Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024) Was EXACTLY What I Expected | Movie Review

my friend's beetle juu beetle juu is a brand new film from Tim Burton and is the follow-up sequel to The 1988 classic Beetle juu this new film brings back Michael Keaton Winona Ryder and Katherine O'Hara and also brings in some new faces like Jenna Ortega and the biggest questions that I had going into this was will this live up to the Legacy original and also will it be a worthwhile sequel that is what I'm going to be talking about today this is my spoiler-free review for Beetle Juice Beetle juu so make sure you smash like subscribe if you're new here and let's set this juice loose I'm sorry that sounded that sounded weird but okay Beetle Juice Beetle Juice and I'm going to hold off from saying it a third time three generations of the Deets family return home to Winter River after an unexpected family tragedy still haunted by Beetle Juice Lydia's life soon gets turned upside down when her rebellious teenage daughter 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 and let's talk about this a little bit so it's very rare it almost seems impossible that you could have this this classic movie and then have a sequel green lit 36 is years later and you have several of the main cast returning including the star Michael Keaton himself and you also have the same director and the same composer that is wild to me it feels like it shouldn't be a thing but it is and this movie could not have worked without all of that I'd say that Beetlejuice 2 succeeds majorly in one area and that is that it Nails the feel and all of those different elements coming together have a lot to do with that this sequel feels like it was made in 1989 or 1990 or something like that it exists and stands next to the original and for people that might be hesitant about seeing this movie or hesitant that it might ruin the original for you or something like that I feel like you can breathe easy when you hear that because you go in and you watch this movie and you very quickly realize that Tim Burton didn't try to get crazy with it there are some small CGI tidbits that are obviously a little bit better than they would have been back then but then there's some like clamation going on and I don't know his ability to put us right back in that world it's just crazy to me something else that I want to note early on is that Danny Elfman the iconic composer of a lot of Burton stuff as well as just so many others he returned as well and so it's all there for you to enjoy and while you're watching it you're feeling that and my initial thoughts upon walking out of the movie was that I was satisfied I wasn't blown away or really surprised I guess and obviously the Fanboy fan man I should say in me walking out you know I could be a little bit disappointed in that but I think being satisfied is more than I could have asked for what I would say is that this movie was more in line with what I expected from Tim Burton rather than what I had hoped for from Tim Burton and I'll start with the flaws and then I'll kind of work my way to the good stuff here so something that's different to this film compared to the first film is this movie has a plot a and a plot B running together simultaneously whereas the first movie you have the maand you know they go down to the bridge they die they come back to the house they're haunting the house the family moves in somebody says Beetlejuice Beetlejuice three times and Beetlejuice comes back and then everybody's singing and dancing and it's awesome but this film right away splits in a couple different directions and it introduces us to a bunch of different characters some more compelling than others and I want to touch on a couple like my least favorite would have to be Monica Luchi character and it's unfortunate because the trailer kind of got me hyped on her and she's a great actress but I think you'll find that when you watch this movie that whole storyline just doesn't need to be there it doesn't serve much purpose it doesn't move the film forward the only thing that it does is let us exist in the afterlife a little more maybe and some of that might be an attempt to give us a little more Beetle Juice but it doesn't really work because just like the first movie he's not around very much and so if you're going to use him about as much as you did in the first movie just do that there's no need to expand on anything relating to him because we don't need to know Beetlejuice because he's just Beetle Juice like that's what makes him iconic and I don't want to get into any spoiler territory here I will just say that there is another small subplot within this film with Jenna Ortega and to me it purely just felt like a device that was shoved into this movie just to get us from point A to point B she spends some time with this other character and my thought is that that one of these needed to go one of these could have been left on The Cutting Room floor you either flesh out Monica's character or this other subplot because there is a really good movie sandwiched into this thing and that's what's going to keep me coming back the storyline between ASD and Lydia Winona Ryder and Jenna Ortega is fantastic the relationship between anybody who grew up in the 9s goth girl and then our very own modern goth girl you get these two together and it's magic man and Tim Burton gave us this really nice motherdaughter story that had to do with acceptance and grief and loss and growing up I just loved the clear duality showcased of what it looks like to be a teen versus what it looks like to be an adult because Lydia in the first movie is this hardheaded teen but now she's grown up and age brings anxiety in trepidation and fear and so many other things I know from experience but when you're young you're just dumb and headstrong and wild and so watching l raise a new Lydia basically while dealing with her own you know Justin thorough hilarious problem was awesome and it was also very emotional they tied it together in a very clever way and so even with the plots getting a little bit convoluted the way that things kind of wrapped up ended up leaving me on a very satisfied note also side note if anybody's worried that Jenna Ortega is just going to be Wednesday Adams in this I'll say that they did a good enough job separating the characters she's got a little more life in this Al be it not much but a little more but then there is Beetlejuice and Michael Keaton just continues to surprise me man like I didn't think he could do this and he did he absolutely did he freaking killed it and the writing was really on point for him he was hilarious the performance was just chef's kiss you know and he's not as spry as he used to be that's no secret but they figured it out he's the same old Ghost with the most and uh I think that's what I'm most excited about we have another awesome Beetle Juice performance to watch around Halloween and the more the merrier for this time of year I just I need movies to watch at this time of year but I do have three more things that I want to talk about two of them are just shout outs to performances the first being Katherine O'Hara it's just very funny to me how she went from being like my least favorite character in the first movie to like one of my favorite characters in this whole franchise she's near the top of the list she's not she's not quite there but man she did such a great job in this movie she can do so much more than just being Kevin's mom and I feel like I realized that when watching this and I said she wasn't quite my favorite because this next one is easily my favorite performance of this movie and maybe even of the first movie that is William defo and in a time that's like gosh this guy is just in everything and it's almost to the point where it's starting to be like oh yeah William defos in that oh yeah it's him again this role proves why he is in everything he plays this dead actor turned afterlife detective and the comedy that surrounds that is absolutely abely Priceless I don't want to spoil anything but uh yeah just just get ready man because it's awesome and let me know what you guys thought about his performance but finally and once again I do want to shout out Bob just kidding I wanted to shout out how well they did with the effects and the Wardrobe and the costumes and the makeup this movie was gross and dirty and funny and zany and exactly what you'd want out of a sequel it felt like it needed to for the sequel it looked like it needed to for the sequel all these years later this is Tim Burton playing in his wheelhouse and I don't know with this and Wednesday over the last couple of years it just seems like it's safe to say he's not going anywhere this movie was a little long for my taste and it wasn't a perfect movie but when you're dealing with Tim Burton it's just like whatever man you do you Tim but as for my star rating of Beetle Juice Beetle Juice I'm giving it three and 1/2 out of five stars no doubt but my friends what did you think of this movie if you saw it let me know all of your thoughts down below if you haven't seen it let me know are you going to go see it this weekend do you like the original let me know all of that down below also make sure you smash like subscribe and keep up the good vibes my friends peace [Music]