Star Wars

I mean, really - how shit does this look?

Doing a heist movie in Star Wars isn't something that automagically puts me off - I think it could be fun! - but why in the name of Lucas' Beard do they have to make it the story of how Han Solo got everything that defines him?

It's the movie where he meets Chewbacca! And Lando! And gets the Falcon! And… his gun?

He couldn't have anything that's iconic Han going into the thing?

Just, ugh.

Stop making moneygrubbing spinoff backstory shite that doesn't matter, Lucasfilm.

Just for anybody who's not seen the latest trailer…

I'm totally indifferent to the whole enterprise. Miller and Lord are at least interesting filmmakers (there was a time, believe it or not, where a Lego movie seemed like a certain failure), but when they got punted in favour of bland journeyman Ron Howard I kind of lost any faith that it might be worth seeing.

If the reviews are somehow miraculously positive I might see it in the cinema, but I think I'll be waiting for the, uh, digital release on this one.

From what I read, Miller and Lord were fired because they were trying to make some kind of wacky comedy. Nobody who saw any of it liked what was being produced, the studio hired in a dialogue coach for Ehrenreich because his performance was apparently so bad.

Trailer looks decent to me.

I think it's probably a decent movie with a decent plot, I just don't really get why it had to be the Han Solo movie.

Well, other than that sweet, sweet $$$, clearly.

I'm not sure quite how sweet those $$$ are going to be - reception to recent Star Wars films in China has been so frosty that Solo is dropping its 'A Star Wars Story' subtitle in an attempt to avoid the indifference that affected Last Jedi.

Ouch. I didn't know that.

Meanwhile, Infinity War has pre-sold more tickets in the US than the last seven MCU movies combined, so I don't think Disney are all that bothered.

Star Wars isn't going to be torpedoed by a mediocre entry; Ron Howard's career isn't on the chopping block for this, Lord and Miller are the plucky underdogs whose vision was stomped by The Studio Machine, and none of the actors are going to suffer thanks to the on-set shakeup that's going to get blamed for any performance inconsistencies (except, maybe, Ehrenreich's).

Solo is an irrelevance, shuffling its way to a moderate box office that might just scrape its way into profit internationally and with Blu sales, and literally fucking nobody gives a shit.

It's an almost fascinating situation.

I certainly can't remember the last time (Attack of the Clones, maybe?) a Star Wars movie was met with such resounding apathy.

That trailer is fine, and I like a heist movie, but… yeah. I would say that I'd like it to be good, except that I can't quite bring myself to care that much; the apathy I have toward it is almost draining.

It's kind of amazing how quickly Disney managed to make Star Wars no longer special.

Well, turning it into an annual release schedule went a long way on that score. Before that, Star Wars kind of felt like a generational thing - 3 movies every 15 years. Now it's just another franchise.

Marvel are putting out three movies a year, I think Star Wars can handle it.

Even if Rogue One and Solo hadn't appeared to fill the gaps between episodes VII, VIII and VIII, there would be the possibility of watching nine Star Wars films in a weekend; availability density hasn't been an actual problem since the originalhome video release of New Hope, Empire and Jedi.

And that's not including the hundreds of novels, games, comics and TV shows that the franchise supported without a problem for forty years. But maybe you're right, these two stand-alone side-story movies (neither of which, by design, can significantly affect the larger canon) might just be the straw that breaks the camel's back.

Marvel have always had a much more aggressive release slate, though, even at the start of the experiment. Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk came out six weeks apart, and they were already cameoing declarations of grand intentions. I think it's different when you start at (or close to) that speed, as opposed to going from distinct, separate trilogies into that kind of schedule. It just feels out of sync with the legacy of the thing.

Being out of step with the legacy is kind of a thing for me. Star Wars was this thing that was like 'oh shit, a new star wars movie is coming out.' The fact it's annualised makes the whole thing feel a bit cheaper than it probably should? Like, it -feels- less valuable.

