Well, that, and getting Ford to sign on at all. Hell, it would have been better to just leave him out of the movie altogether. But I guess everything has to have a sad ending these days. Man....where is Perry King when we need him?
One man's trash is another man's tresure: I thought Han was one of the best things about TFA, start to finish.
Oh, I hope I'm wrong and that the films keep coming unabated. I was just thinking of the old bean-counter mindset, where some consumers may only choose to see one film per year - and if there are two Star Wars films to choose from, they'd have to decide between them. That makes two of us, at least. When the Disney buyout was announced, I knew at that moment there would be a Han Solo death scene coming, probably in episode 7. So it ended up making sense when the news came out after the The Force Awakens table read that there was so much Han in the story. Harrision's desire to have Han killed at the end of ROTJ back in the early 80s is well documented. In fact, I was thinking originally Leia would die in episode 8 and Luke in episode 9...
Han's death contributed a ton to the story, he was the mentor character in Rey and Finn's hero's journey, and the mentor dying is pretty big part of that. It also both showed how far Ben had fallen, and was the next big step in his fall. A fallen hero killing a loved one is also a pretty big part of these kinds of stories.
3rd here. Han's death had a pretty big impact. It's a big deal for both Rey and Ben, and it's consequences are yet to be fully explored. I agree 100% here that Han's death was a huge piece of the story and its impact will continue forward.