Harrison Ford is reportedly “open” to playing Han Solo in Disney’s upcoming Star Wars: Episode 7. But if he were to return, he may want to make sure that this would be Han’s last hurrah.
EW is quoting an unnamed “highly placed” source as stating “Harrison is open to the idea of doing the movie and he’s upbeat about it.” But their source also indicates that a condition of returning to the franchise that launched his career might be killing the character off.
Ford’s condition isn’t that surprising, seeing as he has been vocal about not really understanding the character or the films as much as he has had other roles. He also famously complained to Lucas about the state of the dialogue in the first film saying, “You can type this shit, but we have to say it.”
Further, back when Return Of The Jedi was in production, Ford pressured Lucas to kill off his character then, but visions of that affecting future toy sales squashed the idea. I suppose there is something to be found in the fact that Lucas did go on to contemplate killing off Bill Dee Williams’s Lando Calrissian character.
With Ford’s interest, it does appear now as if all three principals of the original Star Wars series – Ford, Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher – are at least possibilities for coming back in some sort of capacity for the new trilogy of films. (Lucas met with Fisher and Hamill back in August.)
Of course, any actor’s return could be contingent on any number of factors ranging from wheather their character is actually needed in the script to whether or not they were happy with what that script gave them to do. I would imagine that in Ford’s case the latter condition would be a string deciding factor.
But I wouldn’t write Ford entirely off though. After years of saying he didn’t want to play his other iconic role, Indiana Jones, again, he slowly reversed his feelings on that and returned to the franchise with Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull. Now he has stated that the film didn’t turn out exactly how he hoped it would, but considering that one of the reasons for that has been reduced down to the largely ceremonious role of “creative consultant,” perhaps he might warm up to the idea of one last trip in the Millenium Falcon.
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