REVIEW: Solo: A Star Wars StoryBy Bri ManzanoMay 27, 2018Han Solo. You know the name. You know that he shot first. You know that his son murders him and becomes the swolest meme of 2017. But what else is there to know about him? Well, plenty, if the original trilogy has to say about it. After a life of roguery, he becomes embroiled in the rebel cause by the Force prodigy Luke Skywalker. But before that?...

Young Han (Alden Ehrenreich) escapes from the criminal planet Corellia with only his life. His longtime girlfriend and partner in crime, Qi’ra (Emilia Clarke), is not so fortunate. The only path that leads back to Qi’ra is that of imperial soldier, then imperial deserter, then big-time coaxiom thief. Led by Tobias Beckett (Woody Harrelson) and his team, Han is plunged headfirst into the crime syndicate world and makes some new friends (Joonas Suotamo; Donald Glover) along the way.

Let me tee this up for you. Han Solo is one of the most iconic characters in one of the most influential film franchises of all time. He’s been played by Harrison Ford, one of cinema’s highest-profile actors, for all of his big-screen appearances for the last forty-one years. Solo is about his character history. Expectations are kind of high. And this is the movie we got. Even if it’s not awful, it’s not the movie his character deserved.

It’s so hard to care about anything that happens in this movie. It’s like you’re riding the world’s fastest roller coaster with ninety-degree turns. It’s kind of fun, sure, but it happens so quickly and you’re jerked around so much that it’s hard to enjoy. There’s no development of any situation; you can’t pay enough attention to become invested in any one scene.

As well, there’s not nearly enough focus on the character of Han Solo – or the character of any character, really – which is strange, because Ehrenreich’s Solo really is more of a starry-eyed team player than we know Solo to be. Young Solo doesn’t end up where New Hope Solo begins. He undergoes the kind of experience it would take to jade him into Ford’s Han, but he seems just as optimistic by the end of the film. Given, a jaded protagonist doesn’t exactly a happy ending make, but you must sacrifice as much when giving the character history of a character that is known to start his stint as jaded.

There are some fun action sequences, a few laughs, and some intriguing effects, but altogether it fails to provide any substance to a character who has defined pop culture. Oddly enough, I cared more about the one-off characters of Rogue One.

Rating: 5/10
Favorite scene: any scene with Paul Bettany (I’ve got a thing for dark capes and English accents).
Least favorite scene: any scene with Jon Favreau’s flying monkey.

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