Han's Dice

OK, but what item?

What item was available, because I can't think of a single one.
Han has a blaster, a vest/jacket, and a belt. That's pretty much his entire gear that relates to his identity outside of the Falcon.

So what item would work for your thinking here?

Cheers,
Jayson

 

I would have just done without the dice or any item at all. For Luke, being in the Falcon is enough and I don't think the Kylo/dice scene was needed.

 

Maybe for you, but for how film works, it's not enough because there's no intimacy there.
You can't get the Falcon as an object into a tight frame with Luke whereby the Falcon serves as the counter-character in the shot.
It's physically impossible.

If you just have Luke in the Falcon, cool. Now you've got Luke in the Falcon, and yeah, he's sad, and yes, we can see that he's thinking of Han, but it's not what's called a 'farewell moment'.
It's the difference of looking at a field or the tombstone where someone is buried.
The field will give you a somber setting, but the tombstone gives you the intimate moment because you can frame the tombstone and the actor together as counter-positioned and the tombstone can become the functional avatar to act against for that intimate moment.

Just having Luke sitting in the Falcon would just give us the setting; a somber one, but still just a setting.
It wouldn't give Luke his intimate farewell moment.

So it has to be some object. If not, then you basically just scrap the idea entirely and give it a miss. Somber scenes aren't closers, they're openers.
If you plop Luke in the Falcon in a somber scene setting, without that objectification avatar of something, then what you would have said in film language is that we're going to go somewhere with this moment, like Luke's going to suddenly go do something right away.
That's what happens in films; people sulk in a somber setting of something from the past (or some tragic left-over scene; rubble, etc...), look all sad and then that energy propels the character into action.

That's what typically happens, and that's the statement that would be implied with that because it wasn't closed.
It would basically say, "Oh snap, Luke's going to go kick arse because they hurt Han!", or something along those lines.

But if you plop Han's blaster in there and Luke finishes by touching it and looking at it sad; softly rubbing it, it radically softens the moment and makes it just purely sad and a farewell. It's no longer is a scene begging for an answer of closure.

In film, spaces are openings and objects are closures - just in general.

Well, we didn't have any other objects left other than Han's dice to close off with and turn the scene into sadness instead of frustrated grief that fuels some response like revenge.

And remember, TFA had a scene where Han hung the dice in a close up shot. It just so happens that it was cut from the final edit.

Cheers,
Jayson

 

If the intent was to have a scene of an "intimate farewell" then why the hell would they get rid of the Luke grieving scene?

 

Focus and pacing.

You can imply all that with the dice/Falcon scene and not drift off topic so much.
TLJ isn't a film about Luke's loss of Han.

If you dabble there too much, you can throw the focus of his character off and cause the weight of Han's loss seem like THAT is the reason he's doing things and not his epistomological trial coming to a head.

Cheers,
Jayson

 

Touching on the aspect of marketing, I have to first agree with Jayson's reply; there was nothing in the marketing of Solo centered on the dice. If it's just a marketing function then we should expect to see the dice in the, well, marketing function. But we don't. So I think the marketing facts are very much in opposition to what you're smelling. But secondly, I'd ask, can something not be used for marketing function, as well as being a function of storytelling? I mean, when you think about it most everything about Star Wars has a dual function as marketing. Double-bladed lightsaber? Marketing function to sell toys. But it's still cool in the storytelling function as well, true? All of the ships and characters? Marketing function with dual storytelling function. I don't think that the two are mutually exclusive, and that both can and do exist in a sort of, symbiosis of function.

The fact is that movies are art tied to business. You have to play both fields. When you watch a trailer you're watching scenes that are serving in a marketing function. That trailer wants to sell you a ticket to see this movie. That action sequence is marketing. That cool gun, is marketing. That beautiful girl, is marketing. It's all marketing. But when you watch the movie, all of that marketing is still serving a storytelling function, right? So I feel you're creating a false dichotomy here, by proposing that the dice can have only one function; but not only can the dice have both functions, the dice don't even appear to have a significant marketing function connected with any major marketing for Solo.

