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A very cool film.

I enjoy the Bill & Ted films and this is a great sequel to the original. The film isn't so much about plot as it is just watching Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter. I just want to say that William Sadler is great as the Grim Reaper. He takes the role over and it is very funny. I had a great time watching this film. I own the laserdisc, so I've watched it several times and it is still great.

Station

Dude's this has to be one of the best movies out there, other than the first one. It makes you feel like its summer, and it's the funniest movie you'll ever watch. The soundtrack is killer too. Station.

Non-heinous, dudes

What can I say? I know this movie from start to finish. It's hilarious. It's an strong link to my past and will change the way I view film in the future. Hypothetically speaking :) The down-fall? There's no Socrates Johnson!

A Most Triumphant Sequel

If you liked the first you'll love this one!

A wild, imaginative and eccentric fantasy

Sequels rarely improve on the originals. Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey is bursting at the seams with wacky humor, craziness and invention. Yes, the first was a brilliant ride too but it doesn't live up to this.

Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter are just great in their dual roles as good Bill and Ted and evil Bill and Ted robots from the future. I've never really seen Keanu as convincing in anything else, maybe it's the characters he chooses and not his talent. Too bad his biggest exposure has been as a wooden statue in the god-awful Matrix trilogy. But it's not just Reeves and Winter this time, William Sadler's Grim Reaper is also along for the ride and he steals the show like you've never seen before. Rufus isn't in this one for very long but William Sadler more than makes up for that.

The plot is a bit much to swallow if you're not familiar with the mechanics of the original. A nasty old tyrant 700 years in the future sends evil robot Bill and Teds back through time in the phone booth time machines to kill the good Bill and Ted and prevent their perfect society taking over the world. Once dead Bill and Ted go to hell, challenge the Grim Reaper to a game of Battleship, visit God (after a spot of mugging in heaven), get help from a Martian, brought back from the dead, make good Bill and Ted robots and take on the evil Tyrant guy during a Battle of the Bands finale. Whew! Peter Hewitt (only 25 at the time) brings a bizarre sophistication to the sequel that wasn't present in the blandly shot first film. B&TBJ literally looks like a whacked-out cartoon come to life. The production design is very colorful and vivid, reminiscent of Tim Burton, only not crap.

Don't misjudge this film as being in the same sub-genre as those awful stoners Jay and Silent Bob or even Wayne's World. This is not a dumb generation Xer film, it's a lovely, silly fantasy for all ages and is definitely superior to the original.

Hey Warner, hurry up and release the Bill and Ted animated series on DVD. I want it NOW! Unlike Excellent adventure, this film was shot in plain-old 1.85:1 and the anamorphic transfer on the DVD looks fine and does justice to the very broad color pallet of film. The soundtrack is in Remastered Dolby 5.1 and it sounds above average if not amazing. Definitely get this.

Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey is thoroughly non-non-non heinous.

A most excellent, totally non-heinous sequel

While Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure was funny, Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey is simply hilarious. Of course, the movie is "dumb," but it's a comedy classic in my opinion. This totally triumphant sequel goes all out to entertain, producing a most memorable ending that brings the storyline of both movies together and unifies the past, present, and future of the Bill and Ted universe. Keanu Reeves is, I believe, at his best and most believable as Ted Theodore Logan, while Alex Winter shows off his impeccable comedic timing as Bill S. Preston, Esq. I think the wit is a little sharper in this sequel than it was in the original Bill and Ted film, and its closer associations and sometimes impressively subtle references to popular culture should make the comedy more appealing to a wider audience than that attracted to the original movie.

As the movie opens, the whole world is Bill's and Ted's oyster. They have their own apartment, they are in love with the princess babes they rescued from mediaeval England in the first movie, and the Battle of the Bands is all set to take place the following night. As they already know from Rufus (George Carlin) of the future, their performance at the Battle of the Bands will change the entire world and quickly lead to a blissful future for mankind in which everyone is excellent to each other. In that happy future, Rufus is teaching a class with the aid of such historical figures as Bach, Edison, and the killer guitar player from Faith No More. Then, from out of the blue, the classroom is taken over by gunmen led by Rufus' old crotchety gym teacher Chuck De Nomolos. The man's hatred for Bill and Ted and the way of life they brought into permanent being is so strong that he sends two evil Bill and Ted robots back in time to ruin the lives and future of Wyld Stallyns before they can really even begin. The robots are pretty successful, actually killing the good Bill and Ted. Here begins the truly bogus journey of our heroes, as they face the Grim Reaper himself, get an up close and very personal look at the depths of Hell, and journey to heaven to meet God Himself. It takes more than a well-coordinated Melvin attack on Death to bring them back to life, but they never waver from their determination to come back, save the babes, kill the evil Bill and Ted, and play most triumphantly at the Battle of the Bands.

