Solo: A Star Wars Story Review and References (Spoilers!)

This article contains spoilers for the new Solo: A Star Wars Story. 

Solo: A Star Wars Story has been in theatres for one week now and it has sparked a lot of discussion amongst Star Wars fans. The general consensus seems to be that the film was better than expected, though honestly I think expectations were quite low, but that the film was not necessary in moving the overall Star Wars story along. And I agree. I quite enjoyed Solo and I am excited to watch it again. It had a different feel than the other Star Wars films because it was more of an adventure story than the classic Jedi vs. Sith or Rebels vs. Imperials. It had some Indiana Jones vibes in the sense that the main character was going on an epic journey and was bringing the audience along. Solo was written by father and son team Lawrence and Jonathan Kasdan. Lawrence Kasdan not only wrote The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, and The Force Awakens, but also Raiders of the Lost Ark so Solo certainly had great storytelling going for it. But it really did not answer any big questions or change the Star Wars universe in anyway. We already knew most of Han’s backstory, how he met Chewbacca and how he acquired the Millennium Falcon. However, the timeline between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope has been getting a lot of attention by Disney, two films and a television series, so Solo could be setting up more stories to expand this era.

There has been a lot of talk, both good and bad, about Alden Ehrenreich’s performance. At first I thought he was good at portraying a Han Solo but not necessarily the Han Solo. Which is true; he did not have the same suave and smugness as Harrison Ford’s Han Solo. But then I realized that Harrison Ford’s Han Solo has gone through so much more and had probably developed that personality along the way. He had chosen the scoundrel life whereas Alden Ehrereich’s Han Solo was still exploring his options. Also the adjective suave tends to describe captains (Captain Jack Sparrow, Captain Hook, etc) and Han Solo is not a captain during this film. However, I did really enjoy the dynamic between both Han and Chewie and Han and Lando and I believe all of the actors did a great job developing those relationships.

There were a few key moments in the film that I was a bit disappointed with, though that probably came with having read so many legend books. I was really disappointed with how Han Solo got his name. I was expecting something more dramatic and memorable, possibly Han even choosing the name Solo for himself. But instead it was a nobody Imperial who says it as a passing comment. I was also disappointed with the lack of mentioning Chewie’s Wookiee life debt. Does he not owe Han a Wookiee life debt for saving his life? Is that now considered legend? It seems like a pretty important detail as to defining why Han and Chewie’s relationship is so strong. I also wished that there was at least one scene of Han actually in the Imperial Flight Academy. He defines himself as a pilot and Han learning how to become a pilot seems like an important moment in his backstory. The scene on Mimban really fast-forwarded through some key moments because suddenly Han was demoted to Swamp Trooper with only a brief explanation. The entire film was also very predictable. It seemed obvious as to who was going to team up together and who was going to turn against each other.

The score of a movie is very important to me. With the reality that John Williams is not going to be composing Star Wars for much longer, I was hoping that Michael Giacchino would be composing as he did a fantastic job with Rogue One. This was not the case but I still think that John Powell did a good job. However, it is interesting to note that John Williams actually composed Han’s main theme for this film.

There were so many references and hidden details in Solo that connected it to the rest of the Star Wars universe and I loved geeking out over them. Some of my favourite were:

