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Solo (young Han Solo film) *spoilers from post 1493*

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Comments

  • #272
    eviltimeban
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,178 ✭✭✭eviltimeban


    Goodshape wrote: »
    Just seems like they're failing to create a sustainable universe here. Or, really, not even trying.

    Two 'Star Wars Story' films so far and they lean heavily on characters and events we've seen before.

    It may well be a fun movie, but that galaxy far far away seems like an oddly small place.

    You would expect that "Solo" got the green light before Rogue One came out, so the studios may not have known yet if non-Skywalker-and-co characters would be accepted by audiences (they were).

    My guess is they are being cautious, but there is a bit of a "who's the most popular Star Wars character? Han Solo? Let's do a movie about him!" thing about it. Maybe post-Rogue One we're going to see some more new stories with original characters, in no way connected to the OT.

    Saying that, what is Star Wars? It's about Skywalker and Solo and Chewie and so on. Would anyone expect a Star Trek movie that had nothing to do with the Federation?


  • #273
    Tony EH
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,310 ✭✭✭✭Tony EH


    eviltimeban wrote: »
    Is it? Alden E could play him as a late-teenager. Ford's Solo would've been in his thirties (Ford was 35 when SW was released).

    AFAIK, he's supposed to be a 20 something Han Solo.

    Ford's Solo was supposed to be about 30.

    There's simply not enough time elapsed for it to be convincing. McGregor plays young man version of Kenobi, while Guinness is the old age version, where a lot of toll is taken in looks.

    They can get away with that, but they won't get away with an actor swap for Han Solo in the prime of his life.

    It's an awful idea, been dreadful from the get-go, whose sole drive is money and it'll probably be the first Star Wars film that I'll skip in the cinema. Unless the reviews are absolutely spectacular, I just won't bother because I hate the very idea of this and I genuinely hope it fails, big time.

    Because if it's a hit, that greenlights Disney to destroy every other character in Star Wars until they become unrecognisable from the people we grew up with and the whole thing becomes an insipid, uninspired, mess.


  • #274
    Goodshape
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,488 ✭✭✭Goodshape


    eviltimeban wrote: »
    Saying that, what is Star Wars? It's about Skywalker and Solo and Chewie and so on. Would anyone expect a Star Trek movie that had nothing to do with the Federation?

    "The Federation" is a lot more than a particular set of characters or places. We've seen Star Trek series and films about 5 different starships, and one space station, without too much character or story crossover.

    A Star Trek series/movie that has nothing to do with the Federation would be like a Star Wars film with nothing to do with the rebellion, the Jedi, or the Imperil Army. But that, too, is (or should be) more than a single family and friends.


    And I'm not sure that Rouge One proved anything. The story couldn't exist on it's own, and there's at least three highly prominent characters from the original films inserted in there – two of them Skywalkers!


  • #275
    eviltimeban
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,178 ✭✭✭eviltimeban


    Tony EH wrote: »
    Because if it's a hit, that greenlights Disney to destroy every other character in Star Wars until they become unrecognisable from the people we grew up with and the whole thing becomes an insipid, uninspired, mess.

    Well you don't have to go see it. It's not like they are inserting Alden E into the OT. It's a movie you can easily ignore.

    Not that I'm particularly defending Disney or this movie. Han Solo was my absolute hero as a kid growing up in the 80s, so I'm watching this with a keen eye.

    It will require some massive suspension of disbelief, and buy-in from the start. At the same time, when I saw The Force Awakens, I felt Ford was just too old to play Han Solo by that point, and it didn't really feel like I was watching the "real" Han Solo either.


  • #276
    eviltimeban
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,178 ✭✭✭eviltimeban


    Goodshape wrote: »
    "The Federation" is a lot more than a particular set of characters or places. We've seen Star Trek series and films about 5 different starships, and one space station, without too much character or story crossover.

    A Star Trek series/movie that has nothing to do with the Federation would be like a Star Wars film with nothing to do with the rebellion, the Jedi, or the Imperil Army. But that, too, is (or should be) more than a single family and friends.
    !

    That's all fair enough, not a great comparison.


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  • #277
    Tony EH
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,310 ✭✭✭✭Tony EH


    eviltimeban wrote: »
    Well you don't have to go see it. It's not like they are inserting Alden E into the OT. It's a movie you can easily ignore.

    Not that I'm particularly defending Disney or this movie. Han Solo was my absolute hero as a kid growing up in the 80s, so I'm watching this with a keen eye.

