Summary
Star Wars: Skeleton Crewdebuts in just over one week, and the much-anticipated Disney Plus series will feature a reference to a project Lucasfilm has largely buried.
Star Wars: Skeleton Crewtells the story of four children who get lost in the galaxy and must find their way home after making a discovery on their home planet. The series is sandwiched between the events ofStar Wars: Return of the JediandThe Force Awakens, meaning fans will spot Easter eggs and nods to the past. PlacingSkeleton Crewduring this period oftheStar Warstimelineallowed the creative time to pay tribute to one of the franchise’s most infamous entries:The Star Wars Holiday Special.
During an interview withThe HoloFiles,Star Wars: Skeleton Crewco-creator and co-writer of 6 episodes Jon Watts detailed how much work went into bringing theinfamousStar Wars Holiday Specialreference to life. While details on the reference weren’t provided, Watts did explain that they initially thought they could use some preexisting footage from the Star Wars Holiday Special. However, the footage was “too low resolution” and didn’t have the right angles, forcing theStar Wars: Skeleton Crewteam to get creative:
We had to create this moment from multiple angles, because you see it in various parts of the scene. So we rebuilt the whole thing from scratch. We had to dig up the original designs of the costumes, which were in the Lucasfilm archive…Get all the original specs. We had to redo the music from scratch, because there was no copy of the actual score anywhere, so we had to rebuild that…It ended up being 20x more work than we anticipated, and our stunt coordinator is the main performer in it and he was able to re-choreograph the routine too, because it’s a very acrobatic routine…I will say, without saying what it is, which it is pretty obvious now, it was so much work and it was so worth it. My favorite part.
Skeleton Crewwill also featureelements fromStar Wars Legends, the name given to the franchise’s books, video games, and other media that Disney designated non-canon after it acquired Lucasfilm. These were included because theStar Wars: Skeleton Crewteam wanted to bringLegendsreferences into the story and Lucasfilm encouraged them to include such nods. Watts explained how the process worked:
You’re working with the incredible Lucasfilm design team with Doug Chiang and everyone over there, and it was always just a conversation…As soon as they knew that we were comfortable with more obscure, deep cut references, that really opened up the floodgates for the [question], ‘You know what character you might be able to put in.'
Fans will likely be happy to hearStar Wars Legendsreferences will be included inSkeleton Crew. ManyStar Wars Legendsbooks and video games were well-received upon release and fans were disappointed when Disney de-canonized them. However, theStar Wars Holiday Specialwas so poorly received that Lucasfilm never rebroadcast it or released it on home video.Disney Plus added theStar Wars Holiday Special’s Boba Fett segment in 2021, but fans must turn to bootleg copies or unofficial sources on the internet to watch the whole thing.
Watts and the creative team must have thought fans would get a kick out of the nod considering how much work went into bringing theStar Wars Holiday Specialreference to life inSkeleton Crew. It’s unlikely to change theStar Wars Holiday Special’s reputation, but at least the franchise’s most notorious entry isn’t being relegated to the dustbin of history entirely.
Star Wars: Skeleton Crewpremieres on June 21, 2025, on Disney Plus.
Star Wars: Skeleton Crew
Skeleton Crew is a Disney+ original series set in the Star Wars universe. The series was created by Jon Watts and Christopher Ford and tells the story of four young kids who must find their way home after becoming lost in the galaxy. The story takes place during the same time frame as The Mandalorian.
