Solo: A Star Wars Story
All the pieces of SOLO, the latest non-episodic film set a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, fit together for what should be seamless entertainment: solid cast (Woody Harrelson, Game of Thrones‘ “Mother of Dragons” Emilia Clarke, Donald Glover, Thandie Newton, and Paul Bettany, led by a passable Alden Ehrenreich in the title role), capable director (Ron Howard), well-told origin story (from Jonathan Kasdan and The Empire Strikes Back‘s Lawrence Kasdan), a heist to execute, people to save…. It all works, if you can get past the Star Wars fatigue. Numerous plot points, nods, tropes, even musical motifs tie this prequel to the existing movies, but also, perhaps, show the limits of what can be done with this material. Another spunky droid. More villains in funky masks. Grotesque alien gangster boss, part deux. Evil overlord Skyping in. The Millennium Falcon weaving between space rocks, shooting lasers from gun turrets at TIE fighters, and escaping a space leviathan. If you feel like you’ve seen it all before, you can be forgiven; less forgivable is the incessant music to cue you to how you’re supposed to feel at any given moment, a telltale sign of weak emotional content onscreen. And while both SOLO and earlier non-mainline Star Wars flick Rogue One fill in the backstory, the former kept it fresh with an approach that broke new ground for the series. It’s not that SOLO isn’t entertaining; but divorced from the epic thrust of the main storyline and the charisma of a star like Harrison Ford, what’s left is a high-fashion knockoff. –YSM
I dug Solo more than TLJ. That said, while it was enjoyable, it wasn’t a really necessary addition to the canon.
Maybe Lucasfilm needs to ditch Kathy Kennedy and hire Kevin Feige to do the creative oversight. The MCU has, what, 20 films and they’re still (mostly) fresh and exciting. It’s a bit early for the New Star Wars Era to be lagging from franchise fatigue.
Taking some risks would be nice. But hey, so would a Lando film. That Glover kid was the best part of the movie.
Yeah, what you said about Glover as Lando? For sure!