I remember the hysteria surrounding the release of Solo: A Star Wars story. It was a two-pronged attack: the first was the hand-wringing over the fact that they released a Star Wars movie barely six months after the last one ( The Last Jedi, which managed to scare up some mass hysteria on its own), and the other being the “fact” that Solo was yet another brain-washing piece of excrement (along with The Last Jedi—jeez, that flick really knew how to make new friends and influence people, didn’t it?) that had been released by the “evil” Kathleen Kennedy, who runs Lucasfilm—and who should now fall on her sword, since Solo didn’t make the mega trillions that it was expected to haul in. But amidst all of this panic and frenzied second guessing remains a very important question.
Is Solo: A Star Wars Story any good?
Yes, it is. Not only is Solo good, it’s an extremely well-made space adventure that actually manages to be a fun ride. Pushing aside all of the hysteria that surrounded this film from its very beginning (and for that you’d probably need a herd of Banthas), Solo can be enjoyed as a vastly entertaining Star Wars movie that fills in the details about the origins of everybody’s favorite space smuggler, Han Solo. Since this film takes place in Solo’s formative years, the beloved actor who first gave life to Han Solo, Harrison Ford, was replaced here by the much younger Alden Ehrenreich. Ehrenreich does a great job at portraying a younger Solo, but the movie also wisely surrounds him with a superb cast of actors.
The always great Woody Harrleson shines here as Beckett, Solo’s mentor, an older version of the main character who reluctantly disperses wisdom to Solo once he sees that this kid is sticking around. Thandie Newton is also very good as Val, Beckett’s lover and partner in intergalactic crime. Donald Glover easily handles playing another younger version of a favorite SW character: Lando Calrissian, who’s a suave playboy and hustler with a really fast ship called the Millennium Falcon that’s called upon for a dangerous journey called the Kessel Run. Emilia Clarke (Daenerys, the Mother of Dragons from Game of Thrones) is also very good as Qi’ra, Solo’s childhood love who rises to be the right hand of interstellar gangster Dryden Vos (Paul Bettany in another sturdy performance).
But one of my favorite characters in Solo turns out to be a droid named L3, who’s always fighting for better living conditions for her “people,” the down-trodden mechanicals. She's played by Phoebe Waller-Bridge, best-known from Amazon’s Fleabag, who’s replaced through CGI by her robotic countenance. But her humor still comes through, for there are moments with L3 that had me laughing out loud, especially in seeing how she will keep fighting against her “organic overlords” no matter what the situation.
Ron Howard, who stepped into to direct this film after its previous directors Lord & Miller were fired from the job, drives this story with an assured hand. Howard is probably the true unsung hero here, making us forget whatever backstage soap opera happened during filming by giving us a pleasurable romp through the Star Wars universe. I’m sorry to hear, in light of Solo’s perceived box office “failure,” that Disney has decided to cancel these one shot “A Star Wars Story” films. They were a great way to explore different sides of the Star Wars universe—apart from the main stories told through the saga films. But at least we’ll always have Solo (as well as the equally great Rogue One). --SF
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