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The cementing of a Star Wars truth
Solo: A Star Wars Story
Writers: Lawrence Kasdan & Jon Kasdan
Director: Ron Howard
Han shot first.
We believe this to be true. We know this to be true. And, for years, we have remained at odds with The Creator himself, George Lucas, for the special edition change that aimed, at least in our collective eyes, to soften the hard edge of our favorite smuggler Han Solo. He didn’t survive a point-blank misfire from the hapless Greedo. He shot first. Han. Shot. First.
Yes, there are many reasons we love Star Wars, but debating, discussing, and sometimes just simply throwing our collective hands in the air is also part of the journey. We love to get grumpy sometimes. Han Solo was a nearly perfectly crafted character, but George felt the need to change him just as he felt the need to change a lot of things in his original trilogy. The 1997 Special Editions (and the subsequent Special Special Editions) are really just a true artist continually battling his own finished product. Some of the changes are great and help flesh out the world more—think the remodeled Cloud City—while others certainly left fans scratching their heads. (The Jedi Rocks musical number in Return of the Jedi never stops challenging you to question how much you love Star Wars.) But every one of the changes remained on the surface. Decorations on a cake we already know we love to eat. It was the change in the Han Solo moment that seemed to modify the very core of the character and DEAR GOD GEORGE WHY DID YOU—
Hold on. Take a breath. It’s going to be ok.
Though the special edition of A New Hope remains in place as Star Wars canon and we might have to live our days accepting that Greedo missed (counselors are standing by). Han did shoot first. It was on the planet Savareen and Han killed his mentor Tobias Beckett seconds before he shot him.
Yet this moment, one of the big crescendos of Solo: A Star Wars Story, is not just a fun twist on a Star Wars fan debate. It’s an insightful look at a painful lesson learned and a well-earned Star Wars moment. The Han Solo sitting calmly in Chalmun’s Cantina when we meet him in A New Hope is a lot of things. Fancy words and phrases like world-weary, roguish, conflicted, and hard edged. Though, we all soon figure out what he’s been trying to fight his entire life: deep down he has a heart of gold. However, that never means Han isn’t capable of doing what must be done to survive. The special edition moment of Greedo shooting first does undercut that. The thought behind it was Han shouldn’t be a cold-blooded killer because, well, he’s a good person. Understandable, sure, but getting to the point of being the good person he is deep down is part of the journey we all want to go on. He kills Greedo because he has to, not because Greedo missed at point-blank range. Which is why the moment in which twenty-year-old Han Solo kills his mentor in cold, cold blood is such a rewarding scene. It’s the journey to that point in Han’s life.
Han Solo is a good guy (more on that soon). He grew up with that hard wiring in his brain, but he has already learned how to survive the tough streets of the Imperial-controlled Corellia without a true family and then as teenage cog in a low-level criminal organization. He can’t afford to be the good guy. It’s a game of survival and he wants to win. He feels he has to win.
So, Han Solo buries himself more and more into the life of an outlaw. Trying to form a new family unit with those around him while mistakenly focusing on his love for his old flame Qi’ra. He sees the glamour, starts to create a new version of himself, and has to learn the true cost of this life. But that’s the rub—he doesn’t learn it right away. Two of his new friends immediately die (the underused Val and charming Rio Durant). The droid L3 follows soon after. Han is then abandoned twice. Twice! And that is big to this good guy turned outlaw. His father abandoned him not through death, but through a drinking problem and the destruction of the once-grand Corellian shipbuilding industry (another casualty of oppressive foot of the Empire). Lando leaves him in the middle of a face-off with Enfys Nest and the Cloud Riders, and Beckett follows suit, not wanting to be part of a plan to deceive Dryden Vos. It’s a cycle of trust only rewarded with abandonment in the life of Han Solo.
Then Beckett does more than abandon Han Solo. He turns on him. (Qi’ra does in a way as well but that’s a different cost for Han.) Han is a looooong way from the part of his soul that is a good guy. Qi’ra has told him that survival is more important than winning and Beckett has told him to trust no one because everyone is predictable. His support systems have completely left him alone and Han has now learned that he cannot wait for others to act on his behalf. He has to act first.
All of this builds up to the final moment between Han and Beckett high atop a sandy cliff on the picturesque planet of Savareen. Han has outsmarted his mentor and the crime lord Dryden Voss, but none of that matters now. He is facing off with Beckett. His mentor, yes, but his enemy for sure. Like he said himself, people are predictable, and Beckett is no different. As Han stands across from him, he now knows what Beckett knows—you have to shoot first.
Pew.
Han fires.
Beckett is dead.
Han rushes to his side, the good guy instincts still bubbling below the surface, but Tobias Beckett, who was probably a good guy once himself, confirms the lesson that Han just learned. Beckett would have killed him. He would have shot first. Han Solo and his copilot Chewbacca are alone in the galaxy now. They’ve lost friends, been abandoned and enslaved, and been double crossed again and again. They now know that to survive in this galaxy, you’re going to have to shoot first. Something Han Solo believes in when he walks into that infamous Mos Eisley cantina just a few years later.