By all accounts, Ron Howard is a super nice guy. In an industry filled with people that have sordid pasts and tons of controversy on-and-off-set, the “Solo: A Star Wars Story” director tends to be viewed as “one of the good ones.” So, even though you might have had issues with his last film, ‘Solo,’ you sort of feel bad that Howard got dragged into the discussion. And if you’re the director, himself, you probably are left scratching your head, wondering how your fun, albeit troubled, film found itself at the bottom of the “Star Wars” box office.
In a new interview with the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Ron Howard tries to rationalize what happened with ‘Solo’ and why his film, which is maybe not the best film ever (but far from offensively bad), didn’t connect with a fanbase that normally comes out in droves to show their “Star Wars” love.
“I feel very good about the way [‘Solo’] turned out,” said Howard. “I love the way it played to audiences, which I witnessed and was a part of. So all of that I’m able to feel good about. Sure, I wish it would’ve done [better] and lived up to the box office and so forth, so that’s disappointing.”
He continued, “Why? Maybe it’s the release. Maybe it’s the idea that it’s sort of too nostalgic, going back and revisiting an origin story for a beloved character may not be what the fans were looking for.”
Of course, Howard isn’t without possible answers. While he admits that he doesn’t know the reasons that ‘Solo’ underperformed at the box office, he has some ideas.
“Timing, young Han Solo, pushback from the previous movie, which I kept hearing was maybe something,” said the filmmaker. “And some trolling, definitely some trolling. Some actual aggressive… It was pretty interesting. Not so much, a little bit the Twitter feed, yes, but it was especially noticeable prior to the release of the movie.”
He goes on to explain that he noticed the review bombing tactic being used by trolls on review aggregators Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes. If you’ve paid attention to this type of trolling in previous films, such as “Captain Marvel,” it’s when people upset with the film (for whatever reason, bigoted or otherwise) post “audience ratings” without actually seeing the finished product in an attempt to crater the box office. Rotten Tomatoes has taken recent measures to prevent this from happening in the future.
So, is trolling to blame for ‘Solo’s’ failure? Was it timing? Or maybe ‘The Last Jedi’ hangover? Odds are there’s a bit of all of the above, which lead to the film posting the worst box office result in “Star Wars” history.
READ MORE: Rotten Tomatoes Rolls Out “Verified” Audience Ratings System To Combat Trolls
And even though there’s been a recent push by fans for a possible ‘Solo 2,’ at this point, it seems highly unlikely, especially coming from Howard.