There never should have been a Han Solo prequel movie. Before we can talk about Solo: A Star Wars Story in any meaningful way, this is a fact we simply have to accept - not only is it a really boring, tired idea for a film (who the hell cares what Han might have been up to before meeting Luke and Obi-Wan in Mos Eisley?), it's also continuing the franchises inability to look beyond the original trilogy in any meaningful way, falling into the same trap of the prequel trilogy by assuming that the more details we know of a character's backstory, the better. Coming just a handful of months after Star Wars: The Last Jedi dared to do something new with the franchise, that can't help but feel like a huge step backwards - but around the clumsy references and eye-roll inducing nods at the audience, Solo: A Star Wars Story is at its core just an excuse to see some characters you know and some you don't on a mostly standalone and refreshingly small-scale adventure, and from that perspective... well, it's not bad.
At the very least it's more entertaining than you might expect, especially once you take into account its more than just troubled production. For those not in the know, original directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller had been filming Solo: A Star Wars Story for four months before they were unceremoniously fired and replaced by Ron Howard, who went on to reshoot approximately 70% of the film. That the end product isn't a complete and utter mess is nothing short of a minor miracle, one only made all the more impressive by the film somehow feeling more cohesive as a movie than Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (which had a significantly less troubled production) ever did.
