Solo director Ron Howard shares the one piece of advice George Lucas gave him about making a Star Wars movie: "Don't forget – it's for 12-year-old boys"

Solo: A Star Wars Story director Ron Howard says he was given one piece of advice by George Lucas when he took on the project: remember the audience.

"I talked to him once early, when I was just thinking about doing it. He wasn’t active on the films, but he said, 'Just don’t forget – it’s for 12-year-old boys,'" Howard told Vulture

"I’d always been curious about Star Wars, and Solo landed in my lap when I didn’t have another movie set to go," he said of taking on the project, describing a breakfast with Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy in London that turned into a meeting with producer Alli Shearmur and screenwriter Jonathan Kasdan. "They basically said, 'We’ve reached a creative impasse with [Phil] Lord and [Chris] Miller. Would you ever consider coming in?'"

Released in 2018, Solo served as an origin story for Han Solo and Chewbacca, following how the pair met and their first heist together, 10 years before the events of A New Hope. Alden Ehrenreich played Han, alongside Donald Glover as Lando Calrissian. The cast also included Emilia Clarke, Woody Harrelson, Thandiwe Newton, and Phoebe Waller-Bridge.

"I looked at some edited footage, and I saw what was bothering them. There was a studio that liked the script the way it was and wanted a Star Wars movie, but there was a disconnect early on tonally, and they weren’t convinced that what Phil and Chris were doing was working effectively," Howard continued.

"I couldn’t judge that because I didn’t see enough of it to know. But they were sure. Once I said, 'Okay, I think I can do this script, and I think I understand what you want of this script,' they said, 'We’d want to reshoot a lot.' I looked at the whole movie and then pointed out some things that I thought were great. And Phil and Chris were incredibly gracious throughout that process. They were just seeing two different movies. So I came in, I had a blast, but there’s nothing personal about that film whatsoever. It’s still just a shame."

The movie received mixed reviews (it holds a score of 69% on Rotten Tomatoes) and was a box office bomb, with reports in 2019 suggesting that the movie made a loss of around $76 million.

The next big-screen adventure from the galaxy far, far away is The Mandalorian & Grogu, which arrives in theaters on May 22, 2026. In the meantime, check out our guide to all the other upcoming Star Wars movies and shows on the way.