The Reel Review
This second “anthology” film in the Star Wars franchise (Rogue One being the first) details the backstory of the beloved mercenary turned hero Han Solo, following his life prior to 1977’s original film, as Han escapes a grim life on the shipbuilding planet Corellia, joins up with and is expelled from the Imperial Flight Academy, and gets connected with mercenaries working for a crime syndicate. After the darker, more serious tones of the last two films, director Ron Howard presents a decidedly lighthearted and mind-numbingly predictable story, complete with the requisite eye-popping visual effects and cutesy dialogue. And while it is nice seeing how Han meets Chewbacca and Lando Calrissian (Donald Glover), many of the characters in this very long, plodding film have a cartoonish, one-dimensional sameness to them. And for hardcore fans, a character as beloved as Han Solo and iconically portrayed by Harrison Ford, deserved a much more fitting portrait than the bland one delivered by relative newcomer Alden Ehrenreich.
Curious how Solo ranks among the other Star Wars films? Click here: https://thereelness.com/2018/05/23/star-wars-ranking-the-films-first-to-worst/