A Re-Review of "Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey"

This is immediately following "...and gentlemen, what we have here is Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper."

Welcome back. Well if you're keeping track, today is the day that Bill & Ted Face the Music hits the airwaves. You can stream it or, if you're lucky enough to live in a city/region whose government listened to scientists and made sure the spread of COVID-19 was contained effectively so that your way of life could be restored back to normal ASAP, you can go catch it in theaters! However, before you do, you have to get the rest of the way up to speed. Yesterday we talked about and reviewed the movie that started it all, 1989's Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure. Well, that was big enough success to warrant a sequel be made. Now, what could a sequel to Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure possibly even be about? How would you up the ante? Would Bill and Ted have to travel back in time to collect historical documents instead of figures? Would they have to travel forward in time to write a thesis on where they think the world is going? What would possibly happen to these two knuckleheads?

"Bill, I'm seeing double!" "Me too, Bill" "What'd you
say, Ted?" "I didn't say anything Ted, Bill did." "That's
right, Ted!" "Thanks, Bill!" *Air guitars*

Well... the sequel is nothing like any of that. This is 1991's Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey, a movie that teaches us sequels can be whatever the hell they want, deviate in tone as far as humanly possible, and be bat-shit insane when compared to the original. Yes, Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey is one dark sequel to such a family-friendly movie. Still, this one is technically a family movie too, but it's just so outlandishly weird while maintaining an astonishingly dark, artistically driven yet dementedly comedic narrative. If Excellent Adventure was a straight-up start-to-finish family movie, this one is also a family movie... but is in no way straightforward. It's so outlandish its hilarious. If there's a sequel in the world that is nothing like its original and arguably still upholds as debatably just as good as the original, this is it. So let's get into why Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey, despite its absolutely baffling presentation, is one of the top-notch sequels of the modern era. Cue Winger's "Battle Stations", we're going in!

The music of Bill and Ted's band, Wyld Stallyns, has created a utopian future society. In the year 2691, former gym teacher turned terrorist Chuck De Nomolos (Joss Ackland) attacks the Bill & Ted University and steals a time-traveling phone booth, intending to alter the history of what he considers to be a foolish and frivolous society by sending evil robot replicas, Evil Bill (Alex Winter) and Evil Ted (Keanu Reeves) back to the late 20th century to prevent the originals from winning the San Dimas Battle of the Bands. How do they plan on doing this? By murdering Bill and Ted, taking over their lives, and giving a speech to dismantle world peace after they win the contest in the originals' place. The class's lecturer Rufus (George Carlin) attempts to stop De Nomolos but seemingly becomes lost in the circuits of time. See? Not even ten minutes in and we're all about evil robots and exercising the ability of murder. Clearly this movie's on the same wavelength as the first one. NOT. Wait, that was Wayne's World. Forget that one.

These animatronic puppets look like you microwaved
troll dolls and tried to fix it with Play-Doh.

Two years after their adventure through time, the Wyld Stallyns are auditioning for the aforementioned upcoming Battle of the Bands. Though Bill (Alex Winter) and Ted's (Keanu Reeves) current girlfriends and former 15th-century princesses Joanna (Sarah Trigger) and Elizabeth (Annette Azcuy) have become skilled musicians, Bill and Ted are still inept. Despite this, the organizer, Ms. Wardroe (Pam Grier) assures them a slot in the contest as the final act, hoping everyone who would judge the contest would have already gone home by that point. Following a 521st birthday party for the Princesses, Bill and Ted propose to Joanna and Elizabeth right as the evil robots arrive from the future. After luring the real Bill and Ted away to Vasquez Rocks as a ruse to speak to the Princesses, the evil Bill and Ted robots murder the real Bill and Ted by throwing the two over the side of a cliff. The robots then begin working to ruin the duo’s eventual fame along with their relationships with their fiancés.

"Bill, you ever get the feeling you're being watched?"
"Yeah, Ted! Death is always watching."
"No, dummy! That's Santa Claus!"

In the afterlife, Bill and Ted's souls are met by Death (William Sadler) who says they may challenge him in a game for their souls, but warns that nobody has ever won. It's just like the plot device used in The Seventh Seal, known in native Sweden as Det sjunde inseglet) where Antonius plays Death at chess in exchange for his life back. Bill and Ted escape after giving Death a "melvin", known colloquially as a "wedgie", and are unsuccessful at alerting the police through possession of Ted's father Capt. Jonathan Logan (Hal Landon, Jr.) and a deputy, eventually cast down into Hell at a séance held by formerly Bill's, now Ted's stepmother Missy (Amy Stock-Poynton). In what is the darkest, weirdest, and outright most unsettling twist in the movie, Bill and Ted are then tormented by Satan through three nightmarish displays of Bill's and Ted's personal Hells; they are worked to death by Col. Oats (Chelcie Ross) of the Alaskan Military Academy, Ted relives stealing his younger brother Deacon's Easter basket and being stalked by a demon bunny rabbit while Bill faces a horrific Hell of having to kiss his nasty, dying, hairy grandmother, Granny S. Preston, Esq. (also Alex Winter). Forced to face their own fears, the duo realize their only escape is to take Death's offer, who appears and allows them to choose a game. To Death’s dismay, unlike The Seventh Seal Bill and Ted select modern games like Battleship, Clue, NFL Super Bowl Electric Football and Twister. Death is beaten every time, so in the end he reluctantly admits defeat and places himself at Bill and Ted's command. The playing of Death at modern board games is a hilarious little twist on the plot device from The Seventh Seal. Death screaming "You have sahnk my bittleship" in his Ukrainian accent is hilarious to me.

