Warning: Spoilers Off applies to Moments pages.
Film
- Han manages to get through the Imperial control of civilians at the spaceport on Corellia, but not Qi'ra, who's dragged away by Moloch. He would not see her again until three years later.
- And he's not the only one separated from loved ones in the spaceport. We see stormtroopers ripping screaming families apart and carrying pleading civilians off left and right.
- Han's Imperial CO on Mimban. You'd probably expect an Imperial commander to hide in the rear, casually sending men into the meat grinder while calling them cowards and shooting somebody as an example to the others, right? You would be wrong in this case. The Major is leading his troopers from the front, slogging through the mud and blood with them while encouraging them with patriotic slogans. When a man stumbles, the Major helps him to his feet and reassures him that they're almost to the objective. The Empire rules by fear, but this guy instead tries to give his troopers pride and hope. He has to be the least villainous Imperial leader in the entire franchise. The poor bastard gets obliterated by heavy artillery for his trouble.
- When we first meet Chewie, he's chained up in a pit in an Imperial trench. He's been starved, he's covered in mud, and he's treated like a monster by his captors, who expect him to murder prisoners to eat them.
- Tobias losing Rio and Val in the botched train job, the former being his co-pilot and the latter being his lover whom he planned to settle down with later. Tobias is clearly a broken man after their deaths. Worst of all, it was All for Nothing as Han is forced to drop the coaxium shipment - the thing they came for - into the abyss to escape from the Cloud Riders.
- The way he calls Han a coward, with a furious yell just as he drops the shipment - isn't the yell of a hardened criminal losing their pay, it was the yell of a man who just endured the deaths of both a lover and a friend. Then when he goes to report to Dryden, the way he surrenders his knife; saying that it's all he's got left (seeing as his blasters were also destroyed in the job), really drive it home.
- Chewbacca can't stand seeing his people being enslaved on Kessel.
- L3-37's death on Kessel. Lando is genuinely devastated, grabs her broken upper half and tries to keep it "alive", unsuccessfully.
- Adding to that are L3's last confused and heart breakingly terrified words to Lando as she tries to figure out what's happening to her, and Lando desperately trying to to assure her that she'll be fine.
- Even though her memory core is uploaded to the Millennium Falcon's computer, letting her live on as the Falcon itself, a layer of sadness is added to Lando losing the ship to Han, as he's now separated from L3 for good. (At least until The Empire Strikes Back provided he didn't meet Han again in-between)
- The movie explains how Han becomes from a young man with big dreams (like Luke) into the cynical space smuggler we know. Throughout the movie, Han was lied to and betrayed by multiple parties, from the Imperial Immigration officer who separated him and Qi'ra, to the Imperial recruitment officer, his sort-of criminal world mentor (whom he is forced to kill) and finally his own childhood sweetheart who willingly abandons him for the sake of controlling a criminal empire. During his last confrontation with Dryden, he dryly laments that he's starting to get used to the feeling of betrayal.
- Listen closely to Han's voice when he is playing his second Sabacc game with Lando. He sounds like Harrison Ford. While this can elicit cheers from many who felt like this was the Han Solo they loved, others can only be saddened that this is proof that Han doesn't give a damn about everyone else but himself and Chewie, and is only using a façade to conceal his misery.
- Beckett's final moments with Han after he shoots him seem to show that after it's all said and done, Beckett really did gain a genuine respect for Han. Especially when he applauds him for making the first move in the kill. The buildup to the standoff also makes it clear that neither side was going to be happy with its results.
- Qi’ra’s mere existence could be considered a walking Tear Jerker for Han Solo in hindsight. This is the girl who grows up with Han in the Crapsack World that is Corellia. And the struggles they both endured in the slums bonded them close together and it’s clear that Han falls heads over heels with her, and even three years of being separated he still can’t get over her. When she finally shows back up in his life as a changed woman, circumstances mean Han could never end up with her again. Han’s life could’ve changed drastically had Qi’ra managed to escape with him on that fateful day, but the mere existence of the Original Trilogy films means Han and Qi’ra have no choice but to go their separate ways in the end. Despite their Doomed by Canon status, once Han silently realizes he and Qi'ra will never be when she doesn't follow him, he still seems to regard her abandonment of him with empathy.
- Beckett warning Han to never put his faith in anyone, because that way, he'll never be betrayed. As later films in the series show, Han disregards it and ends up frozen in carbonite because of Lando's betrayal (under Imperial pressure), then dead at the hand of a son who betrayed him.
