Scifi Diner Podcast 329 – Our Spoilery Review of Solo: A Star Wars Story

Tonight’s Menu: We share our Solo: A Star War’s Story Review.

Scifi Diner Podcast 329 – Our Spoilery Review of Solo: A Star Wars Story

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Our Solo: A Star War’s Story

In this second ‘Star Wars’ stand-alone, spin-off film, it opens with the traditional “A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…..”

Across the known galaxy during the early years of the First Galactic Empire, organized crime syndicates are running rampant due to rampant lawlessness on the mid and outer rim worlds since the fall of the Galactic Republic, forcing others to fight for survival. On the industrial ship-building planet Corellia, Lady Proxima (voice of Linda Hunt), leader of the White Worms gang, is after a hyperfuel known as coaxium. Meanwhile, one young man seeks a way out of Corellia for good.

That man is Han (Alden Ehrenreich). After getting his hands on some coaxium, he meets with his girlfriend Qi’ra (Emilia Clarke) as they plan to escape. They are found by some of Proxima’s minions and are taken to her, where she demands the coaxium. Han takes out a rock that he pretends is a detonator and throws it at the walls to bring in sunlight, which the worms are sensitive to. Han and Qi’ra run and evade the worms as they chase after them, managing to lose them after Han gets them through a tight spot in the wall with his cruiser, but they end up stuck and have to keep running on foot.

At the nearby spaceport, Han and Qi’ra evade Imperial storm trooper guards and bring the coaxium to a female Imperial officer as a bribe to help them escape. They nearly make it to freedom until they are spotted by the worms again. Han is able to make it out, but Qi’ra is captured. Han promises to find a way to get her out. Now on his own, Han decides to enlist as a pilot for the Empire. He speaks to a recruitment officer, and he asks Han his full name. When he can’t give him one, and when the officer sees he is alone and has no family, he gives him a name and dubs him… HAN SOLO.

Three years later.

Han is fighting on the planet Mimban as an Imperial infantryman since he got kicked out of the Imperial Flight Academy for insubordination. Most of the fighters on his side get themselves killed, but Han manages to find three thieves posing as fighters – Tobias Beckett (Woody Harrleson), his girlfriend Val (Thandie Newton), and the alien Rio Durant (voice of Jon Favreau). Fed up with constant conflicts, Han wants to join them after telling them he’s a good pilot, but Beckett refuses to let him join, even after Han tries to blackmail them. Han is taken by guards and thrown into a pit to be fed to a beast. The beast turns out to be none other than the Wookie Chewbacca (Joonas Suotamo). He attacks Han at first, but after Han reveals he can speak Chewie’s language, they decide to work together to break out. Han uses Chewie to break the beam that’s keeping them held together, which causes the ceiling to collapse, along with two guards hoping for Chewie to eat Han. The two escape and see Beckett, Val, and Rio leaving on a ship, hoping to have caught a ride. Rio manages to convince Beckett to bring the two on-board since Chewie could work well as extra muscle.

The crew rests for the night on the snow-covered planet Vandor before their upcoming job. As they sit around a campfire, Val figures that Han is doing what he is doing for a girl. Beckett tells Han that they are trying to steal a ton of coaxium from a train for the people they work ...