Western Animation / The Addams Family (2019)

As always, weird is relative.

House: GEEEEEEET OOOOOOUUUUUUT....
Morticia: It's hideous.
Gomez: It's horrible.
Both: ... It's home.

The Addams Family is an animated movie based on the franchise created by Charles Addams, directed by Conrad Vernon and Greg Tiernen of Sausage Party fame and animated by Cinesite, featuring vocal talent from the likes of Charlize Theron, Oscar Isaac, Nick Kroll, Finn Wolfhard, and Chloë Grace Moretz. The film was released on October 11th, 2019 by United Artists Releasing in America, and Universal Pictures internationally.

For thirteen years, the cheerfully macabre Addams family (Gomez and Morticia, their children Wednesday and Pugsley, their butler Lurch, and their disembodied hand Thing) have been happy to live far away from a world that despises them and everything they love (ghosts, monsters, playful attempts at murder and mutilation, that sort of thing). But when the perpetual fog around their house blows away one day, they discover a whole town has recently been built!

While the Addamses try to fit in with the new neighbors, reality TV star and home-repair guru Margeaux Needler has plans for the bright and beautiful planned community of Assimilation, NJ... plans that don't involve the crazy Addams family, their haunted house, and their hordes of equally weird relatives who are coming into town for Pugsley's "Sabre Mazurka" on the same day she's filming the season finale of her show Margeaux's Design Intervention.

On October 15, 2019, following the film's successful opening weekend, a sequel, The Addams Family 2, was announced, with a planned release date of October 1, 2021 and both directors set to return. Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, the sequel will release simultaneously in theaters and on digital retailers.

For the two animated series by Hanna-Barbera, see The Addams Family (1973) and The Addams Family (1992).

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The 2019 adaptation of The Addams Family provides examples of:

• Abhorrent Admirer: Grandmama is this to Lurch.
  Grandmama: (to Gomez and Morticia) When you're done with Fabio, send him up to my room!
  Lurch: Oh, boy...
• Adaptational Angst Upgrade: In every other iteration of the Addams Family, they are portrayed as a Creepy Family blissfully ignorant of just how radically different they are from everyone else, the Addams Estate having been inherited and the Addams regularly interacting with the world (or at least the world tries interacting with them) from it. Here, Gomez and Morticia were literally chased out of their home country by angry mobs on their wedding day because they were afraid of them, happening upon the abandoned asylum that would become their home and lived in seclusion for thirteen years before the drained swamp revealed the neighboring town. It is also implied that the rest of the extended family have been living nomadically until finding a home in Assimilation.
• Adaptational Jerkass: Morticia. Unlike other portrayals of her, Morticia is distrustful of those outside from the family and only reluctantly interacts with the people of Assimilation from Gomez's encouragement. This is understandable, however, given how the movie starts with her wedding to Gomez being interrupted by a mob with torches, swords and pitchforks actively trying to slay the entire Addams clan simply for being who they are. This also makes her fear Wednesday's curiosity with the culture of Assimilation, with each step outside of the typical Addams style making her worry that she will lose Wednesday. While this can make her come off as narrow-minded as the villains of the story, just from the opposite direction, it should be noted that she only grounds Wednesday for life after Wednesday sings a verse from earlier in the movie, from a song about how one shouldn't be an individual, just be like everyone else.
• Adaptation Deviation:
  • Grandmama is now Gomez's mother, as she was in the original series, but Fester is his brother, like he was from the 90s films onward.
  • This version of Cousin It is much shorter than usual, and has actual arms and hands like in the original series.
  • In the original series and the live-action films, the Addams Mansion was in the family for generations. Here, it was a haunted abandoned asylum before Gomez and Morticia discover it.
  • In the original series, Lurch played a harpsichord while in the movies it was a pipe organ. Here, both are present, and Lurch plays them and a grand piano masterfully. So what if the pipe organ sometimes sounds like a piano and the piano sometimes sounds like an electric keyboard? He also handles vocals!
  • This version of Thing is a left hand as opposed to being portrayed as a right hand in all other adaptations.
