Bill and Ted (film)/Headscratchers


 * How did the boys know how the tape that distracted Ted's father ended? They were clearly listening to the tape to find out what it said during the first part, but by the time it ended they had left the room.
 * They were probably ad libbing it at that point. Didn't they mention not remembering how it ended on the tape?

"Ted: "Dude, it's Sigmund Frood." Bill: "How much time we got left?" Ted: "Tons. Why?" Bill (grins): "Extra credit, dude.""
 * Bill and Ted pass their history presentation with flying colors, but a large portion of the presentation was delivered by the historical figures. How would your high-school history teacher react if you brought in a Lincoln impersonator to deliver your final presentation on your behalf?
 * ... You made a JBM page to ask that?
 * I would find it sufficiently awesome. Definite A+. Remember that they brought in the hot stepmom to help, shall we say, "influence" the teacher's decision as well.
 * They probably gave them extra points for effort for the whole 'show' aspect of it. Plus, it was probably assumed the "impersonators" were acting off of Bill and Ted's direction. Also consider, for the ones that didn't speak English, the two of them did participate in the presentation.
 * It's suggested that their assignment only required three or four historical personages -- after getting Napoleon, Billy the Kid, and Socrates, Bill and Ted were ready to get a medieval serf and then wrap things up. It's only after they accidentally landed in Austria that Bill decides to snag Sigmund Freud and more historical dudes for extra credit.


 * I find it a bit more troubling that Billy the Kid fired a real gun in a crowded theater and nobody seemed to really care.
 * Nobody knew that it was a real gun. They probably thought it was a prop.
 * A "prop" that shoots out light bulbs?
 * Compare the presentations given by other students: the girl who says Marie Antoinette in our day might say "Let them eat fast food," and the guy whose presentation ends with "San Dimas High School football rules!" I think their teacher has adjusted his expectations accordingly.
 * Had it been me, they would have at least lost some points for Socrates, whose section of the presentation consisted of telling people that he loves baseball and San Dimas.
 * It's not just a history report, it's a presentation on how historical personalities would respond to modern-day San Dimas. Besides, the editing makes it seem like Socrates had more of a contribution than what was shown.
 * Very few impersonators (except maybe Elvis ones) know everything there is to know about the person they portray and their lives, at least not to the extent and detail as the one who actually lived it. The same goes for actors, unless you are speaking of ones who totally immerse themselves in their characters or who are just devoted to doing a good job. But Bill and Ted wouldn't be able to afford such people, or even be able to find them and convince them to perform in their school report (as it is, the fact they were accepted as actors at all must be because of their living in SoCal and thus able to find and pay cheap actors). Ergo, the teacher would have to assume that the "actors" were given their scripts and coached by Bill and Ted, so that all the information given and its verisimilitude/accuracy would be ascribed to them as well. Thus, the A.


