Bill & Ted 3: Face the Music

[George White]

I am not sure. Kimberly Labelle is now a producer, while Diane Franklin has only just started acting again.
Annette Azcuy apparently still acts, though her last screen credit 2017. Sarah Trigger is long out of the biz.
i imagine it's become an in-joke, recasting a  la the Griswold kids in Vacation.

[Hand Solo]

Really went in wanting to like this. Wasn't keen, seemed like it was trying to be a bit too 'woke' with concentrating on strong female characters in a Bill & Ted film? Seriously seemed like they were doing the Ghostbusters remake with a gender swapped Bill & Ted then altered the script after that tanked. Louis Armstrong was cringe making `old school black people' grunts and may as well have done a scat improvisation after each line to make sure you understand he's a jazz guy. And Jimi Hendrix was more Phil Lynott and have they never heard Hendrix play, it was nothing like his style, in this he was doing Yngwie Malmsteen fretwank classical stuff. Lots more I could mark out as wrong but don't have the energy right now.

And the ending. The song that brings the world together, YOU ARE THE SONG.

Fuck off.

The robot was shit as well. Yeah, a depressed robot, that's novel.

[Dropshadow]

The only time I laughed watching this thing was the bit where they fell out of the window at Dave Grohl's house. Didn't hate it, but....... it should never have been made. The Blade Runner 2/Disney Star Wars of "comedy".

[Hand Solo]

The only time I laughed watching this thing was the bit where they fell out of the window at Dave Grohl's house. Didn't hate it, but....... it should never have been made. The Blade Runner 2/Disney Star Wars of "comedy".

Oh yeah the best song ever was written by Dave Grohl??? just because we can get him to cameo.

They could have done it with Jack Black/Tenacious D and at least it would have been a meta-joke that made sense, plus get Grohl in there too as he's in the video.

[Hand Solo]

There was also a bad Bill & Ted sitcom?

YES WAY

[Hand Solo]

The new Half In The Bag cover a lot of the problems with Face The Music, a lot of stuff that chimes in with mine like it being a cheap remake of Bogus Journey, with a subplot of gender swapped BIll & Ted doing a remake of Excellent Adventure. The robot being just a rubbishy version of Death - starts out as an adversary then a sort of embarrassing bandmember they get lumbered with, but then they've got Death in the film too so what's the point? The terrible ending. A lot of the female characters were there just to have them there, but didn't really seem to be there for any plot reasons. Their earlier Bill & Ted Re:View claim the 'Princesses' were only really in the first and second films (in which they don't do anything either) as 'NotGays', a love interest only shoehorned in by the studio so Bill & Ted's relationship doesn't get misinterpreted.

They actually liked Louis Armstrong and Hendrix, and thought Armstrong was meant to be over the top. I think it was just a poor impression, it was like old Amos `N Andy black caricatures from the old timey radio comedy days, it made Billy Crystal's Jazzman character look subtle. In fact this guy was more subtle.

Why did Keanu seem like he's getting videos of kittens being brunt alive being piped into his eyes 24/7 throughout? Medication?

[Small Man Big Horse]

The robot was shit as well. Yeah, a depressed robot, that's novel.

I didn't think he was depressed at all, that's a very weird reading of it. He had some doubts towards the end, clearly, but I never thought that he was miserable.

[The Mollusk]

I guess you could say it was whoa-ful.

I haven't seen it but I wanted to use that pun.

[Sin Agog]

Watched the first twenty minutes on 123movies a couple of days ago.  Had that low energy, floaty feeling you get with movies that should never really exist, like the cinematic equivalent of that Lou Gossett Blazing Saddles series that was shot for four seasons and never once intended for air solely so Fox could keep the rights to a sequel.

[SteveDave]

I was a few cans in when watching it but it zipped by and warmed my heart even though I do think something is wrong with Keanu Reeves.

