Maxance Vincent
Warning: The following article contains spoilers for episodes one and two of Star Wars: Skeleton Crew.
It’s been a long time since I felt something watching Star Wars. After the disastrous J.J. Abrams-directed The Rise of Skywalker, this once-incredible franchise became relegated straight-to-streaming to fill the void of Disney+ with middling results. The Mandalorian, while promising, turned into absolute junk fairly quickly. Don’t get me started on the crushing disappointment of Obi-Wan Kenobi and the constant excellent/unwatchable push-pull of The Acolyte. Minus the incredible first season of Andor and the decent Ahsoka, the landscape has never been more grim regarding live-action Star Wars titles.
And when Lucasfilm, which seemed like an invincible gold mine at the time Disney acquired the studio for a whopping $4.05 billion, can’t even get a Star Wars movie in theatres from recognizable filmmakers such as Rian Johnson, James Mangold, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, and Taika Waititi, there’s a massive problem. It’s even worse when the only post-TROS movie to make its way to the big screen will be Jon Favreau’s The Mandalorian and Grogu in 2026, which is confirmed to be a retrofit of season four of the successful Disney+ series. And we all know how that turned out, quality-wise, with Moana 2.
There’s a lot to be worried about regarding the current state of Star Wars and blockbuster entertainment as a whole. So, consider me incredibly skeptical when they announced that a live-action spinoff of The Mandalorian, titled Star Wars: Skeleton Crew, would bring the joys of Amblin-styled family entertainment back to the screen in pure Star Wars fashion. How many more bad shows can one take to become completely disillusioned by a franchise that meant so much to him when he discovered it at a relatively older (child) age? Yet, when the Jon Watts-directed first episode of the show, titled “This Could Be A Real Adventure,” began, I felt something I hadn’t experienced before in a very long time watching a Star Wars title: wonder, which is something many family movies lack these days.
In the most sauce the Spider-Man: Homecoming director has ever had, Watts crafts a bravura setpiece of pure excitement, illustrating what ‘space mutiny’ looks like, with the crew of Captain Silvo (portrayed by a masked figure with a muffled voice…one points me to a specific actor, but I guess we’ll see) raiding a ship for credits. The action is tightly executed and quickly locks us into how these pirates operate after an opening text tells us of the increasing plague of piracy since the fall of the Empire. The captain is quickly betrayed by his team after the vault they broke into contained one meager unit, and we cut to the show’s title card.
What a way to introduce us to this faction of Star Wars that was glossed over in plenty of television series but not fully explored. From the looks of its first two episodes, with the second being helmed by David Lowery (who recently directed a pirate film with Peter Pan & Wendy, so he’s quite apt to the task of translating his knowledge to a galaxy far, far, away), Star Wars: Skeleton Crew will absolutely bathe into movies that inspire wonder and adventure for both young and old audiences. Such a massive action setpiece like the one in the first episode is fun for adults but mind-blowing for children, who are likely seeing something they have never experienced before and are genuinely excited to see what will happen next.
Add four incredibly charming child characters leading the adventure, with a ‘grown-up’ eventually joining them (played by Jude Law), and Star Wars: Skeleton Crew may be a real winner. Its inspirations are, however, painstakingly obvious. From the rigid suburbs that have populated children’s films of the 1980s and 1990s (most notably, in this case, Steven Spielberg’s E.T. The Extraterrestrial, but Québec audiences may very well think of Michael Rubbo’s Tommy Tricker and the Stamp Traveler or…basically any Rock Demers-produced or Roger Cantin-directed film) to the pirate memorabilia discovered by protagonist Wim (Ravi Cabot-Conyers) harkening back to finding out One Eyed-Willy’s treasure map in Richard Donner’s The Goonies, Watts, and Lowery proudly wear all of the family film influences on their sleeves.
With another incredibly emotional score from Mick Giacchino (following his work on The Penguin) that taps into pure nostalgia, from John Williams to Dave Grusin motifs, it’s hard to resist what Star Wars: Skeleton Crew lays out in front of our eyes. Even the most ardent haters of modern-day Star Wars will find enjoyment in seeing Wim and best friend Neel (Robert Timothy Smith), alongside Fern (Ryan Kiera Armstrong) and KB (Kyriana Kratter), discover a pirate starship in the middle of At Attin, a quiet, structured, suburban town.
Of course, this being a Goonies-esque family production, the adults are mostly absent in Wim and Fern’s lives. At least in the first two episodes, Wim’s father (played by Tunde Adebimpe) neglects his child for work (the dialogue in these scenes isn’t very strong, especially when Wim skips his Career Assessment Test, his father’s only solution is for his son to go back home while he works). At the same time, Fern’s mother, Fara (Kerry Condon), is the school’s Undersecretary and may seemingly hide something to be revealed in subsequent episodes.
This exacerbates their thirst for rebellion against their parental figures (illustrated by Wim dreaming about Jedis while Fern races with her hoverbike in school, a prohibited activity) and adventure. At first, Wim believes the ship he discovered is a hidden Jedi temple, but it is far more dangerous and troublesome than he and the group think. And without a second to lose, the ship begins to activate itself (after Wim pushes a button…ah, children) and sends the four kids, alongside a broken pirate robot named SM-33 (Nick Frost), into hyperspace. Oops.
This comedically positioned ending to the first episode wouldn’t have worked if the four leads were so affable together, possessing a real sense of skill in front of the camera and note-perfect timing that, yes, immediately recalls The Goonies, but even pictures like Super 8, The Dog That Stopped the War, The Hidden Fortress, The Monster Squad, and Young Sherlock Holmes. In those movies, the younger actors supplanted the adult performers and were the show stealers of their respective stories. As a result, it gave children figures to latch onto and have their lives be, hopefully, empowered in a new direction.
Watts also explores the world of At Attin before Lowery jumps into adventure, allowing audiences to notice its intricacies and immerse themselves into a tightly-guarded place (for good reason, as explained in episode two) before pulling back the curtain on what makes this mythical place so special. The second episode reveals that At Attin is home to a lost treasure, which is likely why a ship crash-landed in the environment with its captain dead. At a pirate spaceport, each time one of our protagonists mentions where they are from, no one believes them since At Attin isn’t “real.”
But as more pirates suddenly think they may be telling the truth, this is where Jude Law’s Jod Na Nawood comes in. The children are locked inside a cell, with Law’s character listening closely to what they say. Appearing as if he were a ghost, he offers them help and reveals his use of the Force by stealing the keys from the prison wall and breaking them out. What will happen next? Time will tell, but I haven’t been this excited at a cliffhanger ending for Star Wars ever since Rey (Daisy Ridley) met Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) at the end of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. We sadly know how that trilogy ended (The Last Jedi innocent), but how will this show wrap up? The potential for something great is there. I’m hopeful this series will reignite, or at least remind me, of my childhood days, watching and discovering the excitement of adventure cinema.
The first two episodes of Star Wars: Skeleton Crew are now available to stream on Disney+.
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