 * Why are Lincoln, Beethoven, and Freud so blase about being kidnapped?? Especially Lincoln. I'll grant that it would relatively easy for someone with a time machine to be able to kidnap the president, but not without his objecting. I mean, the man has a country and a war to oversee to and none of these folks, from what I know of them, would take very kindly to being abducted by a couple of jerkoffs who want help with a school project. Maybe when they heard what was at stake, but Beethoven couldn't even understand English. (The movie's Beethoven: I don't know whether the real one could or not.)
 * I think the logic of the movie is, more or less, "Lincoln was a good dude; he'd quickly recognize that our heroes are basically good dudes." If you're not satisfied with that level of logic, I think you've got the wrong movie.
 * Not to mention, wouldn't you want to know what the future was like? He was probably pissed at first, but decided this was a golden opportunity to see what life would be like. Let's hope he didn't ask anyone how his presidency ended...
 * Funny story: About 2 weeks before his assassination, Lincoln had a dream where he saw himself dead. He believed that dreams were windows to the future, but that is was wrong to try and change the future. If he did find out about his death, he would have probably been OK with it, seeing as how he kept the union together and ended slavery.
 * Knowing that he'd be considered a great president by future generations, rather than blamed for letting the war get started in the first place, was probably very vindicating also.
 * As for Beethoven, Freud could have translated for him.
 * When Napoleon was being watched over by the family, why did he not cut the boy's throat when he called the proud Emperor a dick? I would not have allowed that were I Napoleon. I'd execute him and his entire family.
 * Did Napoleon speak English either? Would he have known the modern meaning of "dick"?
 * Yeah, all Napoleon would've had to do was give one order and his army--Oh, wait, right. He was just an unarmed, overdressed man who didn't speak the language he was being insulted in. Napoleon was a leader; even if he was going to order an execution, he wouldn't be the one doing it, and he had no army to do it with.
 * Plus, he had no power at all. Were they in his royal court of France in his proper time, then yes he could've had them arrested and did to them what he pleased. Since he wasn't...
 * Unarmed? He had a sword on his person.
 * But he's not Ax Crazy. Even if he could understand the boy (which, as said, is pretty doubtful anyway), it's a stretch to say Napoleon, while lost in a strange new world surrounded by people speaking a foreign language, would suddenly just grab his sword and start killing people. Even if he'd like to, he's smart enough to know that he doesn't have any sort of authority in this situation. Remember, Napoleon didn't inherit the title of Emperor, he earned it through military conquest and political skill.
 * Plus, it's a bratty kid who called him that. Is he supposed to be so petty as to dignify a child's rudeness with Disproportionate Retribution? Give the guy some credit for having a bit of honor.
 * Don't know about the others, but Joan of Arc probably thought Bill and Ted were angels and would be quite willing to do whatever they wanted. She would've excused their odd language as being the language of Heaven, which she would consider herself not yet worthy to understand.
 * So a woman who'd dedicated her life to expelling the English from her homeland didn't notice or care that angels were speaking the language of her enemies?
 * Modern American English and the English that Joan would have known are considerably different. She may even have had a revelation that "Angels can speak in English", which led to her becoming a pacifist and revealing herself as a girl, causing a stable time-loop.
 * This is supported by how exactly their approach to her was handled--she was praying in church, the booth landed right in front of her as if in response to her prayer, and they didn't even speak, simply extending their hands to her. By the time she found out who they really were (and that they spoke English) she was already on her way, and could be convinced that the mission was necessary to save the world or some such. Just knowing her story was set down and remembered, that she had fulfilled God's mission well enough for that, would be enough for her. Not to mention the whole time travel thing would seem like something divine to her anyway.
 * Shouldn't Napoleon have freaked out six ways from Sunday when he met Joan of Arc? She's only the literal patron saint of his empire, for cryin' out loud!
 * Maybe Napoleon didn't place much emphasis on Joan until the meeting. Or it could have been seen as celebrating the saint. Also, she was canonized in 1920, while Napoleon's reign ended in 1814 (although he'd have a three-month second tenure the following year), and he died in 1821, so she wasn't yet even a saint. It should also be pointed out that Napolean spent most of his time with Ted's younger brother and his friends. He didn't meet Joan until the end when it came time to do the presentation.
 * That said, why didn't Billy the Kid freak out when meeting a former president? Why didn't Freud freak out when meeting Beethoven? Wouldn't all of the Western historical figures be impressed to meet Socrates? Wouldn't most of them be scared of Genghis Kahn? There isn't enough time in the movie to deal with all of that. Besides, since it was a movie aimed as mostly teens, they would probably find such scenes boring and confusing.
 * Also, as a point of interest, Beethoven was, in real life and as it is implied in the movie, totally deaf. So no, I don't think either version understood English.
 * Beethoven became deaf in his late 20s. He was not deaf his entire life (although he did pretty much compose the entirety of his Ninth Symphony while deaf).
 * It's a moot point, since he was well past his late 20s in the movie.
 * And then there's the Rule of Funny: the guys drag him off while he's playing, and he still thinks he is playing. C'mon. He was deaf, not blind. But hey, ROF. So one can possibly let it slide.
 * Blase? Where did you get that impression? Lincoln protested rather vehemently when they grabbed him, and so did Freud (they had to have Billy the Kid lasso him and drag him in!). The only one who didn't was Beethoven and that was, as stated, due to the Rule of Funny regarding his deafness. Also note that when the booth first landed, Freud eyed it very closely and curiously; he likely thought he was hallucinating or otherwise having a delusion, and was thus trying to analyze it to figure out what was going on in his psyche. By the time they all get to the future, everything would have been explained to them; even aside from what was at stake, Lincoln would see it as a noble endeavor supporting the study of history, Beethoven would surely appreciate the chance to show off his music where he knows it is appreciated, and Freud might have still believed it all to be a dream or psychological disorder and thus played along with it to study it, because he found it fascinating. (Similarly, imagine Socrates trying to philosophically contemplate what was happening to him and why!) The others, again, would either have been concerned with saving the future, or have enjoyed showing off their prowess/knowledge for the benefit of posterity. (Except Genghis Khan, who just seemed to enjoy showing off period.)


