Star Wars: Analysts reveal the REAL reason why Han Solo movie failed at the box office

Several reasons have been touted as to why Solo will be the first Star Wars movie of the Disney era to make a box office loss.

One popular one doing the rounds has been “franchise fatigue”; suggesting the five-month gap between The Last Jedi and Solo just wasn’t long enough.

Another has been the prominent reports of production trouble, with Ron Howard replacing the fired Phil Lord and Christopher Miller midway through the process.

Some have even suggested that the mixed reaction The Last Jedi received put punters off Solo.

But Doug Creutz of financial services firm Cowen Group has reportedly said in a new report that it’s marketing that’s to blame.

According to Deadline, he said: “While Last Jedi received critical acclaim (91% Rotten Tomatoes rating), it received a mixed reaction from audiences, as some thought it was too much of a revisionist take on Star Wars.

“However, if the franchise was able to survive Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones, we have a hard time believing Last Jedi could have done that much damage.

“With The Last Jedi having come out just five months ago, some have speculated that Solo was too soon of a follow-up.

“If this were the case, though, one would think Marvel would be having even bigger problems, with four Marvel-branded films having come out in the last six months (Thor: Ragnarok, Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War, and Deadpool 2). Clearly, that hasn’t been the case.”

He summarised: “Disney’s marketing department, in our opinion, had one job: sell audiences on Alden Ehrenreich as Han Solo (who we thought did a creditable job in the movie with very tough shoes to fill).

“The teaser, by our count, only had about 10 seconds of screen time where Ehrenreich’s face was clearly in the picture – not, in our opinion, nearly enough.

“In general, we felt like the Solo marketing campaign didn’t get fully up to speed until about a month before the movie came out, and that is simply too short of a window for a big franchise picture.”

Star Wars bosses now have 18 months to regroup before Episode 9 hits cinemas in December 2019.

There are also several more projects rumoured and confirmed to be coming out of LucasFilm over the coming years.