I love the ending of the movie; it has little shame in its pursuit of utter goofiness, and I admire that type of commitment to inanity for the sake of entertainment. The whole scene takes about fifteen minutes, but the guys put on one heck of a show at the Battle of the Bands. The fun doesn't even stop when the credits begin to roll because we are treated to a number of magazine and newspaper headlines of the future chronicling the many successes of Bill and Ted and the somewhat troubled rock and roll career of Death. I love this most non-heinous, totally excellent movie. If you want comedy, look no further than Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey.

You gotta love this one!

When I was a kid, I totally loved both Bill & Ted Movies. The other night, Bogus Journey was on and since it was at least 5 years since I last saw it, I decided to tune in. AND I LOVED IT ALL OVER AGAIN! This film is still funny after all those years. 'Excellent Adventure' is better, but this one rocks just the same. Sure, some of the perfomances are a bit cheesy, but hey, this entire film is cheesy in a cool way. Plus it features the coolest personation of Death ever in a movie! Concluding: Totally like non bogus movie dude! Way Excellent! STATION!!!

Funny and light, even death is a joke. Great graphics.

I enjoyed this film. I wish I could find it on DVD or VHS. I worked on this film and met "bill and ted" while shooting the scenes with Death. Funny thing I over heard was the director telling a surfer friend of mine the "meaning of life" according to "bill and ted". The director is British and I doubt if he's ever surfed in his life. The working title was "Bill and Ted go to hell".

Does big budget equal the same magic?

This is the movie I was more excited for than any other movie that I can remember. More than Phantom Menace (yes, I'm serious) The original Bill & Ted's was the most fun I ever had at the theater and I was hoping for a repeat of that breath of fresh air I had back in early 1989. Well, this just didn't have that same originality. Don't get me wrong, this movie's great. It's just not as easy going. This movie actually has some mildly serious themes in it (although, mild is the key word here) and the whole thing falls apart in the end. Had it not been for the cutting room floor, this one could have been much better. The novelization proves that. Anyways, I was happy enough just to see my favorite buddy-duo reunite for one more screen adventure. Were it not for the poor ending (damn you Hollywood studios! Damn you to Hell's labyrinths!) this could have been a 9 or a 10. Well, probably a 9.

Better than the original

Much funnier than the original which was funny by itself. Too bad Alex Winter hasn't done more work even if what he has done since is hilarious. Seeing Steve Vai brings back bad hair band memories.

Great adventure for everyone who wants to escape reality

If you feel like watching a movie where everything gets completely wacky, but its still good, then this is it. This movie throws an off-the-wall adventure at two teens. It's full of laughter, effects and adventure. All in all its good clean fun for everyone. I think most people will enjoy watching this movie for one reason or another.

A Film That Puts The "Fun" Back In "Funny"

Who says sequels can't be as good as originals? This movie proves that that is not always true. It was well-written, more mature, and just out-and-out funnier than its predecessor. Alex Winter once again showed great comic timing as Bill, although the film was absolutely stolen by William Sadler as Death ("Don't overlook MY butt. I work out every day, and reaping burns a lot of calories"). Some may call it stupid humor, but that's not really the case; the funniest scenes in the movie - such as the Twister scene or "20 Questions" - are original, well-played, and just plain clever. We all know Keanu Reeves has never been known so much for his acting, but he's above his average here, and Winter, Sadler, and George Carlin are all great fun.Certainly this film can't appeal to everyone. If the idea of, say, Death playing Battleship, Clue, and Twister doesn't seem funny to you, you probably won't like it (although you may want to lighten up a little). If it does, well then you'll probably agree with me on this: Bill & Ted rock!!!

I am in awe

It baffles me how such insanely stupid c*** can be so popular. At no point in this utterly meaningless trash was it even remotely funny, or intelligent, or even laughable. It was just plain awful. My already faltering respect for Keanu Reeves took a deep plunge - luckily, there is "The Matrix" to hold on to...I think I need to watch it as antidote now.With the exception of "Barb Wire", this is probably one of the very worst movies I have had the misfortune to watch. The only reason I saw though it all was that I was paralysed by the awfulness and couldn't reach the remote.

