s Astrid that completely gets thrown out of the picture until the last moment once something interesting with that character occurs, making it seem like the character only exists as an excuse for Astrid to enter the afterlife and for one hilariously disgusting gag.
To put it simply, there is too much going on in terms of the plot and 105 minutes is just not enough time to make all of these new elements work as well as the film clearly wants to. It makes me wonder if a director’s cut is on the rise and the film we see right now in theaters is strictly studio mandate to make sure the sequel has a similar runtime as the original.
Thankfully, the film’s main saving grace can be contributed back to the main elements that made the original stand out as well as it did, one of those being Tim Burton. Burton is able to successfully translate the horror and black comedy elements that he is well known for and make it work fluently into a Beetlejuice sequel released in 2024. While there are certainly references to modern times scattered throughout, this seems like a movie that it’s own DNA could have fit very well back in the 1980s which it originated from. Whatever script issues can be found is totally made up with Burton’s commitment to crafting creative effects, zany humor, and the energy-filled juice to make this for an enjoyable time.
The other main element that works wonders here is Michael Keaton back as Beetlejuice. While roughly having the amount of screentime as he did in the original, his presence on screen is more evenly spread out this entire time, making Beetlejuice himself not wear out his welcome and still be a riot to watch every time he is on screen. Even though there will certainly be a debate as to whether or not the character should have a meaningful arc and be tweaked to fit more in the “politically correct” times (which it does NOT btw), Beetlejuice still makes for one of the most funny, scary, and purely entertaining antagonists in horror movie history.
The rest of the cast of both old and new always equipped themselves admirably into the creative and mind blowing world of Beetlejuice. Winona Ryder is still an enjoyable presence, making Lydia’s transformation from being a former Goth teen to a hostess of a live reality show feel very organic for the character. Jenna Ortega is able to provide the right amount of depth to the character that she brought in Wednesday, even if her character here is much more one-note, and prove she’s a new Gen Z star in the making. Willem Dafoe is good in just about anything he does so him playing a more over-the-top chaotic version of Two-Face is a no-brainer for him. Monica Bellucci makes every single minute of her limited screentime worth it as Beetlejuice’s bitter ex-wife. And I whole hardly enjoyed Danny DeVito role here as the best/worst janitor ever.
The production values are quite spot-on for the most part. You can definitely tell that Burton had a vision of making his sequel feel right at home visually and aesthetically as his top films in the 1980s while still making sure it properly translates to the 2020s. The designs for the after-life ghosts and monsters are top-notch that it will likely have one person dressing up as them for Halloween, the afterlife world is always super amusing and fun to explore, there’s plenty of disgusting visuals and gore that fit right into the oddball tone that the movie is going for, and Danny Elfman has not missed a beat with his marvelous score here. Even if certain visuals and attention to other animation styles don’t flow as well as they probably should, it feels appropriately out of place enough in the world of Beetlejuice that it’s easy to let those slide.
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is most certainly an imperfect legacy sequel but that might just be part of it’s charm. Even if it’s yet another example of Hollywood scrapping down the bottom of the barrel and chasing as much nostalgia dollars as it can, there’s never a moment on screen where Tim Burton’s own voice and passion is not shown through the entire one hour and 45 minutes of film. I just only wish that vision felt more cohesive and flown better together in terms of the different plot elements and characters the film throws at you.
For those that are just looking for a decent excuse to revisit the world of Beetlejuice or looking for a proper flick to get you in the right Halloween mood, you will likely have a good time. For those that were looking for sequel that is better or on par with the original, you might be quite disappointed. For those that want to see Tim Burton going back to what he did best in the 1980s and throw as much visuals and ideas on screen as he can, it can go either way.
However, I would argue the most important question to all of this is whether or not Tim Burton and Michael Keaton still has the juice with Beetlejuice. Considering my answer is yes, that might just be good enough for me, even if I wanted something a bit more.
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