'Beetlejuice Beetlejuice' is half the movie the original was

But Tim Burton still shows flashes of demented wit

“Come in,” Betelguese (Michael Keaton) says at the opening of the legacy sequel “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice,” “If you dare.”

Which seems to sum up the trepidation that many audience members may feel at seeing a legacy sequel to the belovedly weird 1988 comedy that served for many kids as a gateway drug to horror movies. We’ve been burned so badly before that somehow, hearing that there will be a sequel to a favorite movie featuring the original filmmaker and cast, our first reaction is a defensive crouch.

Like the waiting room full of recently deceased souls who shuffled off the mortal coil in hilariously bizarre ways, “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” is a mixed bag. It starts off very slow, weighed down by the need to explain itself (and maybe justify itself) to both new and longtime fans. But around the midway point, it does get its mummified legs underneath it. There are moments of truly demented wit that harken back to an era when director Tim Burton didn’t seem more interested in set design than plot and character.

Things start off promisingly enough, as the camera rolls across a painstakingly detailed model of the bucolic New England town of Winter River as Danny Elfman’s manic oompah soundtrack plays. We first catch up with Lydia Deetz (Winona Ryder), the adorable goth girl of the original. Lydia is now using her psychic powers as the host of a “Ghost Hunters”-style reality TV show, produced by her New Age boyfriend Rory (Justin Theroux).

Lydia has her own rebellious teenage daughter to deal with, Astrid (Jenna Ortega of Netflix’s “Wednesday”), who thinks her mother is a con artist. Both are mourning the death of Lydia’s husband (who is the one ghost she can’t see). Estranged mother and daughter are brought together back to Winter River, along with Lydia’s artsy mother Delia (MVP Catherine O’Hara) after another family tragedy.

Meanwhile, below decks as it were, Betelguese has his own problems, as his formerly dismembered ex-wife (Monica Bellucci) has reassembled herself and is looking for revenge. (Amusingly, Burton shoots the flashback to their courtship as if it were a grainy old foreign horror movie.)

The first half-hour or so of “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” is pretty sluggish, especially the aboveground drama involving the living. The mother-daughter conflict is played as routine YA melodrama, and the attempt to make Rory a fatuous comic character like Delia’s New York art friends in the original really doesn’t work. And there’s really no narrative reason for Delia to be there at all, although O’Hara’s exquisite comic timing carries the film over some bare patches.

But once Lydia and Astrid enter the underworld, and the living and the dead start mixing it up, “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” does tap into the spirit of the original. Burton very wisely doesn’t update the visual effects too much, reveling in the oddball sets, stop-motion animation and gruesomely funny practical effects of the original.

And the film makes some audacious choices that genuinely surprised me, and seems to resurrect Burton’s gleefully juvenile sense of humor of “Mars Attacks!” and “Frankenweenie,” which has been all but absent in his recent run of studio blockbusters. Similarly, Keaton clearly revels in the chance to display his comedic chops again on screen, and doesn’t hold back.

There’s a sequence involving the song “MacArthur Park” (“Someone left the cake out in the rain”) which is a clear homage to the “Day-O” scene in the original. But it is so over-the-top, and goes on so long, that I just had to admire its gonzo spirit. No other filmmaker but Burton could do that.

In the films, characters conjure up Betelguese by saying his name three times. I had some fun at “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice,” and hope it kickstarts a more adventurous late phase in Burton’s career. But I do hope he can resist saying “Beetlejuice” a third time.

“Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” is now playing in theaters. In Madison, it’s playing at Marcus Point, Marcus Palace, AMC Fitchburg 18 and Flix Brewhouse Madison.