• Advertised Extra: Despite appearing in various promotional media and receiving top billing in the credits, Cousin Itt doesn't show up until around the middle of the movie with a couple of lines.
• Age Lift: Though Wednesday is generally portrayed to be the younger of the Addams children, this film (as with the 1991 and '93 films) lifts her to being older than Pugsley. This is likely to facilitate her going to junior high school while Pugsley stays home to prepare for the Mazurka.
• Alpha Bitch: Wednesday immediately runs into some mean girls on her first day of public school, and quickly puts them in their place.
• Amusing Injuries: There is a lot more slapstick compared to the 1960s series, featuring Fester getting shot three times with a crossbow, characters nearly blown up with bombs, Morticia dodging decapitation from the living house trying to slam the windows on her on a daily basis, Wednesday's bed itself being a prepped guillotine, Gomez with a Head in a Vise and Morticia screwing a corset onto herself. The characters completely shrug it off with no sense of danger from their injuries.
• Appeal to Obscurity:
  Pugsley: Dad, has anybody ever failed the Mazurka?
  Gomez: Only one: your third cousin Zander.
  Pugsley: Never heard of him.
  Gomez: Exactly!
• Apron Matron: Grandmama's sister, Great Auntie Sloom, holds the high authority among the entire extended Addams family to decide if Pugsley has successfully completed his Mazurka. While Gomez and Fester try to train Pugsley as best as they can, and take the whole thing seriously, they both dread her final judgement.
• Ass Kicks You: Bethany does it to a student whose drink she just stole.
• Bad Is Good and Good Is Bad: Naturally, it's the Addamses.
  • Morticia peeks out a window at a miserable storm and declares "What a beautiful morning!"
  • One of Lurch's household chores is to blow vacuum dust all over the house, which somehow seems to clean itself.
  • Morticia is as horrified to see Wednesday wearing bright and colorful clothing as Margeaux Needler is to see her daughter Parker dressing in punk/goth fashion.
  • Morticia's own rebellious phase as a teenager involved joining the Girl Scouts.
  • Morticia takes an apprehensive tone when asking how Gomez knows what cotton candy tastes like.
    Gomez: Tish, it was my youth, I made mistakes!
• Badass Boast: When Bethany bullies Parker, Wednesday makes a declaration of war.
  Wednesday: Don't cut your eyes on my crew unless you're ready to dance.
  Bethany: What did you say, little ghoul?
  Wednesday: I don't think you understand. I'm not locked up in here with you, Bethany. You're locked up in here... with me.
• Balloon of Doom: Parodied and discussed. Wednesday comes home with a red balloon. Morticia inspects it closely and says "Strange. Usually there's a murderous clown attached to the other end of these."
• Bedlam House: The Addams' mansion is an abandoned, decrepit insane asylum. Their butler Lurch is a former patient who was apparently forgotten about and left behind for who knows how many years.
• Big Bad: Margeaux Needler, who tries to rally the entire town against the Addams.
• Big Brother Is Watching: The townsfolk of Assimilation don't know that Margaux has hidden cameras in all of their homes. They unanimously decide that spying on them is one step too far when they find out about it.
• Bowdlerise: Wednesday's pigtails, which end in nooses, are hidden in promotional media.
• Brick Joke:
  • When the family first runs into Lurch, he is wearing a straight-jacket from the "Asylum for the Criminally Insane". Later, we see that his "room" is lined with old mattresses.
  • Mitch ends up going missing in when the film crew goes to look over the Addams family mansion. In the climax, he pops out of a painting.
• Bright Is Not Good: Margeaux has blonde hair and is associated with pastel colors, but she insists that everyone must conform to her version of “normal” and tries to purge the Addamses from Assimilation just because of how strange and different they are.
• Broken Aesop: One of the film's aesops is that your family is still family. However, this may seem a little weird given that Wednesday regularly makes attempts on Pugsley's life or shoots crossbow bolts into her uncle Fester, even though they both seems to like it and it's Played for Laughs.
• Chain Lightning: When Wednesday resurrects her frog in science class, the lightning jumps to each of the other frogs from one to the next.
