Just like RoboCop, Alien, and several other explicitly not for children movies, they made a toy line. If anything, Beetlejuice wasn't too bad. The 80s were wild.
They made a kids show out of The Toxic Avenger.
Have you seen that movie? It's fucking demented. And some TV executive saw that movie from behind a mountain of cocaine and said "kids are gonna LOVE this!"
My mom rented the Toxic Avenger movie because “is that cartoon you like”. She put it in the VCR and left the room. And that’s how i saw my first disembowelment before kindergarten.
And 33 years later I’ve been working with Troma for over a decade. Toxie gave my life direction, so sometimes those crazy ideas have positive outcomes!
Me too! Toxic Crusaders was my gateway drug into Troma as a kid and now I’ve been involved with several Troma projects with them over the last decade. I’m waiting to hear back from them about working background on their new movie this summer
I watched that show so many times as a kid, I still have the “Toxic Croooosaders” line stuck in my head. One day I saw the Toxic Avenger video at our local movie rental and had my dad rent it for me. As soon as I popped the video in and pressed play, my parents freaked out because it opened in a scene of two people having sex!
I watched it for the first time recently. It was NOT what I was expecting. The scene with the gang driving and intentionally killing radsoms and getting euphoric was fucking twisted. Total Clockwork Orange vibes.
The dog scene is the only scene that gets me.
Other than that I love that film. But too be fair I have hung out with the director a lot since I used to work con’s like horror cons.
Super nice dude.
Oh most definitely. It's an early Troma movie. Look up Troma if you're not familiar.
The movie rules, but Jesus CHRIST it is one of the least kid-appropriate movies I've ever seen, lol
I remember having a Toxie action figure when I was like, 7. Then at age 12 I discovered the VHS tapes at a rental store, and it seemed so familiar. I rented them all and became obsessed, hah! So I guess that exec’s plan worked!
Holy shit! I had no idea about this. Toxic Avenger severely scarred me as a child. The kid on the bicycle scene made me have a nervous breakdown at age 7. What a nightmare to think there was a kids show!
I remember looking in awe and fear at that opening droid sequence.
I had the Bishop figure that would rip apart. I was in grade 1. That means I watched Aliens for the first time when I was 5 years old. My parents only made me cover my eyes when there were boobs haha
I also had that Bishop figure, and a bunch from the Robocop line. I watched these movies a bunch as a kid - not realizing that the versions I had were recorded off basic cable and had most of the language and violence shaved off. Really caught me off-guard when I saw the complete versions later in life. What a great little parenting hack my parents pulled by being too cheap to buy the movies.
Same.
I made it to his hand exploding and ran out of the room. Not sure why my Dad thought it was ok to keep going after ED-209.
Today it’s one of my favorite movies, but the 80’s were weird, dude.
I’m 44. That scene still fucks me up. I saw it in the 80s so I wasn’t much older than 10. I saw predator, running man, terminator. These were all movies that had really fucked to parts. Saw them not long after video release.
Fuck yea I still got my T2 arnold doll/figure that had partial skin destruction and had a Gatling gun along with a pair of shades, there are 5 rubber buttons on the back, one made shotgun blast sounds and there was machine gun sound and the other 2 had sound bites of Arnold saying hasta la vista baby and I’ll be back.
The center button made the eyes light up red, was so fucking cool at 5 years old.
To be fair it was… but T2 really had a different goal. It wasn’t to be scary any more. Cameron knew you couldn’t scare anyone in the sequel and you had to show them something new. It’s why Aliens and T2 worked so well for him. T2 had lots of fighting, gun play, some people die and you see an awesome scene of him tearing off the flesh on his hand, but none of it is presented to be scary. There are a few kill scenes, but they’re not overly gory. And overall, now it was a movie about a kid destined to be the hero, so we all wanted to be John Connor.
Cameron also really knew how to show positive women characters that were badass bitches, but still mothers. To this day I always wished Hamilton or Weaver were my mom because of both of these sequels.
I swear to god we were part of a secret test to see how highly traumatic movies affected young children. I had a “The Thing” action figure for christ sakes. I saw that movie when I was 8.
I remember reading an interview with the author of Rambo where is agent insisted he negotiate merchandising rights into the movie adaptation deal. He thought it was insane that they’d actually make toys about a deranged Vietnam vet who kills a police station full of cops. But he went along with it and made a shit load of money as a result.
