‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’: What Do Critics Say? What Do You Say?

I was ready to pan this movie because life is too short to waste time, but after seeing Solo today, I have to say that I found it charming. There were moments when I felt I was really watching a young Harrison Ford channeled through a warm, very likable Ehrenreich. I found the narrative setup intriguing enough to draw me into this prequel world and pique my curiosity about how the story will unfold & dove-tail with the more familiar Star Wars oeuvre. Emilia Clark surprised me as well. I did not recognize her until it was over. I didn't follow the media buildup and went in without pre-conceived notions or expectations. Every actor and character was a fresh surprise, and I really liked the movie. These movies, being prequels, will have (and should have) a tone differing from that of the flash and action of the later stories. We saw this with Roque One and it made the story plausible as one chapter in a long series. And not to spoil anything, but Ron Howard does give us flash and action, and it is well done. He also gives us characters that share the stage well with each other. No single actor dominates this talented cast and so I was charmed by each actor's performance. Howard must be so enjoyable to work with and I think his generous work style comes through in the balanced performance landscape. I think they did a great job with the backstory, created a Han Solo I really want to know more about and set up a continuing narrative that I look forward to seeing. Well done.

We saw “Solo” yesterday and loved it despite going in with low expectations. It means something when the whole audience applauses at the end. We hadn’t experienced that since “The Force Awakens”. Bravo Ron Howard and everyone else involved in the making of the movie!

Wow this was bad. Especially for a movie trying it's damnedest to be diversified and loaded with SJW issues, they forgot to at least pass the Bechdel test. This is where two women characters are named and actually have a conversation in the movie that doesn't involve desire for a man.. In a movie that introduces a pan-sexual, this has got to have the women's rights activists positively seething! It literally reminded me of how phony the PC Principle character is on South Park. The first character killed in the movie is of course a person of color, only put there to fill a quota, and snuffed before they had to pay her too much. This is a legendary movie/TV trope, and they somehow ignorantly did it immediately. Thor Ragnarok, also failed these issues, but at least had 2 strong women characters. This movie literally only had a female character to show Han practicing his pick up lines and how he'll be polished with them on Leah. You'll see people saying ohh what about her fighting skills? Everybody in Star Wars movies fights well, even guys who've never fought before like Finn! So what I'm basically saying its so busy trying to throw in social issues, it doesn't stop to think about making them work cohesively around a script. It's literally an example of when well intention-ed white people try to tell black people they understand their struggles and end up really ticking off the people their trying to impress. These aren't by far the only problems. The script was 10th grade.

With no Lucas shenanigans, Han unquestionably shot first... as mentioned previously, it’s a movie, designed to entertain. While this was not fine dining, it was a great burger and fries. Woody Harrelson crushed it.

I thought this was the best of these new crop of movies. I think because it felt “smaller”?… Not overblown… No preposterous action sequences… I was smiling ear to ear the whole time. Great evening… Great fun.

I was somewhat entertained by the movie although L3 was very irritating. There is one aspect that did bother me and yes, I understand that this is just a movie. In previous Star Wars movies the “good guys” kill lots of people (using the term to mean humans and others) but it mostly was to accomplish a “greater good.” In this movie they kill many people in the process of stealing, the “greater good” only came about after most of the killings. I think that I would find morally distasteful a bank heist movie with the robbers killing lots of people in the process even if at the end they switched from greedy to doing good with the money. I do not mind violence in movies if the bad guys “get it” (I enjoy the Death Wish movies although in one of the later ones Bronson did take out an innocent, I believe). Solo left me wondering about the moral justification for all the killing that Han and company do and again, I know that it is just a movie.

Why is it that a rundown of reviews and a solicitation of audience appraisals is conducted here for movies like "Solo" and "Avengers" but not for the ones that really matter? There haven't been many of those lately but we can certainly start with "Isle of Dogs," "The Death of Stalin" and "Foxtrot."

We just got back from seeing the movie. Hey I liked it! I found it to be very entertaining. Interestingly I have not read much about Emilia Clarke's performance or her role overall in the film. I thought she was wonderful. And after many, many years of Sith leadership being a boys only club it appears things are going in a new direction!

This was nowhere as interesting as Rogue One, and doesn't feel like a part of the SW universe. The actor who played Han didn't have the charm or charisma to pull it off, and Emilia Clarke just can't act. Donald Glover as Lando was great, and so was Woody Harrelson. But the film almost put me to sleep in a few spots, and I found myself wishing it was over. It adds nothing to the Star Wars films at all, and I pray there will be no sequels.

Hans was asked to strap in, because they were going into warp speed, but once they did he was sitting straight up and there was no evidence of warp speed in his acting. Also as an introvert I found the female robot very irritating and just wanted to turn off her voice even though I appreciated her humor at times.

This is a really fun, well made movie. I would watch it again and highly recommend it for a very enjoyable afternoon or evening. I think Ron Howard did a remarkable job.

The original "Star Wars" was so terrible, owing to its idiotic screenplay, that I've never bothered to watch another. Not surprised "the franchise" (as opposed to "the art") made a ka-jillion dollars, though. Garbage sells.

As a long time fan ( Saw “A New Hope” when it was just “Star Wars”) this movie was a perfect backfill to the legacy left by the original. I always wanted to know why Lando was wary of Han in Empire...and why he would betray him. Seeing the card game where Lando loses the Falcon? So satisfying. And why Han and Chewie got to be best buds? So much fun. Like the many Sherlock Holmes follow ups - unnecessary but plain enjoyment.