[Dr Rock]

Wasn't bad, but Keanu wasn't Ted.

[popcorn]

I've always liked the characters of Bill and Ted but not really liked the films themselves and this was pretty much the same. Agree that Keanu seemed low-energy but Alex Winter gave a terrific performance.

Spoiler alert

I thought the Dave Grohl cameo was really funny, the clear highlight of the whole film. I love the idea that 1) their future selves thought they could pass off a Foo Fighters song as the greatest song ever written, 2) their younger selves just accepted this without question and 3) when they meet Dave Grohl they both go "Dave Grohl! :D" - they penny doesn't drop, they're both on top of the world and having a great day and on top of all that here's rock superstar Dave Grohl.

[close]

I thought this was maybe going to go down a different plot tunnel - questions of plagiarism and authenticity and so on, maybe going to explore what that crap Beatles film Yesterday completely failed to - but it didn't, oh well.

[olliebean]

Didn't anyone else twig pretty much as soon as it was said that

Spoiler alert

the song was by "Preston & Logan" with no first names

[close]

, that

Spoiler alert

it was obviously going to be by their daughters rather than them

[close]

? Was it supposed to be that obvious, or am I just a supergenius?

[Famous Mortimer]

I've always liked the characters of Bill and Ted but not really liked the films themselves and this was pretty much the same. Agree that Keanu seemed low-energy but Alex Winter gave a terrific performance.

Spoiler alert

I thought the Dave Grohl cameo was really funny, the clear highlight of the whole film. I love the idea that 1) their future selves thought they could pass off a Foo Fighters song as the greatest song ever written, 2) their younger selves just accepted this without question and 3) when they meet Dave Grohl they both go "Dave Grohl! :D" - they penny doesn't drop, they're both on top of the world and having a great day and on top of all that here's rock superstar Dave Grohl.

[close]

I thought this was maybe going to go down a different plot tunnel - questions of plagiarism and authenticity and so on, maybe going to explore what that crap Beatles film Yesterday completely failed to - but it didn't, oh well.

That bit was a puzzler because

Spoiler alert

in the world of the movie, aren't they supposed to have been much more famous than Dave Grohl?

[close]

[popcorn]

That bit was a puzzler because

Spoiler alert

in the world of the movie, aren't they supposed to have been much more famous than Dave Grohl?

[close]

That occurred to me too, but it doesn't really work either way because no one seems to remember them. I mean they're playing to empty bars.

[olliebean]

What I wondered, tbh, was why they were jumping years into the future instead of just jumping ahead to that very night when they knew the song would be performed.

[Hand Solo]

What I wondered, tbh, was why they were jumping years into the future instead of just jumping ahead to that very night when they knew the song would be performed.

There's some nonsense exposition in the first one about no matter how far they travel back and forward in time, the clock in San Dimas is always ticking, meaning they've still go to present their history report at set time. I imagine the 'stealing it off ourselves' works with the same faulty logic, we have to go forward in time to after we've written it to steal it, rather than to tonight when we perform the song we've already stolen off our future selves. Neither make much sense, but it was just handled a lot better in the earlier film because it gave a sense of tension, this one just seemed like everything was tacked on to give them a big final event scene like in the last two. And the whole 'the world writes the song' thing was a big cop-out', as Preston & Logon don't really exactly write it, just provide a backing beat for 'the world' to perform the song?

[Hand Solo]

What was Bill's shirt btw, I thought it might be Eddie The Flying Gimp from Idiot Box but he didn't have ears:



Could be the Blue Meanie?

[popcorn]

The more I think about this the more obviously shit it appears. The only thing it has going for it is Alex Winter.

They should have opened it with Bill and Ted no longer speaking to each other, washed up and disillusioned. One of them should have sold out and become a manager of the Circle K. The other one's living in a van. Then it's about getting the band back together etc. It's the Ghostbusters 2 intro but then that's one of the few really good bits of Ghostbusters 2.

