The new Beetlejuice movie came to theaters Sept. 6 and many are questioning if it should have stayed unreleased. The sequel did not live up to the original 1988 film, despite all of the hype surrounding the release.
The return of Beetlejuice has been long awaited. While seeing some new faces in Tim Burton’s world, most of the original cast has returned. In addition to these familiar actors, the movie gave us dance sequences, music, and monsters inspired by the original Beetlejuice movie. We did not feel as if the movie fit Tim Burton’s usual style of being very dark and funny.
We thought the movie was a fun watch, but it almost felt unfinished. The plot had a steady start and seemed promising. However, the further we got into the movie, the more confused and bored we felt. The plot moved too quickly, making it hard to follow and unenticing. This ruined the quality of the movie and made it hard to watch.
Many aspects were reused, such as the banana boat song and the sandworm, which did give us a nice nostalgic feeling. We ask ourselves the question: was the new movie all that necessary when the original felt almost exactly the same?
The only thing that really stuck out was the relationship between Lydia Deetz’ daughter, Astrid Deetz played by Jenna Ortega, and Jeremy Frazier, played by Arthur Conti. This plot point was the most unique aspect to Beetlejuice, but even then, it was short-lived. The movie had a few plot twists, but near the end some were deemed unnecessary and unrelated. We also felt like the script jumped all over the place, and the line of reasoning did not match the movie plotline.
The script was flat and we think they could have incorporated more humor into the movie to make it more interesting. If we had been hooked to the movie and if it had kept us laughing, then maybe it would have been a more enjoyable watch. However because it did not keep us invested, it was hard to always pay attention. All in all, we feel as though the movie was not news breaking, and we would not recommend Beetlejuice to viewers.
