Originally published June 25, 2017. Updated April 16, 2018.
Neil Calloway thinks the troubled Han Solo film proves Disney’s hearts aren’t in the right place…
So, with the news that Phil Lord and Chris Miller have left the Han Solo movie, it’s time to ask if Disney really are the best people to move the Star Wars franchise forward.
Of course, films run into trouble all the time, and a studio as big as Disney wants to protect its investment, but it’s not the first time this has happened. There have been two Star Wars Anthology films, and both of them have had productions issues. First re-shoots and Tony Gilroy being drafted in to polish/rewrite on Rogue One, and now the directors departing this film. It doesn’t bode well at all. They got away with it with Rogue One, but it remains to be seen how much longer they’ll be able to dodge the bullet and come out with a hit.
Some of us have had reservations about the Han Solo film from the moment it was first announced, and for me a film focussing on him has to clear a very high bar to have been worth it. First, for many, Harrison Ford is Han Solo, and having anyone else play him just won’t be the same. Second, if the original Star Wars films and Westerns set in space – and in many ways they are – then Solo is the typical Western hero; you don’t know much about him, he doesn’t exactly stick to the rules, you can’t really trust him, but you can rely on him to get you out of trouble. Great Western heroes (perhaps anti-hero is a better description) have a mystique about them; we don’t know intimate details about their past, they don’t say much, but they do get the job done.
The original Star Wars films hinted at events in the past that were shown on-screen in the prequels, and when they were shown it was to widespread disappointment; it turns out we like some mystery to our fantasy worlds -the films in our own heads are better than the ones other people make.
Now, Ron Howard is a safe pair of hands, he has a good Lucasfilm pedigree, having starred in American Graffiti and directed Willow, and I’m sure he’ll be a good midwife and bring the film through a troubled gestation, but he’s hardly a director to get excited about. He probably won’t deliver a bad film but it will hardly be a great film either.
Disney taking over the franchise from George Lucas was like a football team changing hands from a well-meaning but often misguided British businessman to a faceless international corporation; it might mean a huge injection of cash and some initial excitement, but how long will it last before you wish the guy who didn’t get everything right but at least cared is back? Disney is a notoriously difficult company to work for; its employees have nicknamed it Mauschwitz, and while comparing a film studio in Southern California to a Nazi extermination camp is patently ridiculous, nobody jokes about Paramount being like Treblinka, do they? It’s hyperbole and gallows humour, but it doesn’t mean there isn’t a grain of truth in it. Since taking over Star Wars, Disney have licensed the characters and their likenesses for use in just about every product; I sometimes wonder if a law has been passed that means boys under the age of fourteen have to wear at least one item of Star Wars branded clothing before they leave the house now. The films have been diluted, reduced from an iconic moment in popular culture to another column in a spreadsheet alongside Mickey Mouse dolls and Elsa costumes.
To borrow a line from Jurassic Park, when it comes to the Han Solo film Disney were so preoccupied with whether they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.
Neil Calloway is a pub quiz extraordinaire and Top Gun obsessive. Check back here every Sunday for future instalments.
