The Ending Of Bill & Ted Face The Music Explained

Bill & Ted Face the Music is finally here, and we're betting that you, like us, found it to be a most excellent reality-hopping adventure full of wit, warmth, and heart. Fans have waited a very, very long time for the belated sequel to 1989's Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure and 1991's Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey, and the flick did not disappoint. It finds our heroes in a most precarious predicament: It's not every day that you find out that you're responsible not only for the fate of the world, but for all of reality as we know it. And it's definitely not every day that you have to deal with several (increasingly disturbing) versions of yourself in the quest for the song that will set everything right. That, though, is the position that our bodacious friends Bill S. Preston, Esq. (Alex Winter) and Ted "Theordore" Logan (Keanu Reeves) find themselves in — and with only a scant 77 minutes to write the song and perform it at a mysterious location known only as "MP 46."

That's not even all; the duo also has to contend with a time-traveling, murderous robot named Dennis (Anthony Carrigan), while unbeknownst to them, their daughters Theodora "Thea" Preston (Samara Weaving) and Wilhelmina "Billie" Logan (Brigette Lundy-Paine) have gone off on their own journey throughout time to help their dads out by putting together a most excellent band to back them up. But that's not exactly the way it works out — and now would be a good time for us to warn you that we'll be venturing into massive spoiler territory for Bill & Ted Face the Music from here on out.

At the film's beginning, Bill and Ted are dragged in front of a panel of future dudes in the year 2720 by Kelly (Kristen Schaal), the daughter of their original time-traveling mentor, Rufus (George Carlin, who briefly appears via stock footage, making us tear up). The future dudes are none too pleased with the duo's failure to write the song that was supposed to unite the world, and they're informed of just how dire the circumstance has become by the Great Leader (Holland Taylor): a song, to be written by "Preston-Logan" must be performed at "MP 46" in exactly 77 minutes — or time and reality itself will cease to exist.

They embark on a series of travails involving multiple iterations of their future selves and a trip to Hell to make up with Death (William Sadler) and save their daughters and all of the bodacious musicians they've collected throughout history (thanks a lot, Dennis). Finally, the duo — accompanied by Thea, Billie, Death, Kid Cudi, Jimi Hendrix, Louis Armstrong, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Chinese flutist Ling Lun, and prehistoric drummer Grom — arrive on a crowded highway just as reality seems to be totally falling apart. Fortunately, they happen to be in the right place — mile post 46, or "MP 46" — and as Billie and Thea begin to assemble and warm up the band, Bill and Ted arrive at a stunning realization.

"It's you," they tell their daughters. "Girls, you're not here to back us. We're here to back you." Sure enough, despite their protests that they can't write music, their Dads' encouragement to just "listen a little, make things you like, and put it all together" inspires them to coach the historical figures into performing a truly epic tune — but to save all of reality, it's not enough for their audience, which happens to be everyone across all of time and space thanks to the bodacious wormhole opening up in the skies above, to simply listen.

As the band starts to warm up, Bill and Ted realize that they'll have to get everybody throughout history to play along, which means that they'll have to distribute instruments to everyone who has ever existed... in seven minutes. Fortunately, Kid Cudi is on the scene, and he happens to be surprisingly knowledgeable about quantum physics. With his assistance, Bill and Ted use their trusty phone booth to become "infinite" versions of themselves, which are able to quickly carry out the mission of equipping everybody in history with guitars, drums, horns, and cowbells (Jesus Christ's instrument of choice, oddly enough).

As everyone throughout time begins to play the same song, reality suddenly begins to stabilize. The historical figures and settings which had become jumbled and out-of-place throughout the film are returned to their proper times and places, and the future dudes realize that the universe is not folding in on itself. As Bill and Ted join the band to perform the most epic guitar solo ever (even earning a look of approval from Hendrix himself), we hear Billie and Thea, in voiceover, offer a succinct summary. "And so, it wasn't so much the song that made the difference," Billie says, leaving the last word for Thea: "It was everyone playing it together."

Over the closing credits, we indeed see a wide cross-section of people all over the world jamming out to the same song — a message of unity that has perhaps never been more sorely needed than it is in 2020. That this message was delivered by Bill, Ted, and their most righteous daughters Thea and Billie, somehow doesn't surprise us in the least.

Bill & Ted Face the Music took nearly 30 years to make it to the screen, and now that it's finally here, fans have wasted no time at all in speculating about whether there could be a Bill & Ted 4 in our future. As it turns out, this question has been asked of screenwriters Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon, who wrote all three Bill & Ted movies and have been right beside Winter and Reeves, lobbying for Face the Music to get made, for all those years.

The dudes' answer was a bit of a mixed bag. "I think three [movies] is the magic number of storytelling," Matheson said, speaking with GameSpot. "It's the beginning, and the middle, and the end... It's a strange rhythm to the Bill & Ted story, because the beginning [and] the middle happened very close together. And the end is very, very delayed... [but I] can't imagine what else there would be to say about them." Solomon agreed, saying, "I think we both — Chris and I — feel like the Bill & Ted story has completed itself." However, he did allow one caveat: "I could see a story for Billie and Thea."

That's all we needed to hear. Sure, the world has been united and reality has been saved — but if the Circuits of Time should ever get all tangled up again, we're pretty sure those future dudes know who they should call. We have a sneaking suspicion that we'll be seeing Thea "Little Ted" Preston and Billie "Little Bill" Logan again... probably as they're about to embark on a most excellent adventure.