Out of My Mind is the 5th episode of season 1.
Cast
- Beetlejuice (played by Stephen Ouimette)
- Lydia Deetz (played by Alyson Court)
- Delia Deetz (played by Elizabeth Hanna)
- Charles Deetz (played by Roger Dunn)
- Barry MeNot (played by Keith Knight)
Plot
On a beautiful day just outside her home, Lydia puts earthworms in the garden while Beetlejuice disguises as a flower, eyeing Charles intently. Seeing an opportunity for a prank, Beetlejuice proceeds to possess a garden hose and insert it into Charles' pants, after which he starts pumping water into his pants causing Charles to "swell" like a balloon due to water building up beneath his clothes. Lydia, who doesn't like what Beetlejuice did, addresses her friend and tells him not to play pranks on her parents anymore - or else they will find out about him and forbid Lydia from seeing him ever again. Beetlejuice cries at the thought of not seeing his friend again, so he promises Lydia not to play pranks on her parents again... but not without crossing his fingers behind his back, intending to go back on his promise.
Later during dinner, Lydia and her parents are about to have quite the meal: spaghetti. Lydia plays with an earthworm when Delia urges her to put it away before setting her delicious cooking down on the table. Beetlejuice comes back and disguises himself as a clock on the wall and, unfortunately, breaks his promise of not pranking Lydia's parents by transforming Delia's spaghetti into worms, horrifying the family. Thinking their daughter had substituted the spaghetti for worms in an attempt to get cheap laughs, Lydia's parents angrily send her to her room as punishment.
An unhappy Lydia harshly scolds Beetlejuice for going back on his promise and getting her in trouble for it, demanding an apology, but Beetlejuice is too stubborn to say he's sorry and dances around Lydia's apology request by saying what she wanted him to say word for word (Lydia tells him to "say you're sorry", to which Beetlejuice responds with "You're sorry"). Frustrated and angry, Lydia sends Beetlejuice back to the Neitherworld by uttering his name three times until he says he's sorry. Beetlejuice is at first just as angry, but as time passes he relapses into a depressive state, missing Lydia quite dearly. He tries to cheer himself up by watching a little TV (literally) and sees Barry MeNot's "Worm Your Way" commercial, but as it revolves around worms and being lonely, Beetlejuice is reminded of Lydia once more and gets upset before he makes the mistake of shouting how he feels out loud: "I can't get her out of my mind!" And because what he says often becomes a reality in literal form, his statement soon becomes true as it causes Lydia to be forcibly dragged into Beetlejuice's head!
Once inside his head, Lydia begins searching for a way to escape. And so does Beetlejuice, whose thought bubbles soon show that his first idea is to take his head and shake it madly in an attempt to get her out, which only causes the ground beneath Lydia's feet to shake like an earthquake. As Lydia continues trying to get Beetlejuice to think of a way to get her out, his "train of thought" appears. The train soon stops at a nearby station, Lydia meets his personification of willpower (addressing himself as "Will") who is a wimp, along with "Prankenstein" (a parody of Frankenstein) who is responsible for Beetlejuice pulling pranks. Prankenstein chases the two as Lydia and Will ride the train until it enters a tunnel that isn't big enough for Prankenstein to enter, temporarily saving the duo. Will shows Lydia Beetlejuice's "Gross Factory" and explains that this is where he gets his gross ideas from, which prompts Lydia to question whether Beetlejuice has any time to think about her. In response, Will reveals that not only Beetlejuice thinks about her all the time, but that he also has an entire shrine devoted to her which Will takes care of (and happily accepts donations for).
Beetlejuice enters Lydia's room in a desperate search for her, hoping she has escaped by now. Meanwhile, Delia and Charles carefully examine the spaghetti from earlier and see that there are in fact no worms, saying that Lydia would never put worms in spaghetti and that they must've imagined it, so they decide to go upstairs and apologize to Lydia for punishing her. They knock on the door of her room while Beetlejuice is still searching for Lydia, but because she hasn't escaped yet and thus isn't here to respond, Beetlejuice covers for her by imitating her voice and reassuring her parents that it's "alright" and that "she" will be down in a moment, after which Charles and Delia go back downstairs. But soon after, a terrible crisis strikes as Prankenstein becomes intent on persuading Beetlejuice to pull another prank - and a really nasty one at that - on Lydia's parents as they're going downstairs; Lydia and Will now have to prevent Prankenstein from influencing Beetlejuice's next course of action.
Though Will considers himself weak and useless against Prankenstein, Lydia encourages him to stand up for himself and challenge Prankenstein to a match (complete with spectators and a referee) with control over Beetlejuice's mind being the prize. At first Will is cowardly and stares at Prankenstein in fear as the latter grasps him, but Lydia doesn't give up and keeps cheering for Will. Once she tells him to do it for her however, Will obliges and starts fighting back despite being much smaller than his opponent, biting Prankenstein's thumb to release himself from his grasp and tying his toes so as to make Prankenstein stumble. As Prankenstein falls down, Beetlejuice forgets the prank he wanted to pull, buying Lydia and Will some more time before Prankenstein gets back up and tries to hop towards the two due to his toes being tied up. Will accidentally gives Lydia the idea of "Out of sight, out of mind" being what Beetlejuice must say to free her, so they both rush to the megaphone and begin shouting the aforementioned phrase into it several times until Beetlejuice repeats the phrase. Prankenstein gets his toes untied and attempts to attack Lydia, but before he can do her any harm she is launched into the air as Will bids her farewell, finally exiting Beetlejuice's head.
A short time later, Beetlejuice remarks how taking one's head off makes combing hair easier, when Lydia comes in with two big plates of Delia's spaghetti. However, Lydia refuses to share and reminds Beetlejuice of the apology that he still owes her. He almost says "I'm sorry", but stops before saying "sorry" and instead morphs his sentence into "I'm so stupid for making a promise like that". Lydia is at first angry, but when Beetlejuice tells her that she knows what he means, she finally forgives him and decides to share the spaghetti, thanking him for the apology. Having made up, Lydia and Beetlejuice start excitedly slurping their spaghetti as they dance mid-air.
Trivia
- The part where Charles and Delia send Lydia to her room without supper over a prank is based on the 1963 book "Where the Wild Things Are" (written and illustrated by the late Maurice Sendak), where Max, a mischievous boy, gets sent to bed without supper by his mother for wreaking havoc in the household.
- Will, Beetlejuice's willpower, makes his first and only appearance in this episode, along with Prankenstein.
- This is the first episode where Beetlejuice can be seen crying.
Pictures
See all image pictures in this episode.
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