When you say "to get the emotional depth from TLJ, you need to go see Solo" I feel that you're not realizing that the emotional depth is being initiated in TLJ. The scenes with the dice aren't meant to be "accepted" they are meant to be, seen. We're taking something mundane and trivial, and we're saying, now we are beginning to transform this mundane and trivial thing into something greater. Do you see what I mean? The dice have gone from triviality, to becoming the representation of the spirit of Han Solo. This is why they didn't vanish until they were in Ben Solo's hand. It's showing him what he has lost by his own hand. So, it's not an issue of, do you accept this?, but it is an issue of, this is what is happening. It is not, these dice were a very significant prop, but, these dice are now a very significant prop.

More to the point, when a person hangs something from the mirror in their car, it is a personalization. It is a virtual part of that person's personality being attached to something that is also a part of them. In this case, the vehicle. In the original Star Wars, the dice were just a trivial prop perhaps as mentioned, as alluding to another Lucas film. But the fact is, whatever the allusion (if any) it was an allusion to personalization. In this case, the personality of Han. So the writers are simply taking that trivial thing, and have begun to transform it into something greater. Adding depth.

Saying, "I can't accept this mudane thing is being given greater depth" is like saying "I can't accept that ring of invisibility is the One Ring" it's not a matter of acceptance; it is a matter of fact. This is what is happening in this story. This mudane ring is being made greater, these dice are being made greater.

Now in Solo, that beginning is being taken to even greater depth and, yes, the impact of the dice in TLJ is now even greater than prior to Solo, but that is simply a fact of the matter. This is what is going on in the Star Wars franchise by way of storytelling. They're taking things old, and making them new. So when you watch an older movie, it now has a fresher aspect to it. When you watch ANH, and see those trivial dice, now that once-trivial scene had a newness to it. When you watch TLJ after Solo, now the dice scenes are even more connective and new. If you watch Rogue One, and then ANH; now ANH has a newness to it with the added depth of the transmission data, and the characters you just watched going through their ordeal in getting that data. It's a series of retroactive storytelling designed to add layers and depth to that which came prior, in order to refresh the experience of the old, and make it new.

Think about Luke's lightsaber in TFA. That was just a prop just like Han's dice. But in TFA, now it means something. It's the symbol of Luke Skywalker. The dice are the symbol of Han. Both were trivial objects that the viewer never cared about (who ever thought to see either again?) but they were personal objects, nonetheless.

 

Damn fine post!






Two things on the side:
1) Regarding marketing in Star Wars...

2) Memorial Objectification of the original Trio
Luke


Han


Leia?



I mean...I'm joking around here, but only somewhat. What would you represent Leia with?


Cheers,
Jayson

 

he movie was 2 and half hours, a few seconds of Luke mourning wouldn't drastically affect the focus or pacing.

 

It's funny you went that direction of a Leia's symbol because I actually ended that post above by saying "Given the sequence, I'd expect to see some symbol of Leia spanning Episode 9." The hair-buns were the first thing that popped into my head (as I'm sure would be for a lot of people) but I thought, doesn't fit the motif of personal item. So then I did that Matt LeBlanc gif, and unfortunately my mind imagined as always, and I saw in my mind's eye this scene of Rey walking through Leia's quarters and looking fondly at the various items. Then she opens a closet door and we see her expression is curious. She reaches into the closet for something. Okay now a quick cut, full Star Wars fanfare theme begins. Shot begins at Rey's feet, slowly pans up and out. She's wearing the Leia slave bikini. She ignites the lightsaber and I turn to the person next to me and say "This is a very apt metaphor. This is the greatest scene in Star Wars history. Maybe even in all of cinema."

But then I was like: 1. Just stick to the facts. 2. Nobody wants to hear your Daisy Ridley fantasies. So I deleted the closing line. But, full transparency, there it is. Don't judge me.

 

It could actually entirely change the focus of Luke's arc; not the film.
You have to play it by how it feels when you're sitting there in the editing room, and that could have pulled too much towards giving Luke too much emotional motivation built on-screen revolving around Han.

