Tim Burton released Beetlejuice 2 in 2024, but neither Alec Baldwin nor Geena Davis returned for the long-awaited sequel. In the original movie in 1988, Burton tells the story of a couple named Adam (Baldwin) and Barbara (Davis) who die in an accident and end up tethered to their beloved home as ghosts. However, when a family moves in and starts to change the house into something unrecognizable, they seek out a poltergeist named Betelgeuse to help them scare the family off. However, they get more than they bargained for with the demonic presence.

In 2024, Burton returned to the franchise. While he kept most of the family who moved into the house, except the dad, played by Jeffrey Jones, he omitted the ghosts of Adam and Barbara, who were conspicuous by their absence. Instead, the Beetlejuice sequel focused on some new characters, including Lydia’s daughter Astrid (Jenna Ortega) and a new evil ghost – the ex-wife of Betelgeuse, played by Monica Bellucci. However, despite the new characters, it left many questions about what happened to Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis’s characters.

Tim Burton Deliberately Moved Away From Alec Baldwin & Geena Davis’ Characters For Beetlejuice 2

Tim Burton Wanted To Explore A Different Story

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice brought back many characters from the first movie. Michael Keaton returned as Betelgeuse, Winona Ryder returned as Lydia, and Catherine O’Hara returned as her mother, Delia. However, two of the lead characters in the first film, Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis, were conspicuous by their absence. This led to questions about why the two ghosts tethered to their beloved home were no longer in their house when the new movie rolled around. Tim Burton said he wasn’t interested in their story anymore:

“I think the thing was for me I didn’t want to just tick any boxes. So even though they were such an amazing integral part of the first one, I was focusing on something else.

A sequel like this, it really had to do with the time. That was my hook into it, the three generations of mother, daughter, granddaughter. And that [would] be the nucleus of it. I couldn’t have made this personally back in 1989 or whatever.”

Including characters like Adam and Barbara also posed a problem for Tim Burton when controlling the costs of his Beetlejuice sequel and keeping his effects practical. Betelgeuse himself is buried under a lot of makeup. However, Adam and Barbara were human-looking ghosts, and both Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis would need to be de-aged digitally if they appeared in the film because they wouldn’t be aging as ghosts like Baldwin and Davis have in real life. Thanks to this problem, it was too much trouble to keep them in the movie.

Where Alec Baldwin’s Character Is Supposed To Be In Beetlejuice 2

Adam & Barbara Found A Loophole

However, it is impossible to have a Beetlejuice sequel without knowing why the ghosts of Adam and Barbara are no longer in their home. In the first film, the two had decided they just wanted to live peacefully as ghosts in their house and seemed put out that a family wanted to move in and change everything. With the house deserted for years since Lydia grew up and moved out, why would the ghosts leave since they finally had it for themselves? They were also sentenced to spend 125 years in the house so that they couldn’t have left it on their own.

The reasoning was explained in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. Lydia knew what had happened, and she said that Adam and Barbara found a loophole in their clause, which allowed them to finally “move on.” This not only wrote out Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis but also allowed Tim Burton to add to his film’s story since their absence means Lydia can’t prove to Astrid the existence of ghosts.

It is unclear if this means that Adam and Barbara moved on to the Great Beyond or if they are free to wander the world as ghosts. However, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice did offer a small look at the characters without needing Adam Baldwin or Geena Davis to do so. In the town model in the attic, there are small figurines of Adam and Barbara reaching up into the sky from the model town, a nice wink, and a reference to the beloved characters.