Development A first attempt at an appearance of Han Solo as a child was present during the pre-production of
Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith in 2002, showing an early draft of a young Solo that takes part in the battle on Kashyyyk. Later, a planned live-action TV series developed by
Star Wars creator
George Lucas titled
Star Wars: Underworld would have depicted Han Solo's first meeting with Chewbacca and his winning the
Millennium Falcon from Lando Calrissian. In 2012, about three weeks before Lucasfilm became a Disney property,
Lawrence Kasdan had a meeting with Lucas and
Kathleen Kennedy about relaunching the franchise and was presented with nine film ideas, devised and sketched by Lucas himself, which included the new sequel trilogy and various spin-offs. However, Kasdan wasn't sure if he wanted to make more movies even though the story about Han Solo was the one that inspired him the most, so Lucas commissioned him to write the screenplay. After Lucas sold his company to Disney in 2012, Kasdan was hired to help finish the script for
Star Wars: The Force Awakens, leaving his son
Jonathan Kasdan in charge of writing
Solo until his return. Jon Kasdan cited the films
Treasure Island (1950),
Unforgiven (1992),
Heat (1995),
The Big Lebowski (1998) and
Gangster No. 1 (2000) as influences when writing the screenplay. The film was internally codenamed "Harry and the Boy" and initially planned to follow
The Force Awakens. In February 2013,
Disney CEO
Bob Iger confirmed the development of two
Star Wars standalone films, one written by Lawrence Kasdan. Shortly thereafter, it was reported that Disney was working on a film featuring Solo. Disney CFO
Jay Rasulo described the standalone films as
origin stories. In July, Lucasfilm announced that an anthology film focusing "on how [a] young Han Solo became the smuggler, thief, and scoundrel whom
Luke Skywalker and
Obi-Wan Kenobi first encountered in the cantina at
Mos Eisley" would be released on May 25, 2018. The film was supposed to be released after
The Force Awakens, but the temporary departure of Kasdan led to the first development of the spin-off
Rogue One. The project was to be directed by
Phil Lord and Christopher Miller from a script by Lawrence and Jonathan Kasdan. Kathleen Kennedy would serve as a producer, with Lawrence Kasdan and Jason McGatlin as executive producers;
Allison Shearmur and Simon Emanuel also produce. In May 2016, Lawrence Kasdan stated that filming would start in January 2017.
Casting In January 2016, a list of actors in consideration for the role of young Han Solo was revealed, including
Emory Cohen,
Scott Eastwood,
Ansel Elgort,
Dave Franco,
Blake Jenner,
Logan Lerman,
Jack Reynor, and
Miles Teller. In March 2016, it was reported that
Taron Egerton,
Alden Ehrenreich, and Reynor were on a shortlist for the role. In May 2016, Ehrenreich was reported to have been cast as the young Han Solo, and was confirmed for the role at
Star Wars Celebration Europe III two months later. Miller called casting the role one of "the hardest casting challenges of all time," adding that they "saw over 3,000 people for the part", Glover was confirmed for Calrissian shortly after, with Clarke cast as the female lead the following month.
Yahya Abdul Mateen II was a finalist for the role of Calrissian, while
O'Shea Jackson Jr.,
Shameik Moore,
Adande Thorne, and
ASAP Rocky also auditioned for the role. In early January 2017,
Woody Harrelson was revealed to be in negotiations to portray Han Solo's mentor, and was confirmed to be appearing in the film shortly after.
Christian Bale had previously been in discussions for the role. A subsequent interview with Harrelson bolstered speculation that he may be specifically playing
Legends character
Garris Shrike, but Harrelson revealed the character's name as Beckett in March 2017. In February 2017,
Phoebe Waller-Bridge joined the cast in an undisclosed role, said to be "a CGI-driven performance" similar to
Alan Tudyk in
Rogue One as the droid
K-2SO. Additionally, it was reported that
Thandiwe Newton was in negotiations to star in the film. Waller-Bridge and Newton were confirmed as part of the cast by the end of February, alongside the announcement that Joonas Suotamo would appear as Chewbacca, reprising the role from
The Force Awakens and
The Last Jedi, where he shared it with original Chewbacca actor
Peter Mayhew. and was confirmed shortly after, portraying a half-human, half-animal creature.
Warwick Davis was confirmed as part of the cast by the end of July 2017. under the
working title Star Wars: Red Cup. By February 10, the film had spent $54.5 million on production. Lucasfilm announced that principal photography started on February 20, 2017.
