10 Easter Eggs You Might Have Missed In Solo: A Star Wars Story

Solo A Star Wars Story is finally here, and as you might expect, it's full of easter eggs, references and callbacks to the previous adventures set in that galaxy far, far away. Being a prequel that fills in the early years of the scruffy-looking nerf herder, now played by Alden Ehrenreich, it gets to pick up and tie together, or at least be inspired by, many storylines and characters from various movies, TV shows and even old EU novels. For instance, we finally get to see Han pull off that famous Kessel Run in 12 parsecs (we even learn that he's rounding down when he says that), we find out how the titular hero got the legendary name of Solo and exactly how he won his beloved Millennium Falcon from Lando Calrissian in a game of Sabaac. Of course, there are also a bunch of fun cameos, too, such as Jon Favreau as the monkey-like alien, Rio. Those are just some of the more obvious connections to Star Wars' past and future, though. Hidden within Solo are also a lot of more obscure nods and callbacks, and while it may take repeat viewings to catch them all, here are 10 interesting ones which you may have missed while watching it. EU Allusions First off, it's worth pointing out that, while Solo creates its own origins story for Han, it does draw a fair amount from the Expanded Universe - despite what writer Lawrence Kasdan recently said. In the old expanded canon, Han's homeworld of Corellia was known for producing the best pilots and spaceships. In the movie, the planet is nowhere near as nice a place to live, as it's depicted as an industrial, crime-ridden hellhole, but it's still a hub for spaceship construction, albeit under the orders of the Empire. Han is likewise revealed to have been an Imperial pilot for a time until he deserted his post. In the novels, he flees when he frees Chewbacca and some other Wookie slaves, while in the film it's fairly similar, as he runs away after he hatches a plan to escape with his future fuzzball friend. The EU marks this as establishing Chewie owing a life debt to Han, which is why he never leaves his side from then on. The movie doesn't make any mention of this, though. Han's Gold Dice Han's lucky golden dice - or chance cubes, if you want to use the official in-universe name for them - used to be a minor background detail that could be glimpsed hanging in the Millennium Falcon's cockpit from A New Hope onwards. However, they gained a lot of extra significance in The Last Jedi, when they were used to symbolize Han's passing in the emotional finale to that movie. In Solo, their prominence continues, as they reappear throughout. Though we don't get to find out exactly where Han got them, we do learn that they've been his lucky charms through his tough life on the streets. He gives them to Qi'ra for luck, and doesn't get them back until they reunite years later. At the end of the movie, he hangs them up in the Millennium Falcon, where they'll stay until Luke finds them after his death. You can theorize that, to Han, they represent the struggles of his youth, but also act as a memory of his relationship with Qi'ra. A Big Shot Gangster On Tatooine When her and Han are planning on running away from Corellia, Qi'ra warns him that it's dangerous due to slave traders often pinching kids on the run. For example, she mentions the Hutt cartel. This is, of course, the criminal organization run by Jabba the Hutt. Jabba doesn't ever get a namedrop in Solo: A Star Wars Story, but he's alluded to several times after this. When he pretends he's leaving towards the end of the film, Tobias Beckett says he's moving on to a new job working for a "big shot gangster" who resides on Tatooine. Again, we all know who this is referring to. Now piloting the Millennium Falcon with his best pal Chewie, Solo ends with Han remembering what Becket said and deciding that he might as well try out for that job this big shot gangster is planning and travels to Tatooine. Thanks to A New Hope though, we know that this ends badly for him, as he manages to tick the giant slug off. Should've Gone To Bossk After Beckett enlists Han and Chewie to become part of his team and help out with his big coaxium heist on the planet Vandor, his partner Val is not happy with his choice. She doesn't have faith that the job will go as planned and says that they should have gone to more professional criminals for help. One of those she mentions is Bossk. You might remember Bossk as the lizard-like bounty hunter - technically, he's a member of the Trandoshan species - that Darth Vader employs to hunt down Han in The Empire Strikes Back. Though he didn't do a particularly impressive job in that film, spinoff media has significantly expanded on his character and established him as one of the most fearsome criminals in the galaxy. The Clone Wars TV series even revealed that he helped teach the young Boba Fett the tricks of the bounty hunting trade. Another professional thief Val suggests they should have enlisted is "the Zan Sisters." We're not 100% sure, but this could be a reference to the Pike sisters, Zan and Zu. Appearing in the novel Shadows of the Empire, the Pikes are established as dangerous crooks operating during the Clone Wars, so they could still be around by this point. The Man Who Killed Aurra Sing When Lando first encounters Beckett, he's impressed to meet him as he knows the man by reputation, as he's the one who killed Aurra Sing. Beckett says that he only pushed her and it was the fall that killed her. Lando is still grateful, though, as he reveals that he owed her a lot of money. Of course, Aurra Sing is another bounty hunter. She made her Star Wars debut in The Phantom Menace - she can be glimpsed watching the pod racing on Tatooine - and as with every minor character in the canon, other mediums expanded her presence in the galaxy. She and Bossk actually have a similar role in The Clone Wars, as both of them train Boba Fett. She's also teamed up with Cad Bane and worked for Jabba's evil uncle, Ziro. It was a bit odd that she wasn't seen during the Original Trilogy alongside many