By all accounts, Disney and Lucasfilm’s second Anthology film “Solo: A Star Wars Story” was a box-office disappointment. There was already a troubled production where Ron Howard had to be hired to reshoot practically the whole film, after the firing of original directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller.
The mixed reviews that Solo garnered confirmed for many the doubt that was already very much at the forefront of this film’s pre-release buzz. This all resulted in a $392 million worldwide box-office intake, a very average result in terms of “Star Wars.”
Speaking to THR, Disney’s film chief Alan Horn expressed frustration over the reception “Solo” got:
“It’s always a challenge because — and I say this with love and respect for media — the thing about these big movies is they get a lot of attention, whether positive or negative. So when they don’t work, like Solo, the media says it’s a failure. I think it was a pretty good movie. It didn’t resonate as much as we’d hoped it would, but the press writes it up in a more negative way than I would. These are very high-profile movies. If Aladdin, which I happen to think is a terrific film, doesn’t work somehow, that’s big news and much bigger news than if a movie somewhere else, like The Kid Who Would Be King [at Fox,] doesn’t work.”