Warning: This article contains spoilers from Beetlejuice Beetlejuice.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice saw Michael Keaton return as the title character more than thirty years later, but not all of the original cast returned.

The sequel to the 1988 film Beetle juice opened in theaters on September 6, 2024, grossing over $110 million in its opening weekend. The film refocuses attention on the Deetz family, including Winona Ryder’s ghostly Lydia Deetz and Catherine O’Hara’s eccentric Delia Deetz, after the family patriarch, Charles Deetz, passes away. The family returns to the house once haunted by Barbara (Geena Davis) and Adam Maitland (Alec Baldwin) in the original film, but this time around there are more sinister plans afoot.

Trouble begins when Lydia reunites with Beetlejuice, the dark demon, while her daughter Astrid (Jenna Ortega) finds herself in the middle of her own drama. While the film features some familiar faces, such as Ryder and O’Hara, others are noticeably absent, including Davis, Baldwin and Jeffrey Jones, who played Charles.

So why haven’t original cast members like Baldwin returned to Beetlejuice Beetlejuice? Here’s everything you need to know about how the film handled their absence and why they chose to skip the sequel.

Which members of the original Beetle juice cast not returning for sequel?

While Keaton, O’Hara and Ryder returned for Beetlejuice Beetlejuiceleads Baldwin, Davis and Jones did not. Glenn Shadix, who played Delia’s equally eccentric interior designer boyfriend, also did not return for the sequel after his death in 2010 at the age of 58.

Jones has largely stayed out of the spotlight since his legal troubles in the years since Beetle juiceIn 2003, the actor pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography after hiring a 14-year-old boy to pose for indecent photos. He was ultimately sentenced to five years of probation, counseling, and registration as a sex offender for the rest of his life, according to Entertainment Weekly.

However, the following year, Jones was arrested in Florida for failing to update his sex offender status. He was arrested again in California in 2010 and pleaded guilty, resulting in a sentence of hours of community service and additional years of probation, as BBC News reported.

Although some of the original cast did not return, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice added a slew of actors, including Willem Dafoe, Monica Bellucci, Justin Theroux and Ortega. Bellucci plays Beetlejuice’s soul-sucking (literally) ex-wife, while Dafoe stars as an actor-turned-cop in the afterlife who tries to track her down. Theroux is Lydia’s partner and soon-to-be Astrid’s stepfather, much to her chagrin.

What did Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis say about not returning?

While Baldwin hasn’t spoken about his absence from the sequel, Davis has made comments in the lead-up to the film’s release. She confirmed that she wouldn’t be returning in April 2024 during a conversation with Entertainment tonight.

“No, I’m not. I’m not in the remake,” she said. “Oh, you thought I would? Yeah, no, you know what? Because my theory is that ghosts don’t age… Not that I did.”

She added that she suspected she wouldn’t return because it had been 30 years since she last appeared in the film – but her character would have to look exactly the same.

“Our characters were forever stuck in the way they looked when they died, so it’s been a while, it’s been a minute,” Davis continued.

While she admitted her participation wouldn’t fit into the story, Davis told PEOPLE in 2022 that she would “obviously love to revisit” her character.

What did Tim Burton say about some cast members not returning?

Director Tim Burton explained to PEOPLE in August 2024 that he felt like the new story he wanted to tell wasn’t about the Maitlands and focused more on the relationship between grandmother, mother, and daughter.

“I think for me it was that I didn’t want to just check boxes,” he said. “So even though they were such a great integral part of the first one, I focused on something else.”

He added that the key to the latest installation was time and the importance of capturing this story many years later.

“A sequel like this, that really had to do with the times,” Burton said. “That was my hook in it, the three generations of mother, daughter, granddaughter. And that (would be) the core of it. I personally couldn’t have done this in 1989 or something.”

How did the movie explain what happened to those characters?

The Maitlands’ absence is briefly touched upon in the film, when Lydia says that the ghosts who used to haunt their home have found a “loophole” that allows their souls to leave the house. In the original film, however, it was stated that this was not an option.

As for Jones’ Charles, the Beetle juice sequel began with his death, which is explained in stop-motion animation when he gets into a plane crash while birdwatching and gets his head bitten off by a shark. Charles is still in the film, however, with bits of him wandering through the afterlife, unaware that he is dead and still searching for Delia.

Burton came up with Charles’ death, screenwriter Alfred Gough told Entertainment Weekly. The director described his own worst nightmare and inspired Gough to use it for Charles’ death.

“The way Charles dies in that animation is Tim’s nightmare of dying,” Gough said. “He literally pitched, ‘My nightmare is, I’m in a plane crash, I survive the plane crash, I almost drown, and then a shark eats me.’ We thought, ‘Well, that’s genius. So that’s how he’s going to die.'”

Who plays Charles Deetz in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice?

Although Jones did not return for Beetlejuice Beetlejuicehis character would still be seen in the film. However, the film cleverly avoids showing Charles’ face as his head is bitten off by a shark, leaving only his headless, bloodied corpse wandering the underworld.

Although Charles does have a few lines in the film, the voice actor and stand-in are not listed in the credits, so it is unclear who will play the role in the new film.