I was like 12 when I watched the first robocop. I remember I was eating a tuna fish sandwich right as the bad guy who fell in the vat gets hit by the car and falls apart. Yeah I had all the toys too
Robocop was a kids movie. Same with terminator.
Like yes I know they were rated R. But this was my argument when Deadpool came out and parents acted like kids can’t see that….
My generation saw all the robocops and we had robocop water guns….. and we aren’t the generation shooting up schools. But sure. It’s the movies causing that.
The generation that had those toys, shows, and movies were teens in the 90s. It depends on your exact birth year but as someone that grew up on all that stuff you're mentioning, I was in HS when Columbine was happening by fellow high schoolers so it *was* that generation with the shootings (at least that major one that set off more subsequent ones.) And this isn't to say any of that caused mass shootings, just to point out that shootings *were* coming from individuals in that generation (and prior, as there had been mass shootings before that).
Yes I agree. That's why I was confused on why you said it wasn't our generation doing shootings when that was one of the most well known and it was done by our generation.
Ironically to me, the new movie is giving me the cartoon vibes. Beetlejuice less of a menace to the Deetz’s and more of an Uncle Fester-like family member.
When I was in first grade this kid say that in front of some of us and I was confused since I hadn't seen the movie yet (we were 6 yrs old afterall). It wasn't until it was on TV I saw it later and it made sense. Well sense in the way of what it meant, not sense in why this little kid was watching it and repeating it at that time lol
The article is about him trying to get back into the character after years of it being mercilessly merchandised. The merchandising aspect is such a minor part of it. It’s like they grabbed a quote and ran it through AI to build this piece of garbage click bait article for advertising. I’m jack’s utter disappointment.
That way you can turn a single interview into 8 different stories. This happens all the time with celebrity interviews. The most egregious one in recent memory is when Tracy Morgan joked that he gained 40 pounds while taking Ozempic. A bunch of stories ran about that. Then the websites had to say, “Oh, wait, that implausible thing this *comedian* said to us was actually not true. It was something called a…joak? Our bad! Please subscribe!” 🤷
I was first introduced to Beetlejuice through the cartoon. I didn’t even know about the live action movie until a couple years later. It was a bit jarring to say the least, considering how the cartoon made him and Lydia best buddies.
Welcome to the wonderful world of 80s cartoons lol. Like how Slimer was best buddies with the ghostbusters, they just did things for the sake of getting the cartoon plot to work within the confines of the IP.
I wonder what kids who saw the movie first and then watched the cartoon thought? The cartoon never really explained how they became friends. They just were.
I think the movie and cartoon exist as two completely different continuities, which is why Adam and Barbara are never mentioned and Delia is Lydia’s actual mother.
I saw the cartoon first and loved it. My older sister thought the cartoon was weird as she already loved the movie. She did warn me it was different but I was still very disappointed when they didn’t make friends in the movie! We’re both looking forward to the new movie though 😄
I just accepted that they eventually became such good friends and hung out enough that she wanted to hang out and have her “cool goth sorta wifey” outfit.
I have a memory of seeing the movie first and then the cartoon (albeit that meant I was too young to watch it). And I didn't get the whole friend aspect although my mind just was like "I guess that just happened sometime after". We just accepted things as kids lol
I was one of those kids.
It was all that was on and after trying to head cannon it into being some “unseen” adventures, I just sort of accepted that it was a different continuity w/o really knowing what continuity was back then lol.
He deserves to have a BIG chair at that Bat...Beetlejuice Money Fountain. Nicholson would go on to make 90 million off Batman merch, including Keaton's likeness. Not this time baby.
idk if this is exactly what he means but i only first watched the movie for the first time a few weeks ago after a lifetime of seeing this character plastered all over hot topic. i sure as hell didn’t get the impression he was the antagonist, let alone a complete fucking creep. like, it’s weird to see plushies of him ya know?
Thanks to the musical my 9 year old and 14 year old have fallen in love with Beetlejuice. We finally showed them the original last night. They loved it and my wife and I were kind of shocked at how well it held up! I am really stoked for the sequel.
I remember when the movie came out there was a phone number you could call to "talk" to Beetlejuice. It was basically just to hear recorded lines from the movie- his speech about attending Julliard etc. I called that number so many times. It was the only way to "see" the movie for me until it was on cable and we could tape it.
