Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is now in theaters, and we're breaking down the long-awaited sequel's batsh*t crazy final act to see if the door to the Afterlife might be left open for a third movie.
Major spoilers follow.
When her daughter Astrid (Jenna Ortega) is tricked into trading her soul to restore the ghost of murderous neighbour/love-interest Jeremy (Arthur Conti) to life, Lydia Deetz (Winona Ryder) reluctantly summons Betelgeuse (Michael Keaton) for help. The Ghost with the Most agrees to bring Lydia to the Afterlife to rescue Astrid... if she'll sign a contract promising to be his bride.
Lydia manages to bring Astrid home, but has already agreed to marry Rory (Justin Theroux), who Betelgeuse exposes as a gold-digging cad. Still, the prospect of tying the knot with a lecherous demon isn't exactly appealing to Lydia, and Astrid manages to find a loophole which allows her mother out of the bargain.
Betelgeuse is then vanquished with the three magic words, popping like a balloon and returning (presumably) to the Afterlife waiting room.
Lydia and Astrid reconcile, and we then see them travelling to all the place's Astrid's late father promised to take her via a flash-forward. Astrid ends up getting married and having a baby... which turns out to be an infant Betelgeuse, who massacres the hospital staff before crawling across the ceiling Trainspotting-style and landing in his mother's arms.
Fortunately, it was all a dream, and we see Lydia wake up in bed and turn to face... Betelgeuse! Yep, this was also a dream. The end.
Not a definitive ending to the story by any means, and Tim Burton could very easily bring these characters back for another ghoulish adventure. Warner Bros. may try to persuade him to do just that if this movie is a success, but as things stand, it doesn't sound like the legendary filmmaker has much interest.
"Yeah, I mean, they talk, whatever, but if it follows the model now, I'd be making that one, I'd be over 100, and it's possible, but I don't know," Burton said during a recent press event (via /Film). "With medical science these days, I don't know. But no, I mean, like I said, for me, I wasn't really personally interested. If you said it to me, I would run the other direction. This is one where it was something that caught my thing. Now, would something else hit? I don't know. Not right now, because I'm still finishing this one, basically."
Have you been to see the movie yet? If so, let us know what you thought in the comment section down below.
Beetlejuice is back! After an unexpected family tragedy, three generations of the Deetz family return home to Winter River. Still haunted by Beetlejuice, Lydia's life is turned upside down when her rebellious teenage daughter, Astrid, discovers the mysterious model of the town in the attic and the portal to the Afterlife is accidentally opened. With trouble brewing in both realms, it's only a matter of time until someone says Beetlejuice's name three times and the mischievous demon returns to unleash his very own brand of mayhem.
Burton, a genre unto himself, directs from a screenplay by Alfred Gough & Miles Millar (Wednesday), story by Gough & Millar and Seth Grahame-Smith (The LEGO Batman Movie), based on characters created by Michael McDowell & Larry Wilson. The film’s producers are Marc Toberoff, Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, Tommy Harper and Burton, with Sara Desmond, Katterli Frauenfelder, Gough, Millar, Brad Pitt, Larry Wilson, Laurence Senelick, Pete Chiappetta, Andrew Lary, Anthony Tittanegro, Grahame-Smith and David Katzenberg executive producing.
Burton’s creatives behind the scenes includes director of photography Haris Zambarloukos (Meg 2: The Trench, Murder on the Orient Express); such previous and frequent collaborators as production designer Mark Scruton (Wednesday), editor Jay Prychidny (Wednesday), Oscar-winning costume designer Colleen Atwood (Alice in Wonderland, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Sleepy Hollow), Oscar-winning creature effects and special makeup FX creative supervisor Neal Scanlan (Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory), Oscar-nominated composer Danny Elfman (Big Fish, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Batman); and Oscar-winning hair and makeup designer Christine Blundell (Topsy-Turvy).