Following its recent arrival on the streaming service, fans have discovered that Netflix has censored the seconds long shot of the ‘Oh Là Là’ lingerie magazine cover in Back to the Future II.
After a frantic chase to retrieve the Grays Sports Almanac from the younger Biff Tannen in an effort to restore the timeline to its original state, Marty McFly finally obtains the almanac after Principal Strickland confiscates the book from Biff and tosses it in the garbage.
However, Marty instead discovers that the confiscated book was actually a risqué lingerie magazine titled “Oh LàLà” which Biff attempted to disguise using the cover of the almanac. Dismayed, Marty discards the lingerie magazine and resumes the hunt for the history altering publication.
The magazine cover, featuring a woman wearing a modest-by-today’s-standards night gown and high heeled sandals, appears for roughly 5 seconds of total screen time.
In the Netflix edit, while the contents of the magazine are still seen, these five seconds have been completely removed, resulting in a jarring and confusing cut transition straight to Marty’s frustrated panic.
These edits were documented by the titular host of the Salty Nerd podcast and Youtuber Justin Proper, who provided the original and edited scenes, respectively:
Hey @netflix you wanna explain to me why you edited #BackToTheFuturePart2 ?
This is the original scene.
You cut out the magazine cover discovery and 2 lines from Marty.
And not even that well. Your edit was sloppy AF.
What gives? pic.twitter.com/93PRXa3TMQ— Salty Nerd (@salty_nerd) May 19, 2020
Here’s the @netflix edit of Back to the Future Part 2.
If they sloppily edited this beloved trilogy, WHO KNOWS what OTHER films they’ve tampered with without you even noticing? https://t.co/Y1F5Wwy13M pic.twitter.com/Yr9mUItJQx
— Justin Proper 🌈 (@TheJustinProper) May 19, 2020
As of writing, Netflix has not commented publicly on the reason for this strange and unnecessary edit.