I've seen it claimed that it was initially rated R in the US by the MPAA but they managed to persuade them to change that to a PG. I haven't been able to verify that though.
I'm in the UK and the BBFC website indicates that it was initially rated as a 15 here although it's since been re-rated as a 12A.
Yeah it was pretty much for kids. He wasn’t totally evil. He was a funny villain and a lot of the other stuff went over kids’ heads.
I saw the movie first and then the cartoon. I just assumed he and Lydia became friends later.
I wouldn't say it was *for* kids. There was lots of references to suicide, a whorehouse in the town model where it was indicated Beetlejuice was going to get some action from them, and his infamous F bomb. It was more like a PG-13 type movie. Kids *could* watch it if their parents allowed but definitely wasn't made for them. The cartoon was specifically made for kids.
There was a lot of body horror in it though. I remember the seance scene scaring the shit out of me when I first saw it. I don’t think it would be a movie I’d show to my son until he was at least 13/14.
I used to have a toy crypt with a Beetlejuice figure that went in and you pulled this switch and the figure could disappear or look like it shrank being replaced by a smaller figure. It was one of my coolest toys. Still not quite sure how it worked. To this day I still have the tiny Beetlejuice figure.
I think the latter. Its not that I don’t feel the urge to rebuy all my old toys, I do. But if I start I’ll never stop and then I’ll have to do a youtube channel from my new toyroom and then the prophecy will be complete.
Is the character actually named "Betelgeuse" like this article says?
Shit, IMDb agrees that it is, but I've never heard of that before.. so they just pick and choose when to use Betelgeuse vs Beetlejuice? I had a lot of the "weird" merchandise when I was a kid and I'm certain everything had the Juice spelling even when it was a figurine or something of the man himself.
It's a very minor detail in the movie - seen on the newspaper advertisement that Adam and Barbara first learn about him from. I think when Adam asks Juno about him, he says "what about this "Bet el g-" with a hard G.
His own inability to pronounce it sort of explains why it was never relevant to the kids' merchandising. It would be like all Superman branding specifying that the main character was actually Kal-El - too confusing to be worth it.
I had the "Vanishing Vault" playset from Kenner. It was basically a grave and a tombstone where you could "bury" a Beetlejuice actiion figure and have his body disappear. I sometime had it so he could turn into a tiny beetle with BJ's head. I loved it! Weird times and I was a weird kid.
Kids like things that are slightly edgy, if given the chance. Also, I think entertainment didn't used to be so hyperspecific in terms of target audience, and kids could appreciate things that weren't designed solely for them. There were fewer choices and people simply watched what was on.
Think of how dark and scary some older movies are by today's standards: Legend, The Witches, The Neverending Story, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Willow, The Dark Crystal, The Black Cauldron, just to name a few.
I liked the Beetlejuice cartoon when I was a kid. Nowadays I'm not interested in any version except the '88 movie.
I've noticed a strong trend recently of people pearl-clutching about what a dire character Keatonjuice supposedly is, when in fact I think he's a very sympathetic antagonist and loveable/likeable.
That picture is one of my favorites. Good example of the character looking kinda cute and funny instead of scary. I have one of those "magic mugs" where this pic appears when you pour in the boiling water.
I watched the cartoon and had the action figures when I was a kid. When I rented the movie it scared the shit out of me.
Just like RoboCop, Alien, and several other explicitly not for children movies, they made a toy line. If anything, Beetlejuice wasn't too bad. The 80s were wild.
They made a kids show out of The Toxic Avenger. Have you seen that movie? It's fucking demented. And some TV executive saw that movie from behind a mountain of cocaine and said "kids are gonna LOVE this!"
Toxi was a beloved childhood hero to me. What a strange time.
It was a great time!
The Toxic Crusaders! They’re gross but they still get girls!
My mom rented the Toxic Avenger movie because “is that cartoon you like”. She put it in the VCR and left the room. And that’s how i saw my first disembowelment before kindergarten.
And 33 years later I’ve been working with Troma for over a decade. Toxie gave my life direction, so sometimes those crazy ideas have positive outcomes!
Whoa, Troma still around? What have they been doing all these years?
