Star Wars Gets a Ron Howard Narration

Screen Rant

Arrested Rebellion: Star Wars Gets a Ron Howard Narration

By Dan Zinski

Published Jul 24, 2017

Ron Howard adds his signature narration to the original Star Wars trilogy in a mash-up video that puts an Arrested Development spin on things.

Star Wars and Arrested Development may seem galaxies apart, but actually the two universes have a surprising lot in common. That becomes weirdly apparent as you watch the new Nerdist video that recaps the original Star Wars trilogy with voice over assistance from none other than Arrested Development narrator/Han Solo replacement director Ron Howard.

The whole world was alarmed when Lucasfilm and Disney elected to unceremoniously dump Phil Lord and Christopher Miller as directors of their Untitled Han Solo Star Wars Anthology Film when the movie was already largely in the can. Then when Ron Howard was named as the project's new director, everything seemed to be okay. And lots of people couldn't help joking that Howard should lend his Arrested Development voice over talents to the movie along with his directorial skill.

Someone at Nerdist decided to run with the idea of Ron Howard narrating Star Wars, giving us the Star Wars/Arrested Development mash-up Arrested Rebellion. Set a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, this is the story of a rebellious family that lost everything and the one son who had no choice but to keep them all together. Using the Force.

Some of the jokes are fairly obvious (the obligatory "Ron Howard's narration contradicts the character's words" gags come fast and furious) but some of them are actually chuckle-worthy. For instance, in the Arrested Rebellion universe, Gene Parmesan is not a private detective but a bounty hunter so notorious his name is actually a synonym for "bounty hunter." When Han Solo brags that the Falcon is the ship that made the Kessel run in less than twelve parsecs, we cut to a "footage not found" frame (so maybe Han is lying about the Falcon's Kessel run record?). The video saves the biggest laugh for last though, jumping ahead to the "next season" of Arrested Rebellion and revealing the biggest spoiler of all-time in the flattest, driest, most unimpressed Ron Howard manner imaginable.

After awhile it becomes apparent that, in fact, there's some kind of weird synchronicity between the universes. Just like Arrested Development, Star Wars features an inappropriate sexual relationship between two family members. Also like Arrested Development, Star Wars centers around a complicated, at times adversarial relationship between a father and son. Like George Bluth, Darth Vader uses arm amputation to teach his kid a very harsh lesson.

One more thing Arrested Development and Star Wars have in common: both will be returning to our lives in the near future. We have no idea what Ron Howard's Han Solo movie will be about (despite his numerous teaser images from the set), but we do know that Arrested Development season 5 will center on a whodunit involving the death of Lucille Austero.