Also, invoking the presence of the novels, games, comics and TV shows? C'mon, guy. Expanded universe doesn't count. It never counts.

But that's what these movies are.

No, they're not. These are canon, a full part of the Actual Story. Even before Disney tore it up, the old Expanded Universe stuff was only ever a kind of pseudo-canon, where the books and stuff had to match up with each other, but any new movies (what was termed "G-Canon") always took precedence.

No, the Star Wars Stories aren't essential to the main saga, but a hugely and suddenly increased number of cinematic releases does dilute the impact of a new installment, Episode or otherwise.

Tell that to the box office.

The box office that - as you pointed out - saw them remove "Star Wars" from the title of this movie in China because of the impact it had?

EDIT: I suppose that might be more to do with the fact that the last Star Wars Story was a fucking garbage fire than the ubiquity of Star Wars in general.

The impression I got from the stories I read was just that Star Wars never really took off in China at all - I imagine that when the original trilogy came out there wouldn't have been much Western stuff in Chinese cinemas, and nowadays they have rules about how many non-Chinese films can be shown.

There's an anecdote from the filming of Rogue One where Gareth Edwards asked the guys from the Maldives army - who were playing the Stormtroopers on Scarif - if they were excited to be in Star Wars and most of them hadn't even heard of it.

It's not a massive cultural event everywhere.

And it's becoming less of a cultural event anywhere with each passing sidequel. :O

I don't really see the point in prequels. You know how they end, they always seem a bit pointless. I still haven't seen Revenge of the Sith, for exactly this reason, and I likely never will.

It's got a decent lightsaber fight towards the end. Which is probably just on YouTube, anyway. Other than that, there's not really anything to recommend about it. I certainly don't remember much else.

Anyone seen Solo yet? I saw the trailer, noted they’d cast someone in the lead role who looked and acted nothing like Harrison Ford, and assumed it would be a car crash. How bad is it exactly?

I haven't seen anyone who had any problem with the film, and I've seen a few people who liked it quite a lot, so I think it's probably fine.

Anyway, I don't see why recasting a character as a dissimilar actor would be a problem for Star Wars when it hasn't been for The MCU or Star Trek or James Bond.

Haven't seen it, and I'm not really planning to. Even if it is good, it looks entirely disposable. It's the first Star Wars film I've ever not wanted to see in the cinema, and I'm apparently not alone; it did less than half The Last Jedi's numbers opening weekend.

It's the first time ever a Star Wars has opened and not felt like A Big Deal; it's gone from this generational event to an annual release, and it just isn't the kind of franchise that can sustain this - unlike Marvel, which was basically conceived this way.

If they continue strip-mining Star Wars, there's a real chance they're just going to kill it. If they do want to carry on making annual movies, I think they need to explore more of the universe, instead of having to link everything back to the OT.

So, Solo.

I was prepared to come out of Solo pleasantly surprised. I was prepared to emerge slightly disappointed. I expected to leave the cinema feeling pretty much nothing, following two-ish hours of whatever the cinematic equivalent of lemon sorbet is.

I was not prepared to come out dumbfounded at the utter, nigh-unsalvagable stupidity of this thing.

The Good

The performances are broadly okay, if a little too inoffensive; none of them are particularly even, perhaps to be expected given the late-stage director shuffle and extensive reshoots that basically reconfigured the whole film. The production design, as expected of the franchise, is almost flawless; there's some terrific effects work and the whole film looks gorgeous as a whole. There are also two genuinely great action sequences, a much-lauded train heist as seen in the trailer, and a bit following Imperial ground troops in a war zone, reminiscent of the beach setpiece that opens Edge of Tomorrow. I'd have happily watched a lot more of that movie. The cute-meet between Han and Chewie is actually really great, and is the one bit of plot gymnastics that actually works.

