A Disney Parks Ride Is Apparently Changing Star Wars Canon
Han Solo's history is suddenly complicated.
The Millennium Falcon may be synonymous with Han Solo, but he actually didn’t own it for very long. The Falcon has a long and storied history ranging from the Kessel Run all the way to the junkyards of Jakku, during which it changed hands several times.
Now, a new chapter of the Falcon's history is being told thanks to a cross-promotion for the upcoming movie The Mandalorian & Grogu. But this update throws a wrench into the story of Star Wars’ most beloved scoundrel, and it suggests that Han may have lost the Falcon a lot sooner than we thought.
The Millennium Falcon is iconic, but it’s missing from large chunks of the Star Wars timeline.
We know Han Solo owned the Falcon after the original trilogy, and we know he lost ownership of it sometime before The Force Awakens, but the chronology in between is very sketchy. A glimpse of the ship’s cross-section in The Force Awakens’ sourcebook reveals the ship was his at least until he married Princess Leia Organa, as he apparently added a kitchen as a wedding present. (That’s sweet of him, but how were Han and Chewie feeding themselves until then?)
With their wedding taking place in 5 ABY (After the Battle of Yavin, the climatic battle of A New Hope), Han could have lost ownership of the Falcon anytime after that. Nearly 30 years later, Rebels pirate Hondo Ohnaka struck a deal with Chewbacca to use the ship for a coaxium heist, an adventure that forms the narrative of the Smuggler’s Run ride at the Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge theme park.
But that’s about to change. In anticipation of The Mandalorian & Grogu’s 2026 release, the ride is getting a facelift that will move the action from the Resistance era to the New Republic era, a setting that’s been slowly filled by The Mandalorian and its various spinoffs. The change isn’t coming until May 22, 2026, the same day as the movie’s release, but we already have a glimpse of what’s ahead thanks to concept art revealed at D23 in August 2024.
The concept art shows park guests flying alongside Din Djarin and Grogu, which raises questions about the Falcon’s history. Han loaning his ship to Hondo during the Resistance era makes sense, because the Resistance was busy battling the First Order. But the New Republic era is relatively peaceful, and canonically, Han Solo is taking a well-earned break. Will we find out how he lost the ship he called home for years, or will there be another convenient explanation for why someone else (namely, you and your park-going friends) is borrowing it? Did he just decide to hang up the keys and go fishing for a few years, or what?
Park rides may be a very minor part of Star Wars canon, but they are still canon, and Star Wars now has a prime opportunity to answer a big mystery. At what point in three decades did this iconic ship go from Han Solo’s sick ride to, as Rey called it, “the garbage”?
