Bill & Ted Face the Music (2020)

I was excited to hear about one more Bill & Ted movie.  In both cases, it’s said that the title duo save the world by releasing a song.  Exactly what that meant and how that played out were left to the viewers’ imaginations.  It was a lot of pressure, to say the least.  Someone  comes from the future and says that the fate of the known universe  rests on your musical skills.

As the title of this movie implies, it’s time to see what it is that actually brings the planets into alignment.  With the death of George Carlin during the intervening years, Rufus only makes a cameo.  It’s up to his daughter, Kelly, to move things along, historically speaking.  You see, it’s only a few days until William and Theodore have to actually perform.  They have no song.  The band has fallen apart.  Their respective marriages aren’t far behind.  At least their daughters  have some talent.

To their advantage, they have access to a time machine.  They realize that they can go ahead and get the song from their future selves.  Working against them is a killer robot sent by the very future that they’re supposed to save.  Oh, and they only have a few hours to write the song, get the band back together and actually perform this unwritten melody, all while the cosmos, in its entirety, is falling apart.

It’s a bold premise, to say the least.  I guess after the first two movies, you need something a little different.  If you haven’t seen the first two movies, it’s possible to watch this one as a stand-alone movie.  There are a few callbacks to the first two movies that you’ll miss, like Ted’s father denying that the events of the second movie could have happened.  If you have seen the first two movies and are on the fence about this one, there are worse ways to spend a few hours.

I have to admit that there was a different feeling to this movie.  Many of the major characters were back, although it seems that the franchise doesn’t have a problem with recasting.  (Outside of Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter, I think only one actor has been in all three movies.)  It seems like the movie was made to maybe recapture some of the nostalgia from the late 198s and early 1990s.

True to form, though, there’s a lot of fun to the movie, especially if you don’t think too hard about it.  (I mean, how do you make a franchise out of a time-traveling phone booth?  Who does that?)  The thing that caught my attention was that none of the future versions of Bill or Ted had the song, even though they should have.  It wasn’t until the distant future that they got anything.

True, this may be because the universe is falling apart.  There is that.  I think it’s meant more to be a fun movie with characters that we’re familiar with.  I could see this being something to finally tie up the franchise.  There is a certain finality to it, especially considering the post-credits scene.  There’s also a possibility of some sort of spinoff with the daughters, although I don’t really see that happening.  (I will say one thing:  I find it odd that Bill, Ted and Rufus all had daughters.)

I’m not sure where I stand now that I’ve watched the movie.  It’s not entirely excellent, but it’s not entirely bogus, either.  It’s difficult to come up with three movies that work together, so I will cut the writers a little slack.  Also, the juvenile aspect isn’t that juvenile.  I do get the sense that the music is being faced, at least on some level.  Bill and Ted are adults, but not quite grown up.  As they say, growing older is mandatory.  Growing up isn’t.

 

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Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (1991)

I was hoping to see Bill and Ted Face the Music in theaters.  I even went and rented Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey.  Alas, theaters in my area are closed and I’m not paying $24.99 for on-demand, so I’m going to have to wait for the DVD release.  However, that’s no reason not to review Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey.

A few years have passed since the first installment and the Wyld Stallyns haven’t yet saved the world.  They are, however, entered into the San Dimas Battle of the Bands, which should start them on their way.  Enter Chuck De Nomolos, former gym teacher.  He doesn’t like the utopian future of 2691.  So, he steals the time machine from Rufus with the intent of killing Bill and Ted.  Just to rub it in, De Nomolos creates two robot doppelgangers to replace them.  The ghosts of Bill and Ted have to find a way to get back and still win the battle while repairing their relationships with their respective would-be-brides-to-be.

You might think that it would be difficult enough to win the Battle of the Bands, future or no future.  Coming back to life should be even harder.  They do end up escaping hell and besting  Death in several games.  (Traditionally, you only have to beat Death at one game to get your life back, but he’s kind of a sore loser.)

