Tim Burton considered retiring after the release of Dumbo, but Wednesday and the Beetlejuice sequel re-energized him.

I had to look it up, but the upcoming Beetlejuice sequel is actually Tim Burton’s first movie since Dumbo. That was five years ago. The live-action adaptation was released by Disney in 2019, and in another world, it could have been Burton’s final movie. While speaking with Variety, the director admitted that he considered retiring after Dumbo.

“Honestly, after ‘Dumbo,’ I really didn’t know,” Burton said. “I thought that could have been it, really. I could have retired, or become… well, I wouldn’t have become an animator again, that’s over.” The director added that working on the Wednesday series for Netflix helped reconnect him to making things. “We went off to Romania and it felt like it was a creative health camp,” Burton said. “It went so well.”

Burton continued, “Oftentimes, when you get into Hollywood, you try to be responsible to what you’re doing with the budget and everything else but sometimes you might lose yourself a little bit. This reinforced the feeling for me that it’s important that I do what I want to do, because then everybody will benefit.“

Dumbo received mixed reviews upon its release, but our own Chris Bumbray was a fan. “It’s really a return to form for the oft-imitated director and his most affecting film in a long while,” Bumbray wrote. “I thoroughly enjoyed it, and this is coming from someone a bit burnt-out on his more recent work.” You can read the rest of his review right here.

Here’s the official synopsis for Beetlejuice Beetljuice: “Beetlejuice is back! After an unexpected family tragedy, three generations of the Deetz family return home to Winter River. Still haunted by Beetlejuice, Lydia’s life is turned upside down when her rebellious teenage daughter, Astrid, discovers the mysterious model of the town in the attic and the portal to the Afterlife is accidentally opened. With trouble brewing in both realms, it’s only a matter of time until someone says Beetlejuice’s name three times and the mischievous demon returns to unleash his very own brand of mayhem.” The film will be released in U.S. theaters on September 6th.