• Chekhov's Skill: Pugsley's Establishing Character Moment involves trying to blow up Gomez with various explosives, which he has taken away to concentrate on practicing his Mazurka. When Pugsley is reassured that the purpose of the Mazurka is to prove that you can protect your family from danger, he uses his explosives to save the day and prove himself a man.
• Cold Ham: While Wednesday usually speaks in a quiet and aloof tone, she will sometimes compliment it with an intense stare and a Scare Chord. When she comes home wearing Parker's bright-pink dancer uniform, she does a brief rendition of the upbeat conforming pop song with the same low-key look and voice.
• Comically Missing the Point: Morticia has apparently never seen an image of a unicorn before, but aside from the color scheme, approves of what she interprets as 'a horse with a spear through its head'
• Comic-Book Adaptation: IDW Publishing released a one-shot comic adaptation called The Addams Family: The Bodies Issue in November 2019.
• Credits Gag: The family at the end recreate the opening credits of the original TV series.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Per most canon, the Addams clan enjoys an insanely macabre lifestyle and when engaging with outsiders are pretty friendly (Morticia is more apathetic than friendly for her own personal reasons), though Margaux's plan to turn the town against them relies on proving the opposite of this trope.
• Death Glare: Having a piercing "evil eye" seems to be hereditary on Morticia's side of the family—Wednesday stares down local Alpha Bitch Bethany on her first day at school, and Morticia shuts up Margeaux near the end of the movie with a glare of her own.
• Deliberately Monochrome: When Parker asks Wednesday what filter she wants their picture to be, Wednesday remarks that she looks black and white in all of them. She's right.
• Disappeared Dad: We never find out who Parker's dad is as Margaux's the only one of her parents that we see—the only mention of Parker's father we get is when it's implied (though never confirmed) that Parker's parents got divorced at some point.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?:
  • Morticia pours brown liquid into a toilet bowl.
  • Thing is seen looking at pictures of various feet on his computer, but slams the laptop shut when Morticia calls out to him.
  • Margeaux uses an app to spread misinformation about the Addams Family.
  • The entire town of conformists end up turning on a non-conformist Addams Family and want to run them out of town.
  • The town of Assimilation, in name, architecture, and culture, mirrors the planned community of Celebration, FL.
  • The Addams Family seems to be Ambiguously Jewish, what with Pugsley's Rite of Passage being comparable to a Bar Mitzvah.
  • Uncle Fester tells Pugsley to see a doctor if his Mazurka lasts longer than four hours.
  • When Morticia discovers Gomez knows what cotton candy tastes like, Gomez replies, "It was my youth, I made mistakes!"
• Double Standard: Abuse, Female on Male: To an extent. Pugsley and Wednesday's relationship is... a bit like this. Wednesday routinely does things like attempt to kill Pugsley, but in the end she comes to his rescue because she still does love him anyway. This is somewhat lightened by the fact that this is Played for Laughs, and Morticia does order her to go dig him up after burying him alive.
• Emo Teen: Parker becomes one after befriending Wednesday, to her mother's horror.
• Engineered Public Confession: Parker gets back at her mother by posting her rant, where she calls her viewers "brainless peons" and her neighbors "lemmings" and "extras", on the web. The ensuing PR fiasco leads to Margeaux's show getting cancelled.
• Free the Frogs: When dissecting frogs in school, Wednesday brings hers to life a la Frankenstein. She unintentionally brings all the other frogs to life as well (but is still pleased by it), and the entire class runs away from the zombified frogs after she sics them on Bethany.
• Fun with Acronyms: The TV network Margaux's show airs on is the Home Art & Garden-network.
• Genius Loci: The Addams' house is possessed by a rather grumpy spirit. Towards the climax of the film, the spirit vacates the house and hides in the swamp. After the townsfolk repair the house and give it a new coat of paint, the spirit retakes its place and instantly returns the house to its old look.
• Get Out!: As mentioned at the top of the page, the house repeatedly says this to the Addams family. Subverted when it's revealed that the house calms down a bit after Morticia gives the house its morning coffee (by flushing coffee down the toilet).
• Getting Eaten Is Harmless: At dinner, Puglsey briefly dives down Kitty Kat's throat to retrieve food the lion stole from him and swallowed. Afterwards, he continues sitting inside Kitty Kat with his head poking out of their jaws for the rest of the meal.
