8 Biggest Theories About Beetlejuices Backstory & How He Died Before Tim Burtons Movie

Beetlejuice gives surprisingly little information about its titular character, resulting in a slew of fan theories attempting to explain away the backstory of the sleazy bio-exorcist. Despite Michael Keaton’s brilliant performance, Beetlejuice doesn’t have all that much screen time in his eponymous film, resulting in extremely little being known about the source of his powers or his past. Multiple theories have floated ideas for who the pinstripe suit-wearing fast talker was before falling into his post-mortem line of work. Perhaps the upcoming sequel, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, can confirm or deny these postulations.

Some theories branch off from original ideas for the script that never made it into dialogue in the film, which could still be considered canon in their own way. Others simply extrapolate from what little the first film reveals about Beetlejuice and the general bureaucracy running Tim Burton’s vision of the afterlife, including the fact that Beetlejuice was once Juno’s assistant. While many other characters might not return for the Beetlejuice sequel, the origins of Keaton’s iconic character may finally be clarified one way or another.

8 Beetlejuice Was Actually Alive For Most Of The Movie

His death by sandworm can confirm as much

Despite being able to interact with undead beings, having all the trappings of a ghost, and specializing in helping spectral clients, Beetlejuice himself may have been alive for the majority of the film. This theory subverts the twist of M. Night Shamaylan’s The Sixth Sense by claiming that Beetlejuice was actually alive, if not well, without the audience knowing. The biggest piece of evidence for this theory is the fact that by the end of Beetlejuice‘s runtime, Keaton’s character is eaten by a sandworm, and ends up in a waiting room just like the Maitlands did.

There’s a surprising number of smaller details throughout the film that support this theory. For one, no other ghost is ever seen eating other than Beetlejuice, who takes the time to slurp up a few bugs. It’s possible that while trapped in the model village, Beetlejuice survived on insect meat, which would be proportionally-scaled for his tiny body. Additionally, Lydia already proves that it’s possible for some living people to see the dead, explaining Beetlejuice’s ability to interact with ghosts, or even perform feats of magic, such as when she’s seen dancing midair at the end of the film.

7 Beetlejuice Hanged Himself Over A Broken Heart

A likely story cementing his place in the afterlife

Juno confirms that Beetlejuice was once her assistant, meaning that if being a dead man wasn’t one of his many lies, he may have died by his own hand. This can be attributed to a joke the living character Otho makes, claiming that those that commit suicide are destined to become public servants in the netherworld. This joke is seemingly confirmed by the presence of an undead secretary, who has clearly slashed wrists. To determine how and why exactly Beetlejuice took his life, one needs to look no further than an earlier draft of Beetlejuice’s script, which was far darker.

Originally, the film was to actually show Beetlejuice’s death on camera, in a scene in which he hangs himself after being rejected by a woman. Not only that, but considering its confirmed that fatal injuries typically carry over to one’s appearance in the afterlife, Beetlejuice’s lack of a broken neck must mean that he botched the attempt, slowly suffocated rather than quickly meeting his end. One way or another, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice can confirm this fan theory, however morbid it may be.

6 Beetlejuice Died From Drinking And Drowning

His appearance could confirm a different cause of death

As previously stated, ghosts in the Beetlejuice universe typically carry over the cause of their death into their spectral appearance. A diver appears with a shark still around his leg, and a flattened man killed by car crash still moves about the eternal waiting room with a tire track marking his body. Going by this metric, Beetlejuice’s appearance gives some small hints about how he may have went out, staying consistent with the suicide angle that would seem to implicate him as Juno’s assistant.

Considering his yellowed and bloated-looking skin condition, it’s very possible that Beetlejuice drowned to death. One theory purports that he did so after attempting suicide via alcohol poisoning, only surviving his attempt due to an insanely high tolerance forged over a lifetime of vice. Eventually, someone mistook his near-death body for a corpse and tossed him in a body of water, drowning him and resulting in his waterlogged appearance in the afterlife. This would at once explain his original position and the post-mortem hierarchy and his nasty complexion, still looking like he was just pulled out of a river.

5 Beetlejuice Is Actually A Demon

Living or dead, Beetlejuice is a hostile entity indeed

Rather than being a real person who died, one theory posits that Beetlejuice is actually a demonic entity. This would be supported by one of the earliest drafts of the script by writer Michael McDowell, in which Beetlejuice was a far more menacing presence. Rather than being a scummy human pest control worker, Beetlejuice was a scabrous demon, very clearly inhuman and much more malicious (via The Ringer). Other elements of this early draft included Lydia having a sister and the Matilands’ death being far more gory.

