Beetlejuice: Michael Keaton Calls Merchandise of Character "F--king Weird"

Michael Keaton returns as Beetlejuice this September for the long-awaited sequel.

By Haley Miller

This fall Warner Bros. Pictures will release the highly-anticipated followup to the cult classic Beetlejuice, also known as Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. The movie comes over three decades after Michael Keaton graced the screens as the hysterical miscreant in Tim Burton's film and the two, alongside Oscar nominee Winona Ryder and two-time Emmy winner Catherine O'Hara, are reuniting once more.

The hype surrounding the film is electric as new generations of fans look forward to seeing what shenanigans are cooked up in the sequel. As with any huge pop culture phenomena, Over the years the franchise has produced some pretty questionable merchandise which Keaton acknowledges in an interview with Empire. 

"There's been so much merchandising of it, I had to drop back to where it started," he said. "I had to go, 'What was my unusual imagination even thinking about when I was developing it in the first place?' As opposed to seeing a coffee mug or a golf-club cover [adorned with Betelgeuse's face]." The ubiquity of Beetlejuice as a character in the culture created its own challenges. "That was fucking weird," admits Keaton. "To be honest with you – I'm being very frank – it was off-putting, to look and go, 'I don't want to look like all these little things, fuck that – what was the thing that started this?'"

In the recently released trailer, the movie confirmed that it would be set around the death of Charles Deetz played by convicted sex offender Jeffrey Jones. This time around, the pic will meet Jenna Ortega (Netflix's Wednesday) who plays Lydia's rebellious teenage daughter Astrid. The Deetz return home to Winter River but things go awry when Astrid starts poking around. 

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Per the synopsis, "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 own brand of mayhem." Alongside Ortega, it has been previously confirmed that Beetlejuice's wife, played by Monica Belluci, as well as Danny Devito will also have roles in the film, though Devito's sounds like it'll be more of a cameo. 

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice opens in theaters September 6, 2024. Stay tuned to Comicbook for updates on the film. 

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