• Gory Discretion Shot: The camera pans away right before Wednesday brains Pugsley with a shovel and then buries him alive, but you still hear a loud CLANG!
• Gullible Lemmings: The various residents of Assimilation are all on-board with Margaux's plans for them and their neighborhood, believing every outlandish rumor she feeds into them on social media about the Addams'. Granted, the various outlandish things she makes up about them like cooking and eating their pets or turning everyone into zombies isn't too off-brand for the Addams Family (the least damning thing about the Addams she does post is the fact they aren't on social media, though it's still believed to be suspicious nonetheless), but at that point the Addams have only socialized with the town once and for a brief afternoon.
• Hartman Hips: Margaux, and then some.
• Head in a Vise: Morticia is shown putting a vise over Gomez's head. It's not clear why they're doing this, but certainly not to torture him, based on his reaction.
  Gomez: Is that really as tight as you can make it?
• Hollywood Board Games: As it's customary for them, the Addams like to intertwine potential bodily harm with entertainment. In this case, Pugsley and his father Gómez play Battleship using their house as a board. In other words, every room is a square and some of them are packed with explosives. Gómez is standing on his hands for some reason and tries to guess which rooms will blow up in the same way a normal person would guess in which squares their opponent's ships are. Pugsley is remotely manning the explosives and is as enthusiastic about it as his father. Meanwhile, Uncle Fester is taking a bath. He doesn't look annoyed at all that they've blown him up and just jokes that they've sunk his (bathtub) battleship).
• I Can See My House from Here:
  Uncle Fester: I think I can see my house from here... no, wait, that's a women's prison.
• Indy Escape: As the angry mob is throwing giant boulders at the house, Uncle Fester ends up screaming hysterically and running away from one of said boulders that's barreling down a hall towards him. He avoids the classic 1-Dimensional Thinking and ducks into another hallway only for the boulder to stop mid roll, reverse direction and follow him down the new hallway.
• Karma Houdini: Margaux receives no backlash for trying to kill the Addams family, and even starts dating Uncle Fester and sells all of the homes in Assimilation. The only punishment she does earn is getting her show canceled by the network as a result of her incriminating tirade on Assimilation's citizens being live-streamed, but she makes it clear that selling the homes themselves is her bread and butter, not the show. She has yet to apologize for illegally spying on the neighbors, nor do we have any indication that she had patched anything up with Parker.
• Kick the Dog: Bethany stuffs a moldy sandwich and dunks another kid's drink in Parker's backpack for no other reason than because she thought it was funny to do it. Wednesday responds to this by establishing that they are on opposite sides.
• Like Mother, Like Daughter: When Morticia voices her concerns about Wednesday's growing interest in things outside of the family, her father likens it to a phase when Morticia considered joining the girl-scouts.
• Logo Joke: The lion in the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer logo turns into Kitty Kat, the Addams' pet lion, mid-roar. When a red ball lands in front of the logo, Kitty Kat leaps out of the logo and plays with it before knocking the logo facade over. The movie being made by MGM may also be the reason Kitty Kat has a much more prominent role in this movie than he ever did in any other version of the Addams Family.
• Makeup Is Evil: Played with. As Morticia is getting ready for her wedding, she puts on eye-shadow from a container labelled "Mother;" then she touches up her cheeks with powder from another labelled "Father." Later, we find out that both her parents have been dead for about seven years.
• Manipulative Bitch: Margaux posts numerous lies about the Addamses on Assimilation's "Neighborhood Snoops" site, all under different names, to make it look like most of the town is against them.
• Mirror Character: As Wednesday points out to Pugsley before running away from home, Morticia isn't that different from Margaux, as she wants everyone in the family to be the same, just as Margaux wants everything in Assimilation to be the same.
• Mirroring Factions: Wednesday and Parker's discoveries make it clear that the inhabitants of Assimilation aren't as normal as they'd like to believe. Even Margeaux's Big Brother tendencies aren't exactly normal either. Consequently, even her supporters turn against her after it's revealed she planted spy cameras in everyone's homes.