    It will require some massive suspension of disbelief, and buy-in from the start. At the same time, when I saw The Force Awakens, I felt Ford was just too old to play Han Solo by that point, and it didn't really feel like I was watching the "real" Han Solo either.

    Yeh, I get ya. Ford just seemed to be there for a paycheck in some scenes and to kill off a character he's always hated. But, still, I thought old man Han was probably one of the better things about TFA. The playoffs with Chewie were still good. There's still something just "off" about it, I know what you mean.

    As for ignoring Star Wars films, that's easy. I already ignore 50% (prequels/cartoons) of it anyway. But, the problem is not one of "inserting Alden E into the OT", it's the fact that everything Disney does now becomes lore. So, Alden Ehrenreich's Han Solo adventure is now part of the Star Wars story as a whole. :(


  • #278
    FunLover18
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,793 ✭✭✭FunLover18


    Falthyron wrote:
    It will give us the backstory as to how Han and Chewie met (which isn't needed), it will show us why Obi Wan Kenobi gave the reaction he did in A New Hope when Han mentions running the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs, and it will provide a number of examples that go on to explain Han's later behaviour and characteristics.

    Don't forget the scene where he casually picks up a grubby, black waistcoat.
    pixelburp wrote:
    Forget Star Wars, when has a 'before they were famous' / 'the college years' style prequel ever improved or expanded a character from fiction? They're almost always hot garbage that sometimes retroactively erode fan support . Few Disney films ever hit that depth, but 'Solo' is answering a question nobody (bar hardcore obsessives) ever asked.

    It didn't do well critically or financially but I really enjoyed Monsters University, that said I've never watched it and Inc back to back but it certainly didn't diminish Sully and Mike for me.


  • #279
    geecee
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 960 ✭✭✭geecee


    pixelburp wrote: »
    when has a 'before they were famous' / 'the college years' style prequel ever improved or expanded a character from fiction?


    Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd ...:eek::eek:


  • #280
    david75
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 7,611 ✭✭✭david75


    Where does one attain these powers of clairvoyance that allows us to know a film is awful long before it's even finished production? I've always wondered.

    Joke aside I'm as reluctant as anyone about this film but I'm not going into the cinema with a predetermined mindset about it/ aka its sh!t before I've even seen it. If you have that going on why even bother see it except to go home to the internet and declare you were right? This might just surprise us all. Doubt me or any of us will be havee enough balls to go hands up I was wrong it was great.


  • #281
    Tony EH
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,310 ✭✭✭✭Tony EH


    No "clairvoyance" needed. It's merely putting 2 and 2 together. It's all shades of wrong, from its concept, to the actor swap, to L+M, to an emergency Ron being brought in.

    If they get a mildly watchable flick out that chaos, it'll be a miracle.

    This thing isn't about Star Wars.

    It's about money. It's heart in in the wrong place.


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  • #282
    TerrorFirmer
    Closed Accounts Posts: 29,930 ✭✭✭✭TerrorFirmer


    I totally agree. I'm not thrilled about it at all, the concept is just so creativity bankrupt and lazy. I've no doubt it would be an entertaining film, but it just irritates that me of the all the infinite possibilities, they go with something like this. The fact that Ford himself was quite young in Star Wars (especially relative to the supposed age of the character in this standalone) just doesn't sit right. Even if you stayed with the narrow confines of the very original film, there's so much more worth fleshing out. But as Tony pointed out, it's a financial decision.

    I won't be going to see it either (in the cinema, not saying I'd never watch it). I suppose would depend on feedback, or perhaps if there's more of an ensemble cast....something like Captain America: Civil War springs to mind, where the titular character wasn't actually the primary character....nor was there one, generally speaking. Solo could work well like that.


  • #283
    david75
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 7,611 ✭✭✭david75


    The part that has me confused is the release date. Only five months after the last Jedi?
    Star Wars marketing is a juggernaut once it kicks in. TLJ could be the most amazing film ever but to drop a film and start another huge marketing campaign within only a few months of what presumably is the primary concern seems really odd. It's going to be over saturation. I get that it's a totally different kind of film than the saga films but it's already a hard sell. Weird that they've stuck them so close together.


  • #284
    spideyman92
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 312 ✭✭spideyman92


    The title being revealed reminded me why I don't really care for this adaptation. It's too lazy and on the nose. Alden Ehrenreich could do the job as Han fine, but I'd have preferred so much if they took a chance with Anthony Ingruber. When he was cast in The Age of Adaline, it was originally a small one memory flashback scene but it expanded to a lot more scenes when they realised how perfect he was to play a young Harrison Ford. Plus he's really good at playing a different version of the Joker in the Telltale Batman games.


