Star Wars: Why Solo FAILED At The Box Office

4. The Boycott

It may not have been one of the biggest factors in destabilising Solo's hype, but the fact that the Boycott Solo movement was even a story is an indication of something in itself. It indicated just how uninspired a portion (how much is up for debate, of course) of the Star Wars fandom were coming out of The Last Jedi.

That film may have made a fortune for LucasFilm, but it was divisive for fans (hence the - probably manipulated - Rotten Tomatoes audience score of just 46%) and it left a bad taste for those who cared enough to start the Boycott movement. And the very idea that Star Wars fans didn't like the way "their" franchise was being handled is the kind of PR nightmare studios don't want more casual mainstream audiences to even notice.

Fundamentally, that reflects terribly, no matter what portion of the fanbase were even involved in actively boycotting the movie. They had power - which was amplified by the media even in cynical reporting - to impact perception and it definitely worked partly.

That's probably also why there are now accusations of Audience Score tampering on Rotten Tomatoes, which has increasingly become an important marketing tool for studios. In line with the boycott, the idea of the fan score being lower than the critical response is a terrible look for LucasFilm, because those who use it won't know the possible context of the score. They'll work in very binary terms, of Rotten and Fresh, of "worth it" and "not worth it."