• My Beloved Smother: Due to them being chased by an angry mob over ten years ago, Morticia and Gomez are reluctant at first to let their children leave the house. Morticia especially becomes increasingly overprotective of Wednesday when she starts hanging out with Parker and begins changing her appearance.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • When Morticia learns that Wednesday ran away to Parker’s, she blames herself, realizing that her disapproval of her daughter’s friendship drove Wednesday away.
  • The citizens of Assimilation are horrified at themselves for getting so easily wound up and turned against the Addamses, who, behind their macabre exterior, are a fairly loving extended family.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Morticia's sewer apartment comes from the original comic strips found in the New Yorker, which can be found here◊.
  • When Wednesday dances, she does The Droop from the 1964 series episode "Lurch's Grand Romance".
  • When Margeaux and crew first go to the Addams' house, Lurch opens the door with "You rang?" He does this again when Cousin Itt shows up.
  • The very last scene before the credits features the animated characters recreating the opening of the 1964 series. In addition, the on-screen lyrics are in a font based off the title card to The New Addams Family.
  • Morticia briefly joined the Girl Scouts under the impression they ate each other. In the first film, Wednesday scares off a Girl Scout Cookie seller by asking if they're made from real Girl Scouts.
  • Pugsley's room is filled with various road signs. This is a nod to the first film where Pugsley is shown to have a hobby of collecting stop signs and various road warning signs. This same visual joke was used in the original New Yorker cartoons before the movies and TV show existed.
  • One scene features Gomez having his Head in a Vise as a means of de-stressing from the mazurka planning (and also because he felt Pugsley wasn't taking his Mazurka practice seriously), a reference to how some of the family would do the same to relieve their headaches in the original sitcom.
  • The general color scheme of the town of Assimilation and its residents are pastel colors. In Addams Family Values, Morticia applauds Debbie's attempts at taking the family fortune, but wearing pastel colors was completely unforgivable.
  • Wednesday has a pet octopus named Socrates. In the original series, the pet octopus was named "Aristotle" and was owned by Pugsley.
  • The license plate of Gomez and Morticia's car begins with "CHAS," after Addams Family creator Charles Addams. The Addams family mansion is also located in Addams' birthplace of New Jersey.
  • Gomez mentions a relative named Zander who was the black sheep of the family for failing the Mazurka. In the Addams family comics, Zander was a college graduate (which still made him the black sheep).
  • Fester and Margaux get together at the end of the film. In the 90s films/cartoon Fester has had a relationship with the Addams Family antagonists.
  • Wednesday running away from home is the main plot of the episode "Wednesday Leaves Home" from the first season of the 1964 TV show.
  • In the title sequence's montage of family pictures, one of them depicts the family using Lurch as their Christmas tree, a scene that was also depicted in Charles Addams' original New Yorker cartoons.
  • The Sabre Mazurka is similar to the Mamushka from the 1991 movie. In that film it's a knife-based dance of celebration instead of a coming-of-age ceremony, but both dances involve bladed weaponry and are used as a test of one's "Addams-ness".
  • When Gomez and Morticia first explore their future home, they describe it using the the first few lines of the original show's theme song.
• Never Mess with Granny: In the beginning, Grandmama charges at the angry mob storming Gomez and Morticia’s wedding with only a sword while yelling out a Battle Cry. Everyone scatters.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: Margaux is a pretty obvious parody of Martha Stewart.
• Ominous Pipe Organ: Parodied. Lurch is seen playing a pipe organ until being stopped by Thing. As the disembodied hand is requesting him to play a specific piece of music on the organ, he briefly played the following familiar pieces of music:
  • 5th Symphony by Ludwig van Beethoven.
  • Toccata in D minor by Johann Sebastian Bach.
  • "The Entertainer" by Scott Joplin.
  • "Hallelujah" chorus from George Frederic Handel's Messiah.
  • The overture from the The Addams Family stage musical.
  • "The Star-Spangled Banner" by Francis Scott Key.
  • "Charge", a short fanfare frequently played at sporting events.
  • He then eventually played the show's theme song, which Thing liked, and he gave the famous finger snapping of it with a harpsichord accompaniment.
