Dork Side Review: How good are the bonus features for Solo Blu-Ray?

With Solo: A Star Wars Story now available to be part of your collection, here’s a detailed look at the extras as you can find.

Solo: A Star Wars Story is now available on all media platforms including Blu-Ray, DVD, and streaming. Although some features may vary, here is a synopsis of what viewers will find in the extras area.

Deleted Scenes

Several scenes found themselves on the cutting room floor including Proxima’s Den, Corellia Foot Chase, Han Solo as an imperial cadet, extended versions of the battle and the fight between Han and Chewie, a snowball fight and many more.

More from Solo: A Star Wars Story

The explanation of Han Solo’s demotion to the infantry definitely offered to further illustrate Solo’s time in the Imperial Navy. It was not completely necessary as the following scene during the Battle of Mimban explains that Solo found his way into the infantry for “having a mind of his own.”

The snowball fight between Han and Chewie did little to add to the plot. However, it was an enjoyable detour between two lifeforms that were being to bond.

Overall, there was a reason to leave a lot of this out. Almost all of the scenes added nothing to the film’s plot.

Solo: The Director & Cast Roundtable

By far the longest of the bonus features, the roundtable brings together Ron Howard, Emilia Clarke, Woody Harrelson, Alden Ehrenreich, Donald Glover along with the rest of the cast.

They discussed where they were when they found out they were cast, the fight between Solo and Chewie, interactions with Star Wars fans and several other topics.

Fun production facts include:

It took three weeks to film the fight between Solo and Chewie.
L3 was mainly a practical effect. There was a little green screen but it was the work of Phoebe Waller-Bridge, the actress who played L3.
George Lucas made a suggestion for Solo to toss one of Lando’s cloak instead of hanging it back up.

Kasdan on Kasdan

Screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan discusses writing the script with his son, Jonathan. Kasdan wrote Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, and The Force Awakens.

There was nothing tremendously exciting about Kasdan on Kasdan.

Photo Credit: Lucasfilm

Remaking the Millennium Falcon

How did they take the Falcon from the “hunk of junk” back to where it was new? Filmmakers described it as “a sports car meets a junkyard.” Not surprisingly, they found different tiny elements from previous films to include in Solo.

Perhaps the most interesting part of this mini-documentary was that much of the set for the Millennium Falcon was built on top of the Millennium Falcon set for The Force Awakens.

Escape from Corellia

Filmmakers wanted to give the escape sequence the feel of a 1970’s car chase. In order to pull that off, they actually made the different speeders into cars. So, the different speeders were actually cars that could be driven.

The art department and production designers took inspiration from muscle cars like the Ford Mustang.

Frankly, this was ingenious. It is tremendously delightful to watch the filmmakers use live-action filming, CGI and sound design to craft a breathtaking chase on an alien make-believe planet.

The Train Heist

Ron Howard touts the train heist as “an action sequence that will change Han Solo’s life.” Whether that is true, the documentary of the heist discusses how the filmmakers wanted to make the scene like a classic western train heist set in the Star Wars universe.

Howard and his colleagues took painstaking steps to ensure that the heist played out in an exciting manner. It was a combination of location shooting in Italy and blue-screen filming in Pinewood Studios.

Team Chewie

The screenwriters wanted the story between Han Solo and Chewbacca to be a quasi-love story. In fact, Jonathan Kasdan noted that Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy would not begin the film in love. Thus, the scene in the film where Han and Chewie meet is meant to be their “meet-cute.”

Lots of time went into designing and creating the suit for Chewbacca. Each Wookiee suit has individual hair strands.

Fans, you probably can skip this one.

Photo Credit: [Solo: A Star Wars Story] LucasfilmBecoming a Droid: L3-37

The character of L3-37 has much more depth than truly realized in the film. The droid of L3 is an R2 unit that self-evolved over time into droid that is seen during the movie. Additionally, when Lando hooks her database into the Millennium Falcon, it makes a sound. It is the same sound from when they jump to lightspeed in A New Hope. Very cool.

Although the amount of thought that went into this character is impressive, more of this information needed to surface in the actual film.

Of all of the bonus features, this is definitely a MUST watch.

Scoundrels, Droids, Creatures and Cards: Welcome to Fort Ypso

Sabacc, the card game played between Lando and Solo, is an actual card game designed by the filmmakers.

This segment discusses the design but perhaps the most interesting part is about the cinematographer, Bradford Young. Young prefers to use actual lighting instead of off-camera lighting. This gives his film a more realistic feel. However, as Honest Trailers points out, it definitely lends itself to a film that appears dark and shadowy.

Into the Maelstrom: The Kessel Run

“This is the ship that made the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs.” A simple sentence drove an entire second half of the film.

ILM designed a screen around a mock-up of the cockpit. The quality of the images was high quality enough that they could be filmed by the different cameras on set. Thus, it gave the cast a truly immersive experience. They better have this at Galaxy’s Edge.

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The roundtable discussion and the discussion of the script are fairly boring. However, it is wonderful to see how much thought and effort went into creating the different aspects of Solo. Some of the mini-docs are truly worth your time and price of admission.

Check out Solo: A Star Wars Story on Blu-Ray, DVD and streaming.

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