I tried hard to like this comic book adaptation of Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey. I really did. The idea of a comic book based on one of my absolute favorite films (I liked Bogus Journey just a bit better than Excellent Adventure, but both are, of course, brilliant movies) sounded great to me when I first heard it, and I looked forward to seeing it after Ant told me he'd bought it; what I failed to realize was 1) having already seen the movie countless times, there was practically nothing in the comic adaptation that could possibly surprise me, 2) getting Bill and Ted's highfalutin phraseology to sound truly genuine takes an extremely deft touch, and not many folks are up to it (simply peppering their repartee with the occasional "bodacious" and "excellent" just isn't enough to get them to sound right; it's how and where they use these modifiers and adjectives that's really important in bringing them to life), and 3) licensed movie adaptations, at least from this era, are almost always terrible to begin with. Evan Dorkin, in charge of this adaptation, does about the best he can with it (part of the problem is he was evidently working from an earlier, slightly goofier version of the script), but there's really nothing too noteworthy about this sucker.





The comic follows the film fairly closely: Bill and Ted, having successfully graduated from high school (by collecting various historical figures for a history report via a time-traveling phone booth made available to them by Rufus, who hails from the year 2688), find themselves, a few years later, still struggling to make it big with their band, Wyld Stallyns. Unbeknownst to them, a disgruntled contemporary of Rufus's named De Nomolos has just sent two evil robot versions of them into the past on a mission to kill them and take over their lives so that Wyld Stallyns music can never become the basis for the utopian future society. The robots carry out their mission, and Bill and Ted are forced to fight their way through the afterlife and contend with the Grim Reaper (who soon becomes an ally) before finally confronting the robot versions of themselves at the all-important San Dimas Battle of the Bands.

A few minor divergences from the film do crop up, however (some of these also pop up in the novelization, which I somehow managed to acquire several years ago; this leads me to believe that they were edited out of the final movie or simply not filmed at all), mostly towards the end. Bill and Ted's worst fears -- Colonel Oats of the Alaskan military school, Granny S. Preston, Esq., and the Easter Bunny, who all appear in Hell in the film -- are actually unleashed into the real world by the evil Bill and Ted robots, and have to be dealt with by the real Bill and Ted shortly before they arrive at the Battle of the Bands. Pretty dumb. At the Battle of the Bands, meanwhile, Bill and Ted are killed again by their evil counterparts and must call upon Death to restore them to life. Finally, instead of De Nomolos simply getting sent to prison at the film's finale, he is killed by the exploding heads of his robots and sent to Hell.





In contrast to the movie, which could be oddly dark at times, the comic's tone is very light, and the drawings very exaggerated; it's all very vapid and banal. Evan Dorkin is a skilled writer, who has written a ton of intelligent and funny stuff, but his talents were not afforded any real opportunity to shine here (although his art, despite the cartooniness, is serviceable enough). The comic is certainly worth owning as a collector's item, if you're into Bill and Ted (which is basically why Ant bought his copy), but don't expect to be entertained by it.

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