A Rare Superior Sequel

This time around bad guys from the future want Bill & Ted dead so there's no peace in the future. They create robot Bill & Ted's to kill them and take their place to make them look bad. They succeed in killing them and Bill & Ted then meet Death (William Sadler from Die Hard 2) who brings them to hell. There they have to relive some of their worse memories in a scene that's more haunting and cool than it is funny.


The laughs come when they have to compete with Death in a bunch of different board games. It's supposed to be that if they beat him in one they can leave but since he's a sore loser he makes them verse him in a few different games before he gives in. The scene works since the under-rated Sadler is in good form as Death and the best reason to see this movie. The scene where Bill and Ted possess police officers gets some laughs as well though. I loved the first one as a kid but trying to get into it now can be hard since it's a bit more corny. The corniest thing about this one is the ending but otherwise it's a good looking film that's also pretty fun.

Sometimes scattershot, but a worthy sequel nonetheless

Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure was one of the surprise hit phenomenons of the late 80s. It was a pretty bizarre concept. Two heavy metallers rocketed through the ages in a time-travelling phone box. But it was surprisingly entertaining. Far more than you might imagine.It didn't seem necessary to continue, but nevertheless, three years later, Keanu Reeves and Alex Winters reunited for a further adventure, Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey.This film is a complete polar opposite to the first. It has a much darker tone, which may explain its lower box-office reception. You could easily compare Bill & Ted to the first two Back to the Future films. There are eerie similarities.Back to the Future was an enormous hit. It had a freshness and vitality. A snappy pace. A true classic. But Pt 2 was a little more frowned upon. It wasn't quite as optimistic as Pt 1. People thought its screenplay was too incomprehensible to follow. And while by no means a flop, its box-office takings weren't as impressive.You could easily say the same of Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey. And while I think Pt 1 is slightly superior, this sequel is a reasonable success. At least its not a rehash. Far from it. Its a far more ambitious project than the first one.Time travel was the crux of the first film. Here it hardly seems to matter. Its just the drop-off point for an even more wackier adventure.At the start of the film, we get to see more of the future we only glimpsed in Pt 1. The Utopian society Bill & Ted's music helped to shape. Nomolos (Joss Ackland), a 27th Century dictator is tired of a peaceful future. So he intends to change history by sending two Bill & Ted lookalikes, really machines in disguise, back in time to eliminate the real Bill & Ted.Reading that, you could be forgiven for thinking the film has ripped off the plot of The Terminator. But that's just for starters. Once Bill & Ted are killed, they wind up on a bizarre trip through Heaven and Hell, seeking help from alien scientists, and even trying to cheat Death itself (or himself, at Battleship!).Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey is quite a broth of ideas. And I thought Pt 1 was far out! This makes that film look straightforward. Screenwriters Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon have returned to pen this sequel, and they've really allowed their imaginations to wander. The film takes numerous new paths, and takes us right along with it. But for such a wacky, off the charts adventure, the film is surprisingly coherent.Somehow everything works. Despite all the different ideas being volleyed about, I never found it difficult to follow. In fact this is an even more breezier film than the first one was. It moves full steam ahead from one inspired setpiece to the next.Its hard to say which is the funniest because there are so many memorable things about it. Perhaps the most novel innovation is William Sadler's Grim Reaper. He's come to claim Bill & Ted's immortal souls, but by beating him at Battleship and Cluedo, he gets drafted into they're adventure, to take on Bill & Ted's evil lookalikes.This is by far the best thing William Sadler has ever done. Decked out in black cloak, white makeup and enormous scythe, he looks like he's having an absolute ball. He doesn't have to do very much to make you laugh. Sometimes the camera is content to linger on him standing in the background doing absolutely nothing, and you find yourself cracking up. The Grim Reaper never seemed so groovy.Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey is filled with tiny inventions. Bill & Ted's personal Hell is of gigantic Easter bunnies, hardass drill sergeants and scary Grannies. Then we have Death choosing a hoe over his trusty scythe in a department store. And yet all at the same time, the film never forgets its plot line. Stopping Nomolos's masterplan.At the end, the climax does feel a little anticlimactic. But up until then, the film steers a surprisingly steady course. I suppose a few gags here and there fall a bit flat. Ted possessing his own Dad is not as funny as it should have been, but if you like decidedly different films unlike anything you've ever seen, Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey is unmissable entertainment.And its not often you can say that about a sequel.