"Bill, look at these kids we found from the future!"
"Woah, excellent!" *Air guitars*

Realizing they need to locate the smartest person in the universe to help build robots to counter De Nomolos' evil robots, Death escorts Bill and Ted to Heaven where they are directed by God to a deceased Martian duo named Station (voiced by Frank Welker) who readily agrees to help the group. Yeah that's right, a Martian in human heaven. Take that, evangelicals! How do you like them apples? Actually maybe the Bible talks about the planet Mars, I have no idea. On the eve of the Battle of the Bands, Bill and Ted return to the mortal world and race to the concert as Station constructs benevolent robot versions of themselves from supplies picked up at a hardware store, Good Robot Bill (Michael "Shrimp" Chambers) and Good Robot Ted (Bruno "Taco" Falcon). Elsewhere, Evil Bill and Ted abduct Joanna and Elizabeth and tie them high above the stage at the Battle of the Bands, intending to drop them and murder them as well at the finale of their stage performance. It's too late, as the real Bill and Ted arrive just as the Evil Bill and Ted take the stage; the benevolent robots easily defeat their evil counterparts... fucking somehow... and Joanna and Elizabeth are lowered by Station before their ropes break. De Nomolos appears in the time booth prepared to kill Bill and Ted himself, overriding the broadcasting equipment to send a live feed of their confrontation across the entire planet. Bill and Ted deduce that they can go back in time following the encounter to arrange events for De Nomolos to be captured in the present; though De Nomolos attempts to do the same, Bill and Ted gain the upper hand by explaining that it is only the winners who get to go back. This part makes no sense, and if you read my post from yesterday, they did it in the first movie too. De Nomolos literally has them at gunpoint, and Bill and Ted simply say they'll defeat De Nomolos, go back in time to set up stuff to beat him now, but how did they beat him now so they can help their past selves beat them then? Oh the hell knows. It's almost over anyway. After De Nomolos is distracted by Death and arrested by Ted's father, Ms. Wardroe reveals herself to be a disguised Rufus... somehow disrobing Pam Grier's skin into George Carlin, which also doesn't make a lick of sense, who urges them to play.

Satan watching over Hell... that or Steve Bannon waiting
for his next inevitable prosecution. One of the two.

Acknowledging that they are still terrible musicians, Bill and Ted decide to use the time booth and immediately return to the auditorium, Bill looking like Billy Gibbons and Ted looking like Gilby Clarke, along with their families which now include Little Bill (Candace Mead) and Little Ted (Lauren Mead) after spending sixteen months of intense guitar training along with a two-week honeymoon. Now fathers, Bill and Ted are joined by Death on bass, the Stations on bongos, and the Good Robot Bill and Ted on stage as backup dancers, Wyld Stallyns perform a stunning rock ballad (Steve Vai's "Final Guitar Solo" which leads into Kiss's "God Gave Rock n' Roll To You II") as the worldwide broadcast sent by De Nomolos continues, broadcasting their music across the globe and creating seven hundred years of harmony. Following their win at the Battle of the Bands, Wyld Stallyns encounter many perks of fame that help them to fulfill their destinies and create their utopian society with their music, eventually taking their act to Mars.

"Death did you just fart?"
"I deed, Bill. Silent but--"
"--but deadly, yeah we know."

So compared to the first film, how does Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey hold up? Well obviously, mentioned before, it went the sequel route that many did and went much darker than the original, but this movie has some kind of charm from its witty, inept goofiness. Aside from literally killing such lovable schlubs like Bill and Ted and sending them to Hell for a nightmarish portrayal of afterlife torture, they also show a Martian scientist using common household hardware to build animatronic robots to aid them in conquering evil cyborgs built to resemble them. Not to mention, the literal Grim Reaper follows them around and becomes a member in their band, Wyld Stallyns. The movie is just a ton of bizarre fun, unlike the first film which was pretty straightforward fun. If you ask a lot of people, they'll name this one as their favorite, simply for its memorable moments and characters. Its scenery, its lines, and its soundtrack. Like Excellent Adventure, the movie had a pretty sweet soundtrack, including Winger's "Battle Stations", Primus's "Tommy the Cat", and of course, Kiss's "God Gave Rock 'n Roll To You II". In the movie they used Steve Vai's "Final Guitar Solo" as the lead in, and I think that's the best cut.

To me? This one's just as great as Excellent Adventure. Excellent Adventure could appeal to anybody, but this one has an acquired taste. It's so out there, you gotta love it. The scenes involving Death are re-watchable as all get out, I quote Death every time I play Battleship or... well... really any board game. It even gave us a euphoric ending that showed that Bill and Ted literally changed the world as wherever Wyld Stallyns play, the DOW skyrockets. Air guitars were found to eliminate smog. The rumored Wyld Stallyns' break-up even dries out rivers and blackens skies. Read the newspapers at the end, they're just as much apart of the adventure as the movie is. Check out Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey. It's sick, twisted, humorous, and downright enjoyable. A worthy sequel indeed.

Speaking of "worthy sequels", I think it's high-time I watch Bill & Ted Face the Music, the long-awaited sequel. A movie I've waited for for far too long. I'll report back with how much I love it, no doubt.