Fans witnessed the death of their beloved character Han Solo (Harrison Ford) in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. It was nobody else but Han’s own son, Ben Solo/Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), who killed him. As the story of Star Wars: The Last Jedi took off from where The Force Awakens left, fans were expecting to see a proper funeral service in remembrance of Han Solo. But the same didn’t happen. In fact, Han’s death was only briefly mentioned in The Last Jedi. The story rather focused on the events between the Resistance and the First Order.
This left fans wondering why Star Wars: The Last Jedi didn’t touch upon one of the sequel trilogy’s most heartbreaking moments. Star Wars: The Last Jedi writer/director Rian Johnson explained the reason for not showing a proper funeral for Han Solo during an exclusive Q&A session with Collider following an IMAX screening of the movie hosted by the outlet. He explained that there wasn’t room to grieve the death of the beloved smuggler.
“[There was no debate of showing Han Solo’s funeral], just because pacing-wise it didn’t have a place,” said Johnson. “It’s tough in Star Wars because I always think about the mourning that Luke gives to Ben’s death, which is all of four-and-a-half seconds before, ‘Come on kid we’re not out of this yet’ and then boom, you’re into ‘Yay, woo-hoo! Don’t get cocky!’ There’s the moment for it, but it’s not long. We don’t have time for our sorrows, commanders. That’s kind of the thing of Star Wars; you don’t really linger on grief because you’re moving forward.”
Notably, while the film didn’t depict Han’s funeral, it did focus on how his death impacted various other characters that were close to him.
Johnson revealed that in the movie audiences could feel Leia’s struggle with the chaos between the First Order and the Resistance after Han’s death. Luke was also shown mourning Han’s death in the film.
“I really held onto that moment of Leia before they come out of hyperspace, just that moment of feeling the weight of the world on her shoulders…,” Johnson added. “It was never something where there was an organic place for it like, ‘Oh it would go here.’ It was always something like, ‘We wanna get this right up on our feet and going from the start’.”
It’s worth noting that The Last Jedi‘s novelization, which is due out in March, will feature Han Solo’s funeral as well as some other new and extended scenes.
In more Han Solo news, the spin-off movie, Solo: A Star Wars Story’s first trailer is set to release week. but a glimpse of it, perhaps a teaser is expected during Super Bowl.
Source: Collider