It's not about how much time it takes - that's not entirely what focus and pacing is about.
Focus and pacing is about weight of a tangent in relation to the primary topic.

Consider the following two variations of the same sentence:

We shouldn't have desert for breakfast, I miss ice cream, I'm lactose intolerant, but desert for breakfast is bad for you.

We shouldn't have desert for breakfast, I miss ice cream, but desert for breakfast is bad for you.​

The first one weakens the focus and pace of the narrative character for the opponent of desert for breakfast (Luke's the "no desert for breakfast" character here - he's against the proposition of jumping in).
It makes it seem like a part of the reason for the character being against desert for breakfast is because they can't have a type of desert.

Meanwhile, in the second variation where we drop just a mere three words - which is hardly any amount of time extra - we have a more focused and well paced narrative for the character. They are clearly against desert for breakfast because it's bad for you. It no longer seems that they are claiming that desert is bad for you because they can't enjoy it as much, as it does in the first variation.

Our principle focus here isn't that the character laments missing ice cream for nuanced reasons; we don't want that much focus.
We do, however want to bring in that the character does miss ice cream and we want to show that that loss has an impact on them, but we don't want to segue their motivational clarity off in that direction by providing more possible interpretations.

The point being that focus and pace doesn't exclusively have to do with minutes and seconds; it has to do with the emotional energy of the character's motivational energy and the narrative that you're trying to tell with that.

Sometimes you want to include a tangent of recognition in your character, but you don't want to lean over to include that tangent; you'd rather just scoop it up as you go by, because you need their character to remain focused on their primary tangent and you need the pace of their motivation to "stay on target" more.

You could do this with dialogue (e.g. "I hate sand"), but it's more elegant in film to do that without dialogue because then the composer can play a minor key, maybe some dissonant chords, and you can paint some pretty pictures to go with it, and your actor can really push their 'oscar moment' presentation and you get a beautiful moment in a film.

So you get little moments like this.

The only problem that I see is that, for you, the dice meant nothing to you, so you didn't see the point of making the scene include that specific item.
OK, but take it the other way around. Who cares what the object was.

I mean, Luke could have been holding a button that fell off of Han's vest, it really doesn't matter much what that object is. You do this all the time in imrpov theater - it doesn't matter what the object is.
What matters is what context the actor bestows upon it by how they react to that object.

The other meanings of the dice are there, as mentioned, but even if we forgo that, there's still the fact that all of the information that we need is evident in Hammil's excellent performance of imbuing the object with his reaction to them.

And the net result is that you still get the point, but without as much of a deviating tangent away from the primary tangent we see Luke going through in his narrative.

Cheers,
Jayson

--- Double Post Merged, Jun 6, 2018, Original Post Date: Jun 6, 2018 ---

HAHA!!
Excellent! That was brilliant fun!

Maybe her...hmm...white robe belt?

Yeah, that's hard.
But I love your thinking; it was enjoyably funny!

Cheers,
Jayson

 

People are really arguing this topic, eh?

They represent Han and that's enough for me. I didn't realize that they should have some deep-rooted personal backstory other than they were lucky dice. I've driven around for 14 years with a Spruce Goose charm on my rear view mirror and anyone that knows me would think of me if they had it were I gone, but I literally bought it on ebay, so how silly would they be? (*sarcasm*)

 

If I had to pick an item to represent Leia, I'd go with her Ceremonial Necklace from the end of E4. It represents both her planet and her family, which I think would be fitting.

 

On a lighter note... I got my dice from eBay (from the opening night fan event) and they are actually super solid and look great.

 

Kewl, I gotta get that for my ride!

 

You should then make it a bulk order and distribute to any Cantina member who’s interested in buying them. Of course with shipping fee. PayPal works

 

I went to the fan event so I could get the dice. I agree they are legit and it was well worth the price for the fan event. I had them hanging from my rear view mirror but they kept on falling off.

 

Yeah, I double crossed them (no pun intended) and there isn't a problem. They also don't make as much noise or clack around that way.