 * I'm just wondering at the viability of our future Messiahs if they are so quick to abduct a quasi-cannibalistic sociopathic warlord like Gengis Kahn and then release him into a crowded California mall. He attacked a mannequin with a metal bat... let's consider ourselves lucky he didn't defile and/or murder any of the children in the play area. Why didn't they pick up Hitler? At least he never killed anyone with his own hands... except himself... and his dog... :(
 * Well, he did sign with his own hands the documents that allowed The Final Solution to take place. So...Yeah.
 * Bill and Ted probably didn't want to pick up Hitler because even they knew he was a totally bogus dude dickweed.
 * Genghis Khan gets a pretty bad reputation. While his armies were certainly composed of barbarians, he himself was quite an intelligent and capable leader. Life in the Mongol Empire was actually pretty okay -- local elections, rather than a feudal system; the first postal service; women treated comparatively better than they were in Europe; etc.
 * Pretty much this. And if you don't accept that Bill and Ted knew about his qualifications as a leader consider this: Hitler, in addition to being a total dickweed, was a tiny little failed painter. Genghis Khan, on the other hand, is f****ing metal!
 * Is there any historical record that Napoleon would've done something like arrange the execution of an entire family? If you want to have an emperor do something like that, then you go make your own movie. Don't think I'll be rooting for the emperor, though...


 * Anyone else annoyed by the horrific facial hair Bill and Ted sprouted at the Battle Of The Bands in Bogus Journey? After going through 1.9 movies with the two of them clean-shaven, watching them do the final song with that look was rather disturbing.
 * This troper didn't like the look of the beards either. On the other hand, the alternative would've been to cosmetically age them by a few years, and seeing those two looking, y'know, even remotely mature might have made their fans' heads asplode. Also counts as a Rule of Funny Shout-Out to ZZ Top.


 * If dialing the phone number for San Dimas one number lower takes them into last night, then why should Bill and Ted worry about the clock in San Dimas "always running"? They should be able to have complete control over when they get back. Hell, Ted has a trash can materialize out of thin air at the precise moment he needs it, and they're worried about missing the report.
 * They have to worry about the clock because they're getting older. That means that if they travel back in time for a year, when they show up for the presentation, they are a year older. If they travel around for 50 years, they will show up at the same moment - 50 years older. They also need to sleep, eat, etc, they aren't simply in a place where time doesn't affect them
 * Rufus explaining that "the clock in San Dimas is always running" gives their adventures a deadline; considering how much time they spend goofing off BEFORE they get a time machine, they'd probably spend a couple of years using the booth to see vintage Sabbath and Maiden concerts, or getting drunk in the Old West. The deadline is basically a semi-lampshaded excuse to move the plot forward in a time travel movie. And Rufus giving no justification to it can be lumped in with what Bill and Ted simply don't know about time travel technology. "How?". "Modern Technology, William..."
 * And speaking of the trash can, Bill and Ted broke out a bunch of people from jail. Forget that they're historical figures; no one is going to buy that story. They committed a federal offense. Just because Ted's dad realizes that they're part of Ted's report does not mean they're off the hook; they should have faced some serious jail time themselves...unless someone from the future came back to change their minds.


