There's A 'Rogue One' Easter Egg In The 'Solo' Trailer & 'Star Wars' Fans Def Missed It
The Star Wars universe contracted hard after Disney purchased it. The decision was made to take the "Expanded Universe" and turn it into "Legends," in order to give Disney room to rewrite the galaxy's past and future in new films without coming up against "canon." The new trilogy is rewriting the future. So far, only Rogue One has rewritten any of the past. But in just over a month, it will be joined by Solo: A Star Wars Story. And it looks like with Solo: A Star Wars Story's Rogue One Easter Egg, these films, which tell the story of the intra-Star Wars period between Episodes III and IV, will be tied together.
There have been a ton of Easter Eggs hinted at via the two Solo trailers so far. From Han's gold dice, which have taken on a new significance in the latest trilogy, to small moments like Han receiving his BlasTech DL-44, the coming film seems to be promising that many of the early details of Han's life that were canonized via the Star Wars Expanded Universe in some of the earliest novels and comics will be brought back in new ways.
But it's the Easter Egg that ties Solo to Rogue One that may be one of the most interesting.
In the scene where Han sits down with Lando for the first time during the Cloud City Sabacc Tournament (and perhaps the same game where he wins the Millennium Falcon), Lando is in a room surrounded by a fun hive of scum and villainy. Fans expect that this is where some of the Jim Henson Creature Shop aliens that were cut from Star Wars: The Last Jedi will turn up as background characters. But what they didn't expect was to see one of the bounty hunters from Rogue One in the background.
Check out the character standing to the very right side of this shot of Han.
That's a character named Tam Posla. He was noticed and recognized by ScreenRant, who did a bit of digging and realized they'd seen him before: on Jedha, when Cassian Andor and Jyn Erso arrived in the city to search for someone to take them to Saw Gerrera.
Here he is in the background, being consulted by Storm Troopers just before they are attacked by the rebel gang.
And here he is, unmasked, trying to arrest Cassian even though he and Jyn weren't actually part of the attack.
It's not big a stretch to imagine the same character would happen to be in the background at two completely different points in the timeline. One of the other things Solo does in the trailers is to date when in the timeline these events are occurring.
Rogue One revealed itself to be the events that happened literally the week before Star Wars: A New Hope by ending literally at the beginning of that film. Solo is a little more subtle, but just as effective, by having Chewbacca reveal his age is 190 years old. According to Smuggler’s Run - A Han Solo & Chewbacca Adventure, which is a Star Wars: The Force Awakens prequel novel (and therefore part of the new "Expanded Universe"), Chewie was 180 years old at the battle of Kashyyyk in Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith. (Yes, he was there.)
That means Solo is set 10 years after Episode III, and nine years before the events of Rogue One. Tam Posla could totally have been a Sabacc fan and gone to the tourney, only to be working for the Empire, keeping folks in line a decade later on Jedha. It's a subtle tie back, but exactly the kind of geeky "spot the background character" the Star Wars universe has excelled in for the last 40 years.
Solo: A Star Wars Story arrives in theaters on May 25, 2018.
