After a couple of years in the dark we finally get to see the first trailer of Skeleton Crew, a brand new Star Wars series starring Jude Law.
Skeleton Crew is coming out on December 3, 2024. It was made by Jon Watts and Christopher Ford with John Favreau and Dave Filoni working as the producers. The director’s list includes Jon Watts, Bryce Dallas Howard, Lee Isaac Chung, David Lowry, Daniel Kwan, Daniel Scheinert, and Jake Schreier.
The first seconds of the trailer look nothing like the Star Wars we’re used to watching in movies or series. The kid lying in the bed staring at the wooden ships is probably the most relatable part of the trailer.
As a kid, I always imagined how it would be to live in the Star Wars universe. Would I be a Jedi, a rebel pilot, or maybe even a beast handler for the Hutts? This and many other silly questions intruded my mind every time I saw anything resembling a Star Wars weapon, character, or ship.
I spent hours daydreaming about these topics that while irrelevant, helped me take my imagination to a new level. Now we get to see a kid inside the Star Wars universe have the same questions that many of us had during our childhoods.
This show has a very strong E.T., Goonies, and Stranger Things vibe to it. A group of very particular kids crave adventure, something to provide excitement to their seemingly boring and common lives.
The suburban landscape really took me by surprise. If not for the elder Ithorian who’s walking its pet I would have never guessed that it belongs to Star Wars. This is the first time we’ve seen something like this in Star Wars.
We’ve gotten used to watching barren planets, military bases, or opulent cities but never something so like what a real-life middle-class neighborhood looks like. It is so odd, like it doesn’t belong there.
To be fair there wasn’t any incentive to show the lives of normal, especially during the Clone Wars or the conflict between the Empire and the Rebellion.
The timeline of this series is parallel to the events of The Mandalorian, this means that the New Republic is in charge. There might be Imperial Remnants somewhere, but that’s not something the standard population even knows.
In their pursuit of adventure, the group formed by three humans and one Ortolan stumble upon the Onyx Cinder, a ship they mistake for an ancient Jedi Temple. This reinforces what I said before about them fantasizing about all the mysteries out there.
The group of younglings somehow travels through hyperspace and that’s when we see the Star Wars that we’re more used to. A space station built inside an asteroid, a market filled with shady figures, and locations that look completely desolated.
Having a sassy droid in every movie or series is a must and it seems like Skeleton Crew will be no different. I think it’s safe to consider that the SM-33 comes with the ship. It has only one of its eyes lit up which gives it a pirate look.
This is funny because the Onyx Cinder has the same color pattern as the cruiser owned by pirate lord Gorian Shard, from Season 3 of The Mandalorian.
Another ship with this pattern also appears in the trailer I am almost certain that this is not a coincidence due to the fact that it has been confirmed that Vane will appear in the show.
In case you do not remember, Vane is the Nikto pirate who fled after Din Djarin and Bo-Katan defeated Gorian Shard’s fleet on Nevarro. We see at least one more ship with the same pattern in the trailer so it might be that the Onyx Cinder belongs to a pirate group.
The last important element of the trailer is the appearance of Jod, the character played by Jude Law. He appears to be using the Force to grab a key that I suppose opens the gate of the cell where he and the kids are being held.
As one of the kids suggests, the obvious deduction is that Jod is a Jedi but before jumping. The difference between Revenge of the Sith and Season 3 of The Mandalorian is thirty years. Jod (Jude Law’s character) looks like he’s in his late forties.
Jod would have been around fifteen or eighteen years old when Ordered 66 happened so it’s perfectly possible. He’s probably going to be the adult of questionable responsibility who ends up having to look after a group of kids.
I really like being in the dark, even if we can make small connections with existing characters it’s probably not going to be anything to what we’ve experienced so far.
Skeleton Crew is being released during the holiday season, it feels like the tone of this series is lighter than what we recently saw in The Acolyte. Like something the whole family could watch, regardless of their age or knowledge of Star Wars.
Even if the trailer is short, it does transmit the entire “going on an adventure” thing. Many of the live-action Star Wars series feel like a big movie being split into multiple episodes. That’s not something bad by itself but sometimes it feels like a different format would be better for storytelling purposes.
I firmly believe that Star Wars could benefit from exploring different genres, even if some of them are not my cup of tea. So far, Skeleton Crew seems like something completely fresh in Star Wars media. There are many new elements while maintaining the aspects that make Star Wars very unique. My expectations are not particularly high, but time will tell how good Skeleton Crew is (or not).
