Bill and Ted Face the Music was about to have the appearance of George Carlin. But CGI could have been expensive.
Bill and Ted Music Face the music was released in 1980, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure combined sci-fi with slacker comedy to create a classic. In 1991, Bill S. Preston, Esq. and Ted “Theodore” Logan had returned for the sequel i.e. Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey.
Now, after thirty years after the last adventure through different dimensions. Alex Winter’s Bill and Keanu Reeves’ Ted are back for Bill and Ted Face the Music. The long-awaited sequel sees the duo as the middle-aged man. They are still grappling with the fortune that was promised them in the original films. Officials things get crazy as Bill and Ted and their daughters are sent on a new adventure through time that gives us nothing less than a future of the universe.
In addition to Reeves and Winter, Bill and Ted Face the Music brings William Sadler as Death. One character who will not return from the original ones is Rufus. He of course played by the late comedian Carlin. There was a plan at one point to have Bill and Ted meet up with Rufus one more time. They were about to use the old footage of Carlin plus CG. But Dean Parisot, the director said those plans were abandoned because of budgetary restrictions.
The Scene was expensive with CGI
Bill and Ted Face the Music was, In an interview with Polygon, he said, “We probably could have afforded to build the Circle K set but we were using footage from the original Bill & Ted. We would have had to create a CG George Carlin, which is incredibly expensive, and very difficult to pull off in a convincing way. We didn’t have the time or money. But we had a great scene where they went back to talk to Carlin.”
The Rufus reunion, according to Parisot, was supposed to have Bill and Ted receiving one last piece of advice from their earlier mentor. In order to let Rugus be part of the movie without actually appearing, Bill and Ted receive a keepsake from him. This gives them the information that they need.
And, as Parisot says, Rufus does however appear in the film in holographic form as a tribute to the legendary Carlin.
It’s clearly sad that fans won’t get to watch one more meeting between Bill and Ted and their actual time-traveling mentor Rufus. But at the same time, it’s possibly a good thing that the film didn’t try to build a CG Carlin in order to pull off the reunion. CGI technology is getting more civil all the time and can do some incredible things, but current endeavors at reawakening dead actors have not been fulfilled with a lot of audience approval. The most obvious example of such a failed CG comeback came in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story when Peter Cushing was brought back via CG to tease Grand Moff Tarkin.
Bill & Ted Face the Music agreed not to take a related excursion to the incredible valley with a CGI Rufus.