 * Why was Beethoven arrested along with the other historical figures? I mean, he didn't do anything wrong, aside from possibly hogging the piano, and even then the music store owner could have just thrown him out.
 * It seemed like the music store owner was trying to throw him out, and probably called the cops when that didn't work.
 * On the subject of Beethoven, why would he be impressed with a synthesizer keyboard? The man was at least partially deaf when he composed Fur Elise (He was playing it when Bill and Ted kidnapped him- and he didn't seem to notice a phone booth landed just behind him.) and wouldn't even feel much of a vibration from a modern sound synthesizer, unless it had one hell of a bass boost.
 * Possibly he'd stopped by a shop that sold hearing aids first?
 * My understanding is that Beethoven was stone deaf, so a hearing aid wouldn't have helped. I have to admit, this bugged the hell out of me the last time I saw the movie.
 * The answer's mostly just Rule of Cool, but maybe it was the lack of vibration rather than the sound that intrigued him about the keyboard. Perhaps he felt just enough vibration from the speakers to realize it's working, but since the keys don't use strings he could play it a whole lot faster than an ordinary piano.
 * Beethoven didn't go completely deaf until about 1814, and could still hear (although poorly) as late as 1812. Fur Elise was composed between 1810 and 1812. Beethoven probably figured out how to turn the volume on the keyboards all the way up, which is why he was having such a good time playing. ("I can hear the music! This is awesome!") Although why anybody would object to the Maestro playing as loud as he damn well wanted is beyond me.
 * He was playing the music obnoxiously loud, in order to let him hear. This most likely annoyed the store-owner who (after asking for him to leave) called the police.


 * I know the first movie more or less runs on Rule of Funny, but still, how did the writers ever expect their notion of time travel to work? Rufus has to travel to the past to help the guys pass their history report to save the future... that presumably wouldn't exist without them having passed their history report in the first place. The writers didn't even try to come up with some valid reason why the timeline goes askew, it just does. I saw this movie when it first came out in the theater, and even at age ten or so I still thought this was bullshit. The second movie at least has a viable villain to explain the timeline change.
 * Bill & Ted has an unchangeable timeline. Rufus went back to the past to start the chain of events that leads to the utopia he lives in. He always was the one to do it, and he always succeeded in doing it.
 * That still doesn't answer the question though. Assuming you're right, there are at least two possibilities for what happened in the very first iteration of the timeline: (1) B&T pass their history test without Rufus' help, thus raising the question of why Rufus needed to go back in the first place; or (2) B&T fail their test, but still manage to stay together and form Wyld Stallyns despite the setback, which again raises the question above. At the very beginning, one or the other had to happen in order to create the utopian future that Rufus is supposed to protect, so why does he have to be involved at all? The only way your theory can work is if the time loop has been going on, unending, since the beginning of time itself; otherwise it had to start somewhere. And anyway, even assuming you're right, doesn't that remove any sense of urgency from the movie? No matter what happens, B&T are going to succeed; they can't not succeed, so why should the audience care? (I hope this is making sense and I'm not talking out my ass. Needless to say I still love the movies despite all this blathering, or else I wouldn't be blathering in the first place.)
 * It's a Stable Time Loop. The utopia Rufus comes from exists because he went back in time and helped the heroes pass the test. The suspense comes from the fact that the audience doesn't know this yet.
 * If they failed, Ted's father was going to send him to an Alaskan military school. They never would have formed Wyld Stallions. There is no Wyld Stallions music to inspire the world. No utopian future. I believe that was the logic spelled out by Rufus at the beginning of the movie.
 * That was spelled out at the beginning of the movie which is pretty much why the question was asked. If Rufus was able to come from a utopian future to save the utopian future... then that future came to be. The threat to the future was the presentation, so as someone has already pointed out, either they could have passed it without Rufus (and did, making Rufus's future even possible for him to leave) or they were able to influence the world even after they failed. Rufus COULD have come from a dystopian future that somehow figured out they could have averted the misery by having Wyld Stallyns pass, thus giving him a mission to change the future... but having coming back to preserve a past that already happened makes little sense. Another way could be for another time traveler to knock Bill & Ted off course, so Rufus has to fix it. Otherwise, this cycle of Rufus saving the presentation has never been and will never be in danger because there is no other outcome... and makes one curious how it started. It also necessarily removes suspense. Rufus having the life he wants to protect = succeeds in protecting it. The audience can see he succeeds in the first cycle of time loop because he knew the outcome of his success.
 * Who says that the very first time-line was utopian? Or maybe they just barely passed it by extreme studying and just barely made a utopia. The people from one line in the future saw that it was way too close to leave to 'chance' and decided to intervene. And we get maybe the tenth or the seventh or even the second time.
 * Or maybe De Nomolos snuck back from Wyld Stallyns-Utopia and, in a first attempt to change the past in his favor, anonymously arranged for the pair of them to win concert tickets on the night when, in the original time-travel-free timeline, they'd finally buckled down and written their history reports. They go to the concert instead, putting history in peril and necessitating Rufus's intervention.
 * None of these arguments can change the fact that any hypothetical Rufus-free timeline could never work. Why not? Because Rufus informs them at the end that the two medieval-era princesses were also in the band. Even if the boys had passed their history test on their own, Wyld Stallyns would still be missing its keyboardist and drummer without Rufus's help.
 * They're in the band now. That doesn't mean that they were always in the band. Basically think of it this way: You have Timeline 1, where Bill and Ted just barely passed their exam, went on to modest success at the Battle of the Bands, and eventually got famous enough to create a decent semi-utopia. Historians in this semi-utopia look back at history, realize how much of a close call all of this was, and decide that since time travel exists now any little thing could disrupt history a bit and cause it not to happen, so they instead send an agent back to help Bill and Ted with their report. This creates Timeline 2, where things go a little better and smoother. Each timeline refines the method they use to give Bill and Ted help, probably helped out by their own time travel agents and Bill and Ted's own accounts of their adventures in that timeline. By the time you get to the one we see in the movie, it might be on Timeline 342 or something, and in this one Bill and Ted meet the princesses, and thus in the resulting Timeline 343 that this creates, the princesses are part of the band. (Since Rufus is the crossover from 342 to 343, he can tell them this.) The previous 341 timelines might have had Bill and Ted as the only members, or they might have recruited Station via other means later on, or they just had a couple of backup members who eventually went on to other things, or whatever.


