For fans of Tim Burton’s 1998 comedy Beetlejuice, the 2024 sequel Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is a fun exercise in nostalgia, reuniting characters who haven’t been on the big screen in 35 years. Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, and Catherine O’Hara revive and evolve their roles from the first movie, even if their characters are underserved and neglected. But Beetlejuice 2 is mostly an exercise in echoing the past: What’s missing is the shock and surprise that came with the first movie, the sense of innovation, novelty, and subversive humor, and the wholly unique world-building around the exasperations of the afterlife.
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For all those elements, Beetlejuice fans should turn to
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