So, with Death’s help, Bill and Ted put together a team and win the battle.  In fact, De Nomolos’s intervention is exactly what they need to launch their careers and attain world fame.  So, we have a causal loop.  The future is saved and everyone has a most excellent life.

There are a lot of things about this movie that I’ve come to view differently over the years.  I had always assumed that Bill and Ted were really good at games.  They’re slackers, so they’d undoubtedly want to have as much fun as possible.  It never occurred to me that Death might have been bad at games.  Sure, he’s probably had to play those games before as part of a challenge, but it’s not his main function.

I also don’t recall noticing the causal loop.  There are a few jokes about time travel, like how the use of time machines tends to benefit the good guys.  They also use it to get more time to learn how to play since they’re still horrible musicians.

The one thing that got me was the name of the character Station.  It turns out that it was actually an artifact from a script revision.  There was a deleted scene from a police station that wasn’t properly deleted.  All that was left was the word Station, which became the two alien characters.  I spent the entire movie wondering if station was some sort of slang term from the 90s that I forgot about.  (Notice how no one uses bogus any more to refer to something unbelievable.)

It’s not a great movie.  For a sequel, it’s pretty good, though.  Like the first movie, there are parts that are there mostly to move the story along.  Bill and Ted can possess people because why not?  They get sent to Hell by a layperson condemning them because Hell is where they need to be to take things seriously.  They also get to deal with their own demons.

It’s not the same movie as the first, but I wouldn’t want it to be.  It does seem like a natural continuation of the first movie, which makes me want to see the third even more.  It’s not going to be for everyone, but I do find that this movie is a little better than the average movie from that era.  The pacing is full throttle and keeps your attention all the way through.  Here’s to hoping I can get the new movie on DVD quickly.

 

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Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989)

There are some movies that have a timeless feel to them.  I can watch The Princess Bride and it will always be a great movie.  Others tend to feel dated after a while.  Movies like Blazing Saddles were definitely a product of their times.  This isn’t to say that it’s a bad movie, but rather that it hasn’t aged well.  Somewhere in the middle is Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure.  It’s still a most excellent adventure, but it still has a slight whiff of the late 1980s.

The movie centers around Ted “Theodore” Logan and Bill S. Preston, Esquire.  They’re two slackers who are about to flunk out of high school.  This is some seriously bad news.  If this happens, Ted will be shipped off to a military school in Alaska.  Without Ted, the band Wyld Stalyns won’t form and serve as the basis for a wonderful future where everyone gets along.  So, the future residents of San Dimas send Rufus back to make sure that Bill and Ted pass an oral report.

Rufus lends the duo a time machine in the form of a phone booth.  They can dial any time and place they want, so Bill and Ted decide to visit a bunch of historical figures, like Socrates and Billy the Kid.  Instead, eight people from history come to the San Dimas of 1989 to tell Bill and Ted’s school about what they think of modern society.

Needless to say, it’s not easy.  Bill and Ted have to bust the people out of jail, for instance.  There’s also the issue of getting Napoleon out of a water park named Waterloo.  Bill and Ted are also not the brightest.  Billy the Kid is referred to as Mr. The Kid.  They also pronounce Socrates more like it’s spelled.  So, yeah.  The future of the world rests on these two.

I remember really liking the movie when I first saw it.  This is probably because I was closer in age to the two main characters.  It’s still a funny movie and would probably get a few laughs on first viewing.  However, it’s not quite as funny when you know the jokes are coming.

The movie doesn’t delve into the paradoxes of time travel too much.  The movie is a comedy and is more focused on the jokes, like Beethoven discovering synthesizers at a mall.  (Like I said, 1980s.)  It does make for a smoother movie and I didn’t find myself finding too many plot holes or inconsistencies.  It is a little odd that no one reacts to modern-day clothing in the past, though.

I was prompted to watch this when I heard news of Bill & Ted Face the Music.  It would seem that Keanu Reeves is destined to be a man of trilogies.  Interestingly, both The Matrix and John Wick franchises each seem to have a new movie coming out.  This would make Mr. Reeves very busy for the next few years.

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