 * Why does De Nomolos pass out revised history books before the timeline has changed? How does he know how history will unfold? Or is he just guessing, or doing it out of ego?
 * He doesn't care what will actually have happened. That's the history he plans to teach when he's in charge, whether it's true or not.


 * Why did Joan of Arc hijack the exercise class? I understood everyone else's actions, but that just seemed random.
 * Maybe she took it for military training and was getting them ready to fight the English?
 * Yeah, I think her thought process was "oh, they're in combat training! But I've never seen this style before. Hey, it looks like fun!" ...and then her being a natural leader who's used to rallying troops just kinda took over.


 * Presumably, the time machine could have taken any form since it starts out as a fairly abstract-looking crystalline structure made out of gold or brass or something. So... why a phone both, which would have stood out in just about every time period save maybe a twenty-year span with 1988 right in the middle (if that makes any sense)? Why not, say, a tree or a rock? And worse yet, why does nobody comment on it?
 * It got busted in their first trip through time so it's likely that it was unable to change shape. Very much like the TARDIS from Doctor Who. As for people reacting to it, the cavemen were freaking out when they saw it but otherwise, it seemed like it was usually more or less out of the way.
 * It needed to be something simple enough for Bill and Ted to wrap their heads around.


 * In Bogus Journey, at the beginning, De Nomolos - who is half a millennium in the future - speaks like he is speaking from B&T's time. e.g. something like "They are about to reach the second major turning point in their career". But the battle of the bands was hundreds of years ago!
 * It's really just for dramatic effect: he's speaking from the perspective of the time frame he's focused on, like a documentary narrator saying something like "and now that Berlin's fallen, the Allies begin to focus their efforts on Japan". Living in a world where time travel is commonplace, people in the future are probably used to talking about the past as though it's another place existing in the present.


