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Tuesday, May 4, 2021

Movie Review: Solo: A STAR WARS Story (2018)

 May the fourth be with you!

All my fellow STAR WARS fans know what today is! The day to celebrate one of my favorite film franchises! For anyone who hasn’t seen STAR WARS and is confused, let me explain it to you. In STAR WARS a common saying is, “May the force be with you”, and since today is May 4th, you get the gist.

What are all of my fellow fans doing today? I’ve been busy all day admiring my STAR WARS gear, watching one of the films, and drinking chocolate milk. Right now after all that I’m reviewing one of the spin-off movies for you! Before I get started, know this:

My guarantee: On ALL of my reviews there are NO spoilers unless I give you warning. This is spoiler free!
Interested in the other movies? I highly recommend watching them in the following order (with links to my reviews):
IV: A New Hope (1977), V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980), VI: The Return of the Jedi (1982), I: The Phantom Menace (1999), II: Attack of the Clones (2002), III: Revenge of the Sith (2005), VII: The Force Awakens (2015), VIII: The Last Jedi (2017), & IX: The Rise of Skywalker (2019).

Watch them in that order, ignoring those pesky numbers and all of the surprises will be intact!
If you want to watch the first spin-off, Rogue One (2016), then you can watch it any time, really, but in the timeline it goes between what happens in III: Revenge of the Sith (2005) and IV: A New Hope (1977).
What about this one? If you want to watch this movie then you can once again watch it without previous experience, but you’ll get a lot more of the references if you’ve seen the original trilogy (episodes IV-VI) because that is where they drew inspiration even though in the timeline this comes around the same time as Rogue One (2016). Warning, if you have seen the prequels (episodes I-III) but haven’t seen the TV series STAR WARS: Clone Wars, then something near the end will really confuse you. My sister and I were bewildered and didn’t understand what happened because it wasn’t consistent with the rest of the series. That is, until a friend who had seen Clone Wars explained it to her.

Now, what we’ve all been waiting for, the review!


Solo: A STAR WARS Story (2018):
The orphan Han manages to get off the planet Corellia, escaping from a gang. Time passes and he has gone through several army positions until he gets thrown in jail. There he meets a new friend and later runs in to some smugglers. Working together they want to steal coaxium, a valuable fuel. When plans fall through they have to work specially for Dryden Vos of the Crimson Dawn where they strike a new difficult deal to make up for a mistake: Make a Kessel Run to get unprocessed coaxium. What with faces from Han’s past as well as new shifty accomplices, whom can he trust?
Genres
: Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Action, Adventure.
Length: approx. 135 minutes.
Script: 8. A smattering of mild common swearing, but not too bad.
Crew: Directed by: Ron Howard. Written by: Jonathan Kasdan, Lawrence Kasdan, based on characters by George Lucas.
Starring:
Alden Ehrenreich as Han Solo.
‘“Sorry I punched your face.”
“Happens more often than you think.”’
Joonas Suotamo as Chewbacca.
Donald Glover as Lando Calrissian.
Emilia Clarke as Qi'ra.
Woody Harrelson as Tobias Beckett.
Paul Bettany as Dryden Vos.
Erin Kellyman as Enfys Nest.
Phoebe Waller-Bridge as L3-37.
Thandie Newton as Val.
Jon Favreau as the voice of Rio Durant.
Linda Hunt as the voice of Lady Proxima.
Ian Kenny as Rebolt.
John Tui as Korso.
Charlotte Louise as Margo.
Sema-Tawi Smart as Chanteuse.
Clint Howard as Ralakili.
Dee Tails as Quay Tolsite.
Attila Vajda as Sagwa.
Anthony Daniels as Tak.
Kiran Shah as Karjj.
Lily Newmark as Lexi.
Samantha Colley as Ottilie.
Costumes: 8. For some reason today anything I put here seems like it would be weird. Don’t know what that’s about. I don’t have anything bad to say about any of the outfits, I thought they were cool!
Cinematography:
7. Typical for an action movie. Lots of CGI with the space travel which was overdone in a few places but other than that fine.
Cinematography by: Bradford Young.
Music:
8. I don’t love it like I do the original, but I still like it! It was distinctly its own thing yet as the movie went on started using more STAR WARS themes which was very cool. I especially like the track for the Marauders.
Music by: John Powell with a few contributions by John Williams.
Quotability: 5. Has a surprisingly low score for a STAR WARS movie, I know. I haven’t even considered quoting it at all since I watched it, and neither has my sister. But there were some decent lines that I found.
“I admire anyone who can crawl their way out of a sewer.”
Content
: 7. There is death, killing, and one or two suggestive lines. There are some scary things like creatures and powers that people have, but it didn’t bother me excessively.
Originality: 9. It was much more original than I expected! It took an idea and expanded on it, adding fun characters. I was impressed!
Good For: STAR WARS fans.
Age Range:
It is rated PG-13 because of the violence and that’s not far off. I can see younger kids liking this a lot, but it would depend on what they personally like already. That’s me stating the obvious, sorry!
Overall Score: 7.5.
Worth watching?: Yeah, I’m glad to finally know what all of the hype is about.
Will I watch again?: Well...when I first started this review I was sure that the answer was no, but thinking about it this much has made me want to try it again.
Bonus thoughts:
Here’s what you guys have been wondering the whole time: Did I like it? Some of you might have guessed my feelings, but I assure you that there is more to it!
The story was fun, the design of the movie was rad, the characters were well constructed, and it was a neat journey.
Just one big problem:

It wasn’t Han Solo.