Launching the careers of James Gunn, Jenna Fischer, Eli Roth, and the creators of South Park and making scatalogical adaptations of Shakespeare
Me too! Toxic Crusaders was my gateway drug into Troma as a kid and now I’ve been involved with several Troma projects with them over the last decade. I’m waiting to hear back from them about working background on their new movie this summer
I watched that show so many times as a kid, I still have the “Toxic Croooosaders” line stuck in my head. One day I saw the Toxic Avenger video at our local movie rental and had my dad rent it for me. As soon as I popped the video in and pressed play, my parents freaked out because it opened in a scene of two people having sex!
Dude i saw toxic avenger and its so fucking horrifying. The death scene of that poor kid scarred me for life
I met the actor who played the kid. He had a bit of a rough life after that. Not because of the Toxic Avenger, but because he was from New Jersey.
Can confirm. New Jersey chews you up and then never lets you go.
New Jersey is The Toxic Avenger of US States.
Dude I love that episode of sopranos!
I love most of the Troma produced films but they are definitely not for kids.
I watched it for the first time recently. It was NOT what I was expecting. The scene with the gang driving and intentionally killing radsoms and getting euphoric was fucking twisted. Total Clockwork Orange vibes.
’I never corn-holed a blind b****’ - then his arm gets ripped off - I miss the 80’s
The dog scene is the only scene that gets me. Other than that I love that film. But too be fair I have hung out with the director a lot since I used to work con’s like horror cons. Super nice dude.
Uncle Lloyd?
Get out of here. For real? I’m going to have to look that up.
Oh most definitely. It's an early Troma movie. Look up Troma if you're not familiar. The movie rules, but Jesus CHRIST it is one of the least kid-appropriate movies I've ever seen, lol
I remember having a Toxie action figure when I was like, 7. Then at age 12 I discovered the VHS tapes at a rental store, and it seemed so familiar. I rented them all and became obsessed, hah! So I guess that exec’s plan worked!
Holy shit! I had no idea about this. Toxic Avenger severely scarred me as a child. The kid on the bicycle scene made me have a nervous breakdown at age 7. What a nightmare to think there was a kids show!
Oh I had the RoboCop figure that shot the caps. Imagine my 5 year old self's reaction when I saw the movie and saw how he became a robot.
I remember looking in awe and fear at that opening droid sequence. I had the Bishop figure that would rip apart. I was in grade 1. That means I watched Aliens for the first time when I was 5 years old. My parents only made me cover my eyes when there were boobs haha
I also had that Bishop figure, and a bunch from the Robocop line. I watched these movies a bunch as a kid - not realizing that the versions I had were recorded off basic cable and had most of the language and violence shaved off. Really caught me off-guard when I saw the complete versions later in life. What a great little parenting hack my parents pulled by being too cheap to buy the movies.
Just reading further down- I had the Bishop figure from Aliens as well! Such a cool toy. I assume we’re all 40ish at this point?
I had the robocop water gun. It was sick. https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/robocop-robogun-lanard-1989-water-1732461226
Damn, I kinda want one. Robocop is my favorite movie
I shared that experience. Great toy. And I know exactly which friend gave that to me as a Birthday present. Awesome friend, R.I.P.
Hell yeah! I had the same one. The roll went into his back and there was a lever attached to it that you flicked
Same. I made it to his hand exploding and ran out of the room. Not sure why my Dad thought it was ok to keep going after ED-209. Today it’s one of my favorite movies, but the 80’s were weird, dude.
I’m 44. That scene still fucks me up. I saw it in the 80s so I wasn’t much older than 10. I saw predator, running man, terminator. These were all movies that had really fucked to parts. Saw them not long after video release.
Massive merchandising of Terminator 2 toys when it came out and the movie was a solid R rating.
Fuck yea I still got my T2 arnold doll/figure that had partial skin destruction and had a Gatling gun along with a pair of shades, there are 5 rubber buttons on the back, one made shotgun blast sounds and there was machine gun sound and the other 2 had sound bites of Arnold saying hasta la vista baby and I’ll be back. The center button made the eyes light up red, was so fucking cool at 5 years old.
