Bill & Ted Face the Music

More than 30 years ago, cinemagoers first met Bill S. Preston, Esq. (Alex Winter) and Theodore "Ted" Logan (Keanu Reeves), two slightly dense teenage rock fans destined to save the universe in Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure - a time-travelling adventure so charmingly silly that it spawned an equally popular sequel, Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey, that together hold a place in the heart of a certain generation.

And so, in 2020, we’re back for a third instalment, Bill & Ted Face the Music. Nowadays, Bill and Ted are in middle-age and are not much wiser - and their band the Wyld Stallyns - haven’t quite found the utopia-inducing success they were promised - emptying dance floors at weddings rather than bringing harmony to the universe.

They do have some consolation though in the shape of their daughters, Thea (Samara Weaving) and Billie (Brigette Lundy-Paine), each named after their best pal - and of course chips off the old block.

As in the first two movies, the pair (and this time, their daughters) are hauled in to save the day, this time by Kelly (Kristen Schaal) - the daughter of Rufus from the original movies, George Carlin having passed away in 2008. In the future they are told by the universe’s Great Leader (Holland Taylor) that they have until that evening to compose a song to bring the world together and prevent the destruction of space and time.

Rather than try to compose the song, they aim to time travel to meet their future selves at a point when they have penned their universe-saving hit, rather than go to the trouble of writing it. In a parallel quest, Thea and Billie travel back in time to find the greatest musicians who ever lived in a bid to help their dads out - eventually roping in Mozart, Louis Armstrong, Jimi Hendrix, and ancient Chinese musician Ling Lun.

The joy of the original movies was their embracing of the boneheaded goofiness of late ‘80s hard rock youth culture and smart, but flippant, references to both cinematic, and real history. None more so than Bogus Journey’s brilliant parodying of Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal, and the chess game with death (who returns - again played by William Sadler, in Face the Music). Director Dean Parisot and writers Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon attempt to recreate that, but sadly fall short.

They do so for two reasons. Firstly, the 30-year gap means its central characters, and more importantly, their carbon copy daughters, just feel less relevant. Bill, Ted, Thea and Billie - as well as cameos by Dave Grohl and Kid Cudi intended to bring things up to date - feel artificially preserved in aspic, rather than organically imagining the characters in 2020. Secondly, there’s just nothing as clever and funny as, for example, Bogus Journey’s moment when Bill and Ted quote Poison’s Every Rose Has Its Thorn as the meaning of life. The inspired plot point of putting together a band of history’s greatest musicians also has its comic potential wasted.

That said, it’s fun to check in with the duo - and Reeves and Winter retain their clueless chemistry. There’s something to be said for Face the Music as an uplifting diversion during dark times - but just without the spark or magic of the original films.