Solo: A Star Wars Story

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About

Solo: A Star Wars Story is the name of the standalone Star Wars prequel film based on the exploits of the a young Han Solo, a key character in the Star Wars mythology.

History

In July 2015, Following the acquisition of LucasFilm and announcement of new Star Wars standalone films that operated outside the main trilogies,^[4] director J.J. Abrams and writer Lawrence Kasdan mentioned that a Han Solo film was on the way.^[1] Shortly after on July 7th, Chris Lord and Phil Miller, the directors of The Lego Movie and 21 Jump Street were hired to direct the film.^[2]

Two years later, on February 22nd, 2017, the official Star Wars Twitter ^[3] account posted a cast photo of Lord and Miller and the rest of the cast in the Millenium Falcon. The post (shown below) received more than 22,000 retweets and 37,000 likes in eight months.

Director Replacement

On June 20th, Lord and Miller were abruptly fired from the film, citing creative differences with Lucasfilm.^[5] The Hollywood Reporter, CNN Entertainment and Wired all claimed that sources close to the production said that it was due to differences in tone for the film, which clashed with those of screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan.^[6]^[12]^[13]

That day, a series of comments from Lucasfilm-head Kathleen Kennedy and Lord and Miller were posted to StarWars.com.^[7]

Kennedy stated:

“Phil Lord and Christopher Miller are talented filmmakers who have assembled an incredible cast and crew, but it’s become clear that we had different creative visions on this film, and we’ve decided to part ways. A new director will be announced soon."

Lord and Miller stated:

“Unfortunately, our vision and process weren’t aligned with our partners on this project. We normally aren’t fans of the phrase ‘creative differences’ but for once this cliché is true. We are really proud of the amazing and world-class work of our cast and crew."

Two days later, The Hollywood Reporter^[8] announced that director Ron Howard would be stepping in for Lord and Miller, and several weeks of re-shoots had been added to the production. That day, Howard tweeted,^[9] "I hope to honor the great work already done & help deliver on the promise of a Han Solo film." The post (shown below) received more than 2,600 retweets and 12,000 likes in four months.

Title Announcement

On October 17th, 2017, Ron Howard tweeted^[10] a video of himself announcing the completion of production on the film. He also shared the title of the film: Solo: A Star Wars Story. The tweet (shown below) received more than 16,000 retweets and 36,000 likes in less than 24 hours.

Movie Posters

On February 5th, 2018, LucasFilm released a promotional poster for the film in which Solo can be seen pointing a blaster gun (shown below).

On March 16th, the film news blog MovieWeb^[13] published an article titled "Han Solo Posters Lose the Guns," juxtaposing an earlier Solo poster featuring Solo wielding a blaster and Chewbacca holding a rifle juxtaposed with a new version with the weapons removed (shown below).

On March 21st, Jack Posobiec tweeted the posters and referred to the film as “SJW Wars.”^[14] In the coming days, posts mocking the new poster reached the front page of the /r/The_Donald^[16] and /r/KotakuInAction^[17] subreddits. On March 23rd, the film news blog Screen Rant published an article revealing that the updated posters were not for the United States release of the film but had been specifically created for audiences in Brazil.

Reception

On May 25th, 2018, Solo was released in theaters in the United States. On the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, ^[19] the film received a score of 69% (based on 252 reviews). The site's critical consensus said, "A flawed yet fun and fast-paced space adventure, Solo: A Star Wars Story should satisfy newcomers to the saga as well as longtime fans who check their expectations at the theater door." The review aggregator Metacritic^[20] rated the film a score of 63 (based on 53 reviews). Additionally, the film received a positive "A-" Cinemascores rating, which polled moviegoers on opening night.

In preview screenings, the film received more than $14 million in box office gross.^[21] The movie's weekend total was $83 million, which led some to call the film a "flop," meaning it is a failure at the box office.

On May 27th, Solo-director Ron Howard tweeted about the perception of the film's box office take. He said,^[22] "Didn’t meet projections but amounts to a new personal best. check #SoloAStarWarsStory for balanced feedback & then C it on a big screen!" The post (shown below) received more than 640 retweets and 6,100 likes in two days.

Online Reaction

Online, people reacted positively to the film, with many tweets indicating that they found the movie fun and exciting. Twitter user @Fathergamer tweeted,^[23] "Some of the biggest complaints to #SoloAStarWarsStory is that it adds nothing new to the series. The movie is essentially a biopic film about a character thats real in many of our hearts. I feel it did its job masterfully in filling the needed gaps and giving us a fantastic ride." The post (shown below, left) received more than 70 retweets and 670 likes in 24 hours.

Twitter user @XWINTERXSOLDIER tweeted^[24] (shown below, center), "I went into #SoloAStarWarsStory expecting to hate it. I thought it was honestly an unneeded movie. I never thought I would get past Ehrenreich but I was wrong on both counts. Surprisingly good. A worthy addition to the canon and left me wanting more."

The Twitter^[25] account SWRamblings defended the film's box office gross and the perception that the film was a flop. They tweeted, "Since everyone's tweeting about #SoloAStarWarsStory box office: It's Ron Howard's best opening weekend. Ant-Man didn't break 600 million. Doctor Strange only made 677 million. The highest of the new Star Trek's topped out at 467 million. Star Wars is just fine." The post (shown below, right) received more than 575 retweets and 2,500 likes in 48 hours.

Title Card Photoshops

Shortly after Howard tweeted the video of him holding the title card of the film, people online began photoshopping different things onto the black card for humorous effect. Some commented with their negative opinion of the title, while others mentioned other Star Wars characters, like porgs (examples below).

Twitter^[11] published a Moments page to feature some examples of the photoshops.