• Opposites Attract: Thing, a disembodied hand, really likes looking at pictures of feet.
• Parental Neglect: Margaux's so wrapped up in her show and keeping Assimilation "perfect" that she barely acknowledges her daughter, Parker.
• Perky Goth: While Wednesday is her usual indifferent and morbid self, her insular lifestyle has cause her to develop an interest in brighter things. Wearing preppy clothes, pink accessories, and noting that red balloons make her... "the opposite of sad".
• Persona Non Grata: Uncle Fester rambles off a Long List of places he's no longer allowed to visit, which eventually boils down to every continent on Earth, with Antarctica being the noted exception where he is still allowed to go.
  Wednesday: Uncle Fester can come and go as he pleases!
  Uncle Fester: Well, not exactly. There are restrictions. I'm not allowed to go to the mall, the zoo... [continues listing names in the background while the rest of the scene plays out] South America, China, Europe, Asia... I am allowed in Antarctica...
• Place Worse Than Death: When the Addams get run out of the old country, Gomez says they need to move somewhere that no sane or uncorrupted person would ever dare set foot. Cue the next scene as they're driving on the road and pass a sign that says:
  Welcome to New Jersey. What are you looking at?
• Plastic Bitch: Wednesday's first impression of Margaux, the antagonistic suburban mom/real estate developer, is that her face resembles a death mask, with the strong implication that she's had plastic surgery.
• Rite of Passage: Pugsley has to perform a ritual called the Sabre Mazurka to pass into manhood. While he fails the conventional ritual with the sword, him defending the family from the neighbor's attacks with his knack for explosives more than makes up for it, as the ultimate purpose of the Mazurka is to prove that you can protect your family.
• Running Gag: Uncle Fester keeps getting shot with crossbow bolts.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: When Margaux's mob attacks the Addams house, the spirit within flees into the nearby swamp.
• Shout-Out:
  • Gomez orders Pugsley to hand over a Long List of explosives, including holy hand grenades.
  • Upon seeing Wednesday holding a red balloon, Morticia comments that "there's usually a murderous clown attached to the other end of these."
  • Wednesday tells the school’s Alpha Bitch, "I’m not locked up in here with you; you’re locked up in here with me."
  • After resurrecting the dead frogs, Wednesday copies Donald Sutherland's horror face and scream from the end of Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) and orders the frogs to attack the school's Alpha Bitch.
  • While playing with a toy ship in the bath, Fester sings a few lyrics from "My Heart Will Go On".
  • One of the songs played by Lurch on the piano is "Won't You Be My Neighbor?"
  • ... And while doing that he also "shoots" the keys like Chico Marx.
  • According to this interview with the directors, there's nods to The Shining, The Evil Dead (1981), Get Out (2017), The Amityville Horror (1979), plus a sequence inspired by The Blair Witch Project that had to be cut because it was too extreme for the target audience.
  • Margaux hums "Battle Hymn of the Republic" on her way in to her control room, just as Madeline Kahn did in Young Frankenstein before she gets kidnapped.
• Shovel Strike: An offscreen version. Wednesday has tricked Pugsley into digging his own grave, and she's about to push him in when a red balloon floats by and momentarily distracts them. As the camera leaves them to follow the balloon, a loud "Thunk!" sound is heard.
• Sleeps in the Nude: The film begins with Morticia getting out of bed and preparing for her wedding to Gomez. From what can be seen of her before she's dressed, it's unlikely she was wearing clothes to bed.
• Solar-Powered Magnifying Glass: While hanging out with Parker in her room, Wednesday is burning things with a magnifying glass, including the eyes of a teen-boy on a magazine, the knee on a cheerleading trophy (which coincidentally looks like Bethany) and a tree in the yard (which catches fire).
• Spontaneous Mustache: Part of Pugsley's Rite of Passage is spontaneously growing a full beard. Before their swordfight, Gomez slashes Pugsley's beard to leave him with a mustache.
• Standard Snippet: Fester sings a snippet of the 1934 college song "I Haven't Got a Hat", best known for its appearance in the Merrie Melodies short of the same name that introduced the world to Porky Pig.