Weak

In 1989, a lowbrow comedy from Dino De Laurentiis called Bill And Ted's Excellent Adventure made a forty million dollar return on an estimated ten million dollar investment, virtually guaranteeing that a sequel would be put into the works. While the original was a lighthearted piece of fluff that took a boyhood fantasy shared by many and made it real, the sequel is often the sort of conformist tripe portrayed in Joss Ackland's character. You know, the kind that our titular heroes would pronounce as bogus. Indeed, bogus is the key word in this particular title.One problem with the Bill And Ted idealistic future, and one that pretty much scuttles the whole deal, is that their future is as conformist and bullying in its mentality as the people the characters regularly denounce or make fun of. In a world where everyone is apparently enamoured of the sort of try-hard glam-rock that polluted airwaves in the early 1990s, anyone who asks what the point of this crap is happens to be an enemy of the state. A truly good alternative band like My DyING BRIDE could not be allowed to exist in the Bill And Ted future. Hell, Jim Martin, who makes an ironic cameo appearance as himself early in the piece, would probably not be allowed to exist in this world.The plot essentially focuses on an old teacher of Rufus who has decided that he has had enough of the present, and wants to rewrite the past in his image. Of course, in this future where the absence of war is confused with peace, we have to ask who can blame him. But to get to the meat of the matter, this archvillian decides to send two robots back in time to kill our heroes and subvert their fledgling musical careers to put forth his message. The result, as is made clear in the trailer, is Bill and Ted struggling to put one over on Death and thwart the plans of the antagonist. I have to admit, the idea of two Californian lunkheads finding the passage back to life (let's see if anyone who subscribes to their thought pattern gets that reference) is a fairly interesting one. It's just that what is done with it in this film is not.One of the things that made Excellent Adventure work was the fact that little, if any, insight was given into the future that Rufus went back in time to try and protect. In Bogus Journey, we are shown how education is remodeled in the Bill And Ted image. Quite honestly, if the future San Diemas as depicted in this film is the screenwriters' idea of an ideal future, they can keep it. There is no argument, no difference, no disagreement, and no conflict. That sounds awfully like a description of what it is probably like to be dead to me. But if you believe the people who wrote this film, substituting one herd conformity for another will make this perfectly okay.I gave Bill And Ted's Bogus Journey a five out of ten. It has some rather amusing moments, such as when Jim Martin gets out of the phone booth. William Sadler makes an amusing Death in spite of the fact that the character as written has absolutely none of the traits that make Death as a general character work. If the writers had performed as well as these two, then my comments would be considerably different.

Not the same magic.

Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey is a good sequel to ...Excellent Adventure but I was hoping for so much more. Keanu Reeves, Alex Winter, and George Carlin reprise their role and I do like the Seventh Seal send-up of this film, the grim reaper is the best part of the film. Reeves sure makes the audience believe he is that shallow, bravo! Check this hidden treasure out sometime!

How's it hanging death?

I loved Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, but Bogus Journey was not as good, even the presence of Joss Ackland and Pam Grier could not improve it really. SMALL SPOILER: Evil Bill and Ted come from the future to kill real Bill and Ted, and it's up to our heroes to save the day! A couple of funny moments include (possessing Dad, playing games with Death, Cluedo and Twister amongst others!)It didn't have the same impact as the the first film did for me.Overall rating ** out of *****

A mostly Bogus movie with an 'excellent' exception

I hadn't seen Bill and Teds Bogus Journey in years til I was flipping channels the other night and saw it on one of the Showtime channels. I was always amused by the Bill& Ted gag, the first one is pretty good, but the second one fails to live up to the first; that is until Bill and Ted die. Once they are banished to the afterlife by Missy, err, Bills mom, err Teds mom, whatever, the best part of the movie begins. William Sadler steals the movie as Death, the Grim Reaper, who allows them to challenge him to a game for their lives. The whole movie is worth watching just to see the scenes where Death battles B&T in games of Battleship, Clue, and Twister. Sadlers performance as Death impressed me, sadly, the movie goes downhill after that, though Death has a few more funny scenes, including some in the credits where we see what becomes of Bill and Ted, as well as the Reaper.

Odd escapade of film making

What a weird film. While the first movie
was fun and entertaining, this film tried
too hard to be an actual movie. The
music, the special effects and cinematography
was too much and too artistic. They
should have made this movie as fun
loving and as entertaining as the original
instead of trying to make a legitimate
film. While the scenes with Death were
funny and entertaining, the rest of the film
lacked in so many areas. Also, what the
heck was up with the fashion of the future.
This film clearly tried too hard, and it backfired.
Quite an odd film to watch.