Bob Gale says Universal is to blame for the censored Back to the Future 2 scene discovered on Netflix earlier this week. Fans of the franchise were livid when they noticed that a small scene had been edited out of the sequel. Elements of censorship on streaming platforms have been popping up frequently, mostly with Disney+ being the culprit. With that being said, Gale wants fans to know that the edit had nothing to do with Netflix.
Back to the Future Part II fans were more than a little angry when they noticed that it had been edited. In the scene where Marty McFly thinks he finally has his hands on the Sports Almanac, but ends up finding Biff's girlie magazine instead. The version of the sequel on Netflix edited out the cover of the magazine in a rather sloppy way. Bob Gale had this to say about the ordeal.
"The blame is on Universal who somehow furnished Netflix an edited version of the movie. I learned about it some ten days ago from an eagle-eyed fan, and had the studio rectify the error. The version now running is the uncensored, unedited, original version."
That should be good news to Back to the Future fans. The edit seemed rather pointless and it was done in what seemed like a haphazard way. As it turns out, neither Bob Gale or Robert Zemeckis even knew about this streaming version of Back to the Future 2. Gale continued to discuss the matter and believes he knows how it happened. He explains.
"Apparently, this was a foreign version which neither director Robert Zemeckis nor I even knew existed, for some country that had a problem with the Oh La La magazine cover. I asked that the studio destroy this version. FYI, Netflix does not edit films - they only run the versions that are supplied to them. So they're blameless. You can direct your ire at Universal, but I think they will be a lot more careful in the future - and with 'the future.'"
Originally, Netflix subscribers were pretty angry over the idea of the streaming platform editing material. When it comes down to it, the studio is more than likely to blame when we see edits of the movies on the platform, at least according to the way Bob Gale explains it. As for Disney+, their edits are all on them since they own nearly everything that they are streaming.
Back to the Future has been in the news a lot lately, mostly because of the reunion Josh Gad just hosted. Gad was able to get Bob Gale, Robert Zemeckis, Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Elisabeth Shue, and Huey Lewis on a Zoom call. Afterwards, he was able to get a private meeting with the fictional Biff Tannen (played by Thomas Wilson), who called the host a "butthead" for not involving Wilson in the original reunion. The interview with Bob Gale was originally conducted by The Hollywood Reporter.