In an interview a year after the release of Solo: A Star Wars Story, Ron Howard blamed the backlash from The Last Jedi for his film’s poor box office performance.
Solo: A Star Wars Story debuted on May 10, 2018, pulling in a meager $393 million. That may sound like a lot, but the other recent films took in billions, not millions. Although unpopular at first, the recent fan-led initiative #MakeSolo2Happen showed that many fans are finally coming around. Its reception may have been different if it didn’t come out less than 6 months after The Last Jedi.
In an appearance on MTV’s Happy, Sad, Confused podcast, Ron Howard discussed Solo and opined about its perceived failure:
So whatever millions (Solo) made worldwide, those were the core fans, but it didn’t hit that zeitgeist point, for whatever reason. Timing, young Han Solo, pushback from the previous movie, which I kept hearing was maybe something.”
Howard reported that he felt very good about the project and regrets that it didn’t perform better at the box office.
Was Solo Really To Blame?
Howard’s claim definitely has teeth. In the months leading up to Solo’s release, disgruntled fans were heavily pushing the #BoycottStarWars hashtag. Many fans were clearly upset about The Last Jedi, and wanted to teach Kathleen Kennedy a lesson. By making Solo flop, they wanted to send a message to take more care with the future of Star Wars. And it seemed to have worked. Later in 2018, Disney CEO Bob Iger confirmed, “You can expect some slowdown … we’re going to be a little bit more careful about volume and timing.”
But in the last year, as the wounds created from The Last Jedi are starting to heal, fans are coming around to Solo. It was a great movie, with great acting and a fun story. And the cameo of Maul begs for further explanation in a sequel.
While I’m glad that LucasFilm is being more careful about future Star Wars releases, I agree with Ron Howard that Solo’s failure was mostly caused by backlash from The Last Jedi.
Source: MTV
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Solo was not a bomb at the box office only due to the last jedi the movie itself was trash, and further damaged the character. His entire backstory is exactly like Finn? (Solo/Finn) Let’s look…
“Both given names by their enemies now turned sudden allegiance.”
“Both Meet Chewy, and have a fight with him before becoming his buddy.”
“Both are after the main girl in the movie.”
“Both dress like stormtroopers in the first movie of said trilogies they’re in.”
I can go on, and on if you want but the movie had lazy writing, bad directing, and horrible acting. The actor who played Solo didn’t look or sound like Ford which by the way this was a DIRECT PREQUEL! They should have never made this Abomination of a movie. Another movie with this actor should never be made period… This movie should be forgotten and wiped from canon.
Great and entertaining movie with good acting. Maybe you should watch it again? It has alot of the elements from The original trilogi and even Indiana Jones! Loved it!!
Solo 2 also with Aldrich. 👍🏻
Seen it twice, and will never watch that POS movie again…. IF You enjoyed it that’s fine. But to me the movie was un original, and it only damaged SW more than it helped.. This movie should have never been done period.
To each their own. However, you should know that Solo is definitely NOT a direct prequel to Episode IV: A New Hope. It was somewhere between 10-13 years earlier.