I think this might be the big one. People losing interest in “origin” stories that just get deeper into overly familiar territory but can’t expand its boundaries, i.e. can’t offer any real surprises. Me, I still enjoy a self-contained time waster and honestly care little about the destination as long as the journey is entertaining. This movie fit the bill. My 14-yo thought it was great.
I think you might be confusing Alden Ehrenreich with Ansel Elgort. Makes sense name-wise I guess.
Just got back from seeing it. When I heard about the production troubles back in the day I thought this was going to be bad. When I learned that there was a droid named L3-37 in it I was sure it was going to be dog shit. Still it’s Star Wars and I am still compelled to put my butt in the seat.
This was my favorite non original trilogy Star Wars movie by a long shot. I thought Glover nailed Lando (and some how sounded exactly like OG Lando.) I will say that everything on the planet they warp to after the heist was by far the weakest part of the movie. I hated the twist with the pirates. I found it exceptionally dumb when the main one took off their helmet and surprise it’s a 15 year old girl who kicked your ass on a flying train earlier in the movie. Also they aren’t pirates, they are the fledgling rebellion that Han somehow kickstarts. They didn’t need to tie it into the original story like that. I did love that Han shot first in the end. Also the Darth Maul reveal is just going to confuse 99.99% of the audience who must now think Han Solo is older than Darth Vader.
How is that real character growth? She already did this in the first movie and it also never even raised the question whether or not it’s important that her parents are “someone”. For her it was all about having parents at all, the whole “are the parents important” angle was a FAN thing. Rey didn’t ask herself if her parents were Skywalker/Jedis or in any other way “important”. It’s not like she suspected her parents to be anything else than nobodies, it would actually have been a surprise if they weren’t (to her of course).
That’s what me annoyed most about TLJ, it confused audience expectations with character expectations.
So maybe you can argue for some minimum amount of character growth but I honestly don’t see a different character at the end of TLJ compared to the end of TFA.
Afterall SHE is the one to motivate Luke to action so HE gets to have some growth while Rey remains static as character.
Those are precisely my feelings on the films. I would say yes, it’s worth it.
I like Rey. I like Finn. I enjoyed the TLJ. She started off as a scavenger with a singular focus and a reoccurring dream about her parents. At the end of TLJ she’s a growing Jedi off to save what is left of a rebellion. I think the expectations of what these characters do and how they must riseor rinse and a repeat of the original group is just not a realistic one. I don’t hold them to it.
We had one person jump in here and make some claim about Solo not doing well because of souring due to TLJ. I don’t think that’s true, and then of course later that same person tried to shut down the TLJ counter argument as soon as one showed up saying it’s just a rehash. Sure there were some who didn’t like it. I doubt that’s the reason Solo is having problems. They’re not even related.
Solo looks like yet another cowboy in space with charm and an attitude movie. I don’t care if it was in Star Wars. At no point did i ever say to myself, what this franchise really needs is a Han Solo origin movie. And the trailers suggested no reason for me to go see one other than I think Glover is a pretty good actor. So now that people are suggesting the movie might actually be worthwhile, despite what the critics say, I’ll probably see it because that suggests what the trailer does not, that it might be fun to watch.
None of that has to do with TLJ or any kind of pure Star Wars requirements.
Awesome. Thank you!
I’m just an anecdote, but I absolutely loved The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi.
From Solo’s initial announcement through every single trailer, I had no interest in seeing it. At least not in a theater. It sounds fun and I’ll watch it on Netflix in 6 months.
This article matches my own thoughts on exactly why I’m so disinterested:
And the cameo sounds really dumb to me too.
Darth Maul is not a character. He’s an empty vessel. Hearing he’s in this movie and seeing all the “explainer” articles pop up everywhere make me even less interested in seeing this movie. Like someone else here said: “smallest galaxy ever”.
All the meta analysis seems like a dog chasing its tail to me. The answer is simple, write good stories. People will see movies that have good stories, and Disney can’t seem to figure this out with Star Wars.
The Force Awakens as the “prevent defense” of movies. It works.
Agree. Couldn’t have said it better. Seriously, L337? Somebody should be fired for that.
Well, that depends. How do the characters say L337?
They thankfully never say her full name. Just L3. Thank god.
I saw it on Sunday and thought it was OK as a film but that it just does too much fan service and answers too many questions. It tries to end the film having every throwaway quote, allusion or inference answered clearly.
Han Solo as a character seemed like a mystery wrapped in an enigma but the film makes him feel he’s the high school football captain that did everything in the first year of adulthood and then spends the rest of his life waving the state championship he won at anybody that will listen.
It’s the equivalent of having a prequel to a fist full of dollars where the man with no name is hit over the head forgets his name, develops a relationship with a poncho maker, starts smoke cheroots to cure a halitosis problem and walk like he does by a bad case of haemorrhoids.
You can put me in the “liked it” camp. (I also liked TLJ) Didn’t have any expectations going in. I actually think it was a much better constructed movie than Rogue One which I felt was 2 acts of pointless meandering followed by a really kick ass battle in the 3rd.
As for Solo, I enjoyed the interplay between the characters and the (fairly predictable) series of double crosses. The Kessel Run stuff was just great. I think they didn’t take advantage of some very likable characters and the reveal near the end was pretty stupid. But it was enjoyable summer fair. Maybe 20 minutes too long.
Counterpoint: I thought Glover was the weakest of the principle actors (EDIT: except for Bettany, but Bettany’s character was badly written) in the film. Someone above said it feels like he’s doing a bit, and that’s pretty accurate. He delivers his lines like he’s doing an impression of Lando, not like he is Lando.
Yeah I totally agree. He was good at the impression, but I don’t think he really owned it. More like a Saturday Night Live sketch.
It came off to me as Lando having that self-perception when he was younger, particularly with his “Lando Chronicles,” which I found pretty amusing.
Man, nothing about this movie makes me interested in seeing it, even as a lapsed Star Wars fan.
I’m with you man. Used to be a huge SW fan. Phantom Menace wounded it. Force Awakens nearly killed it. Now I just don’t care.
Except about the cartoons though. Love those.
As much as I liked it as a standalone movie, it was completely unnecessary. No one really needs to see Han get the Falcon or meet Chewie or learn how to be a criminal or any of that. Everything you need to know about Han Solo is right there in A New Hope. He’s a smuggler and ne’er-do-well with a reluctant streak of goodness. That’s all you need for the story and to understand the character. The Kessel Run and winning the Falcon in a card game, all that stuff are details that are best left to audience imagination. Seeing it added nothing, and may have even detracted from your idea of how it went down.
The bit about his name is the dumbest and most obvious illustration of this. Previously, it was a cool sci-fi name that had a symbolic meaning for the character type. Now, its literally a call-out to the audience about his solo status. Lame.