Oh God, The Bad

Everything related to plot and character is a trainwreck. Some of the best actors are squandered (especially blink-and-you'll-miss-her Thandie Newton). It needs to be forty minutes shorter, and could almost certainly do with losing the prologue stuff on Corellia, but the worst thing is the interminable sequence of double-crosses that close the film.

Spoilers follow, in no particular order.

Spoiler - click to showQi'ra should have been introduced as a Bond Girl-esque character, rather than someone tied to Han's past, before a final-reveal twist moves her into the Secret Mastermind position. There's some stuff about warring criminal gangs that could have resolved with her being a double agent, instead of some inexplicably-masked rebel alliance mercs and a cameo from Darth fucking Maul.

Spoiler - click to showHan and Lando needed to have an existing relationship, ideally built around the Falcon trading hands between them continually over the years. There's nothing built between these guys over the course of the movie, and the only reason any of their camaraderie sticks is because Donald Glover carries the fuck out of that banter.

Spoiler - click to showThere needed to be either more time spent establishing Han as a smuggler in this crew, or he should have been introduced as a long-term member of it from minute one. The half-assed induction job (the aforementioned train heist) inexplicably leaves Han and Chewie as partners with Woodie Harrelson, despite the fact that they basically fucked up the entire thing.

Spoiler - click to showHan needed to be an outright anti-hero. His heart of gold stuff here - especially everything related to Qi'ra - totally undermines the change of heart he has in A New Hope; he shouldn't be a good guy in this.

Spoiler - click to showLet's talk about the unfortunately-named L3-37. This is a droid character who constantly asserts her individuality, her right to self-determination and the rights of droids to be free from organic oppression. She starts an actual rebellion to free other droids at one point, but when she's fatally wounded in a gunfight Lando and Han upload her into the Falcon's computer without taking the time to consider how what they're doing completely violates every stated opinion she has about her own autonomy. (All this so they can do the Kessel Run in under 12 parsecs because Christ forbid we get through the movie without seeing every fucking thing ever reference from Han Solo's past.) Her disembodied consciousness is now in the Falcon's flight computer forever, which adds a whole lot of unpleasant context to A. the constant references to the Falcon as "she", and B. the Falcon's temperament when it comes to hyperspace.

I cannot in good conscience recommend this film to anybody.

it's gone from this generational event to an annual release

Perhaps the bigger problem for Solo is that it's barely six months since The Last Jedi. If it had actually been a year it might not feel so bad.

it's gone from this generational event to an annual release

Perhaps the bigger problem for Solo is that it's barely six months since The Last Jedi. If it had actually been a year it might not feel so bad.

You know when I said that Star Wars has stopped feeling special?

Aye :(

I've watched The Last Jedi like six times since it came out on bluray, and saw it twice at the cinema. I don't think it's any less special for that.

Honestly, I don't know if I want to buy into the idea of movie franchises as "events" because… I dunno, it feels like submitting to the marketing machine, in a way. This is mass-produced entertainment for the broadest possible audience - elevating it to some kind of de facto cultural effect because of previous entries' cultural importance is imbuing them with a lot of import before they've had a chance to earn it.

Anyway, I don't see why recasting a character as a dissimilar actor would be a problem for Star Wars when it hasn't been for The MCU or Star Trek or James Bond.

It’s a bit different here I think because Han Solo is so massively iconic and has been played by the same actor for nearly 40 years.

Here, you’re casting someone as a version of that character that’s essentially the same age as that definitive version everyone remembers. You have to be able to make everyone believe it’s the same guy. The Star Trek reboots went to some trouble to do that; it appears Solo didn’t even bother. That’s kind of weird.

Ehrenreich is 29, Ford was 35 in '77; I'm not sure how long before Star Wars Solo is set, but he is a bit younger.

Someone on Twitter (I've lost who now) suggested a Leia movie with Millie Bobby Brown; I might be on board with that, but I still think they need to move into unrelated-to-anyone-named-Skywalker territory if they want to really grow the thing. There are only so many stories to tell about the same five people.

