On Beetlejuice Beetlejuice [kinda spoilers]

I saw Beetlejuice Beetlejuice in theaters this weekend! For a sequel bringing back a pretty old property, I thought it was fairly well done! It took a little bit to get good but eventually it did. Points off because I lose respect for Tim Burton every time he tries to make a commentary on cell phones or activism for absolutely zero reason, and I felt the costumes were lacking. (NO shade to Colleen Atwood she’s vv cool.) I did really like the costumes. I just didn’t love some of them, especially the red wedding dress. Devastatingggggg it lacked so much drama. I think it would have been really cool to put Lydia in a super dramatic bustle, cus in the first movie she has that massive hoop skirt. In this movie tho.. I can't find any good pictures of it but it's so lacking. What happened guys :// 

Jenna Ortega’s costumes were pretty awesome though. Also hated hated Lydia’s (ex)boyfriend/fiance. I hated him, not because he was written well, but because he pissed me off. Also at the beginning they establish that Lydia has a borderline drug addiction WITH her toxic boyfriend manager and then NEVER come back to it??????? For why Mr. Burton?? Man just adds so much unnecessary stuff to his projects in recent years. All the cringe teenage stuff in Wednesday was in this too. No one wants to hear his old man opinions about modern society. I feel like he’s also losing his style. There were places where I feel like opportunities were squandered for gothy spooky fun, or stylized sets or smth.

He just has this kinda attitude about modern things. Modern art, modern youth culture (or his 70-something-year-old idea of youth culture), modern relationships. For example, in Wednesday they have Enid, Wednesday’s best friend but also her complete antithesis tell her she should totally get Snapchat, insta, tiktok, etc. Not wrong in and of itself really, but part of the off-puttingness of the inclusion of “modern” themes in Tim Burton’s work also stems from the fact that it feels like he’s mocking his target audience. Call him a headless man the way he’s on that high horse.

In the new Beetlejuice movie, Lydia’s daughter attends a private girls' school and is big into climate activism as her late father was (her late father being a point of contention between Lydia and her daughter, because Lydia can see ghosts yet can’t see the dad’s ghost, so naturally her daughter is hurt and thinks all the ghost stuff is bs). Anyway, climate activism. It’s not relevant to the story, it’s just a thing he throws in. It’s so hard to describe what’s wrong with it. It feels so stilted and unnatural, and moreover it feels mean-spirited. He includes themes of activism and “wokeness” not to insult it explicitly, but rather to silently mock it. “This is what you *kids* do these days, right? This is the world now?” It adds nothing. It is bothersome and off-putting by merit of its unnecessary inclusion and inaccurate portrayal. 

There are some practical effects, but not as many as in the original film. To be expected I suppose, in our age of advanced vfx, still sort of disappointing though. They did use claymation to portray the death of Charles, Lydia’s dad (who couldn’t actually be in the film because the actor that played him is a wretched human being) which was kind of a cool thing, it just didn't really fit stylistically imo.

Alas, my disrespect for the creator has rendered me a biased critic. Overall, good film, great cast, some really banger costumes (I'm looking at YOU, Marie Curie halloween costume, you had no reason to be that spooktacular x3), and a relatively compelling plot. I would recommend (but not in theaters cus good heavens these ticket prices almost put me in the grave I tell you what).