It was quite a controversial decision when Disney decided to push back the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens from the saga’s traditional May date to December, but in the three years following, the Star Wars franchise firmly established its box office dominance over the final month of the year.
The Force Awakens amassed a whopping $2.068 billion from its 2015 release, with 2016’s Rogue One: A Star Wars Story adding a further $1.056 billion and last year’s Star Wars: The Last Jedi grossing $1.333 billion despite splitting the fanbase and receiving the most divisive reaction of any Star Wars movie to date.
However, the saga returned to the month of May this year, although it was anything but triumphant, with Ron Howard’s Solo: A Star Wars Story tanking at the box office (the first instalment of the franchise to do so) with just $392.9 million and leading Disney and Lucasfilm to announce a Star Wars “slowdown” as they reassess and reevaluate their plans for the saga moving forward.
Various factors no doubt played into Solo’s lack of box office success – a rushed marketing push from Disney, as well as the sour tastes left in many mouths after The Last Jedi – but it seems that co-writer Jonathan Kasdan is steering towards the move away from the Christmas season as the number one factor for its failure:
https://twitter.com/JonKasdan/status/1076267290772103169
Solo was fairly well received by audiences (those who bothered to see it), but Howard was working against the clock having to reshoot much of the movie following the exits of original director’s Phil Lord and Chris Miller. A December release would have afforded him much more time to work on the film, as well as allowing for a full promotional campaign.
That being said, with the likes of Aquaman, Bumblebee, Mary Poppins Returns and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse all raking in the cash at the box office, competition would surely have been fierce and Solo’s success would have been far from assured.
SEE ALSO: Solo’s Ron Howard interested in directing another Star Wars movie
What do you think went wrong for Solo? Would it have fared better in December? Let us know in the comments below…
A new adventure with the most beloved scoundrel in the galaxy. Through a series of daring escapades deep within a dark and dangerous criminal underworld, Han Solo meets his mighty future copilot Chewbacca and encounters the notorious gambler Lando Calrissian, in a journey that will set the course of one of the Star Wars saga’s most unlikely heroes.
Solo: A Star Wars Story features Alden Ehrenreich (Hail, Caesar!) as the famous smuggler, Donald Glover (Atlanta) as Lando Calrissian, Woody Harrelson (War for the Planet of the Apes) as Tobias Beckett, Joonas Suotamo as Chewbacca, Phoebe Waller-Bridge (Fleabag) as L3-37, Emilia Clarke (Game of Thrones) as Qi’Ra, Thandie Newton (Westworld) as Val, Ian Kenny (Sing Street) as Rebolt, Harley Durst (Wonder Woman) as Moloch, Jon Favreau (Spider-Man: Homecoming) as Rio Durant, Paul Bettany (Avengers: Infinity War) as Dryden Vos and Warwick Davis (Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi) as Weazel.
