Beetlejuice (1989) TV Show Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. Today I'm taking a look at the 1989 ABC/Fox cartoon, Beetlejuice, based on the 1988 Tim Burton movie. I watched the three episodes from the show's first two seasons that are included on the Blu-ray of the movie last night since it was Halloween and decided I wanted to talk about the show. I'll be focusing on the show overall rather than on the three episodes that I watched last night specifically, though I will say which episodes I watched. So, let's get into it.

Beetlejuice was one of the many cartoons that I watched on Global in the early '90s along with Droids, Ewoks, The Care Bears Family, The Adventures of Teddy Ruxpin, Inspector Gadget, The Real Ghostbusters, My Pet Monster, The Bugs Bunny & Tweety Show, and Dennis the Menace. The movie had come out in 1988, and while this show was based on the movie, it was not only its own thing, but was the only other Beetlejuice thing we'd end up getting aside from three video games based on the movie until Beetlejuice 2 comes out next year, unless Warner Bros. Discovery delays it until 2025 due to the ongoing actor's strike. Either way, Beetlejuice has been a dead franchise since the show ended in 1991.

While I didn't see the movie until it was on TV in the 2000s, I loved the cartoon. It was funny, well animated and the characters were fun. I probably saw the entire show when it was on TV, but until I got the Blu-ray of the movie I hadn't seen the show since I was a little kid. So I actually don't remember very much of it from then. Including the three episodes on the Blu-ray. Those episodes are Season 1, Episode 2b, "Skeletons in the Closet", Season 2, Episode 2b, "Spooky Boo-tique", and Season 2, Episode 7b, "A-Ha". Which brings me to something that I didn't remember from when I originally watched the show. Most of the show's episodes are only 12 minutes in length, so they were aired together as individual stories, similar to other cartoons that aired at the time, like The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, with one opening title sequence and one closing credits sequence. Though there are still plenty of single 24 minute episodes (30 with commercials of course), with the fourth season, which was the show's final season, only having 24 minute episodes. Again, there were alot of cartoons that were out in the '80s and early '90s that had episodes that had two stories, so it's not like this show was unique in that respect.

Besides the opening title sequence, I think what I remembered most about Beetlejuice are the extra supporting characters. Obviously, Lydia and her parents carried over to the movie, but in the Neitherworld, there's a ton of characters that weren't in the movie. The main one being Jacques the Skeleton, Ginger the tap-dancing Spider, The Monster Across the Street, who looks like a hairy, eyeless monster wearing cowboy gear, and his dog, Poopsie. There are others, like Lydia's friends, Bertha and Prudence, and her rival, Claire, but the Neitherworld characters are in the opening title sequence and are in the episodes a bit more since there are some episodes where Lydia's in the Neitherworld for the whole episode. 

As for the three episodes that I watched last night, they were all pretty funny and really good. I mean most of the jokes in them were pretty bad, but they're the kinds of things that I think are funny. They also gave a decent preview of the series as a whole, since one was Lydia and Beetlejuice looking for their car, Doomie, one had the pair interacting with the other Neitherworld denizens, including Jacques and The Monster Across the Street, and the third episode had them interacting with the people in Lydia's life in the real world. No Sandworms in the episodes though. 

Overall I really had a great time revisiting Beetlejuice after thirty years or more, as, even though Global continued airing reruns until 1998, I probably stopped watching the show sometime around 1992 or 1993, because I don't actually remember watching it at the log house or the other two houses that my family lived in until we moved to where my parents and I live now. It's possible I did watch it later than that, I just don't remember doing so, since that was the era of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, Sailor Moon, Animaniacs, and Eek! the Cat amongst other shows I watched on Global at the time. Regardless, it was still fun watching the show again after having not seen it in more than 30 years.

Alright my friends that's going to be it for me for today. I'm gonna try to have a comic book review out tomorrow. Nothing big, just a single issue that I haven't picked out yet. So we'll see what I end up picking. Until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.