New Release! Solo (2018) [Spoiler-Free Review]

Spoiler-Free! Read on without Fear!!

Director: Ron Howard

Maybe it helped that I was going in with very modest expectations, in the wake of the lukewarm reception among critics and fans, but I enjoyed this movie a bit more than I had anticipated. It's not the best Star Wars movie, but I found it to be a solid, entertaining popcorn movie that uses its mythological resources efficiently.

The movie takes place roughly a dozen years before Star Wars: A New Hope Episode IV (a.k.a Episode IV, a.k.a "The original Star Wars movie"), offering us the main backstory of Han Solo, the infamous smuggler-turned-rebel as portrayed by Harrison Ford in the original trilogy. Picking up with a Han approximately 20 years old or so, played by Alden Ehrenreich, we follow his escape from his home planet of Corelia, where he and his girlfriend Qi-ra (Emilia Clarke) had grown up in oppressed poverty. Though Han nearly manages to get Qi'ra out with him, she is held back, leaving him no choice but to enlist in the army to escape capture at the hands of an ever-growing Empire. After three years as an infantryman, Han manages to latch onto a group of thieves led by Beckett (Woody Harrelson), and he begins to find his true calling as someone who operates well outside the law.

I was impressed by how well this movie hit its marks, without leaning too heavily on "Easter eggs" for fans or being overly familiar. The movie does a nice job telling some of the most well-known aspects of the legendary rogue - how he meets Chewbacca, how he gets the Millenium Falcon - but it doesn't try to explain all of it, as I suspect weaker writers would have done. I was fully expecting explanations for everything we associate with the original trilogy Han, right down to the signature white shirt and black vest. Fortunately, the father/son writing team of Lawrence and Jonathan Kasdan showed effective discretion in this area. Sure, it's a bit silly that many of the things we associate with Han all occur in Han's life within such a short span. But this didn't bother me much. I felt that enough new characters were introduced and that the plot hummed along well enough to be enjoyable.

Paul Bettany was a clear strength in the film. The character
Dryden Vos and Bettany's portrayal were intense in a way
that I found highly enjoyable.

The acting was perfectly fine. Sure, it's a bit odd seeing Woody Harrelson in a Star Wars movie, but he was cast well as the cynical, gun-slinging thief Beckett. Donald Glover, who simply can't seem to miss these days, is nearly perfect as a young Lando Calrissian, and even smaller parts played by Thandie Newton and Emilia Clarke are handled well. Probably the most pleasant surprise for me was the performance of Paul Bettany as ganglord Dryden Vos. Surprising not because I didn't expect Bettany to be good, but simply because I didn't know he was in the movie. He plays a frighteningly intense, intelligent, and murderous adversary who, despite not being a classic "Sith" villain, is rather intimidating.

Solo is a film that, while not doing anything exceptionally well, does nearly everything pretty well, and doesn't have any major missteps. Though it's not as wildly entertaining as The Force Awakens, or as novel as Rogue One, it's more cohesive and consistent than The Last Jedi. It's one I'll gladly watch again in time, even if it's never going to be among the very best Star Wars movies.