When it comes to the excellent adventures and bogus journeys of Bill and Ted (Alex Winter and Keanu Reeves), the space-time continuum is for dorks. Don’t worry too much about the gnarly “laws” of time travel that plague other science fiction, dudes. But if you’re ready to party on with Bill and Ted Face the Music, there are some key things to remember from the two original movies… especially from the plot of Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey.
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How exactly have rockin' time travelers to skipped to the past and back using a telephone booth and circuits adjusted to the totally tubular digital age? Let's take things slow for a minute, and focus on the past before we look to the present.
The First Bill & Ted Is The One With The Historical Figures
...and is also the reason that one kid thought it was high-larious to intentionally mispronounce Socrates as “So-crates” in class. Was that one kid me? I'll never tell. But, like, the point is that Excellent Adventure is the one where the guys go back in time so people like Napoleon and Joan of Arc can help them pass History class. They also "rescued" two medieval princesses by taking them to the future, where they became their girlfriends and, later, wives.
In the second one, Bill and Ted don't really time travel but they do literally defeat Death... NBD!
The Second Movie Is The One With George Carlin And Robot Bill & Ted
Originally, George Carlin's character travels back in time to make sure that Bill and Ted's garage band goes on to create world-changing philosophical change. He comes from a Utopia, where Bill and Ted are legendary and everyone salutes with air guitar. This really gets going when their song is broadcast globally at the end of Bogus Journey and triggers world harmony.
But not everybody in the future is jazzed about society worshipping two slackers from the late 20th century, even though the only real tenet of their philosophy is "be excellent to each other" and "party on, dudes." Who wouldn't want to follow those most basic messages of empathy and generosity? Weird! In Bogus Journey rebels send robot doppelgangers back in time to kill Bill and Ted and screw up their destiny.
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How Bill & Ted Beat Death That One Time
So when Bill and Ted are hella dead, they meet Death in a parody of Ingmar Bergman's artsy film The Seventh Seal. After they play a bunch of games with Death like Twister and Battleship, and win every time, he becomes their good buddy and even joins Wyld Stallyns on tour after they return to life.
With Death on their side, Bill and Ted go to Heaven and get the help of God and two aliens named Station to help them defeat the bad robots.
Bill & Ted University, Rad
In the future, there is a school named after Bill and Ted that, ironically (if you're a fan of the Alanis Morissette definition), is where the villain comes from in Bogus Journey. Of course a gym teacher wanted to take down Bill and Ted.
The Whole Missy Thing
It’s definitely not the most progressive in-joke in the Bill and Ted ‘verse that Missy (Amy Stoch), a senior when the boys were freshmen, married Bill’s dad and then divorced him and married Ted’s dad.
There is an end credits scene at the end of Bogus Journey (no, those were not invented by the Marvel Cinematic Universe) that reveals Missy next married Chuck De Nomolos (Joss Ackland), the evil gym teacher from the future. Are they still together in Bill and Ted Face the Music? Patience, wastoids, we'll have to wait and see!
“Little Bill” & “Little Ted”
At the end of the movie, Bill and Ted introduce their kids to the audience before rocking out, but they never gendered them — which is mad convenient, as Bill and Ted Face The Music co-stars Brigette Lundy-Paine (Atypical) and Samara Weaving (Hollywood) as their grown up kids.