Woody Harrelson Is in Early Talks to Play Han Solo’s Mentor in the Spinoff Film
Woody Harrelson seems to have found himself a niche. After mentoring Katniss Everdeen to greatness in The Hunger Games, the actor is poised to go guru again for the Star Wars young Han Solo spinoff movie.
According to Variety, talks are still in early development, but Harrelson is currently the top choice to play the character. We haven’t gotten a name yet, but there’s a chance he could be someone readers of the Star Wars Legends novels might recognize. While the novels prior to The Force Awakens are no longer considered canon, or only considered sorta canon, this spinoff movie could take some of its cues from plots that have already been established. Harrelson could be in talks to play Alexsandr Badure, who was Solo’s mentor in the Han Solo Adventures series. If this is true, we’ll see Han Solo attend the Imperial Academy during the Empire’s rise and his subsequent return to smuggling after he was kicked out. Which meeeeans we’ll be seeing the Kessel run.
While Lucasfilm and Disney have made it clear that there won’t be any strict adaptations of the books coming at us anytime soon, it could be really fun for readers to finally see some of the Star Wars stuff they’ve had such fun reading about appear onscreen. And a screenwriter would probably have an easier time adapting story beats that are already there. And, come on, can you really make a movie about young Han Solo without showing us Kessel?
The Han Solo movie is scheduled for a May 25, 2018 release, which could get bumped back to December.