I have a particular nostalgia for films and television shows that came out in the 80s. Mainly because that’s the decade I more or less grew up in. When filmmakers remake, reboot, or do sequels of some of my favorite 80s films I’m a bit trepidatious.  Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is the sequel to one of my all-time favorite 80s movies Beetlejuice.  It’s from the same director, Tim Burton, as the original film was so that is a good thing.  It’s hard to capture the magic of something that was so popular back then,  but I’m here to say he does it with flying colors. This is an amazing sequel.

When we pick up the Deetz’s thirty-six years later Lydia Deetz (Winona Ryder) is the host of a television show focusing on ghost sightings or encounters. She is rather famous. She also has a relationship with her agent/producer of the show Rory (Justin Theroux). She gets a phone call at work from her mother, Delia Deetz (Kathrine O’Hara) who informs her that her father has died in a plane crash coming back from a bird-watching excursion. Along with the daughter/  granddaughter of the Deetz’s Astrid Deetz (Jenna Ortega,) together the family has to go back to Winter River to deal with the affairs of their father/grandfather. Little do they know that this will bring back some trauma from the past in the form of the mischievous dead man Beetlejuice (Michael Keaton)

Tim Burton has been a director who has had an up-and-down career. He’s directed some all-time great films like Batman, Ed Wood, and Edward Scissorhands, but he’s also made some not-so-great films as well. With him returning to one of his best properties, Beetlejuice, he is trying to achieve something great once again. He achieved that goal. With the original Beetlejuice, he was able to make people laugh and use his macabre nature to create a movie people would remember for decades to come. With Beetlejuice Beetlejuice he topped himself. Burton is back and I’m happy for him and hopefully his success with this sequel.

One of my favorite parts about Burton’s sense of style regarding his films is how dark they are. With this movie returning to one of the Darkest films in his filmography he dives back into the dark realm of death. He creates this world once again with precision and skill. Every detail from the makeup team to the production design and costume department is impeccably realized. I was smiling every time the movie went to the death realm. There were so many new creative characters and ways that these teams implemented their talents. One particular moment where a dead janitor gets electrocuted and knocks over some crates and a bunch of parts fall out and form a beautiful dead woman who staples herself together. It ends up being Monica Belluci as her character Delores. This is an amazing sequence, but just the tip of the iceberg for what these teams were able to accomplish.

Burton has been making films for a long time so he’s developed a lot of friends in the business. He was able to get a great cast assembled for this sequel. Of course, he got back most of the cast from the original film. Except for Jeffrey Jones as Charles Deetz. He has a great tribute within the context of this movie though. Winona Ryder, Kathrine O’Hara, and Justin Theroux were all fantastic. The four newcomers to the cast Jenna Ortega, Monica Belluci,  Author Conti and Willem Dafoe are all nice editions as well. DaFoe was a dead police man and he brought more than one laugh. Most people including myself came to see one person, and that was Michael Keaton returning as the title character Beetlejuice. 

Michael Keaton has been having a moment lately or rather the last ten years. He’s been picking some good and interesting projects. In some of them, he plays the good guy such as Robbie in Spotlight or Birdman in Birdman, but he’s also played some bad guys during this time as well. He’s even reprised roles from his past, Bruce Wayne/Batman from Burton films. One of if not his most iconic characters is Beetlejuice. He created a character like none before with Beetlejuice. It was going to be hard for him to capture this magic again thirty-six years later. He knocked it out of the park. He was phenomenal once again. He brought all of his experiences in his career to the forefront and killed it. I was laughing out loud at many of the scenes he was involved in. Specifically, the ending sequence was hilarious. I loved every minute he was on screen. His chemistry with Ryder was fantastic as well. This is an Oscar-worthy performance. 

I love dark and moody stories when they are done right and two writers who are known for their work on the CW Alfred Goough and Miles Miller, brought the dark and moody flavor back to cinemas with Beetlejuice Beetlejuice.  They had a couple of subplots that added a nice transition to the main story but they all came together in the end. The mixture of all the subplots involving Jenna Ortega, Kathrine O’Hara, and Beetlejuice’s stories fit in perfectly with the main story featuring Winona Ryder. I didn’t feel these subplots were unnecessary at all. They just gave Burton and Company more to play with. This was a terrific story/script all the way around. There were no missed beats.

A couple of other things that were very well done in this sequel were the score by returning composer Danny Elfman who brought his unique talent back to this sequel. His music is very singular regarding this franchise.  That music came back in shades and I loved it. Those dark and spooky tones work so well together with the story and all the other dark and twisted elements of this movie. There is also an aspect of animation that Burton and his crew added to this film. The animated sequence adds another element that Burton I know for. He made a few animated films in his day. Now he adds these to a live-action movie. It just makes perfect sense in the context that they are used. 

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is another in a long line of sequels that have come out in 2024. Like a lot of the others, this one is fantastic in every sense of the word. From the production design, makeup and hairstyling, costumes, animation, score by Elfman, the script by Miller and Gough as well as the entire cast specifically Keaton as the title character Beetlejuice. This movie is worthy of a lot of awards consideration come next year. It’s that good. Burton has returned to his old form and I’m glad because the film world is better when Tim Burton is making great, dark, and spooky movies. Hopefully, everybody will go and support this hilariously wonderful dark comedy.

4 ½ stars

Dan Skip Allen