Ed Solomon reveals the original ending for Bill & Ted Face the Music

As we all hoped it would, BILL & TED FACE THE MUSIC arrived as one of the most triumphant films of this year. Clocking in at a perfect 91 minutes long, the third film featuring Bill and Ted's excellent adventures through time manages to pack nearly every minute with heart, humor, and call-backs to what's made the series so appealing since the original's 1989 release. It's well known that BILL & TED FACE THE MUSIC was a labor of love for all involved, especially when you consider that the movie took over a decade to go from concept to screen. You simply don't get that amount of determination unless everyone involved truly believes in the project, even when it goes through a variety of script permutations during its evolution.

Recently while speaking with Collider, BILL & TED FACE THE MUSIC co-writer Ed Solomon revealed that the film once had a very different ending, one that he and Chris Matheson felt needed to change if their grand finale was to be as bodacious as the series deserved. In the final version of the film, it's Bill and Ted's daughters who help compose the song that unites the world in peace and harmony. It's the kind of twist that not a lot of fans saw coming, but in watching the film, it all makes sense in a very touching and deserving manner.

As I was saying, Ed Solomon talked about the film's original ending on The Collider Podcast, saying:

Our first draft that we wrote in 2010, the ending of the movie was really small. We had a scene at the beginning where 20 years ago they had put $100,000 down to rent the Rose Bowl for their triumphant 20th Reunion Tour, and when we meet them in the movie when it opens they have sold literally zero tickets. We had a scene where they went to negotiate with the guy to try and get their money back and the guy was like, ‘No, you’re stuck’. The whole movie was moving towards this ending, and the guys were thinking, ‘Well obviously it must be at the Rose Bowl. Obviously we’re gonna fill the Rose Bowl with this triumphant song, we just don’t know how.’ And the whole movie happens like it happens [in Face the Music], they go into the future, their lives get worse and worse, and they arrive at the Rose Bowl and it’s empty. There’s no instruments there. It didn’t happen. They failed. And they go home and they sit down in their living room, and you’re like one minute from the end of the movie. And they realize they failed, they feel like they failed, and then they hear music coming from the other room and they walk in and they look and see their kids and they realize it was never them, and the movie’s over.

As it turns out, Alex Winter and Keanu Reeves thought the above-mentioned ending was pretty bogus, and so work on making the finale far more triumphant began:

That was the first ending that we had, and Alex and Keanu were, I think correctly, like, ‘Uh, that’s sort of a bummer’ (laughs). We’ve had this experience on the first two Bill and Ted movies, where I thought a smaller ending [would be better]. In Excellent Adventure the movie ended in the classroom, [with Bill and Ted bringing the historical figures in]… We went in and we reshot with the rock concert-y ending, and we rewrote the ending scene to make it bigger and more triumphant. And then we had to reshoot the ending of Bogus Journey as well, so we thought, ‘Alright, here at the end of Face the Music, are we gonna walk into this knowing we’re gonna have to reshoot it or are we actually gonna make it bigger and better?’ So we did.

Eventually, the task of writing the song that would unite the world had reared its head, a task that both Solomon and Matheson knew would be a difficult one indeed. 

The script transitioned quite a few times over the years, especially the end. The irony of it all was figuring out what the song was came down to the final minute as well… We always knew that writing a song and making the song ‘so good that it will unite the world’ was an impossible task and we’re setting ourselves up for failure. So we gradually started to realize, when we were trying to figure out how do we get out of that idea gracefully, that okay it’s not gonna be about the quality of the song per se, it’s gonna be about the fact that everyone plays it together.

Lastly, Solomon also revealed to the outlet that at one time they had written an alternate ending for the film that had Bill, Ted, and the Princesses riding Santa's sleigh as part of a time-manipulation plot to save the day.

We had a version that I really loved that did not last very long, it lasted for one draft. Bill and Ted had to get instruments to everyone in the world throughout all space and time in one evening, and they were like, ‘How are we gonna possibly do that? We have no way to do that!’ and they say, ‘Well we can’t, but there’s one man who can,’ and then we cut to, ‘Ho ho ho!’ and a sleigh, and it was Bill and Ted and the Princesses on Santa’s sleigh using Santa magic because Santa can go around the world in one night. They were actually going down chimneys and they were having a great time, and it was this crazy montage that we had written. That did not last. I thought because the antecedents to this movie were A Christmas Carol and It’s a Wonderful Life, so maybe it’s a Christmas movie and we have Santa at the end? I think Alex Winter liked it briefly, but I don’t think anyone else thought it was a good idea, then we ended up scrapping that.

For more secrets and details as to how BILL & TED FACE THE MUSIC was achieved be sure to check out Collider's full report here.

Also, if you've yet to experience BILL & TED FACE THE MUSIC, I highly recommend it. I marathoned both the original films before delving into the new one and was not disappointed, not in the slightest. In fact, I had a big, dumb smile on my face for a vast majority of the film, and it's without a doubt one of this year's best. It's a feel-good adventure with lovable characters, plenty of laughs, and a great message about how bringing people together is crucial to our survival as a species. Do yourself a favor and seek the movie out on digital platforms today.