1. The gang pulled the Wookiee Prisoner Gag similar to in A New Hope though this time both Han and Chewie were prisoners.
2. The “Imperial March” is used as the official Imperial anthem in the propaganda film Han sees near the beginning.
3. Lando thanks Tobias Beckett for killing Aurra Sing. Aurra Sing was a bounty hunter who was a recurring character in The Clone Wars series. She can also be seen watching the pod race in The Phantom Menace.
4. The Lucky Dice. What started as a small detail in A New Hope, simply a pair of dice hanging in the cockpit of the Millennium Falcon, has grown to have a much deeper impact in the latest Star Wars films. In The Last Jedi, we saw how important those dice were to Luke and Leia because they had been important to Han. And now in Solo, we see just how much those dice meant to Han.
5. Han receives his blaster, a DL-44, in Solo; a blaster that stays with him throughout the films.
6. Lando has a model of Cloud City aboard the Millennium Falcon.
7. The planet Scarif is mentioned when Han, Qi-ra, Beckett, and Drydan Vos are discussing where to steal the coaxium from. Scarif is the Imperial run planet where the end battle of Rogue One took place.
8. In The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, Lando pronounces Han’s name as Han (rhyming with Tan) instead of Hawn (rhyming with Dawn). In Solo, Lando again pronounces Han’s name like that but ignores Han’s correction, possibly explaining why Lando pronounces it differently than everyone else (except Leia at times, which still does not have an explanation).
9. Speaking of Lando, the guard disguise he wears at Jabba’s palace in Return of the Jedi makes an appearance. This time, Tobias Beckett is wearing it during their heist on Kessel.
10. Rio Durant mentions having a Mynock Roast. Mynocks are the bat-like creatures that were first seen inside the space slug in The Empire Strikes Back. Fun Fact: The space slug is called an Exogorth.
11. We know that the Millennium Falcon has the best navigational system in the galaxy and In The Empire Strikes Back, C-3PO makes the comment “Sir, I don’t know where your ship learned to communicate but it has the most peculiar dialect.” In Solo, the droid L3-37 has the best navigational system according to Lando and she becomes “one with the ship” after being destroyed. This could explain what C-3PO meant in Empire since L3-37 had quite the personality.
12. After many threats over the years, Chewie finally teared someone’s arm off.
13. Every Star Wars film has the line “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.” In Solo Han says “I’ve got a good feeling about this.”
14. Han flips the Millennium Falcon on its side to aid in escaping the Maelstrom similar to how he dodged asteroids in The Empire Strikes Back.
15. The same score from the asteroid field in Empire plays during the Kessel Run. (This might have been my favourite moment of the entire film).
16. Lando and Han’s “I’m pretending to be mad at you” aggressive hug in Solo was the exact same as in Empire.
17. A big-shot gangster putting together a crew on Tatooine is mentioned and we can only assume that it is the crime lord Jabba the Hutt himself.
18. Beckett mentions to Han that the younger man does not know what it is like to live with a price on his head. Throughout the original trilogy that is exactly how Han is living.
19. Han wears a jacket. Why is that a reference? Because he rotates between vest and jacket for each film. Solo = jacket, New Hope = vest, Empire = jacket, Jedi = vest, Force Awakens = jacket. Yes, Star Wars fans do pick up on those things.
20. Chewie learns how to play dejarik, or holo-chess, which he plays against C-3PO and R2-D2 in A New Hope. Dejarik is also seen in The Force Awakens.
21. Bossk the bounty hunter is mentioned. He is the lizard-looking bounty hunter that Darth Vader hires in The Empire Strikes Back to capture the Millennium Falcon. He also appears in The Clone Wars.
22. The swamp planet that Han is fighting on when he first meets Beckett is Mimban. Mimban is also a location in Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, the first original story Star Wars book to be written and published. Even though Splinter of the Mind’s Eye is now considered to be legend, it is still an interesting reference.
23. Darth Maul tells Qi-ra that he is on his home planet of Dathomir. Dathomir appears in a couple of episodes of The Clone Wars and Rebels.
24. The Shadow Collective was a criminal alliance formed by Darth Maul during the Clone Wars. It was made up of many crime organizations and his tie to the Crimson Dawn in Solo might indicate that Crimson Dawn is part of the Shadow Collective.
25. And we finally see Han Solo make the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs. Except he mentions that it was only 12 because he rounded down, but in A New Hope he says that he made the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs. So by his rounding down logic, did Han Solo actually make the Kessel Run in 11 parsecs? Or does the story just get exaggerated every time he tells it?

And yes, those are only some of the references in Solo: A Star Wars Story! This film was jammed packed with them and I am sure I will find many more each time I watch it.

Have you seen Solo yet? What was your favourite part?

P.S. I have to mention that not only am I a huge fan of Star Wars, but I am also a huge Han Solo fan. I even wanted to name our dog after Han Solo without naming her Han Solo so we named her Echo Seven, after Han’s call sign on Hoth. But we just call her Echo so we don’t seem like too crazy of Star Wars fans at the dog park.