    Plus I really don't need to see the Kessel Run. It sounds cool and I'm happy letting my imagination fill in what the **** it was like rather than having every little detailed spelled out.


  • #285
    david75
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 7,611 ✭✭✭david75


    Ingruber does a world class Harrison ford impression. That doesn't mean he can act at all. The natural charisma and sorta magnetic charm that Ford has is impossible to replicate. Better to find someone who has that or something similar which Alden seems to. Ingrubers online campaigning to be cast even after the film had started shooting, was sorta pathetic.


  • #286
    eviltimeban
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,178 ✭✭✭eviltimeban


    david75 wrote: »
    Ingruber does a world class Harrison ford impression. That doesn't mean he can act at all. The natural charisma and sorta magnetic charm that Ford has is impossible to replicate. Better to find someone who has that or something similar which Alden seems to. Ingrubers online campaigning to be cast even after the film had started shooting, was sorta pathetic.

    I agree (though not about the pathetic bit, you gotta hustle!). When the movie was first announced I thought "it's GOT to be him". But thinking about it now, a) he might be a crap actor, and b) it might lead to a real-life "uncanny valley" moment. Like, "this guy REALLY looks like Han Solo... but he's not Han Solo..." They were better off casting someone who could channel the character well, while looking reasonably like him, which Alden does.


  • #287
    david75
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 7,611 ✭✭✭david75


    eviltimeban wrote: »
    I agree (though not about the pathetic bit, you gotta hustle!). When the movie was first announced I thought "it's GOT to be him". But thinking about it now, a) he might be a crap actor, and b) it might lead to a real-life "uncanny valley" moment. Like, "this guy REALLY looks like Han Solo... but he's not Han Solo..." They were better off casting someone who could channel the character well, while looking reasonably like him, which Alden does.

    Yeah dead right. The pages that the lads reading for Han got out a good while back and I can't remember the specifics but they're basically lookin for someone who's borderline arrogant relies on his looks and charm to woo the ladies and isn't afraid of being underhanded to get what he wants but still gets away with it cos he's charming when he needs to be.


  • #288
    pixelburp
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,711 CMod ✭✭✭✭pixelburp


    david75 wrote: »
    Where does one attain these powers of clairvoyance that allows us to know a film is awful long before it's even finished production? I've always wondered.

    No knowing, but precedent for these sort of films, plus well publicised production issues suggest the final product may be less than stellar. Now, Disney are no mugs and know how to make diamonds from coal, and Solo (urgh) has as better chance than most pointless prequels, but cynical caution mixed with fatigue is understandable
    david75 wrote: »
    Joke aside I'm as reluctant as anyone about this film but I'm not going into the cinema with a predetermined mindset about it/ aka its sh!t before I've even seen it. If you have that going on why even bother see it except to go home to the internet and declare you were right? This might just surprise us all. Doubt me or any of us will be havee enough balls to go hands up I was wrong it was great.

    Ah now to be fair, of all of us here on this thread you're as prone to a predetermined mindset as anyone Dave, being as you are a superfan :) I could flip your logic and suggest you could be guilty of going into the cinema, wanting the film to be amazing and surpass expectations, and declare the rest of us haters. ;)


  • #289
    Tony EH
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,310 ✭✭✭✭Tony EH


    spideyman92 wrote: »
    The title being revealed reminded me why I don't really care for this adaptation. It's too lazy and on the nose. Alden Ehrenreich could do the job as Han fine, but I'd have preferred so much if they took a chance with Anthony Ingruber. When he was cast in The Age of Adaline, it was originally a small one memory flashback scene but it expanded to a lot more scenes when they realised how perfect he was to play a young Harrison Ford. Plus he's really good at playing a different version of the Joker in the Telltale Batman games.

    Plus I really don't need to see the Kessel Run. It sounds cool and I'm happy letting my imagination fill in what the **** it was like rather than having every little detailed spelled out.

    Ingruber might do a decent impression. But he has to be able to carry an film in a lead role and that's a different kettle of fish entirely. A flashback might be ok for him to handle, but a two hour film with him on screen for possibly 80% of it?

    Also, I'm sure that he got an audition. He was turned down for a reason.

