Broken handle on sliding door behind driver

sorry to say may have to cut into the panel to gain acces that way , try to remove the window weather strip outside and slide a thin but rigid piece of wire with a bend on the end to try and release the door lock , aka car thief style , or buy something called a SLIMJIM , this will slide behind the weather strip so won't even have to remove that

the linkage behind the handle either the retaining clip broke or popped off need to remove the door panel to check and fix

the child lock rod may have been extended...
open the driver side door, and with a skinny finger, push that child lock rod back in towards the rear of the sliding door
use the passenger side as reference
once you pushed it in, you can now open it from the inside handle

take off door panel. the panel is held on by plastic anchor pins. just put a screw driver between panel to pry up then pull out by hand. on the door handle pry slightly on plastic handle housing. there should be a torque screw or 2 behind the handle. "do not " force this part off. this is the integrity portion of the door. it should come right off after you losen the torque screws. unhook eletric harness and I do believe there are 3 mount bolts for the window regulator and 2 for the window. you can access the 2 bolts for the window by sliding the wind by hand up or down and access through one of the open bolt holes. i just did this about 3 weeks ago. its not a hard job at all. partstrain.com is where i bought my window regulator. i only paid about $60 which included shipping. on a scale of 1-10 i would give this a 3. not hard but a little frustration due to limited space.

There is a clip behind the window crank (winder). There is a special tool to slide behind the winder that pushes the clip out, the tool is not expensive and can be purchased at most parts stores. It is possible to remove the clip without the tool, but a little tricky (no brute strength!!!). The clip is thin (about the thickness of a heavy paper clip) and 'u' shaped. It slides onto the center backside of the winder. Gently push in the door panel while you gently pry out the winder. You may be able to grab the clip with some very narrow needle nose pliers, or use one or 2 flat thin screwdrivers to slide the clip off. Let me know how its goes.

If you removed the 2 bolts near the handle (1 you reach by removing the lock & pwr windows control panel by prying it up, it will pop loose) there are plastic bolts/clips that press in through openings around the edge of the door panel. Just pry out slowly and they should pop out. Work your way around the door. It should slide off over the release handle which you may want to pull outward so it slides over it easier. I just did this 2 days ago to replace my passenger mirror.

tascafordparts.com same car as villager

Have you been replacing the handles with aftermarket replacements made in China. If so, spend the extra $$ to get the parts from a GM dealer. They obviously break too but perhaps not as easily.

you can do this. you have to remove inside trim panel for access. if you still need to do, I will send you repair steps. let me know

Then you'll have to remove the inside door skin. It's not too difficult. The hardest part is if you have manual rollup windows, you need to remove a clip behind the window crank and sometimes it will fly off and get lost. Remove all screws you can find (some are behind plastic covers, like for the inside door opening handle, after removing that one slide it to the front of the car to remove the handle), one or more may be hidden under the bottom carpeted area if you have that (run your fingers around the edge area to feel the holes). After all that the door skin should be held on by 'panel pops' sometimes these break if the cars old or if your not carefull. You can get replacements cheaply enough.
If you need anymore help let me know.