Before you turn on me know that I liked it quite a bit! The thing is, I would be very engaged then I would think, “Wait, this is Han?” It would completely throw me off track because it. isn’t. him. Han is a mysterious character whom we first see in A New Hope. I don’t need a backstory made up for him. Alden Ehrenreich was trying his best, so I don’t blame him in any way as he was great to watch, but I prefer to think of him as a whole new character in the fabulous STAR WARS universe.

The most believable character of the ones we are familiar with was Donald Glover’s Lando. He was very charismatic yet without a lot of maturity. I love Lando so I highly approve. I think of this movie as Lando with a bunch of new never-before-seen characters.
My favorite part of all of this had to be Dryden Vos. Paul Bettany rocked acting him! He was so creepy with a spoilt elegance. It was revoltingly awesome. He was an epic villain.
I have to say that I didn’t like L3-37, but that’s just me. Qi’ra was a fascinating character whom I want to know more about!
I liked a ton of concepts here. The Marauders, the Crimson Dawn (such a neat name! Every organization needs to have such an incredible name), and Enfys Nest and crew! It had great potential.

This film was definitely an ordeal to make! They went through several directors before landing on Ron Howard as well as some change of cast and crew involving several reshoots. Knowing this beforehand I thought that it would be easy to spot where things got changed around, but I was wrong and didn’t notice.

The climax was one of the craziest that I’ve ever seen! I was getting whiplash from everything that was happening so quickly! At first I was just stunned (and a little irritated) but thinking about it now, it was really cool. Probably my second favorite part of the movie after Dryden Vos. If, like me, you are a hardcore STAR WARS fan yet are wary of trying this then I would say it is worth a shot! You don’t have to believe that everything is cannon and just enjoy it as something completely different like me, or if you enjoy it as it is then I’ll be happy for you!



Well, there’s the scoop from me. Thanks for reading this! Tell me if you’ve seen this and what you think of my thoughts! Was anyone else unsure of this film? Was it better or worse than you expected? Let’s just talk all things STAR WARS! Who else likes Dryden Vos as much as I do?

May the fourth be with you, and Godspeed rebels.

MovieCritic

12 comments:

  1. I agree my biggest problem is Han. He doesn't look like him, act like him, or talk like him. I would have enjoyed the movie much more if was about a random character instead of Han. But I did enjoy it as a sort of heist space movie.

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    1. It was too much to ask me to suspend my belief that far. Even months later I just think of it as the movie about a different guy who happens to be named Han. I didn't know how much I would enjoy a space heist movie, so I liked that aspect a lot!

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  2. Great review! I haven't seen this one in awhile (it might be since it came out), but I liked it when I saw it.
    Oh, I can definitely see how you would think "This isn't Han." Alden Ehrenreich did a good job, but he and Harrison Ford played Han completely different ways.
    I really like backstories, but I think that it definitely could have been just as good if it was about a new character.
    I agree with you that I love Donald Glover's Lando, and I think Qi'ra is really interesting.

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    1. Thank you! I wanted to see it when it originally came out but didn't have the chance so it was good to see it finally last year.
      Yeah, they both had good acting and make you believe the motivations, but they just aren't the same person.
      My sister LOVES backstory, but usually it just makes me either more confused ro sad, so I love having new characters instead. We got plenty of them here so it makes sense that he could be new, too.
      The dynamics that we got with both of them were so fascinating! I want to know more about each of them now.

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  3. Replies
    1. It was more fun than I thought it would be! I had a blast... *laughs at own pun*

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  4. I've had this one one my list but I wasn't sure if it was worth it or not so this was helpful

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    1. My favorite thing is being helpful, so I'm really happy that this did just that!

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  5. Yeah this one didn't enchant me much, though I had been kinda excited to see it. I agree with what you say about Han being a mysterious character in A New Hope! He was perfect without a backstory. :) I think the problem was with the script rather than the actor...the cocky, self-centered Han we know and love doesn't seem to have had such a tragic backstory, so it's kinda difficult to buy this.

    Great review!

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    1. Exactly! The actor did a great job with what he was given, but what he was given wasn't the Han we know and love. I know that a lot of characters who are cocky because they've had a hard life and are trying to cover it up, but we just feel watching Harrison Ford as Han that that wasn't the case.

      Aww, thank you, Megan!

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  6. Replies
    1. Your talking about it convinced me to see it, and I'm glad I did!

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