The Wyld Stallyns ride again! It’s been a bumpy road for Bill and Ted 3: Face the Music, there is finally an end in sight. Stars Alex Winter and Keanu Reeves confirmed that the long-awaited third installment in the most righteous Bill and Ted series will begin filming this summer, with an eye toward a summer 2020 release.
The announcement came on the official Orion Pictures YouTube channel, where Reeves and Winter make the announcement at the famous Hollywood Bowl. While the Bill and Ted 3 filming and release dates are the big news, most of the video is actually a tribute to Bill and Ted‘s dedicated and patient fans. “We owe you a huge debt of gratitude and we wanted to say thank you,” Winter says, before both actors drop Bill and Ted’s catchphrase, “Be excellent.”
Previous reports indicated that Bill and Ted 3: Face the Music will see the time-traveling rockers suffering from a cosmic midlife crisis. “Basically, they’re supposed to write a song to save the world and they haven’t done that,” Reeves said on The Graham Norton Show. That pressure, as well as Bill and Ted’s crumbling family lives, come to a head when a time-traveler warns them that if they don’t write the fabled tune, time itself will break apart.
In 2012, news broke that that Galaxy Quest director Dean Parisot had signed on to Bill and Ted 3: Face the Music, while original Bill and Ted screenwriters Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon would return to pen the script. According to Winter, that was still the plan in 2018, although Reeves quickly cast doubt on the sequel’s future, claiming that rights issues and financial concerns threatened to scuttle the production.
Judging by the latest announcement, those conflicts have been settled, although it’s not clear if Parisot is still attached to the project. William Sadler, who played Death in Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey, is expected to reprise his role for the sequel.
Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure debuted in 1989, and told the story of two rock and roll-obsessed teenagers who traveled through time in order to pass their high school history class, ensuring that their band, the Wyld Stallyns, would eventually bring peace and harmony to the world. In the follow-up, Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey, Bill and Ted died, and had to escape hell to make their local battle of the bands competition
