Bantha Skull Solo First Take

Posted by Bret on 05/25/18 at 02:00 AM Category: Solo Film

SPOILERS FOLLOW - LAST WARNING!

Here's my recap and review of Solo: A Star Wars Story:

Solo was fun. It was enjoyable and had humor and emotional touches. The story took turns that I did not expect, despite seeing all the trailers and multiple interviews, and reading a bunch of features and articles.

The first act wasn't a slam dunk. It was a little uneven. The opening on Corellia had some cool shots, particularly the one we saw of the Star Destroyer (not the local bulk cruisers mind you, I'm talking about the big Corellian ships now) under construction. I was getting a little concerned early on when Han was taken to see Lady Proxima. The whole setup was potentially headed in the direction of stupid, but the crack with the thermal detonator struck me funny, and the scene ended quickly enough segued into a decent car chase (homage to Lucas), which included Han rolling the car through a tight spot like he would later do with the Millennium Falcon. (Fortunately, he didn't say "I'll try rolling, that's a good trick!") Anyway, after seeing some lightly conveyed "Imperial brutality" at the Corellian port, the first act gets better when we get suddenly thrust into some WWI-style trench warfare on Mimban. (The AT-ST getting airdropped into battle was pretty neat.) We quickly get introduced to Tobias and Val Beckett (did we know they were together?) and Rio Favreau, and then a key scene where Han meets Chewie and they break out of the brig. There wasn't much emotion here, and it wasn't that much of a surprise that the "beast" lurking in the dungeon was Chewbacca. After a jailbreak and crew intros, they move rather quickly to the next set piece, "The Great Train Robbery on Vandor." This was a cool scene with a good amount of drama. We briefly see the Range Troopers in a shootout (it's funny how action figures released prior to the film have almost no screen time). Val sacrifices herself AFTER SHE ZIPLINES (well, she uses an ascension gun, but close enough), Rio is killed, and there's an encounter with the rival Enfys Nest and her speeder bike marauders, the Cloud Riders, as they tussle over the now detached car full of valuable hyperfuel. Nobody wins, and the surviving crew is picked up by crime lord Dryden Vos's yacht. Qi'Ra returns to the screen, and the crew talk their way out of death at the hands of Dryden Vos (played well by Paul Bettany, but I can't help but wonder how Omar would have done) and are given another shot to recover a load of hyperfuel. Qi'Ra doesn't explain too deeply, but tells Han that she is different than he remembers her, and that working for Vos and his Crimson Dawn organization is no joke, nor is the crime lord that Vos himself reports to.

Act II has the crew linking up with Lando Calrissian (Glover, as expected, completely delivers) and his droid L3-37 during a game of Sabacc. Han did not win the Falcon here, but we see Lando cheating to beat Han (he's a scoundrel!). This scene, followed by the crew on the Falcon as they journey to Kessel is a good character building opportunity. We see the crew interact with each other, and we learn about them and some of their motives. The Kessel heist was a fun scene from beginning to end. The infiltration, intro of the Pyke (from The Clone Wars), and L3-37's droid rebellion were all highlights. We got to see Chewie rip someone's arms off (having been robbed of him doing that in the cut scene from TFA) and rescue some fellow Wookiees (confirmed to NOT be Malla). Lando kicking his feet up and recording his story while this was happening was pretty funny. But him risking his life to try to save L3 hit an unexpectedly emotional chord. Han then running out to help, and Chewie declining to be with his fellow Wookiees so he could stay with Han (and save Lando and L3) was also nicely done. The Kessel Run was probably the biggest highlight, although in retrospect, I was surprised it wasn't the actual climax. In one of the most poignant moments of the film, which got the biggest round of applause and cheers from the audience, Chewbacca slid into the co-pilot's seat next to Han and they exchanged smiles, as they embarked on their famous run to save crucial time before the unstable fuel would reach critical temperatures and explode. Prior to the successful run, the Falcon escapes from a giant tentacled space creature which seemed almost like a Rathtar, which would be funny if it actually was a full grown one, while future Han was smuggling babies. Anyway, this brought us to Act III.

The final act took place on Savareen, where the crew needed to refine the otherwise unstable fuel that was stolen from Kessel. However, Enfys Nest shows up, presumably to take the fuel, at which point Lando hilariously flies away in the Falcon, abandoning everyone in the process. In the first big (mostly) surprise of the film, Enfys reveals herself to be a young woman, and her Marauders/Cloud Riders are actually a band of survivors of Imperial brutality, looking for some way to fight back, and declares herself to be on the same side as the crew. At this point, the Cloud Riders also take their masks off, and we see a few cool things. There's a Rodian, a welcome sight to see a familiar alien populating the universe, since Disney seemed to want to act like all the alien races from the PT and OT never existed, and all new alien races had to be invented. We also see Warrick Davis, yay! And finally, we see an alien that looked like he was Edrio Two Tubes' species, so it seemed like a nice tiny link to Rogue One. Becket bails, and tells Han he should look him up on Tatooine where he can put a crew together for some gig for a big honcho there. (I'm thinking that's probably Owen Lars. Is it Owen Lars? It's totally Owen Lars.) Dryden Vos shows up in his weird Raymond Luxury Yacht, and after Enfys Nest's Cloud Riders take care of Vos's men outside, we then get a series of crosses, double-crosses, and triple crosses, as everyone turns on each other in Dryden Vos's office. Vos is killed by Qi'Ra, who urges Han to find Chewie (who was essentially kidnapped by Beckett). Han catches up to Tobias, and after a standoff, Han shoots first! Respects pass between the two men, and Beckett dies. We then see Qi'Ra take control of the yacht, and set up comms with Vos's boss. Yep, get ready folks: The big twist is that the big man is none other than Darth Maul himself. Shut the front door! Qi'Ra then sails off into the sunset. Han meets up with Enfys, and gives her the fuel. She tells him it will help fund a rebellion. I'm guessing not just any rebellion, but probably THE Rebellion. And that alien with her might very well be Edrio Two Tubes himself. So maybe that money goes to Saw Gerrera's efforts.

