The 2018 prequel Solo: A Star Wars Story isn't the most heavily embraced entry in the franchise, but its star is returning regardless. Our trusted and proven sources tell us Alden Ehrenreich will reprise his role as Han Solo in Dave Filoni's upcoming Star Wars movie. We've also learned Leia Organa - the role originated by the late Carrie Fisher - will also appear in the film, and the part will be recast.
Regardless of Solo's underperformance, Alden Ehrenreich's return makes sense from what we already know about Dave Filoni's live-action feature directorial debut in the franchise. We know the film will take place in the New Republic era, i.e. the era between the timeline of the original trilogy and the more recent sequel trilogy. Both Han Solo and Leia are still alive during this period, and Harrison Ford has been clear that he has no intention of returning to the first role to make him famous.
While we know Alden Ehrenreich will be in the film and that Leia will be recast, we don't know how big their parts in the movie will prove to be. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly in April, Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau made statements hinting that the feature will be an event film akin to 2012's The Avengers. Filoni called it "a clamoring of characters saying, 'How do I get in this picture?' And that's what Jon [Favreau] and I have been figuring out."
The implication seems to be that Dave Filoni could be bringing in characters from most or all of the current and/or completed Disney+ series set in the New Republic era including The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett, as well as the upcoming shows like Ahsoka and Skeleton Crew. Considering the extended lifetimes of certain alien species - along with Star Wars' penchant for resurrection - we could possibly see characters popping up from Andor, Obi-Wan Kenobi, the prequel films, or even The Acolyte.
Then there's the many animated characters waiting to be transferred to live-action, something Dave Filoni is intimately familiar with as the showrunner for The Clone Wars. Filoni has hinted we could even see non-canonical characters from other media pop up in the film, and there's always the officially canonical Star Wars comics and novels published after Disney's acquisition of Lucasfilm. For example, the Wookiee Black Krrsantan (Carey Jones), who made his live-action debut in 2021-2 series The Book of Boba Fett, appeared first in Marvel's 2015 Darth Vader comic.
When Alden Ehrenreich first played a younger Han Solo in 2018, the film proved to be the first Star Wars flop. With a production budget approaching $300 million, not to mention an undisclosed marketing budget, Solo failed to break even. Critics were relatively unimpressed with the story though there were few complaints about the cast, and Donald Glover's turn as a younger Lando Calrissian proved to be a standout.
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