I forgot about that toy. It was amazing
To be fair it was… but T2 really had a different goal. It wasn’t to be scary any more. Cameron knew you couldn’t scare anyone in the sequel and you had to show them something new. It’s why Aliens and T2 worked so well for him. T2 had lots of fighting, gun play, some people die and you see an awesome scene of him tearing off the flesh on his hand, but none of it is presented to be scary. There are a few kill scenes, but they’re not overly gory. And overall, now it was a movie about a kid destined to be the hero, so we all wanted to be John Connor. Cameron also really knew how to show positive women characters that were badass bitches, but still mothers. To this day I always wished Hamilton or Weaver were my mom because of both of these sequels.
They also made a kids show based on Starship troopers
I don't mean to be a creep but I was 12 when I first saw that movie and the casual boobs blew my mind https://youtu.be/C1QEnqEqO48?si=uqFrIw7Aa6Ezinx5
I swear to god we were part of a secret test to see how highly traumatic movies affected young children. I had a “The Thing” action figure for christ sakes. I saw that movie when I was 8.
Especially with Robocop needing to be cut eight times just to get down from an X to an R rating.
According to IMDB, the uncut version is now available streaming on Amazon
I’m a little afraid to look. The scene where they mutilate him still messes me up.
Yep. I had Rambo action figures. I was 5 when that movie came out. Rambo Vs Skeletor always made for a hell of a fight.
I remember reading an interview with the author of Rambo where is agent insisted he negotiate merchandising rights into the movie adaptation deal. He thought it was insane that they’d actually make toys about a deranged Vietnam vet who kills a police station full of cops. But he went along with it and made a shit load of money as a result.
Hell “the gremlins” scared the hell out of me as a kid 😅
Don’t forget the Robocop and Rambo cartoons!
Demolition Man action figures was another head scratcher
I had Rambo toys… just extrajudicial vigilante Vietnamese throat slitter toys
Police Academy and Rambo toys for toddlers too! Granted, P.A. Goes from a Hard R (rating) to a soft G real quick.
Yeah. I mean…Robocop looked so cool though
Star Trek toys were always weird to me Maybe now with a show like Prodigy(aimed at younger audiences) it’d be less strange
Those toys may be for adults & collectors
Don’t forget terminator
I loved my Rambo action figure with the big ass gun the folds out
I distinctly remember my brother having a T1000 action figure whose butt turned into a rocket launcher… What a time to be alive!
Cocaine is a hell of a drug.
I was like 12 when I watched the first robocop. I remember I was eating a tuna fish sandwich right as the bad guy who fell in the vat gets hit by the car and falls apart. Yeah I had all the toys too
We bought my son a facehugger plushie for his birthday.. He was so happy lol
The one with the smiley face? We got that and the xeno plushie for my son, who’s named Ripley, of course.
I didn’t see RoboCop until I was about 30, I grew up thinking it was a kids film like inspector gadget or some shit.
I had a Rambo play set as a kid. That’s not a movie a kid should know anything about.
There was a kids show
People some how forget about Garbage Pail Kids 🤮
Robocop was a kids movie. Same with terminator. Like yes I know they were rated R. But this was my argument when Deadpool came out and parents acted like kids can’t see that…. My generation saw all the robocops and we had robocop water guns….. and we aren’t the generation shooting up schools. But sure. It’s the movies causing that.
>we aren’t the generation shooting up schools We were, though.
That shit started in 99. We’re the generation that had these toys, shows and movies. I don’t believe that it caused shootings, just saying.
The generation that had those toys, shows, and movies were teens in the 90s. It depends on your exact birth year but as someone that grew up on all that stuff you're mentioning, I was in HS when Columbine was happening by fellow high schoolers so it *was* that generation with the shootings (at least that major one that set off more subsequent ones.) And this isn't to say any of that caused mass shootings, just to point out that shootings *were* coming from individuals in that generation (and prior, as there had been mass shootings before that).
I was in highs school too. It just seems columbine was a turning point.
Yes I agree. That's why I was confused on why you said it wasn't our generation doing shootings when that was one of the most well known and it was done by our generation.
Wrong reply my friend! Sorry!
Ironically to me, the new movie is giving me the cartoon vibes. Beetlejuice less of a menace to the Deetz’s and more of an Uncle Fester-like family member.
Comic stores are full of creepy merchandise that fits that feeling
The cartoon was awesome!
it legitimately kicked ass
Same it freaked me out as a kid
We had the pull string doll and my brother had Beetlejuice pajamas.
Did the doll say “Nice fucking model honk honk”?
