When Bill & Ted Face the Music was released in 2020, as a completist, I realized that I would have to rewatch Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey because too much time had passed for me to accurately maintain any mental continuity and integrity in recalling the storylines and truly appreciate the latest installment of the franchise. Unfortunately the pandemic’s effects has kept me so busy that it is hard to even watch one television show episode, forget three movies in a row, but I somehow set aside enough energy and time to do it in chronological order.

Bill & Ted Face The Music is the third installment in the franchise. In order to save the world, Preston and Logan must create a song to unite the universe, but they have not made a good song in decades, are endangering their marriage and their financial wellbeing by trying to create this song and have set an example that their daughters may be following. Will they be able to get it together to save their families and the universe or will the this challenge finally break them?

I feel really ambivalent about Bill & Ted Face The Music. The titular characters in this installment were the most relatable as adults than they were when they were younger. They finally seemed to be daunted and under a lot of pressure to reach their potential while running out of time so this film seems realistic and credible as a film about aging and actually confronting your own shortcomings and mortality, but um, this is Bill and Ted. What makes them special is their confidence that together, they can achieve anything while acknowledging and accepting their lack of ability and relying on others.

While it makes sense that after three decades, these characters would be different than when they were young, there are moments when Bill & Ted Face The Music feels as if they do not completely understand what makes them great. For instance, when the couples go to couples’ therapy, the close friendship becomes a problem, not an asset, in the way that they interact with their wives. While it is funny, it is inconsistent with their behavior in Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey when they propose to the princesses. While they did it together, they were still separate and could speak as individuals. (Or am I remembering that incorrectly?) It is such inconsistencies which make the overall story feel weaker and have less integrity than its antecedents.

At the end of Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey, we meet their kids with an unexpected plot twist that little Bill and little Ted are actually their daughters, not sons. Bill & Ted Face The Music feels a bit like an apology for the problematic depiction of women in the first film by trying to treat them as three-dimensional characters who exist independently from the titular characters with mixed success. Characters such as Kelly, the messenger from the future, whom the comedic genius Kristen Schaal plays, and The Great Leader, her mother, whom the legendary Holland Taylor plays, have some of the best mother daughter riffs and imperfectly held power. I adored Brittany Runs a Marathon’s Jillian Bell’s therapist. Even though I enjoy Glee’s Jayma Mays and television veteran Erinn Hayes’ performances as the princesses, it was disappointing that the actors were visibly younger than their husbands and more polished than their earlier counterparts. The previous actors playing the princesses seemed more down to earth. Samara Weaving and Brigette Lundy-Paine as their daughters felt more like an impression of Bill and Ted than original characters who happened to have Bill and Ted as their fathers. It felt gimmicky as if they were begging for a spinoff, but this time with women. I would not watch it. I have seen Weaving in a few films, and she feels as if she is acting instead of disappearing in her role.

When I found out that Lundy-Paine was nonbinary, I realized that Bill & Ted Face The Music missed an opportunity to truly explore and challenge gender though it tried in its costume choices. I think that their heart is in the right place, but they do not quite get it. I appreciate the effort, but I actually do not need a Bill & Ted movie to be anything more than a movie about Bill & Ted so when it tries and fails to do more than focus on the chemistry and friendship, they are not sticking to writing what they know. After all, they are just a bunch of guys. So are Bill & Ted. I like all these guys, but if they decide to do more, they need to bring more diversity in the writing room, not just the screen. Sorry Matt Damon.

Bill & Ted Face The Music’s plot points feel like a mashup of Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey because it toggles between using time travel and spiritual dimension travel to move the plot forward. My problem with the first half of the movie lies in the titular characters moving forward in time to get help from their future selves. Considering how the movie is resolved, it seems inconsistent with this plot point though it did appear that maybe the film was trying to tackle parallel universes. Either way, I do not accept a Bill and Ted being so horrible though it was objectively funny. Along those lines, there is a spectacular post credit scene that is worth the wait and elderly Keanu Reeves is hotter than middle aged, no facial hair Reeves. Why did y’all make him shave?!?

Bill & Ted Face The Music does beat earlier installments in the way that it credibly depicts how figures from the past could interact with each other. This film’s theme of music as a universal language that transcends time works and created an emotional cascade that made it the most touching of all the films. I hate emotional manipulation, but it worked, and I felt something at the end of the film as music becomes the unifying force in the face of divisions such as time, country, race and gender. I do have to award a side eye that the one black woman musician was basically preverbal. Even Buffy the Vampire Slayer did it better when it depicted the first slayer. Is Kid Cudi one of the all-time, great musical legends? Fact check, please. The musical theme leant a festive, New Year’s air to the doomsday clock.

If the Grim Reaper was the unexpected best supporting character introduced in Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey, then Bill & Ted Face The Music prove that lightning can strike twice with the introduction of Dennis Caleb McCoy, an awkward killer robot from the future. He stole every scene, but when he lands in hell, I never wanted those scenes to end. I literally laughed out loud and thought that he should just tuck the movie under his arm with the demons and Schnaal just riffing for the rest of the movie and leaving the stars behind.

Missy is still problematic except now she may be a pedophile. The casting of Ted’s little brother does not make mathematical sense given what we knew about him from the earlier movies. Ted’s father’s overall character arc works.

Bill & Ted Face The Music gets better as it unfolds and ends on an emotionally resonant note, but is at its weakest when it feels like a rehash with a lack of continuity or a cynical audition for future sequels. It is the most visually beautiful of all the films.