Solo’s Poor Box Office Performance Isn’t Because Of Star Wars Fatigue But Instead Poor Marketing

Though there may be a lot of reasons behind Solo: A Star Wars Story's poor box office performance, a veteran media analyst suggests the film's commercial failure shouldn't really be blamed on Star Wars fatigue but instead on poor marketing.

According to a report by Deadline, Cowen veteran media analyst Doug Creutz just recently gave a detailed report to investors that reaffirmed his "market perform" rating on Disney's shares after the release of Solo.

Cowen went through all the potential reasons behind Solo's poor performance at the box office, taking into account the film's production woes, its tight release date, and fan bias after the divisiveness of Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

Though some might say that the animosity some fans have been holding against Disney after the release of The Last Jedi might actually be one of the main reasons why nobody showed up to watch Solo, Creutz says that that isn't the case.

"If the franchise was able to survive Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones, we have a hard time believing Last Jedi could have done that much damage," Creutz wrote in his report.

Instead, Creutz' report put the blame on the film's poor marketing campaign, saying that Lucasfilm did a pretty poor job of selling Alden Ehrenreich as young Han Solo. The Hail Caesar! star was relatively unknown, and so the studio had to have a more aggressive marketing push for the spinoff. According to Creutz, Lucasfilm did a much better job of marketing Felicity Jones in Rogue One, noting that the first thirty-five seconds of the film's trailer did a good job of establishing Jyn Erso as the film's protagonist.

Solo's trailer didn't do the same, giving just "about 10 seconds of screentime where Ehrenreich's face was clearly in the picture – not, in our opinion, nearly enough."

Do you think Solo's poor marketing campaign should be blamed for the film's box office failure? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comment section below.

Solo: A Star Wars Story is currently screening in cinemas.

Read: Star Wars Editor On The Changes Ron Howard Brought To Solo