10 biggest movies of 2018

9. Solo: A Star Wars Story

Solo may have made this list, but it was by no means a financial hit. Rounding out the box office at $213 million, Solo made less money domestically than even Attack of the Clones, coming in ninth place among all the major Star Wars films—one step away from dead last. According to Rotten Tomatoes, audiences liked it more than The Last Jedi, but those numbers certainly were not reflected in its gross earnings. Solo’s budget was at least $250 million, and likely even more; even factoring in its international profits probably isn’t enough to make Solo profitable.

The theories why Solo tanked are varied. Factors from bad marketing to a poor release date could have contributed, but overall Solo just couldn’t compete with its Star Wars siblings in quality. The film required a ton of reshoots after the fact, which is never a good sign. Overall, the story did not provide anything particularly new or interesting besides a decent way to kill a couple of hours, something that nearly contemporaneous films like Infinity War and Deadpool 2 arguably did much better.

And of course, structuring much of the plot around Han’s romantic subplot was inherently a potential misstep—we all know that Han doesn’t end up with Qi’ra, so why should we care what happens? Solo doesn’t provide a satisfactory answer to that question, and so the relationship falls flat.

As it stands now, Solo is highly unlikely to get a sequel, which, for many reasons, could end up being a good thing. Instead of churning out another movie that’s a sequel of a derivative, we could get another Rogue One: something set in the Star Wars universe, yet with new characters and a more original concept. Certainly, Solo has proven that Lucasfilm can’t just churn out an endless offering of mediocre Star Wars films and count on brand recognition alone making them successful.