    Regarding the Kessel run and all that, yeh, that's something I couldn't care less about. As far as I'm concerned, Han Solo was talking bollocks about Kessel runs and parsecs and all that crap, trying to bluff a couple of bumpkins from a backwater planet. The look on Kenobi's unimpressed face is worth watching when Solo says that line. It's like he thinks Solo is a gobshite.

    See, this is where this film is going to really screw things up. Things that don't need explaining or elaboration are going explained and elaborated on, killing any mystery and interest in one fell swoop.

    One thing is for sure, after 'Solo', we'll never be able to look at that character in the same way again.


  • #290
    buried
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,980 ✭✭✭buried


    The reason I have no hope for this thing or any future Disney Star Wars Story works is the complete and total removal of any semblance of mystery or story gap where the audience member (me) can fill in the blanks through usage of my own imagination.
    I always found this to be the greatest magickal aspect to the original trilogy, and also one of it's strongest. Not knowing what happened in between episodes in the first trilogy made them even more legendary. I know other fans and writers have written their own story gap fillers between episodes IV - V - IV, but I ignore all of that noise. I don't want to know what their interpretations are for what happened in between those stories. As a fan, audience member and owner of an artistic effort- I have and own my own interpretations, and it's all mine in my own imagination.
    It was always a great enjoyment to wonder what happened in between episodes V & IV for example, how the characters ended up in ROTJ in the situations they had appeared at the start. That mystery added to the enjoyment, and you cared about these characters. These new lame "stories" trying to explain and showcase everything what happened before and in between can do one as far as I'm concerned. It literally p!sses all over the magick and mystery and it's done for nothing else except get arses on seats and footfall in the Omniplex malls. It will end up killing the magick in the end, but not If you stay away from it.

    Bullet The Blue Shirts



  • #291
    david75
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 7,611 ✭✭✭david75


    I'm expecting the worse but hope for the best but I really don't get how it will affect how you view Han in the OT Tony? If it truly can't enhance Han in the OT I don't see how it can ruin him either?


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  • #292
    eviltimeban
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,178 ✭✭✭eviltimeban


    david75 wrote: »
    I'm expecting the worse but hope for the best but I really don't get how it will affect how you view Han in the OT Tony? If it truly can't enhance Han in the OT I don't see how it can ruin him either?

    Exactly. Knowing that Darth Vader was once the little kid from Phantom Menace, doesn't detract from his role in the OT.


  • #293
    david75
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 7,611 ✭✭✭david75


    buried wrote: »
    The reason I have no hope for this thing or any future Disney Star Wars Story works is the complete and total removal of any semblance of mystery or story gap where the audience member (me) can fill in the blanks through usage of my own imagination.
    I always found this to be the greatest magickal aspect to the original trilogy, and also one of it's strongest. Not knowing what happened in between episodes in the first trilogy made them even more legendary. I know other fans and writers have written their own story gap fillers between episodes IV - V - IV, but I ignore all of that noise. I don't want to know what their interpretations are for what happened in between those stories. As a fan, audience member and owner of an artistic effort- I have and own my own interpretations, and it's all mine in my own imagination.
    It was always a great enjoyment to wonder what happened in between episodes V & IV for example, how the characters ended up in ROTJ in the situations they had appeared at the start. That mystery added to the enjoyment, and you cared about these characters. These new lame "stories" trying to explain and showcase everything what happened before and in between can do one as far as I'm concerned. It literally p!sses all over the magick and mystery and it's done for nothing else except get arses on seats and footfall in the Omniplex malls. It will end up killing the magick in the end, but not If you stay away from it.


    Can't argue with any of that. Just finished the new book 'from a certain point of view' which is 40 stories by 40 different authors about 40 different characters but exactly as A New hope is happening.
    So you have a Tarkin story and an obi wan story and a Yoda story, they're excellent, but then stories about R5D4, a story about a jawa on the sandcrawler that found R2 and him downloading R2s memory and watching all the stuff that's happened to him and wishing he could get off Tattooine

    Also stories from random x wing pilots and storm troopers etc etc.

    It was jut too much. They need to stop mining that period.

    Hopefully they're stepping away from it once the last Jedi is out and now the 40th anniversary of ANH is officially over.



    Want them to start exploring the period between ROTJ and TFA. There's 30 years to play in. Where was Luke?

    I'd love that story.


  • #294
    david75
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 7,611 ✭✭✭david75


    This at least is really encouraging.

