Most of you probably remember the motion picture Beetlejuice. If you don’t, get in your car and drive straight through your garage. Fixing the door will give you about enough time to think about what you’re doing with your life.
But do you remember the toys? Maybe not. So today: a Guide to Beetlejuice Toys I Remember
This here is kind of your basic Beetlejuice figure. This fellow had spinning-head-action, a removable rubber head that revealed a shrunken, otherwise identical version.
In the tradition of 80’s toys, this came with small accessories that were immediately lost. The orange cockroach version of Beetlejuice was lost so quickly it was almost as if you’d traveled back in time and lost it before you’d even bought the goddamn thing. More frustrating was losing the large version of the head. With the small head you could only reenact the last 40 seconds of the film. How were you supposed to attempt rape on your Winona Ryder figure with a head that goddamn small (let’s just ignore the dirty possibilities of that sentence)?
.
.
.
.
.
Here’s another figure, missing head-style. This one also had a rubber head, but try and find one online with the head still on the same continent.
Now that I think of it, I think the primary game played with Beetlejuice action figures was playing, “Where is the goddamn head? Seriously, did you look in the Legos? Maybe you should open your fucking eyes and look again before I blow my head off!”
Also, it did not bode well for my future fashion sense that the two primary outfits worn by Beetlejuice (purple crushed velvet suit and black and white striped suit) did not offer any humor to me and seemed not unusual.
.
.
.
.
.
Now we’ve got this son of a bitch. Okay, great concept. Who doesn’t want to stab a figure with a hundred blades and see the tips come out the other side?
But, on the flipside, nothing worse than stabbing a victim 99 times and then staring down at the perfect space to plunge the final knife. Believe me, this is a frustration that I and an older homeless woman, who shall remain missing and nameless, know all too well.
Oh yeah, and ANOTHER pop off head that reveals a plain eyeball. Which leaves a shitload of play options.
.
.
.
.
.
Totally rad toy. No real complaints other than this:
Tim Ikenoye, if you’re out there, you owe my mom fifteen bucks. You brought the vanishing vault to school and then forced my mom to buy me one by forcing me to bitch and moan about it from that day until the next gifting-mandatory holiday.
.
.
.
.
.
Ah, Otho.
Wherever fine Beetlejuice merchandise was sold, you could be sure to find an Otho in stock.
Now, being the mature adult I am, no figure would please me more than an Otho to sit on my desk, criticizing my decor while sipping on a cocktail at 10:30 in the morning. However, as a child, Otho’s Southern Gay charm swaddled in Asian robes could not compete with the idea of stabbing an undead corpse man with swords.
Also, Otho could have done better with a better accessory. I would have given anything to open an envelope, possibly winning a golden ticket which would result in Glen Shadix himself stopping by my house and spray painting the walls with home improvement suggestions that would go completely unheeded in our house with no carpentry, but would make for excellent conversation nonetheless.