 * The comic book adaptations depict the Grim Reaper as the traditional skeleton in a robe, suggesting that the Reaper in Bogus Journey is basically a low-rent version of that. That said, how to the boys manage to give Death a melvin when Death has no crotch?
 * Well, the skeletal version of Death can talk without having a throat, so I'm guessing his groin works the same way?
 * Hey, hey, he's a not "low rent" version of a skeleton. He's an extended Shout-Out to the Grim Reaper's appearance in The Seventh Seal. The odd thing isn't that he looks human in the movie, but that they didn't keep that look in the comic book (maybe because they would have had to keep paying extra royalties, or they just thought the joke would be lost in comic-book format).
 * According to the author of the comic adaptation, he was working from the Bogus Journey script and assumed that Death was the traditional skeletal version. By the time he found out it wasn't, he didn't have time to change it. Said author also stated that he likes the skeletal version better, which is probably why that's the one in the comic series that followed.


 * Not necessarily Bill & Ted, but in Bogus Journey, Bill and Ted get the idea to possess people to get help in their murder. Bill questions it, and Ted says "Hey, it worked in The Exorcist...1 and 3". What happened in The Exorcist 2?
 * Oddly enough, the demon didn't really possess anyone in the second movie; at least, possession wasn't as central to the plot. Or Ted's just taking a Fanon Discontinuity shot at the first sequel.
 * Plus, y'know... that's the joke.
 * In the end credits montage of the second movie, why as the Grim Reaper wearing a space suit? It's not like he'd need it.
 * Because it's how he acts. "Why don't I get a space suit?" "Dude. You're Death. You don't need it." "But it looks comfy." "It's not, dude, you're not missing anything!" "Oh. Well. Okay. I guess I will be the only one standing there without a space suit. Everyone else will be looking like an astronaut but I will be just-" "DUDES! Someone get Death a friggin' space suit already!"
 * He probably doesn't need to breathe, but he seems to use what is basically a normal human body most of the time. There's no logical way to asphyxiate Death, but there should really be no logical way to melvin him either.
 * Anyone else find it a little sad that Bill and Ted befriend all of these historical figures... most of whom died in tragic and sometimes violent ways? Lincoln: assassinated. Socrates: unjustly executed. Joan of Arc: burnt at the stake. Beethoven: possibly poisoned. Billy the Kid: likely shot to death (although his status as a criminal is debateable so it's either a justifiable death or an unjustifiable death depending on what accounts you subscribe to). Kahn and Napolean weren't exactly the nicest guys so maybe their deaths aren't as much of a Tear Jerker as the others.
 * One of the Wild Mass Guessings here suggests that Bill and Ted's interactions with those folks caused their untimely deaths, in some Timey Wimey way. Sorry if that made you cry some more! (Also, you forgot Freud's death, perhaps the saddest of them all.) Meanwhile, in terms of Real Life, it doesn't seems like a stretch to suppose that there's a strong correlation between lasting historical fame and getting killed; if you stick your head out far enough it'll be chopped off. (At least, when it comes to political/military leaders, which four of those folks were.)
 * Oh yes, Frued suffered from Cancer, then asked his friend to kill him via morphine overdose. They really did get some tragic figures, didn't they?
 * Bill and Ted idolize rock stars. I'm sure they're used to the concept of people they like and admire dying badly.
 * This is actually Played for Laughs in one of the comic books. Bill and Ted need guidance, so they go to visit the wisest person they know; Socrates. Who is just about to drink the hemlock that will end his life. After annoying the hell out of him (he can apparently understand them in this continuity), he is actually quite enthusiastic about drinking the stuff.
 * It occurs to me that most of those figures could be the Ur Example on how to Face Death with Dignity. All of them are remembered centuries (or millennia) after they die. Knowing this, they'd probably feel better about their inevitable deaths. After all, everybody dies sooner or later, and somebody like Lincoln would probably take comfort knowing that he won the war, freed the slaves, and was rememberd as one of the greatest Presidents in history.