Beetlejuice’s amazing cosmic powers may seem to support a possible demonic nature, playing by rules neither other ghosts nor humans are seen to be able to operate on. Beetlejuice’s reality-warping abilities far outclass anything the Maitlands or other ghosts seem to be able to accomplish, and being bound by his name repeated three times is congruous to demonic containment in other media, such as the entities of The Conjuring series, in which knowledge of a demon’s name grants one great power over them. Still, there’s no hard confirmation of this infernal theory.

4 Beetlejuice Was Poisoned To Death

Another gruesome way to go that lines up with his character and appearance

Beetlejuice’s chalk-white skin and green hair almost makes him similar in appearance to another Tim Burton villain, The Joker, but doesn’t provide a concrete cause of death. While asphyxiation and drowning are both valid theories that could explain how he passed away without any obvious external markings, the idea that Beetlejuice was actually poisoned might be the most likely origin for his humble beginnings working under Juno. His rotten patches of mottled green skin, darkened eyes and discolored mouth all point to poison as a cause of death.

Specifically, YouTuber The Fangirl puts forth a Beetlejuice theory suggesting the exact chemical that did the bio-exorcist in, dichlorodiphenyl trichloroethane, commonly known as DDT. DDT was a real pesticide used in the early 70s that was widely used, despite its horrifically toxic effects on the environment and people, before being banned by the EPA. Ignoring Beetlejuice’s audacious claims of having survived the Black Plague and been around for over six centuries, this would line up nicely with Beetlejuice’s death taking place just before the events of the film in 1988.

3 Beetlejuice Was Bozman Of The Bozman Building

He may have had more of a connection to the events of the film as a human

Beetlejuice comes into contact with the Maitland family for the first time only after becoming a ghostly con artist, but one theory supposes that he has more of a connection with their dealings than he may have originally thought. One theory supports the idea that before Beetlejuice became Beetlejuice, in life, he was known as Bozman. The same Bozman whose name was used for the Bozman building Alec Baldwin’s Adam Maitland buys supplies to build a model for at the beginning of the film.

Adam overhears a barber named Old Bill musing on the origins of the Bozman building, noting that while Adam assumed the building was built in 1835, the original owner’s grandson claimed to have found a bottle within the foundation dating the construction to 1936. It’s possible that Beetlejuice haunted this building, his old home, before committing suicide, before moving on to the model of his actual hometown in the Maitlands’ house. This may have been a technicality he was able to use to wedge himself into their lives and manipulate them into granting him his freedom.

2 Beetlejuice Was A Con Artist Who Was Cursed In The Afterlife

His curious relationship with death’s rules could be explained by a curse

Beetlejuice’s fast mouth and smarmy powers of manipulation seem to suggest he’s been a con artist for a long time, likely before dying. It’s very possible that his unique position in the bureaucracy of the dead was actually brought about by some horrific curse, keeping him from moving on and finding peace post-mortem. This theory of Beetlejuice being cursed would explain his unique powers and name binding.

The strongest evidence for this idea comes at the end of the film, after Beetlejuice winds up in the waiting room for the dead following being eaten by the sand worm. When he attempts to steal a better place in line, his head is shrunken by a magical head-hunter. It’s easy to imagine him angering some supernatural force this way in life, resulting in his curious predicament after death.

1 Beetlejuice Is Actually A Denigrated Michael Keaton Clone

Ties in his appearance to an earlier Keaton flick

Perhaps the single most far-fetched Beetlejuice theory ties him in to another Michael Keaton character, Doug Kinney from Multiplicity. In the science fiction comedy, Kinney finds himself using an experimental machine to make different clones of himself, each of which manifests a different personality trait. As the film progresses, the clones get increasingly less intelligent, possibly culminating in Beetlejuice himself, who, while cunning, isn’t always the brightest.

A theory linking the two films suggests that Beetlejuice is actually the final clone of Doug Kinney, denigrated into a slimy car-salesman ghoul due to the machine’s erratic quirks when it comes to making copies of copies. It’s possible the malicious final Kinney murdered his brothers, or even the original Keaton character. This far-fetched crossover theory is admittedly ruined by the fact that Beetlejuice takes place in 1988, whereas Multiplicity is set in 1996.