After her acclaimed performance in Wednesday, many were happy to hear that Jenna Ortega would be joining the cast of Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, a sequel to the cult classic ’80s movie. She plays Astrid, Lydia Deetz’s estranged daughter who doesn’t believe in ghosts in the new movie. This marks Ortega’s second collaboration with Tim Burton after Wednesday, but the two projects share more than just a star and a creative team. While in Winter River for her grandfather’s funeral, Astrid meets and befriends a local teen named Jeremy Frazier. As some viewers have already started to notice, Jeremy bears a strong resemblance to a key Wednesday character: Tyler Galpin.

Tyler is a barista at the local coffee shop and one of the titular girl’s love interests in Wednesday. Fans already can’t help comparing him and Jeremy, and it’s not difficult to see why. They have similar personalities, similar fashion senses, and similar roles in the story as love interests to Ortega’s character. Tyler and Jeremy’s stories even follow similar trajectories, with both characters hiding something ominous beneath their unassuming exteriors. That said, there are some subtle distinctions between the two that haven’t been as widely discussed, and when it comes to their futures in the Beetlejuice and Wednesday franchises, these could make a world of difference.

Jeremy and Tyler Are Seemingly Normal Teenage Boys With Very Dark Secrets

Astrid Deetz Falls for the Same Act as Wednesday Addams

Viewers who’ve seen both Wednesday and Beetlejuice 2 already know that Tyler and Jeremy’s stories both take a sudden turn after their first kiss with Ortega’s character. In Tyler’s case, Wednesday has a vision that reveals Tyler is the Hyde, a monstrous creature that’s been maiming and murdering people all season. As for Jeremy, he and Astrid start floating as they kiss, revealing that he’s actually a ghost. He asks Astrid to help him rejoin the world of the living, but to do so, he tricks her into trading her life for his. As Astrid has yet to discover, Jeremy is actually a murderer who killed his parents and fell to his death during a standoff with the police. In other words, both boys are killers who deceive their respective love interests.

Both boys are killers who deceive their respective love interests.

On top of that, neither Tyler nor Jeremy shows any remorse for his actions. When Wednesday and Astrid finally figure out the truth, both boys only taunt them and leave them to their demise. It quickly becomes clear that they never actually cared about their love interests at all, with Jeremy merely using Astrid to get back to the living world and Tyler keeping Wednesday distracted as he works with Laurel Gates to derail her investigation. What’s more, while Tyler isn’t directly involved, he has no qualms about leaving Wednesday with Laurel, who needs Wednesday’s blood to resurrect the villainous Joseph Crackstone. In other words, both boys are ultimately leading the girls to their doom to bring a murderer back to life. But as villainous as Tyler and Jeremy are, one might not be quite as bad as the other.

Beetlejuice 2’s Jeremy Meets a More Permanent End

Tyler Could Still Evolve in Wednesday Season 2

As antagonists to the heroes, neither Jeremy nor Tyler has a happy ending in their respective stories. In Beetlejuice 2, Lydia manages to save Astrid before she can be sent into the Great Beyond, and Betelgeuse sends Jeremy straight to Hell. As for Tyler, he’s arrested after Wednesday’s roommate Enid defeats him in a final showdown, but Wednesday‘s Season 1 finale hints that he may have escaped custody. The character has already been confirmed to be in Season 2, though what role his character will play this time isn’t clear yet. In contrast, Jeremy’s end seems much more permanent, especially considering another Beetlejuice sequel has not been announced. Neither one is in a great position at the end of the story, but the disparities between their endings reflect some crucial differences in their characters.

One important piece of lore in Wednesday is that Hydes are automatically loyal to the person who unlocks their monstrous form. Since Laurel did that for Tyler, he had no choice but to obey her. Tyler may not feel guilty about the terrible things he’s done, even relishing the memories of the murders he’s committed in his Hyde form once he remembers them, but perhaps he could’ve been different without Laurel’s poisonous influence. Now that she’s dead, maybe he’ll get the chance to find out who he truly is in Season 2 when he’s not being controlled. Tyler might be a bit too far gone for a full redemption, but he could still make better choices in the future. Alternatively, since Wednesday defeated Laurel, some have speculated that his loyalty could transfer to her, which would allow his character to head in a new direction.

In contrast, Jeremy acted entirely of his own volition in Beetlejuice 2. He hints that he had a difficult relationship with his parents in life, but it doesn’t excuse what he did to them. Furthermore, Jeremy has had time to evolve, spending over two decades as a ghost before meeting Astrid, but he’s no better than when he was alive. Interestingly, Jeremy has the same goal as Betelgeuse, which is to rejoin the world of the living, but he goes about it in a much different way. Whereas Betelgeuse just tries to marry Lydia to get out of the afterlife, Jeremy gets Astrid to recite an incantation, with which she unwittingly agrees to take his place in the Netherworld. As Betelgeuse’s method confirms, there are other ways for a ghost to come back to life, but Jeremy still chooses to sacrifice Astrid, who never did anything to him, for his own gain. Even if there is a third Beetlejuice movie, it doesn’t seem likely that Jeremy will get another chance, and he hasn’t done anything to deserve one either.

There are other ways for a ghost to come back to life, but Jeremy still chooses to sacrifice Astrid, who never did anything to him, for his own gain.

Although both Jeremy and Tyler are villains who deceive, manipulate and endanger their love interests, only one of them has the potential to change. Tyler embraces Laurel’s evil plans and doesn’t seem at all conflicted about inflicting violence on others as a Hyde, but he doesn’t really have a choice. Fans will have to wait until Wednesday Season 2 to see what he’s like when he’s not under Laurel’s thumb, but he’s still better off than Jeremy. The Beetlejuice 2 antagonist chose evil in life, but he had a chance to change when he met Astrid. Jeremy could’ve made peace with his situation and chosen to just befriend her or leave her be, but instead, he tried to send her to the afterlife so he could be resurrected and likely wreak havoc on innocent people. He gets his comeuppance in the end, and he has no one to blame but himself.