The current climate of films for most of the 21st century has seen many adaptations and revivals of older works. The latest on this trend are the “Wyld Stallyns” themselves: Bill and Ted.

With a new movie on the horizon in Bill & Ted Face the Music, I felt it was appropriate to do a retrospective on the films since I found myself wondering whether these movies were more obscure cult classic items or if they are a bit more ubiquitous in pop culture.

The screenplay for the first film was written by Ed Solomon and Chris Matheson, based on a comedy routine they performed in college. The original screenplay involved the duo traveling through time in a van, but following the release of Back to the Future in 1985, the concept was dropped since it was felt it would be too similar to the DeLoreon in that movie. A phone booth was selected as the time travel device in a reference to the TARDIS from long running British sci-fi series Doctor

Who. The plot involves two dimwitted teenage slackers Bill S. Preston, Esq. (Alex Winter) and Ted “Theodore” Logan (Keanu Reeves) from San Dimas, California traveling through time to finish a history report. They are assisted by Rufus (George Carlin) a man from the year 2688 where humanity has become a utopia based upon the music of Bill and Ted’s band: Wyld Stallyns. To ensure that future comes to pass, the duo must collect historical figures to help them pass their class.

The movie is very simple and goofy. Reeves and Winter are infectiously likable on screen and have a good repoire with one another (despite the fact when you get right down to it, Bill and Ted are basically the same character).

Now of course the time travel doesn’t make too much sense, such as how time is still moving in San Dimas even when they are traveling around time and could in theory return when they left. But, of course the movie doesn’t need to follow through on this as it is just silly and goofy, really shown in the scene where they discuss using time travel to acquire Ted’s dad’s keys by saying they’d do it after the report, and if that is confusing, rest assured, that’s the joke.

The film has a sequel released in 1991 entitled “Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey”, and while the first film may be remembered more than the second, I am honestly a bigger fan of the sequel.

The sequel involves evil robot doubles of Bill and Ted coming from the future and killing both Bill and Ted, leading them to traveling through the afterlife in many hijinks to return to life, including outwitting Death himself in a variety of games including Battleship, Clue and Twister in a parody of The Seventh Seal.

The newest film will be released in theaters and will also be available for videoon-demand on several platforms.

I highly recommend seeking out both older films, they are goofy and have a bizarre late Eighties/early Nineties charm to them. And I am looking forward to the upcoming new film to see what a Bill & Ted movie 30 years after the fact will be like.