In an epilogue of sorts, Han and Chewie track down Lando playing Sabaac. They greet each other in a manner that mirrors their meeting on Cloud City in ESB, this time with Han surprising Lando with a bear hug (and in the process, carefully disarms Lando of the cheat card up his sleeve). Lando, out of cards, loses the Falcon to Han, who says it was "fair and square." He and Chewie occupy the cockpit, and take off towards their next adventure.

Overall, I enjoyed it. There were some weak points in the story. The first act was a little disjointed, but things got on track by Act II. The entire Kessel scene was my favorite part of the movie. It had the most emotion, good action, comedy, and featured the best of all the characters as they came together for each other.

The characters were all enjoyable. Probably the biggest question surrounded Alden Ehrenreich. I'm not going to say he was the greatest young Han Solo that we could imagine, but I thought he was decent. He was charming, and played a naive and inexperienced Solo. He was cocky, but completely lacking in wisdom. But in my opinion, he was definitely not deserving of the early vitriol. More was made of that than was necessary. Emilia Clarke was also good, although there was clearly a lot more to the character, due to the 3 years she was missed, than she showed on screen. Her skills and cunning only came out at the very end. I like Thandie Newton, but her role was cut short and kept to only the first act, so there wasn't much to it. She had a noble sacrifice to save her husband and the mission, but I was left wanting more Val. L3-37 was a highlight, but was also surprisingly short. She really shined as she led her droid rebellion, and had some good lines, before dying in Act II. Harrelson and Bettany were solid. No Oscars here, but they played their parts well, and along with Newton, helped solidify the rest of the young cast. Of course, as predicted, the real standout was Glover. He stole every scene he was in. I would totally be into a Lando movie. As for the supporting cast, we got to see Clint Howard and Warwick Davis. We also heard Jon Favreau as Rio, and apparently Anthony Daniels was in the film, but I didn't catch where. He was not C-3PO, as was rumored when Mark Hamill was doing his trolling thing. There was no sign of Darth Vader, unless I missed some kind of poster or hologram of him in the recruiting center.

The lack of Threepio and Vader helped avoid the Small Universe feel, but we got it anyway when Han unwittingly helped fund the Rebellion, which, in 10 ABY, was in its infancy. Enfys Nest was an interesting reveal. We were already spoiled that the character was female, but she was much younger than I anticipated. For a fleeting moment when she said the loot could fund a rebellion, I was thinking (with Edrio Two Tubes standing right there) it might by a teenage Jyn Erso, but I don't think the two knew each other before they met on Jedha in Rogue One. Earlier, when she first removed her helmet, I thought for a second that Tobias would recognize her has his and Val's daughter. She's probably nobody we know, although I did quickly see one theory that she's Rey's mom. (sigh)

The score was the best since Disney took over. It had a lot of riffs that were ripped straight from the OT, most notably during the Kessel Run. I liked most of the designs of the vehicles, the planets, the aliens (with the exception of Lady Proxima), and the wardrobes. There were plenty of Easter eggs, many noted in the recap above, but there were many others. Becket dons the helmet and gear of Tamtel Skreej. The smuggling compartments used by the heroes in ANH were used to store the un-refined Coaxium. The gold dice were prominent. Mimban came straight from the very first EU novel.

The Maul twist at the end elicited a big reaction from the audience. I couldn’t tell if it was positive or a collective eye roll. It was a big gamble, and it brought the animated series' fully into the fold, if there was any doubt before. When it was mentioned that Vos reported to someone terrifying, I assumed it was Jabba. When Qi'Ra opened the link at the end, I was stunned. I happen to like the Filoni cartoons, and I've said before that after getting over the initial annoyance of Darth Maul returning from the dead in his first TCW appearance, I actually thought it was a pretty good story arc, which carried through to an amazingly well done ending in Rebels. We last saw him in TCW getting his comeuppance from Sidious, and then returning to seek vengeance in Rebels. Somewhere in between I know there was some canon literature which I never read, so I have no idea what he was doing between the TCW and Rebels. Now we know that he was leading a crime syndicate from his base on Dathomir, presumably with the intent of raising money and power so he would have the means necessary to exact his revenge on Sidious. I thought Qi'Ra was going to don that Mandalorian looking suit of armor that was on display in Vos's office, and she would assume some new identity for future canon stories. But if not, maybe she eventually becomes Boushh? Is that possible in the new canon?

In our recent feature, "5 Reasons to Look Forward to Solo" I mentioned that we should expect Ron Howard to play it safe, and Solo would be politics-free. Some fans got a scare when information came out about Lando's pansexuality, but as I suspected, this was a total non-issue in the film. If the writer hadn't said anything, you would think nothing of it. As it was, Lando was very flirty with everyone and everything, which I found funny and perfectly in line with his super suave persona, and it had zero impact on the plot and registered a solid zero on the controversy scale. Also in that article, I mentioned that the cast would be enjoyable, and it was. Perhaps the only miss was that I would say the early reviews were little overly positive. It was an enjoyable film, and the thing that might turn out to be most controversial aspect was the inclusion of Darth Maul.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed it. It wasn’t anywhere close to perfect, but it was fun, and I'll take it as a welcome chapter in the Star Wars timeline.