I'm not sure how long before Star Wars Solo is set

It's basically impossible to say, but at the very end of the film, Spoiler - click to showHan and Chewie head off to Tatooine because they've heard about some big job that a local gangster is putting together. Given how dumb the rest of the movie is about compressing events, I assumed that it's the job for Jabba that's referred to in Han's conversation with Greedo in the Mos Eisley cantina. Which implies it's a couple of weeks or months at the most.

At the same time, the closing scenes Spoiler - click to showstrongly imply that we're seeing the very first members of a rebellion, a rag-tag group of about a dozen randoms and Warwick Davis, which seems like a long way from the big military-political Rebel Alliance that we see in Episode IV or Rogue One.

The more I think about Solo, the less I like it, and I didn't like it all that much to begin with. It's all tell, no show - perhaps best exemplified by how we're constantly told what a great pilot Han is, but we basically don't see him fly a ship for more than thirty yards until the Kessel Run.

I'm not sure how long before Star Wars Solo is set

It's basically impossible to say, but at the very end of the film, Spoiler - click to showHan and Chewie head off to Tatooine because they've heard about some big job that a local gangster is putting together. Given how dumb the rest of the movie is about compressing events, I assumed that it's the job for Jabba that's referred to in Han's conversation with Greedo in the Mos Eisley cantina. Which implies it's a couple of weeks or months at the most.

Spoiler - click to showNot making excuses, especially for a movie I haven't seen, but it's likely Han did multiple jobs for Jabba before dropping his shipment at the first sign of an Imperial cruiser; certainly, Jabba's line in the Special Editions, "you're the best smuggler I ever hired," suggests that Han didn't immediately fuck up first time out. It's also implied that Han's been trying to get the money together to pay Jabba back for a while: "Yeah, but this time, I've got the money." I dunno, there are certainly more egregious continuity issues in the series… coughprequelscough

It's frankly amazing how much work Solo seems to do to set up a sequel to itself, which will almost certainly never get made even though – now that he has the Falcon and the gun and the name and the Kessel Run – it would probably be a better film just by virtue of the fact that now they don't have any more of that crap to shoehorn in.

Sounds like it suffers from the usual problem with prequels that it's all just a little bit pointless.

I think you can do prequels okay so long as you're not over-reliant on existing characters from the chronologically-later stories. For all its faults (and as much as I love it I'm willing to admit that it has many), Rogue One at least tried to focus on a group of characters whose destiny wasn't assured by the existing franchise entries, even if their mission was ultimately always going to succeed - it at least had some leeway to do unexpected things, though if it maybe didn't go far enough.

Which is why I agree with Ninchilla that these films need to move further away from the Skywalkers if they want to have any worth by themselves. The best bits of Solo are where you see things just off the edges of what we've already seen in the (on-screen) Star Wars galaxy - the warring crime syndicates, the Corellian ship-building, the fuel mines, that Saving Private Ryan section. Solo shows how much scope there is to tell new and interesting stories in Star Wars, and elects to do none of them.

I just remembered that they use the asteroid belt chase music from Empire during the Kessel Run section of Solo, because of course what this movie really wants is for people to draw comparisons between itself and The Empire Strikes Back.

I just remembered that they use the asteroid belt chase music from Empire during the Kessel Run section of Solo, because of course what this movie really wants is for people to draw comparisons between itself and The Empire Strikes Back.

…ugh. That's one of my favorite bits of music in the whole of Star Wars, too…

Posts have been moved from Moving Pictures, though for some reason the post counts in the subforum don't appear to have updated. 🤨

Watched this. Was OK.

Not sure it warrants much more in depth analysis. Glover and Han Solo, good. GoT woman can't act. Woody decent actor. The droid was terrible. Two good set pieces.

6/10. Meh.

I'm not sure how long before Star Wars Solo is set

It's basically impossible to say, but at the very end of the film, Spoiler - click to showHan and Chewie head off to Tatooine because they've heard about some big job that a local gangster is putting together. Given how dumb the rest of the movie is about compressing events, I assumed that it's the job for Jabba that's referred to in Han's conversation with Greedo in the Mos Eisley cantina. Which implies it's a couple of weeks or months at the most.

