Bill & Ted 4: The Potential for an Excellent Adventure

A Promising Update on Bill & Ted 4

Bill & Ted star Alex Winter provides an update on a potential Bill & Ted 4. After first giving life to the titular characters in 1989, Winter and costar Keanu Reeves returned for two sequels, the most recent of which was released in 2020. The Bill & Ted Face the Music ending was initially thought to serve as the conclusion to the franchise, but Winter has since been open about the possibility of another excellent adventure.

Bill and Ted doing air guitar in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure.

Now, during a recent interview on the Sarah O'Connell Show, Winter shares a promising update regarding Bill & Ted 4. While the actor stresses that the film is far from actually getting a green light, he does confirm that progress is being made on the story, with a script to follow. Check out Winter's full comment below: 'We're tinkering with a fourth movie idea that all of us like, and the guys are going to write, so we'll see. It takes us time to get these things going, and we never want to do them unless they're great. 'They feel the same way, it has to be right. We love [the Bill & Ted movies] because they're oddball, and they're not typical mainstream films. They've never been cash-grab movies; no one has gotten rich off the Bill and Ted series. We really do make them sincerely from a place of love and interest. 'There's a really good idea that the writers came up with for a fourth that's kind of obvious. I don't want to give it away -- I can't give it away because I would be drawn and quartered -- but it is a really great idea, kind of an obvious idea. It will get written, and we'll see if we can actually get it made. It may be a little while.'

In late 2020, Winter said in an interview with Collider that he and Keanu Reeves would be interested in returning for a fourth film if the story is strong enough, saying that they 'like working together.'

Will Bill & Ted 4 Actually Happen?

After the first two movies in 1989 and 1991, the Bill & Ted franchise lay dormant for almost 30 years. Then, in 2020, Winter and Reeves returned for Bill & Ted Face the Music. The film earned mostly positive reviews from audiences and critics alike, but the pandemic played a role in its lackluster box office performance.

Made on a budget of $25 million, Bill & Ted Face the Music made only $6.3 million at the box office. As was commonplace during 2020 and 2021, the threequel was released in theaters and on PVOD simultaneously. Despite the poor box office, it was later reported that the movie actually did very well on PVOD, raking in $32 million. A general rule of thumb is that a movie's break-even point is double its production budget, which accounts for marketing and other expenses. Assuming Bill & Ted Face the Music's break-even point was around $50 million, then, the movie lost money.

If the third movie did end up losing money, that will surely affect whether another film can get made, regardless of the quality of the script. However, it's possible that Bill & Ted Face the Music performed well enough on streaming and VOD to be considered a soft success, which could make a follow-up more likely. It remains to be seen whether Bill & Ted 4 actually happens, but Winter's comment suggests it could be quite a while before any concrete news emerges.

The Future of Bill & Ted 4

Bill & Ted Face the Music is currently not available to stream, but it is available for purchase on all major VOD platforms.