Honestly, this is just a movie. Either people will be entertained by it or they won't. With Disney behind things, more will be on the way regardless. What this is not is a set of new commandments coming down the mountain, a cerebral piece of culture or art meant for endless pontificating, or a massive new discovery set for peer review. Though it is not any of those things, we would never know it by the huge amounts of time being spent debating the merits of this movie, its story, its director, and its cast, especially Erenreich and whether he has the right to dare to play the same role that Harrison Ford did--an actor who greatly distanced himself from the Star Wars franchise and the fame it game him for quite a long time. To see Erenreich interviewed is to see a seemingly humble and good natured guy who has been thrown in to the deep end of the pool. Give him a break already. Let him have his moment and his fun--and if viewers have their own fun too then that's terrific. If not, well then move on because that's what the planet is doing very fast and whether "Solo" is awesome or not is about ten million things down the list of important topics facing humanity on Earth in a galaxy far, far away from Han.

Bottom line: my 26 year old daughter and I had a great time. Themes of freedom, resistance: YES. Thandie Newton. We hardly knew ye (we'll always have "Westworld"). But Disney has to rethink pumping out these and Marvel episodes too often. D. Glover whew! Some negative reviews seem prefabbed to score points before even seeing the movie. Ron Howard, take a bow.

Lando before his voice changed.

Shouldn't reviews be segregated to account for publications and cited media outlets that rely on Disney for ad spend? Also, I like the idea of canvasing other reviews. Please do this for Marvel films.

I am not giving Disney one more penny. Not even if they apologize for the out and out disaster that was The Last Jedi. I was so disappointed with that movie, that after viewing it for the first time ever, I threw my Blu-ray disk into the garbage.

I haven't watch SW since the 80's. Its universe seems to get smaller with every successive movies. I imagine they are now like rides at DisneyWorld: many, many slight variations of going around in a circle.

Disney doesn’t understand Star Wars. Rogue One was amazing, but the other two are bad. Especially The Last Jedi. It was illogical. I know it’s silly science fiction, but some rules must still apply in order to suspend disbelief. For example the scene where one smaller spaceship flies into the larger ship at light speed and destroys it ruins just about everything in the universe. If this was a possibility then why didn’t the rebels do that to blow up both Death Stars? And why did the rebels even need the plans for the Death Star in order to analyze it for a hidden weakness? Just ram a ship into it, and call it a day. Another huge problem is the portrayal of Luke Skywalker. Luke was always the most optimistic guy in the galaxy. He saved his evil father when everyone else had given up on him as a lost cause. In The Last Jedi Luke considers murdering his sleeping nephew, because he thinks the kid might be heading down the dark path. That’s not Luke. He’s wise, kind and persevering. I have such bad feelings about how Luke’s character was changed that I cannot in good conscience subject myself to another movie where that sort of thing could happen again. I kind of wish that they would just stop making these movies if they don’t care about honoring the originals.

My 26-year old son is a great Star Wars fan and he liked the movie and so did I. Disney is working the Star Wars brand!

I saw the first Star Wars in one of the grand old theaters in Manhattan when I was 12 and have been a fan ever since. When someone says "Han Solo" only one half-witted, scruffy-looking nerf herder will ever come to mind. So I went into the theater last night expecting to be less than thrilled, but was very pleasantly surprised to find I thoroughly enjoyed it and found the young Han really quite good and charming. And young Lando was perfect. When the movie ended, the packed audience applauded wholeheartedly so I obviously wasn't alone in liking it despite my reservations!

This opened on the 24th here in Spain and I went to see it with my 12 year old son. It was a perfectly servicible action adventure movie with the added cache of occupying the Star Wars universe. In a movie world dominated by superhero films it held up respectably. The chemistry between young Han and the Mother of Dragons, oops I mean Ki’ra, seemed a bit forced and I spent much of the film waiting for some sort of double-cross on the part of one or the other, which given how the plot played out detracted from the cohesion of the film somewhat. I think It was good that Erenreich didn’t attempt to Harrison Ford it up, which made his role seem more natural and believable, but it did lead to a bit of cognitive dissonance as the young Solo differs so distinctly from the older one we are so familiar with. Donald Glover was a true gem in this film, Woody Harrelson seems to have devolved into a character actor, I half expected a Hunger Ganes scene to be edited in somewhere. In short, not in the same league as the first three films, far superior to the prequels (but that’s a low bar). At least there was no planet killing death star type thing to contend with.

Your headline in print was much better: "They had mixed feelings about this."

Great movie! Got a few out-loud-laughs, lots of screen time for the Falcon, but still not enough, good and fun origin stories. I'm so glad they're making these!!! And super fun to catch the cameo of director's brother. The only technical things I'd tweak are trying to get a better sense of scale -- settings felt a little cramped (see Prometheus movies on how to do that); and the music was great, and could have actually been balanced to more prominence (viewed in Atmos theater).

I saw this on opening night in San Francisco and found myself quasi bored and was tempted to scroll through my cell phone during the show. The show did not require much of my attention to follow and when it was over I left feeling uninspired. I’d recommend watching it when it comes out on Redbox or Netflix but it just wasn’t worth the cost of a theatre ticket.

Like Rogue One, it's just an excuse to make another Star Wars movie in the two-year gap between the mainstream titles. Rogue One was bad because it lacked ambition and had no point. Walking into the theater, you already basically knew what was going to happen. I don't expect Solo to be any different.