Beetlejuice
Official franchise logo
Created by	Michael McDowell Larry Wilson
Owner	Warner Bros. Entertainment
Years	1988–present
Films and television
Film(s)	Beetlejuice (1988) Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024) Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (TBA)
Animated series	Beetlejuice (1989–1991)
Theatrical presentations
Musical(s)	Beetlejuice (2018–present)
Games
Video game(s)	List of video games
Audio
Soundtrack(s)	Beetlejuice (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (1988) Beetlejuice (Original Broadway Cast Recording) (2019) Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (2024)
Miscellaneous
Theme park attraction(s)	Universal Monsters Live Rock and Roll Show Warner Bros. Classics & Great Gremlins Adventure

Beetlejuice is an Americandark fantasycomedy horrormedia franchise that originated with the filmBeetlejuice (1988). The franchise centers around theafterlife and the sleazy Betelgeuse (afterthe star of the same name), who can either be summoned from or banished back to the Netherworld by saying his name three times. Betelgeuse's precise nature differs according to the medium he appears in. He has been depicted as a malicious being with motivations ranging from a love of chaos to a desire for human companionship. Each entry in the series involves Betelgeuse's interactions with Lydia Deetz, agoth fascinated with the "strange and unusual". Across the various entries in the franchise, the duo have been presented as enemies, best friends and uneasy allies.

The original film was met with critical and commercial success and numerous accolades. The franchise expanded with the release of a 1989–1991animated television series, a 2018stage musical,several video games and an eventual sequel,Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024), with a third film currently in development.

The character of Beetlejuice has also appeared in theUniversal Parks & Resorts live showUniversal Monsters Live Rock and Roll Show alongsideUniversal Monsters characters, as well as the Australian version of the dark rideWarner Bros. Classics & Great Gremlins Adventure atWarner Bros. Movie World.

Beetlejuice is directed byTim Burton, and written byMichael McDowell,Warren Skaaren andLarry Wilson.^[1][2] StarringAlec Baldwin,Geena Davis,Jeffrey Jones,Catherine O'Hara,Winona Ryder, andMichael Keaton as the titular character, produced byThe Geffen Film Company, and distributed byWarner Bros.

Happily married couple Adam and Barbara Maitland die in a car accident, whereupon they learn that the afterlife is a complex and overworkedbureaucracy in the Netherworld and that they are required to haunt their ruralConnecticut home for the next one hundred twenty-five years before they canmove on. Unfortunately, it is purchased byNew York real estate developer Charles Deetz, who wants to use it as aretreat from hisworkaholic city life. Accompanying Charles are his new wife, Delia, amodern artist; and Lydia, Charles' teenage daughter from his first marriage. Charles and Delia's presence upsets the Maitlands, although the childless couple bond with Lydia, a goth whose interest in the "strange and unusual" allows her to see them.

The Maitlands make contact with Betelgeuse, an older and more powerful ghost who formerly worked for the Netherworld's bureaucracy before his loathsome nature alienated him from his superiors. Betelgeuse offers to work for the couple as a "bio-exorcist" and frighten the Deetzes away. The Maitlands initially agree, but are put off by Betelgeuse's crude demeanor and violent tactics. Upon meeting Lydia himself, Betelgeuse becomes smitten with her and attempts to lure her to the afterlife. Meanwhile,interior designer Otho Fenlock discovers a handbook assigned to the Maitlands to help them cope with being ghosts and uses it to hold a séance.

