Twenty nine years after their last outing on the big screen, those most excellent dudes, Bill and Ted return this summer with the much anticipated Bill and Ted Face the Music and on the back of that, BOOM! Studios have collected the iconic duo’s comic book history and stuffed it into Bill and Ted’s Excellent Comic Book Archive. And it\’s an absolute treasure.

Begrudgingly drawn by eighties punk rocker Evan Dorkin, who admits he felt nauseous when he heard the word dude and couldn’t stand heavy metal, the book opens with a foreword by Dorkin himself, who tells us about how, just like the rest of the world , he came to love Bill and Ted. What follows is a fascinating archive of Bill and Ted’s greatest comic book adventures starting with 1991’s Bogus Journey adaptation.

If you are familiar with the movie then this will serve as an interesting lesson about the journey between paper and celluloid.  Little details including the story behind Death’s portrayal as a skeleton in the comic offer fascinating insight into the movie world and there can’t be too many comic book drawings of Big Jim Martin from Faith No More.

 Then there are the adventures we haven’t seen on screen. Featuring all of our favourite’s from the movies including the Princesses, Abraham Lincoln, Rufus, Napoleon and of course the big bad De-Nomolos, some of the adventures the boys get up to in their bid to save the world through the power of music are equal to the fun we’ve experienced on screen. Dorkin’s original art is very “of the time” and is reminiscent of M.A.D Magazine’s “loud” style, but that fits perfectly with the outgoing and positive nature that encapsulates Bill and Ted and the letters pages, from back in the day, which have also been included  are worth the price of the book alone.

At over three hundred and seventy pages, Archive really is the collection that every Bill and Ted fan needs. As the anticipation for their next movie adventure grows, fill in the blanks with these fascinating stories. Honestly, if you don’t find something in here that entertains you, then dudes you can have my Megadeth collection… Chris Andrews