All 21 Tim Burton Movies, From 'Pee-Wee' to 'Beetlejuice 2,' Ranked Worst to Best

Pretty self-explanatory, but it reaffirms that, yes, the iconic filmmaker has made plenty of good-to-great films since 'Sleepy Hollow' in late 1999.

With Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice tracking to potentially set a new opening weekend record for September (although, for the record, a domestic debut closer to $75 million than $125 million will be fine, thanks), I figured I’d offer up a readjusted all-time ranking of the guy who was my favorite filmmaker right as I was becoming a movie nerd. As regular readers (and listeners) know, Burton was essentially the first “film school in a box” for myself and legions of similarly-aged film nerds in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Before we were old enough to read about or view Martin Scorsese’s violent odes to Catholic guilt, Woody Allen’s introverted psychological passion plays or Hitchcock’s kinky, self-critical voyeurism, Burton’s one-of-a-kind production design, macabre humor, recognizable Danny Elfman scores and oft-repeated themes about tortured outcasts yearning to fit in with so-called ordinary people (or happy outsiders knowing full well that their uniqueness put them somewhat ahead of the curve) were prime examples of “auteur theory.”

Burton’s reputation has declined in the last two decades partially due to a broader subsection of moviegoers only showing up for big-budget tentpole-ish flicks. His critical darlings like Big Fish, Big Eyes and Sweeney Todd don’t gross nearly as much as Alice in Wonderland, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or Planet of the Apes, hence the narrative that Burton has been in a post-Sleepy Hollow slump.

Meanwhile, most of Burton’s live-action movies (and shows like Wednesday) have been adaptations. That’s another mistake we adult fans make when discussing his legacy. From 1985 to 2024, the likes of Beetlejuice were the exception rather than the rule, as even Pee Wee’s Big Adventure was an adaptation of (the late) Paul Reubens’ existing stage character.

It doesn’t help that Burton, perhaps the most influential director of his era, is now a wealthy 66-year-old parent-of-two who dates the likes of Monica Bellucci. He may have inspired an entire generation of pop culture partially rooted in the struggles of the outcast, but he’s not precisely the unloved outcast and hasn’t been one since, I dunno, 1999.

Moreover, where Burton’s images and macabre ideas were once both unique in the Hollywood mainstream and somewhat dangerous (recall how parents lost their marbles over Batman Returns in 1992), they are essentially par for the course. Without arguing that many/most Hollywood blockbusters look like Tim Burton movies, the Hollywood shaped by Batman is one where larger-than-life fantasy spectacles filled with impossible sights and implausible sounds are now the standard global box office diet. Ironically, the man who once defined Hollywood as an outsider saw the industry molded in his image. 

Well, all of that, plus at some point, audiences must realize that the 66-year-old father of two is not the same guy who directed Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, Beetlejuice and Batman before he turned 31. Judging Burton only/mainly as the guy who directed Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands is no more accurate to his overall work than merely holding up Eddie Murphy’s handful of early 1980s comedies (48 Hrs, Trading Places, Beverly Hills Cop, etc.) as the “true” Eddie Murphy.

At its best, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice is very much about that problem within an industry that allegedly craves these sorts of legacy sequels as living museums to films and properties audiences loved as children. As always, when I do these kinds of “rankings,” this list will not be yours (and yes, it includes Nightmare Before Christmas with the obvious caveats) because what fun would that be?