The inexperienced Otho inadvertently begins an exorcism that threatens the Maitlands' afterlives. Betelgeuse tells a desperate Lydia that he can save the couple if she agrees to marry him, an act that would allow him to stay in the realm of the living permanently. A reluctant Lydia agrees and Betelgeuse saves the Maitlands. Betelgeuse initiates a wedding ceremony with Lydia, but the Maitlands successfully defeat him. The group come to a rapport and all live together happily in the house, sharing parenting duties for Lydia.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is directed by Tim Burton from a screenplay by the writing team ofAlfred Gough andMiles Millar, based on a story by Gough, Millar andSeth Grahame-Smith. Starring Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, Catherine O'Hara,Jenna Ortega,Monica Bellucci andWillem Dafoe, the film was released byWarner Bros. Pictures on September 6, 2024.^[3][4]

Thirty-six years after the first installment's events, Lydia has become the host of a paranormal television show and the Maitlands' ghosts have successfully left their house due to a loophole in the afterlife bureaucracy. After Charles dies in ashark attack, Lydia and her teenage daughter, Astrid, return to Winter River for his funeral. Lydia, still haunted by memories of Betelgeuse, confesses her past to her producer/fiancé Rory, who disbelieves her. Attempting to prove Lydia wrong, he summons Betelgeuse, who has since returned to the afterlife bureaucracy and used his new position to expand his bio-exorcism business. Still obsessed with Lydia, Betelgeuse makes romantic overtures to her, but she refuses.

In the Netherworld, Betelgeuse's ex-wife Delores LaFerve, anoccultist who tried to steal his soul, resurfaces and goes in search of him. Meanwhile, Astrid meets and falls in love with Jeremy, a teenage ghost who claims to have died accidentally falling out of his tree house. Jeremy lures Astrid into the afterlife, claiming to be able to reunite her with her late father, Richard, who died while in theAmazon.

Lydia learns that Jeremy murdered his parents and died in a confrontation with the police. She realizes Jeremy intends to trap Astrid in the Netherworld so he can take her place. Lydia summons Betelgeuse, who agrees to save Astrid in exchange for Lydia marrying him. Lydia accepts and the duo travel to the Netherworld together. Betelgeuse intercepts Jeremy as he attempts to swap places with Astrid and sends him to the "Fires of Damnation". Lydia and Astrid briefly reunite with Richard before escaping.

Betelgeuse appears at Lydia's wedding, where he induces Rory to confess he is only marrying Lydia for profit. Delores appears, but she is disposed of along with Rory. Betelgeuse tries to marry Lydia in Rory's place, but Astrid points out a clause in theHandbook for the Recently Deceased that invalidates agreements made by ghosts who bring the living into the Netherworld and as her mother banishes Betelgeuse back there.

In an August 2024 interview withVariety, Tim Burton, when asked about the possibility of a potential third film, stated, "Let's do the math ... it took 35 years to do this, so I'll be over 100. But I guess it's possible with the advent of science these days, but I don't think so".^[5] On April 11, 2025, the third film was officially confirmed to be in the works.^[6] However, in July 2025, Burton cast doubt on a third film in an interview withThe Hollywood Reporter, stating that no one contacted him about it.^[7] In the same interview,Jenna Ortega stated that she would be open to reprising her role as Astrid if Burton was involved in directing.^[7]

Due to the film's financial success, aBeetlejuiceSaturday-morninganimated television series was created forABC and marketed to children andtweens. The series ran for four seasons (the final season airing onFox), from September 9, 1989, to December 6, 1991. Burton served as the show's developer andexecutive producer.^[8] As opposed to every other franchise entry, here the character's name is both spelled and pronounced as "Beetlejuice".

Because of the demographic shift away from the adult-oriented film, the series re-imagines Lydia as a tween instead of a teenager and Beetlejuice as a friendly prankster whom she summons through her bedroom mirror. Rather than inhabit the afterlife, this iteration of Beetlejuice lives in the "Neitherworld", afantasy land inhabited bymonsters akin to Burton'sHalloween Town. Although he refers to himself as "the Ghost with the Most", this Beetlejuice is never depicted as having been a living human, but is rather a creature born in the Neitherworld and whose parents – a similar pair of beings – feature in a few episodes. Beetlejuice additionally has a younger, more popular and polite brother named Donny who admires his elder sibling while eschewing all of his negative traits.