[Hand Solo]

The more I think about this the more obviously shit it appears. The only thing it has going for it is Alex Winter.

It is shit, and Alex Winter is the only thing going for it. The writers didn't seem to be that arsed with doing anything too creative with it considering the time they've had to get it together, and it seemed to be already in post-production during the whole Covid shit so I don't think you can blame it on that.

Also it's nice to see the reevaluation on Winters' visually creative film Freaked from 1993 which I'd never heard of until this year and looks like exactly the kind of thing that would have been a massive hit if not just on video at the time if the studio didn't pull their finger out and advertise it.

And of course Kurt Cobain's favourite show Idiot Box.

[jfjnpxmy]

What was Bill's shirt btw, I thought it might be Eddie The Flying Gimp from Idiot Box but he didn't have ears:



Could be the Blue Meanie?

It's a "Wyld Stallyns" logo t-shirt

[QDRPHNC]

I saw this last night and loved it. It's been a long time since I left a movie theatre feeling unequivocally cheerful.

It was a bit rough around the edges, and cringy and cheesy, but in a weird way that was also its strength. Even watching the originals as a 12 / 14 year old, they had bits that were kind of lame, but that was all part of the charm. It was wonderful that they recognized that and had the guts to embrace it in our much more cynical time, without taking the easy route of making it dark, or meta, or ironic, or mean-spirited.

And Dennis wasn't depressed, he was insecure. And he also gave me one of the biggest laughs of the film, the first time this bad-ass looking robot shows up and immediately

Spoiler alert

starts getting the shit kicked out of him by a bunch of prisoners

[close]

. Second biggest laugh was near the end,

Spoiler alert

Death in the background absorbed in noodling on his bass, oblivious to how shit the rest of the band sounds

[close]

.

The 12 year old I was watching it with loved it just as much as I loved the original at his age. In a word: delightful.

[Hand Solo]

It's a "Wyld Stallyns" logo t-shirt[/url]

Ah, I don't remember the logo in the previous ones?

I never understood why they are called Wyld Stallyns either, is it meant to be crazy 80s band naming? Shouldn't it be Wyld Stallyuns or is the joke is they can't even spell a purposefully badly spelled bandname?

[phantom_power]

Dennis wasn't just insecure. He was that cloying, clingy insecure that is really fucking annoying, constantly seeking validation. He was the best bit of the film.

I may have drifted off a bit watching this last night so can't work out what the older versions of the babes nicking their time machine was all about. Was it explained?

[popcorn]

Dennis wasn't just insecure. He was that cloying, clingy insecure that is really fucking annoying, constantly seeking validation. He was the best bit of the film.

I may have drifted off a bit watching this last night so can't work out what the older versions of the babes nicking their time machine was all about. Was it explained?

They were exploring other dimensions to find one where they were happy with Bill and Ted. In the end they realised that dimension was the one they started off in and came back again! :)[nb]Discounting the fact that they originally came from medival England.
[/nb]

According to a Reddit AMA with one of the writers, they had a bigger subplot following their adventure but it got cut because they didn't have time or budget or whatever. So once again these characters are completely pointless.

[phantom_power]

Nice that Arcade Fire helped write the song to bring humanity together though

[VelourSpirit]

Really went in wanting to like this. Wasn't keen, seemed like it was trying to be a bit too 'woke' with concentrating on strong female characters in a Bill & Ted film?

No it was fine actually

[Small Man Big Horse]

No it was fine actually

Yeah. The whole woke thing seems another bizarre comment, along with the supposed depressed robot, I get the feeling that maybe he was only half watching it as many of the criticisms made don't apply. I can understand someone not finding it funny, or being frustrated over certain other aspects, but not the woke thing at all.

[Famous Mortimer]

Yeah, in a movie series where the two main female characters are completely sidelined, seems weird to describe it that way.

[Ferris]

I liked it, but woof shonky ending.