• Stepford Suburbia: The town of Assimilation, NJ is brightly colored and conformist.
• Stuff Blowing Up: The Addamses' version of playing Battleship involves Pugsley blowing up the bathroom.
  Fester: (in bathtub) You sunk my battleship!
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Once Margaux goes on a tirade against the town and reveals her true colors, Parker reveals she’s broadcasted everything on a livestream. 3 million viewers are outraged over this, but Margaux proclaims she couldn’t care less over a “bunch of bloggers”. Her assistant gets an immediate call from the network who decided to pull the show off the air due to the bad publicity. Margaux doesn’t take this well.
• Take That!:
  • During the prologue when Gomez and Morticia are escaping the villagers with Fester, Gomez announces they'll move somewhere so horrible that no sane, rational person would ever move there. Smash Cut to a sign reading "Welcome to New Jersey".
  • While talking about the Mazurka, Gomez tells Pugsley that he will be surrounded by his whole family, who will then judge his worth as a human being... much like he imagines Thanksgiving is.
• Tamer and Chaster: Gomez and Morticia don't openly flirt and lust after each other nearly as much as most other adaptations.
• Time Skip: The film opens with Gomez and Morticia getting run out of the "old country" on their wedding day, then moving to New Jersey in the United States and taking house in a haunted, abandoned insane asylum. The main events of the film take place thirteen years after the prologue.
• Torches and Pitchforks: The prologue features the Addams clan getting run out of The Old Country by a mob with torches, pitchforks, and a trebuchet. At the climax of the movie, Margeaux Needler motivates her neighbors into forming an angry mob to destroy the Addams' mansion and run them out of town. This mob also wields torches, albeit on their smartphones.
• Unnervingly Heartwarming: A version of this is played for laughs. After Wednesday interrupts her little brother Pugsley from attempting to shoot a crossbow bolt at something, citing that he should be practicing for his upcoming Addams family Mazurka ritual and insists that she wants to help him with as much. Pugsley is surprised and asks her why she wants to help him. She then proceeds, as the camera very slowly zooms in on Wednesday, suspenseful music plays, and Wednesday herself allows a humorously unnerving wide-eyed and raised eyebrow sporting look to come on her face, to respond with, "Because you are my brother. And...I love...you."
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Wednesday. Most of the film's plot is driven by her actions, and her involvement in Parker's gothic change was perceived by Margaux as the last straw.
• Villains Act, Heroes React: Every villainous thing Margaux does throughout the film is fueled by how the Addams' dark, old-fashioned Estate clashes with the candy-colored, conservative aesthetic of her neighborhood, sowing doubt and distrust of them into the townsfolk and eventually demolishes their home by force (with the entire extended family inside) when they decline her "intervention."
• Visual Pun: Grandmama Addams keeps candy at the bottom of her feet. In other words, candy corns.
• The Voice: Morticia's parents have been long dead, and she communicates with them via seance.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Except for Parker, the other characters in Wednesday's junior high plot vanish completely half way through the film. Alpha Bitch Bethany is last seen being chased by re-animated frogs while the twins who are friendly to Wednesday, Layla and Kayla, are also never seen again after the same scene. In Bethany's case, though never confirmed, she may well have been too traumatised by that incident to leave her home again.
• When Trees Attack:
  • Inverted with Ichabod, a pale sentient tree who, as seen on the trailer, at first seems to attack Wednesday and Pugsley dragging them out of bed but in reality is very friendly to the family and it's just waking then up. When Wednesday gloomily asks if something will liven up this tedious day, it responds by flinging Pugsley through an upstairs window. She nonchalantly thanks it for trying in a monotone voice as it gently lowers her down to a ground.
  • Notably, in the climax it's Ichabod and Wednesday who save the entire Addams clan from being crushed by the collapsing mansion.
• You Are Grounded!: Morticia forbids Wednesday from leaving the house after she comes home in preppy clothing, which prompts her to sneak out and visit Parker. Parker also recieves this to some extent when Margeaux locks her in a room along with Wednesday.
• You Need a Breath Mint: According to Fester, Margaux has "breath like a baby's diaper", and he likes that about her.