The series heavily relies onpun-based humor andvisual gags based on Beetlejuice's ability to transform himself into a variety of monsters, people, and objects. Lydia and Beetlejuice's close-knit friendship is a recurring theme of the series, and the pair frequently find themselves in situations where they must rescue each other from danger. A recurring plot of the series is Lydia summoning Beetlejuice to the real world to help her with some difficulty, especially her ongoing school rivalry withqueen bee Claire Brewster. Although he always has Lydia's best interests at heart, Beetlejuice's own selfish and chaotic nature often results in some disaster before he sets things right.

Beetlejuice made a cameo appearance in this 1992 animated TV special, produced, like theBeetlejuice animated series, byNelvana. Like in theBeetlejuice animated series, Beetlejuice is voiced byStephen Ouimette.

On October 6, 2020, Beetlejuice guest-starred in theTeen Titans Go! episode "Ghost with the Most", which aired as part ofthe show's sixth season. In this appearance, he was voiced byAlex Brightman, reprising his role from theBeetlejuice Broadway musical.^[9]

• Adventures of Beetlejuice: Skeletons in the Closet is a video game released for MS-DOS in 1990. It is based on the animated series.
• Beetlejuice is a video game developed by Rare and released for the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1991.
• Beetlejuice: Horrific Hijinx from the Neitherworld! is avideo game created byRare and published byLJN for theNintendoGame Boy. It is based on the animated series.
• ABeetlejuice-themed fun pack for thetoys-to-life video gameLego Dimensions was released in September 2017. The pack includes a Betelgeuse minifigure and constructable Saturn's Sandworm, and adds aBeetlejuice-themed open-world area and battle arena to the game. In theBeetlejuice-themed open-world area, Betelgeuse is voiced by Christopher Swindle, Adam Maitland is voiced by Jeff Shine, Barbara Maitland and Delia Dietz are voiced by Krizia Bajos, and Harry the Head-Shrunken Hunter is voiced byTom Kane. Betelgeuse also features prominently in an episode ofTeen Titans Go! included as part of the game. In theTeen Titans Go! episode, when the Titans travel to the Lego world,Raven summons Betelgeuse by saying his name three times and gets to go to theBeetlejuice world. Betelgeuse says if Raven wants to win the Lego building competition, she should resort to cheating and use magic, but tricks her into making a giant gargoyle that the Titans have to fight.^[10]
• Beetlejuice is represented in theplatform fighterMultiVersus as part of its second season, with Christopher Swindle reprising his role.^[11]

Several comic book series based on the animated television series were published byHarvey Comics in 1991 and 1992. The series were the one-shotsBeetlejuice (October 1991),Beetlejuice in the Neitherworld (November 1991), andBeetlejuice Holiday Special (February 1992), and the three-issueBeetlejuice (September—November 1992).

A series of juvenile novels based on the animated television series were published byAladdin Paperbacks in 1992. The novels wereBeetlejuice for President,Lydia's Scream Date,Rock 'n' Roll Nightmare,Twisted Tours,Camp Fright, andTrial by Ghost.^[12]

In 2016, work began on aBroadway stage musical adaptation of the film directed byAlex Timbers, produced byWarner Bros., with music and lyrics byEddie Perfect and book by Scott Brown andAnthony King. The musical was debuted by readings starringChristopher Fitzgerald, Kris Kukul (musical director), and Connor Gallagher (choreographer).^[13] It premiered at theNational Theatre inWashington, D.C. for a limited run from October 14 to November 18, 2018, withAlex Brightman in the title role.^[14]

The production was scheduled to play its final performance at the Winter Garden on June 6, 2020. The producers were unable to find another theater to house the show due to the COVID Broadway shutdown in March 2020. The show reopened at theMarquis Theatre on April 8, 2022, and closed on January 8, 2023,^[15] at a financial loss, having been unable to recoup its $21 million investment.^[15] Subsequent productions opened across the world, including a North American national tour.

• Beetlejuice
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• English-language films
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