At the same time, the closing scenes Spoiler - click to showstrongly imply that we're seeing the very first members of a rebellion, a rag-tag group of about a dozen randoms and Warwick Davis, which seems like a long way from the big military-political Rebel Alliance that we see in Episode IV or Rogue One.

The more I think about Solo, the less I like it, and I didn't like it all that much to begin with. It's all tell, no show - perhaps best exemplified by how we're constantly told what a great pilot Han is, but we basically don't see him fly a ship for more than thirty yards until the Kessel Run.

Tbf the series has a history of doing that, Luke proclaimed that he's a good pilot on his first meeting with Han, but did we ever see him stick a landing? He crashed twice in Empire (okay one of those he was shot down) and his X-Wing was under water (again) in The Last Jedi

He stuck the landing after blowing up the Death Star. And on Cloud City. And presumably when he went to Tatooine pre-RotJ. And when he landed on Dagobah the second time in Jedi. And when he rendezvous'd with the fleet after leaving Dagobah. He's basically only crashed twice, they've just all been on-screen. Anyway, the two crashes in Empire were enemy action and an attempt with zero visibility and no instruments; and he deliberately scuttled the ship pre-TLJ deliberately to maroon himself.

Yeah "deliberately" 😉

I actually thought it was alright, in at least that I had fun watching it. I do generally like a heist movie though, and tend to find Han and Chewie (and the rest of the non-Jedi) more interesting than the Skywalkers anyway, so I suppose it always had a shot with me, even if it is probably the weakest of the new films.

(It's worth noting here that I don't understand the amount of hate Last Jedi gets, for all its flaws and inconsistencies, but then I'm not as precious as many people about SW lore, and liked some of the ideas it had, and risks it took (and that it took them).)

Solo was definitely hindered by it's near-constant attempts to either reference the existing films or set up sequels though, and in that sense I suppose it's fitting that it was the entry that finally felt the brunt of the inevitable Star Wars fatigue. Can't help but feel a little disappointed that it was though, as I wouldn't have minded another, less forced attempt at some point in the future; the (less space-magicky) parts of the universe that have only been hinted at elsewhere, and that this starts to finally explore, are ones I'd quite like to see more of.

Oh well. Maybe The Mandalorian will be good, eh?

The Mandalorian is going to have an episode directed by Taika Waititi, so I'm on board with whatever it's offering at least until that's over.

I watched The Last Jedi last night. I'm not much of a Star Wars fan really - I think the original trilogy is entertaining fluff, and the prequels are atrocious - but I did enjoy the Force Awakens and I was surprised to find that I absolutely loved this. Easily my favourite of the movies on first watch.

I haven't yet dared look to see why all the internet edgelords hate it so much, but I'm assuming it's because it's not just two and a half hours of Luke fighting stormtroopers, and it has more than one female character.

Yeah, that's pretty much it.

OMG WHY WASNT POE A HERO AND ADMIRAL HODLO WAS TEH DUMB SHE SHUD HAV TLOD HIM THE PLAN AND LUKE SHOULD HAVE KILLED REYLO, etc.

It's not without its issues, but the character work ain't one of them. It's got the best understanding of the Jedi philosophy of any Star Wars film since Empire, and it actually has things to say about heroism. I love it.

I thought The Last Jedi was great too.

The Last Jedi is the first Star Wars film that felt like it was trying to be more than just a Star Wars movie. I'm not sure any of the other films in the series have had a theme between them (except for any contributed by John Williams) and here comes Rian Johnson, the only person except George Lucas to direct a Star Wars film they also had a solo writing credit on, with nuance and character development and growth and also, why not, a shitload of new Force stuff that deepens the entire mythology that underpins the franchise.

Episode IX is going to be such a let-down.