The biggest news in the Star Wars franchise is that Donald Glover has been cast to play a young Lando Calrissian in the upcoming Han Solo movie. There's a lot we'd love to say to him about it, but his mom beat us to it. The actor recently appeared on television and spoke about when he told his parents that he'd been cast in the role. The actor's mother said what the rest of us are thinking.
I told my dad, immediately. My mom was in the back, and she was like, 'Don't mess it up.' She's like, 'Don't mess this up!' Because Billy Dee is like, that's hers, you know?
Apparently, Donald Glover's mom has a special place in her heart for Billy Dee Williams, but the fact is that all Star Wars fans have that feeling toward one actor or character or another in the series. The Han Solo movie is the biggest gamble that Lucasfilm is taking with the series at this point. It's taking the story back, closer to an era of the franchise that we already know, but it also going to focus on characters that we've already met. Han Solo and Lando Calrissian are iconic characters who were played by actors that we can't separate from the role. The idea that other people will take on those characters feels off.
At the same time, the characters are beloved which means that we want to see them again. The idea of seeing who they were earlier in their lives is too attractive an idea to pass up, we just hope that neither Donald Glover nor Alden Ehrenreich, who will play Han Solo, screws it up. Playing a role that has been played before can be even tougher, however. Donald Glover says on Ellen that he can't just try to follow in Billy Dee Williams footsteps, he has to make the role his own in some way. At the same time, if you make it too much your own, then the spark that made the character popular in the fist place could be lost and it won't feel like a young version of the same person. It's a difficult balancing act to maintain.
At this point, we know essentially nothing about where the Han Solo movie is going, beyond the fact that it will include Han, Lando, and Chewbacca among its cast of characters. Beyond that, we're fairly sure it will be a Star Wars movie with aliens and spaceships and interesting planets.
Are you more excited, or nervous, for the eventual Han Solo movie? Let us know in the comments.
