Donald Glover Wants Lando Movie to Be Fun

Movies

Donald Glover recently spoke with The Wall Street Journal in a video interview. Naturally, the topic of Star Wars and his Lando series-turned-movie came up. Glover has been attached to a Lando project since Kathleen Kennedy announced it as a series back in 2020, following his 2018 appearance in the role in the underperforming Solo: a Star Wars Story. Following the removal of showrunner Justin Simien and the switch to a cinematic format, Donald and his brother Stephen Glover are developing the film for Disney and Lucasfilm. Variety confirmed this last year when Glover also stated to GQ, “We’re talking about it. That’s as much as I can say without [Lucasfilm president] Kathleen Kennedy hunting me down.” Additionally, he said of the character: “Lando is charm incarnate,” Donald Glover added at the time. “He’s kind of a maverick, which I don’t think there’s a lot of anymore. It’s hard to be the smooth talker nowadays. Where’s the line? That’s also where the danger is. How close can you get without tripping over it? I would love to play Lando again. It’s a fun time, being him. It just has to be the right way to do it. Time is precious.” Check out Glover’s latest musings on the film here:

“I just want it to be fun. As a Star Wars fan myself, I think it’s important that there needs to be fun being had.”

“It’s very hard to have fun right now,” Donald Glover continued. “It’s tough because there are very serious things happening and those are the only things that connect us, weirdly. So I get why things are serious, but part of the human experience, I believe, is we have a responsibility to have enjoyment. And I just feel like we’re lacking in that department.”

Glover goes on to clarify that Star Wars content “can be super serious. Sometimes it’s way too serious. Everything that has to do with the Skywalkers is like so serious. [With] Lando, I think the best part about him is he’s a scoundrel. And I feel like people can relate to that, and he’s probably like ‘man, this war is whack. I need money,’ which I feel everyone can relate to. I want to bring fun to Star Wars. I just want it to be fun.”

I’m really of two minds here. I agree that sometimes the franchise can be needlessly dire; Kenobi and Ahsoka should have been more fun and uplifting. But at the same time, the bleakest Star Wars Disney has made is Andor, without a doubt, and it’s by far the best live-action Star Wars from Disney. No contest. I think there’s room for both fun space-faring adventures and deeper explorations of morality in this franchise. The real problem is that both concepts have mostly been blundered by Disney, an entity that only sees Star Wars as a cash cow and doesn’t try to understand it. 

I concede that anything starring Lando Calrissian probably shouldn’t be super serious. Honestly, I think Solo would have probably been better as the comedy Phil Lord and Chris Miller were making. I appreciate that Glover just wants to have fun with it and that he’s so open about it. I don’t think we need a Lando Calrissian vehicle at all; Disney and Lucasfilm can’t even get the main story right, let alone side quests. But Andor and most of the animation seem to prove that side quests are all they can manage. 

But what do you think about Lando, his planned movie, or anything else? Do you honestly think this movie will ever get made? Sound off in the comments!

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