Marvel Studios President Sympathizes With Lucasfilm Over Han Solo Shake-Up

A huge bombshell in the world of Star Wars was dropped last week when it was announced that directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller were leaving the upcoming Han Solo film and would be replaced by Ron Howard. Understandably, these reports immediately made many fans think the film could result in a disaster while also rumors began circulating about who was to “blame” for what transpired. When speaking with Yahoo Movies, the mastermind behind the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Kevin Fiege, explained his thoughts on the matter.

“Kathy’s [Kennedy] an unbelievable inspiration over the past few years that I’ve been lucky enough to get to know here,” Feige revealed. “All the movies she’s made became the reason that I wanted to make moves. Being on the inside of any movie you understand. You’ve got to oversee the whole thing and take care of the vision of the overarching film. I would trust Kathy with any of the decisions she has to make, because she’s been making them amazingly for 30-plus years.”

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Feige knows the difficulties of having a director leave a project all too well, as filmmaker Edgar Wright was attached to Ant-Man for years before similar “creative differences” caused him to leave the project. Peyton Reed took over the reins of the project, with Wright’s story and overall concept remaining mostly intact.

The filmmaker tried to downplay the rumors of the situation at Lucasfilm, revealing that “creative differences” doesn’t always mean what the public thinks it means.

“That’s almost always what it is. Sometimes for the press that doesn’t seem like enough,” Feige confessed. “But when you’re making a movie that requires creative decisions to be made every minute of every hour of every day, that’s what it comes down to.”

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Director of the upcoming Spider-Man: Homecoming, Jon Watts, has a similar career path to Lord and Miller, as both filmmaking teams started with modestly-budgeted comedies before moving to massive productions.

“I can only talk about my specific experience — I have no idea what happened on that [Han Solo] movie,” Watts explained. “If anything, I was less worried about someone kicking me off the movie as the camera crew coming out from behind the scenes and revealing this was all an elaborate prank! That would make more sense to me than the fact that I was in charge of this huge movie. I tried to be as upfront and transparent as possible from the beginning about how I saw the movie, and what I was trying to do so there would be no miscommunication along the way. If you feel like you can still see some sort of semblance of my style or personality in the movie, than that’s good.”

Ultimately, Feige knows that the final product is what matters most to audiences, regardless of what behind-the-scenes drama led to what they see on opening day.

“Speaking for myself, every decision you make as a part of production these films is done thinking about what will the experience be live for the audience who stood in line, bought their ticket and sat down to watch the movie,” confessed Feige. “For the most part, I hope that when the lights go down, the slate is wiped clean and the audience says, ‘Whaddya got?’ If the movie doesn’t work, you try to analyze what happened. And if the movie works, that’s all that matters.”

Han Solo will hit theaters on May 25, 2018.

The Han Solo spinoff is filming now under director Ron Howard for a May 25, 2018 release. Alden Ehrenreich stars as a young Han Solo and Joonas Suotamo as Chewbacca in the era before Star Wars: A New Hope, before they met Leia and Luke and embarked on a galaxy-saving adventure. Donald Glover also stars as Lando Calrissian, with Woody Harrelson, Thandie Newton, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, and Emilia Clarke in as-yet-unrevealed co-starring roles.