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Barbara Maitland

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Barbara Maitland is the wife of Adam Maitland and a ghost who haunts the home of the Deetzes.

Beetlejuice (movie)[]

History (BJ1)[]

Barabara is married to Adam and they live in a big, nice house in Winter River. Her cousin, real estate Jane Butterfield, tries to force the couple to sell the house to a large family, as the couple is struggling with infertility. During their vacation time at home, they visit their hardware store and head back home but swerve to avoid hitting a dog. Causing their car to fall off the bridge and sink into the river, and they drown.

They end up back home not remembering how. When Adam tries to leave and is gone for 2 hours due to having been teleported to one of Saturn’s moons, Barbara finds the Handbook for the Recently Deceased and point to Adam their lack of reflection in the mirror, concluding they are dead. They find no answers from the handbook on what to do however. Soon after the Deetz family buys the house and begins renovating it to Delia’s taste. The Maitlands try various ways to scare the family out of the house to no avail as the family can’t see them. In frustration, Barbara tries to leave but gets teleported to Saturn and is nearly attacked by a Sandworm before Adam saves her. They decide to hide away in the attic.

Lydia is able to see them from the attic window. They see a ‘bio-exorcist’ commercial of Beetlejuice offering to help rid the family but they are confused on why his flyers and cards have no address or phone number. They decide to seek help from the afterlife and, following instructions from the handbook, draw a door and knock three times. They enter the waiting room to be seen by their caseworker Juno. They are told to go through the third door and find it’s their house having been completely renovated. They meet Juno who tells them they are to haunt their house for 125 years before crossing over. She also warns them to never reach out to Beetlejuice because of his dangerous antics and he can be summoned by calling his name 3 times.

The Maitlands dress themselves up in sheets to scare Charles and Delia to no avail. Lydia photographs them and realizes they are ghosts. They befriend one another and the Maitlands ask for her to help them scare her parents out of the house, and she agrees to help them. They later realize Beetlejuice is lurking inside Adam’s model and curiously summon him, ending up in the model. They dig up his grave and Beetlejuice emerges, and immediately sexually harasses Barbara. They are troubled by him and Barbara says home 3 times which gets them out of the model. They decide to not work for Beetlejuice and scare the family out themselves. They use their new powers to possess Charles, Delia and their dinner guests into singing and dancing to Day-O, but this excites them rather than scare them. When Beetlejuice manifests into a snake to terrorize the family, Lydia accuses the Maitlands of being part of it. Barbara then scolds Beetlejuice for his actions and warns him to stay away from Lydia. She is then disgusted when Beetlejuice goes to a brothel.

The Maitlands are summoned to the Netherworld and scolded by Juno for summoning Beetlejuice and letting Otho get the handbook. She tells them to come up with a new trick to scare the family and they distort their faces. However, Barbara has second thoughts because of her fondness for Lydia. They stop Lydia from summoning Beetlejuice. They comfort the girl when she admits she wants to be dead with them and they tell her being dead doesn’t make things better.

Otho uses the handbook to summon the Maitlands, who immediately begin decaying, as rather than a séance, he had performed an exorcism. Lydia goes to Beetlejuice to ask him to save them and he agrees if she agrees to marry him so he can escape the Netherworld. She agrees and Beetlejuice keeps his end of the bargain and saves the couple. Just he tries to force Lydia to marry him, the Maitlands interfere. Barbara is sent to Saturn’s moon but she gets a Sandworm to enter the living world and devour Beetlejuice, saving Lydia from the forced marriage.

Months later, Barbara and Adam become secondary parents to Lydia, and peacefully co exist with the Deetz family.

History (BJ2)[]

At some point, Lydia found a loophole in the Maitlands 125 year sentence to haunt their house, allowing the couple to move on to the Great Beyond.

Personality (BJ1)[]

A woman of simple pleasures, she prefers to spend her vacation at home, decorating her Victorian home in a quaint decor in favor of spending it in Jamaica. She is very close with her husband Adam and was interested in having a family, due their difficulty in having children.

While she disliked Charles and Delia at first, she immediately liked Lydia and saw her as a daughter. She strongly dislikes Beetlejuice for his perverted and malicious antics, especially when he showed interest in Lydia. Eventually, after they defeated Beetlejuice, Barbara accepted the Deetzes and lived with them peacefully.

Trivia (BJ1)[]

  • She and Adam had never appeared in the animated series.
  • In a deleted scene, after Beetlejuice placed a metal mouthpiece on her mouth, Barbara ran out of the house and got a Sandworm to help her rather than being teleported there.

Gallery (BJ1)[]

Appearances[]

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