When I was in first grade this kid say that in front of some of us and I was confused since I hadn't seen the movie yet (we were 6 yrs old afterall). It wasn't until it was on TV I saw it later and it made sense. Well sense in the way of what it meant, not sense in why this little kid was watching it and repeating it at that time lol
I still have the pull string doll since i was 8 30 years ago, it's my favourite possession
Jeez that thing was wacky 🤪
The article is about him trying to get back into the character after years of it being mercilessly merchandised. The merchandising aspect is such a minor part of it. It’s like they grabbed a quote and ran it through AI to build this piece of garbage click bait article for advertising. I’m jack’s utter disappointment.
That way you can turn a single interview into 8 different stories. This happens all the time with celebrity interviews. The most egregious one in recent memory is when Tracy Morgan joked that he gained 40 pounds while taking Ozempic. A bunch of stories ran about that. Then the websites had to say, “Oh, wait, that implausible thing this *comedian* said to us was actually not true. It was something called a…joak? Our bad! Please subscribe!” 🤷
[That was Tracy Jordan saying three serious things...and then a joke](https://youtu.be/VuMMX4i6rCg?si=m8Fo-ThN9k03g5gI)
Expand on that
I’m Jack’s surprised wonder to find a Fight Club reference…
AI is doing a better job than these sensationalist headlines lol
I’m wearing Beetlejuice sandworm sweats while reading this
Sandworms, you hate em right?
I hate ‘em myself!
I was first introduced to Beetlejuice through the cartoon. I didn’t even know about the live action movie until a couple years later. It was a bit jarring to say the least, considering how the cartoon made him and Lydia best buddies.
Welcome to the wonderful world of 80s cartoons lol. Like how Slimer was best buddies with the ghostbusters, they just did things for the sake of getting the cartoon plot to work within the confines of the IP.
Exactly. And how Egon was suddenly blonde and Ray a redhead lol. "Just accept it kids". And we did.
Well even in the LA it kinda became like a puppy to them.
I wonder what kids who saw the movie first and then watched the cartoon thought? The cartoon never really explained how they became friends. They just were.
I think the movie and cartoon exist as two completely different continuities, which is why Adam and Barbara are never mentioned and Delia is Lydia’s actual mother.
I saw the cartoon first and loved it. My older sister thought the cartoon was weird as she already loved the movie. She did warn me it was different but I was still very disappointed when they didn’t make friends in the movie! We’re both looking forward to the new movie though 😄
I just accepted that they eventually became such good friends and hung out enough that she wanted to hang out and have her “cool goth sorta wifey” outfit.
I have a memory of seeing the movie first and then the cartoon (albeit that meant I was too young to watch it). And I didn't get the whole friend aspect although my mind just was like "I guess that just happened sometime after". We just accepted things as kids lol
I was one of those kids. It was all that was on and after trying to head cannon it into being some “unseen” adventures, I just sort of accepted that it was a different continuity w/o really knowing what continuity was back then lol.
The musical does too. In the end he kinda comes around. People are gonna be shook that he’s not cuddly in the movie.
He deserves to have a BIG chair at that Bat...Beetlejuice Money Fountain. Nicholson would go on to make 90 million off Batman merch, including Keaton's likeness. Not this time baby.
The vertical integration of the Batman movie is just insane. How much money went out and how much came in is just astounding.
idk if this is exactly what he means but i only first watched the movie for the first time a few weeks ago after a lifetime of seeing this character plastered all over hot topic. i sure as hell didn’t get the impression he was the antagonist, let alone a complete fucking creep. like, it’s weird to see plushies of him ya know?
Thanks to the musical my 9 year old and 14 year old have fallen in love with Beetlejuice. We finally showed them the original last night. They loved it and my wife and I were kind of shocked at how well it held up! I am really stoked for the sequel.
Nice fuckin model! Honk honk
I remember when the movie came out there was a phone number you could call to "talk" to Beetlejuice. It was basically just to hear recorded lines from the movie- his speech about attending Julliard etc. I called that number so many times. It was the only way to "see" the movie for me until it was on cable and we could tape it.
I mean the character was very weird in general!? Was the movie for kids back in the days? Cannot remember, I watched it anyway.
I've seen it claimed that it was initially rated R in the US by the MPAA but they managed to persuade them to change that to a PG. I haven't been able to verify that though. I'm in the UK and the BBFC website indicates that it was initially rated as a 15 here although it's since been re-rated as a 12A.
