For a film wherein the world might finish at any second, “Bill & Ted Face the Music” is very candy and cheery.
And for that, now we have to thank Bill S. Preston, Esq. and Ted “Theodore” Logan, who 30 years in the past have been the sweetest and cheeriest of minor heroes and are actually hanging onto that into center age. They’re not the smartest of heroes, after all, however they know what works for them: As Ted says at one level on this film, “Maybe we should always not know what we’re doing!”
But “Bill & Ted Face the Music” does know what it’s doing, which is to protect the essence of the characters performed by Alex Winter and Keanu Reeves even because it dumps a most disagreeable midlife disaster and an much more heinous menace to actuality as we all know on their still-shaggy heads.
Written by unique “Bill & Ted” creators Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon and directed by Dean Parisot (“Galaxy Quest”), it’s a film that will somewhat be charming than frantic, and one which ups the stakes with out feeling the necessity to get louder or extra aggressive.
And meaning it suits properly into the candy, goofball “Bill & Ted” universe, which started with 1989’s “Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure” and included the 1991 sequel “Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey.” When it got here out, that first movie was not effectively appreciated by critics, a lot of whom couldn’t determine what to make of minor heroes who weren’t stoners or malcontents. Instead, Bill and Ted have been good-hearted, earnest youngsters who didn’t actually have the brains to drag off the air of erudition they thought they have been adopting, however have been fairly sunny and likable anyway.
In the preliminary film, which slowly turned a sleeper hit, Bill and Ted have been despatched touring by time to gather historic figures in order that they might do a bodacious historical past report and Ted wouldn’t flunk out and be despatched to army college, which might have ended their beloved-if-inept steel band, Wyld Stallyns. They acquired their phone-booth time machine from an emissary from the long run, Rufus (George Carlin), who was despatched to assist them as a result of the long run relied on Wyld Stallyns turning into enormous stars and writing a tune that will carry everybody collectively.
“Face the Music” picks up the story 25 years later, with our heroes nonetheless attempting to jot down THAT tune even thought their profession has just about tanked. They’re married to the medieval princesses they discovered within the first film (now performed by Jayma Mays and Erinn Hayes), they usually now have daughters, Billie and Thea (Bridgette Lundy-Paine and Samara Weaving), who’re primarily smaller, smarter Bill and Ted knockoffs.
(One quibble: In the primary two motion pictures, the princesses have been performed by actresses who have been roughly the identical age as Winter and Reeves – so why, on this one, do now we have actresses who’re greater than 10 years youthful?)
At any charge, the strain to jot down a tune to unite the world has gotten heavy over the a long time. “We have been banging our heads against the wall for 25 years,” says Ted. “And I’m tired, dude.”
“Ted, we have a destiny to fulfill,” Bill insists. “Think about our fans, dude!”
“Bob and Wendy will totally understand,” Ted says. “Eileen, we haven’t heard from for several years.”
Of course, a tragic and resigned Bill and Ted could be most bogus companions for 91 minutes of display time, so a time-travel pod arrives on their entrance yard and out pops Kelly (Kristen Schaal), who occurs to be the daughter of Rufus. She whisks them off to the long run, the place issues have gotten lots fancier because the first film, and the place the Great Leader is Holland Taylor rather than the unique’s moonlighting rock stars Clarence Clemons, Martha Davis and Fee Waybill.
Great Leader, who clearly is just not terribly thrilled with this entire Bill & Ted future cult, tells the blokes that they’ve precisely 77 minutes and 25 seconds to jot down and play the tune that may carry the world collectively, “or actuality will collapse and time and house as we all know it would…