Bradford Young served as the cinematographer for the film. In May 2017, filming took place in Italy, with locations including
Tre Cime di Lavaredo and
Monte Piana in the
Dolomites in
Veneto, to the
Fassa Dolomites in
Trentino. Filming also took place in the Canary Islands that month. On June 20, 2017, citing "creative differences", Lucasfilm announced that directors Lord and Miller had left the project with a new director "to be announced soon". It was reported that the directors were fired after Kennedy and Lawrence Kasdan disagreed with their shooting style; Lord and Miller believed they were hired to make a comedy film, while Lucasfilm was looking for the duo only to add "a comedic touch." Lucasfilm also felt the directors were encouraging too much improvisation from the actors, which was believed to be "shifting the story off-course" from the Kasdans' script. The original film editor,
Chris Dickens,
Joe Johnston and Kasdan were also considered, though in regards to Kasdan,
Directors Guild of America rules state that a replacement for a director may not be someone already involved in the production. Two days later, it was announced that Howard would take over directing for the remaining three and a half weeks of scheduled principal photography as well as the scheduled five weeks of reshoots. Howard wrote, "I'm beyond grateful to add my voice to the
Star Wars universe... I hope to honor the great work already done and help deliver on the promise of a Han Solo film." Howard was expected to arrive in London on June 26 to complete filming. During the reshoots, actor Michael K. Williams was unable to return to the production, due to a schedule conflict with filming
The Red Sea Diving Resort, resulting in his part being redeveloped and recast with
Paul Bettany. Williams stated the reshoots for his character were "to match the new direction which the producers wanted Ron to carry the film in," and that he would not have been available again until November 2017; the production did not want to wait for his availability to make a release in May 2018. Bettany, who previously worked with Howard on
A Beautiful Mind and
The Da Vinci Code, had heard of the director's involvement with the film and texted him to inquire into joining the film. "Two weeks later I was flying to London to be in
Star Wars," Bettany detailed in a May 2018 interview with
The Los Angeles Times. Lucas, Howard's friend, mentor and collaborator, made a surprise visit to the set to encourage Howard on his first day shooting. Intended as a short meeting, Lucas spent the whole day with the crew. While Lucas had not meant to interfere, at some point he forgot and asked, "Why doesn't Han just do this?"; Howard included his suggestion. On October 17, 2017, Howard announced that principal photography had been completed, and revealed the title of the film. In March 2018, after it was reported Howard had reshot around 70% of the film, it was announced that Lord and Miller would not challenge for director credit and instead agreed to executive producer credits. The duo saw an early cut of Howard's film and provided him with their feedback. Post-production wrapped on April 22, 2018. According to the writers, the scene where Han shoots Beckett is a deliberate reference to
a scene from the 1977
Star Wars, where the former shoots
Greedo.
Visual effects (Gavin Free and Daniel Gruchy) provided inspiration for the visual effects used to achieve the coaxium train heist. The visual effects were provided by
Industrial Light & Magic, Hybride and Blind LTD and Supervised by Nigel Sumner, Julian Foddy, Greg Kegel, Joseph Kasparian, Francois Lambert, Andrew Booth, Rob Bredow and
Patrick Tubach with the help of
Jellyfish Pictures, Raynault VFX,
Lola VFX and Nvizage. Bredow described working on the train heist scene as a challenge. "I've always in my own life referenced the Star Wars films in terms of having the coolest explosions ever, you know, back to
Joe Viskocil's explosions of the Death Star and the way those evolved over time. It was like, 'How am I going to do something that's different and unique in the Star Wars universe?". He would utilize miniature models and built a 3D model of the mountain in the film and blew it up with a variety of
firecrackers within a large
fish tank built at Pinewood. The team took inspiration from the
YouTube channel
The Slow Mo Guys, specifically a video of the creators
Gavin Free and Daniel Gruchy conducting an experiment that saw them blowing up firecrackers in a fish tank to capture the explosion in
slow motion. Around 60 different designs of the
Millennium Falcon were developed before the final version seen in the film was settled on. Taken into consideration by the design team was 1970s culture, examining
muscle cars, as well as concept art drafted for the 1977 film. Lead designer James Clyne described adding an
escape pod to the front of the ship as solving a curiosity he had as a boy as to why the
Falcon had that design.
Rear-projection visual effects, a technique used to combine foreground performances with pre-filmed backgrounds, were used for the
Falcon cockpit scenes, an updated version of the technique used in the original trilogy. This allowed the actors to have a visual reference for the scene. The creation of L3 was a combination of practical and visual effects. Actress Phoebe Waller-Bridge was present on set and wore a costume to perform her scenes, with post-production visual effects done to erase Waller-Bridge out of the footage and to add in interior pieces and wires.
Phil Tippett created the
stop motion animation for the holochess scene, which included two characters that didn't make it to the 1977 movie.
Music In July 2017,
John Powell was announced as the main composer of the score. Longtime
Star Wars composer
John Williams composed and conducted the Han Solo theme, "The Adventures of Han", for the film. Powell began writing the music in late 2017 after finishing his work on
Ferdinand. In December 2017, Williams wrote two musical pieces and combined them to create Han's theme. The following month, Williams recorded the demos with the Recording Arts Orchestra of Los Angeles at the
Newman Scoring Stage. Powell interpolated Williams' new theme into his score, as well as incorporating music by Williams from previous
Star Wars films, including the
Star Wars main title, and several motifs and cues from
A New Hope,
The Empire Strikes Back, and
The Phantom Menace.
Walt Disney Records released the soundtrack album on May 25, 2018. The deluxe edition was released on November 20, 2020, featuring an additional 40 minutes of previously unreleased music. In December 2020, Mondo had publicly announced the release of the soundtrack on 180g vinyl and limited "hyperspace" vinyl, due for January 2021. == Marketing ==