    J. J. Abrams: Episode IX Will "Go Elsewhere" With Franchise; Prequels Will Be Referenced - http://bit.ly/2zALyW7


  • #295
    Tony EH
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,310 ✭✭✭✭Tony EH


    david75 wrote: »
    I'm expecting the worse but hope for the best but I really don't get how it will affect how you view Han in the OT Tony? If it truly can't enhance Han in the OT I don't see how it can ruin him either?

    In the same way that the Xenomorph was ruined by Ridley Scott.

    When you retrofit a backstory to an established character (that's been around for decades), there is always some loss. Doubly so if that backstory is rubbish. Hello 'Prometheus'.

    Look at the awful crap that was shoehorned into the prequels, with R2D2, C2PO, Boba Fett and especially Vader. That was just terrible and went a long way to not only wrecking those characters, but wrecking Star Wars itself. Luckily, we can all just pretend that that shit didn't happen and just not watch those things. Disney too is pushing them to the side as well. But, 'Solo' is going to be Disney's Han Solo origin story, so it's going to be gospel, meaning whatever shite that's put on the screen is now part of the story whether we like it or not.


  • #296
    Tony EH
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,310 ✭✭✭✭Tony EH


    eviltimeban wrote: »
    Exactly. Knowing that Darth Vader was once the little kid from Phantom Menace, doesn't detract from his role in the OT.

    Knowing that he was whining maggot teen who had a thoroughly unconvincing fall to the Sith was so does though.

    We look at Darth Vader now, knowing that he was once a dickhead who was stupidly manipulated by the most obvious bad guy in the entire universe in a terribly cackhanded story. That he was space Jesus, who built C3PO.

    The prequels wrecked Vader more than anything else.


  • #297
    eviltimeban
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,178 ✭✭✭eviltimeban


    The prequels don't make me feel bad about the OT, they just make me feel bad about the prequels. They were a missed opportunity. But the OT is still golden.
    david75 wrote: »
    a jawa on the sandcrawler that found R2 and him downloading R2s memory and watching all the stuff that's happened to him and wishing he could get off Tattooine

    That's a story that didn't need to be written.


  • #298
    eviltimeban
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,178 ✭✭✭eviltimeban


    Tony EH wrote: »
    Knowing that he was whining maggot teen who had a thoroughly unconvincing fall to the Sith was so does though.

    We look at Darth Vader now, knowing that he was once a dickhead who was stupidly manipulated by the most obvious bad guy in the entire universe in a terribly cackhanded story. That he was space Jesus, who built C3PO.

    The prequels wrecked Vader more than anything else.

    Maybe if Darth Vader (as we know him) was in the prequels more, but he was only in a little bit. I can very happily disassociate Hayden Christiansen's Vader from David Prowse's Vader.

    Again, telling the story of how Anakin fell to the dark side was a missed opportunity.


  • #299
    Tony EH
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,310 ✭✭✭✭Tony EH


    eviltimeban wrote: »
    The prequels don't make me feel bad about the OT, they just make me feel bad about the prequels. They were a missed opportunity. But the OT is still golden.

    Perhaps. but, that's because we can eliminate them completely. They aren't fluidly connected to the OT, which is why the retrofitting in them is chronic. In fact, I say that it's absolutely imperative that they are eliminated, if Star Wars is to make any actual sense as a story.


  • #300
    david75
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 7,611 ✭✭✭david75


    Tony EH wrote: »
    Perhaps. but, that's because we can eliminate them completely. They aren't fluidly connected to the OT, which is why the retrofitting in them is chronic. In fact, I say that it's absolutely imperative that they are eliminated, if Star Wars is to make any actual sense as a story.

    Well we're stuck with them. Kathleen Kennedy said the prequels and OT would never be rebooted or remade and balked at even the suggestion of it.
    I know people like accusing them of only caring about the bottom line but if that were true this would be something they would actually do. And they never will.


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  • #301
    Tony EH
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,310 ✭✭✭✭Tony EH


    david75 wrote: »
    Well we're stuck with them. Kathleen Kennedy said the prequels and OT would never be rebooted or remade and balked at even the suggestion of it.
    I know people like accusing them of only caring about the bottom line but if that were true this would be something they would actually do. And they never will.

    But Disney are already creating their own prequels Dave, in the form of these "...a Star Wars Story" films.

    Also, it would make no sense to actually remake the prequels. That would just mess things up more than they already are. In time, though, I think everyone will just sort of take them as an embarrassing slip and won't mention them. Those that haven't already.

    It will always be a shame, they could have been excellent.

    As for being "stuck" with them, we kind of not. They're incredibly easy to bypass...so far. Your JJ quite has me worried. :(


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