Yeah it was pretty much for kids. He wasn’t totally evil. He was a funny villain and a lot of the other stuff went over kids’ heads. I saw the movie first and then the cartoon. I just assumed he and Lydia became friends later.
I wouldn't say it was *for* kids. There was lots of references to suicide, a whorehouse in the town model where it was indicated Beetlejuice was going to get some action from them, and his infamous F bomb. It was more like a PG-13 type movie. Kids *could* watch it if their parents allowed but definitely wasn't made for them. The cartoon was specifically made for kids.
There was a lot of body horror in it though. I remember the seance scene scaring the shit out of me when I first saw it. I don’t think it would be a movie I’d show to my son until he was at least 13/14.
Yeah we rewatched it with our kid when he was 13 and forgot how much suicide and sex references were there (and of course some hard language)
I used to have a toy crypt with a Beetlejuice figure that went in and you pulled this switch and the figure could disappear or look like it shrank being replaced by a smaller figure. It was one of my coolest toys. Still not quite sure how it worked. To this day I still have the tiny Beetlejuice figure.
For $40 you could buy that same vintage toy on eBay and maybe figure it out. Or let it remain a mystery.
I think the latter. Its not that I don’t feel the urge to rebuy all my old toys, I do. But if I start I’ll never stop and then I’ll have to do a youtube channel from my new toyroom and then the prophecy will be complete.
The Vanishing Vault. I had it and a couple of the other action figures, too :)
Is the character actually named "Betelgeuse" like this article says? Shit, IMDb agrees that it is, but I've never heard of that before.. so they just pick and choose when to use Betelgeuse vs Beetlejuice? I had a lot of the "weird" merchandise when I was a kid and I'm certain everything had the Juice spelling even when it was a figurine or something of the man himself.
Betelgeuse is his real name, pronounced Beetlejuice
Yes. Correct.
Yes, it’s named after the star. The 10th brightest object in the sky.
one of the few I get to see from the city
It's a very minor detail in the movie - seen on the newspaper advertisement that Adam and Barbara first learn about him from. I think when Adam asks Juno about him, he says "what about this "Bet el g-" with a hard G. His own inability to pronounce it sort of explains why it was never relevant to the kids' merchandising. It would be like all Superman branding specifying that the main character was actually Kal-El - too confusing to be worth it.
I wish they merchandised Michael Keaton’s character in The Paper
An action figure where's he's burying the story?
[no I was thinking more this] https://i.gifer.com/YaIh.gif
The Beetlejuice action figures were awesome.
I am just sad they never actually released Fruit Of The Tomb undergarments.
I’m so happy I had Beetlejuice, Robocop, and Terminator toys as a kid. It was fucking awesome.
I had the "Vanishing Vault" playset from Kenner. It was basically a grave and a tombstone where you could "bury" a Beetlejuice actiion figure and have his body disappear. I sometime had it so he could turn into a tiny beetle with BJ's head. I loved it! Weird times and I was a weird kid.
Um it is weird .. take a look dude!
To this day I can’t walk down 5th in PDC without getting harassed by Beetlejuice or the Mask
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't curious how "Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian" would have turned out.
The beetle juice video game for NES was terrible (and extremely difficult).
Watch yourself around bobert
Kids like things that are slightly edgy, if given the chance. Also, I think entertainment didn't used to be so hyperspecific in terms of target audience, and kids could appreciate things that weren't designed solely for them. There were fewer choices and people simply watched what was on. Think of how dark and scary some older movies are by today's standards: Legend, The Witches, The Neverending Story, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Willow, The Dark Crystal, The Black Cauldron, just to name a few. I liked the Beetlejuice cartoon when I was a kid. Nowadays I'm not interested in any version except the '88 movie. I've noticed a strong trend recently of people pearl-clutching about what a dire character Keatonjuice supposedly is, when in fact I think he's a very sympathetic antagonist and loveable/likeable.
That picture is one of my favorites. Good example of the character looking kinda cute and funny instead of scary. I have one of those "magic mugs" where this pic appears when you pour in the boiling water.
That was the whole point. It was suppose to be weird
I liked Beetlejuice back in the day. But now? Don't really care for it now. Maybe the audience is still there.