of her other bounty hunter compadres, but now we know that's because she was previously offed by Beckett. The Millennium Falcon's New Design As first glimpsed in the trailers, the Millennium Falcon looks a little different in Solo from the design every Star Wars fan knows off by heart in the rest of the movies. As Han takes the wheel and almost destroys the ship by completing the fabled Kessel Run, we learn that the reason it looks so different later in its life is because it was hastily repaired by Han and Chewie. So, what are the differences? Well, there's the blue adornments on the outer hull, the single-barrel turrets and, most notably, the space between the front mandibles is filled in. We learn that this is an escape pod, which Han jettisons in order to escape a creature that pursues the ship during the Run. Though these elements of the ship have not been seen in the films before, they actually date back to before A New Hope. This design of the Falcon is based off legendary concept artist Ralph McQuarrie's original vision for the ship. This isn't the first time his work has inspired the modern Star Wars movies, either, as Darth Vader's castle in Rogue One was also based off a piece of his that never came to light in the Original Trilogy. Why The Falcon Has A "Peculiar Dialect" Speaking of the Millennium Falcon, you might recall that C-3PO is perplexed by his communication with the ship in The Empire Strikes Back. "I don't know where your ship learned to communicate," the droid says at the time, "but it has the most peculiar dialect." In Solo: A Star Wars Story, we learn the surprisingly tragic reason for this. When Lando's first mate, the rebellious robot L3-37, is shot and killed in the battle on Kessel, the crew decide to link her brain up to the Falcon's mainframe so that they can access her extensive navigational computer to help them make the difficult escape. Presumably, then, something of the droid's free-spirited personality survived, which is why Threepio is so taken aback by the ship's "peculiar dialect" in Empire. Curiously, The Last Jedi novelization revealed that the Millennium Falcon's mainframe is actually made up of three separate "cannibalized" droid brains. It's unclear whether the other two were part of the ship before this point or were integrated later on, though. The Rebellion Begins It's revealed over the course of Solo: A Star Wars Story that the masked Enfys Nest is not the fearsome, evil space pirate that Beckett's crew had believed her to be. In fact, she's actually a young woman who's trying to fight against the Empire by inheriting the feared mantle that her mother had cultivated before her. She convinces Han and Chewie to give her people the valuable coaxium and rise up against Dryden Vos and his Imperial bosses. When the duo keep to their word and return the coaxium to them, Nest calls the substance "the blood that brings life to something new" and namechecks the Rebellion. The implication is, then, that the Cloud Riders have ties to the Rebel Alliance. We're not exactly sure of the timeline of Solo, though, so it's possible the Alliance might not even be a cohesive organization at this point. Maybe the coaxium helps fund the Rebellion? She also asks Han to join them, effectively asking him to become part of the Rebellion. He turns the offer down, but she hopes that he'll reconsider one day. That he will, Enfys, as Han will go on to become known as, as Finn later describes him in The Force Awakens, "the Rebellion general." Cosmic Cameos This is a Star Wars film, so it's bound to be full of easily-missed cameos. Here's just a few we noticed, though no doubt more will surface over time. Firstly, two Star Wars legends turn up once again in Solo. One is Warwick Davis, who returns for his sixth Star Wars movie - not to mention his roles in Star Wars Rebels and those Ewok films from the 1980s. The actor, most known for playing Wicket the Ewok in Return of the Jedi, portrays one of the Cloud Riders. And for once, he actually gets to show his real face and even grab some lines. Plus, remember Chewie's Wookie friend who he frees from the mines on Kessel? They're played by Anthony Daniels, otherwise known as C-3PO. Thanks to his cameo here, Daniels is now officially the only actor to appear in all 10 Star Wars movies to date. We're not sure who his Wookie character is, but seeing as they share an intimate moment with Chewie, it's theorized that Daniels is playing Chewie's wife, Malla! It's not a Star Wars connection, but director Ron Howard couldn't help but continue a running gag he carries through all his movies in Solo. He always finds a cameo role for his brother Clint Howard and in this film, he appears as the angry owner of a robot that L3-37 tries to inspire to think for himself. The Secret Head Of The Crimson Dawn By far the greatest cameo in Solo: A Star Wars Story is the surprise return of a fan favourite villain. Paul Bettany's Dryden Vos mentions earlier in the movie that he answers to a dangerous boss. It's not until Qi'ra betrays him, though, that we find out who the real puppet master of the Crimson Dawn crime syndicate is: Darth Maul, the Emperor's former apprentice! Some fans might be left scratching their heads as to how Maul is alive at this point in the timeline, as he was cut in two by Obi-Wan back before the Clone Wars. Rebels reveals, though, that his top half survived that ordeal and, now fitted with robot legs, he based himself on his homeworld of Dathomir and ingratiated himself into the criminal underworld. This explains his position at the head of the Crimson Dawn and why he tells Qi'Ra to meet him on Dathomir. This is actually a massive deal, as it's the first time a Star Wars movie has followed up on a major development that happened in a different medium. An explanation for Darth Maul's resurrection could well happen if Lucasfilm greenlights a sequel to Solo: A Star Wars Story, but right now moviegoing audiences are expected to know what happened on Rebels. For fans, this is thrilling and much more satisfying than, say, Marvel's tactic of keeping the movie and TV timelines separate.