'Skeleton Crew' Was Supposed To Be a Movie (I Knew It)

If you read my Skeleton Crew recaps, then you saw as my opinion shifted from absolutely hating the show to warming up to it by the back half. As I came around to Skeleton Crew, a common refrain is that there was definitely a decent movie buried in here. The dreaded parkour episode had even early supporters bemoaning what felt like obvious filler as the show was seemingly stretched out for streaming.

That was exactly the case.

According to Variety, series creator Jon Watts confirmed that the Skeleton Crew was yet another Star Wars movie pitch that saw itself get fed into the Disney+ machine. Watts pitched the film back in 2017, but then he made the mistake of being really good at making Tom Holland Spider-Man movies:

Watts’ career exploded that year with the release of “Spider-Man: Homecoming,” and by the time he was able to untangle himself from Spidey’s web following the release of 2021’s “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” Lucasfilm’s focus had pivoted to making TV series for Disney+.

So Watts and Ford refashioned their idea into what became “Skeleton Crew,” a rousing adventure focused on four kids — Wim (Ravi Cabot-Conyers), Fern (Ryan Kiera Armstrong), KB (Kyriana Kratter) and Neel (Robert Timothy Smith) — who accidentally escape from their secluded planet, At Attin, on a buried ship that once belonged to a legendary space pirate.

How did this approach work out? Well, as of this writing, the chances for Skeleton Crew Season 2 are not looking good. The show has yet to appear on Nielsen streaming charts, which is something even The Acolyte pulled off before it didn’t.

That said, while both The Acolyte and Skeleton Crew were critical darlings, the fan response to Crew has not been a toxic sludge pit. It’s been warmly received, especially by fans watching with their kids, and Watts has noted in several interviews that the audience has been building since the show’s release. However, again, it has yet to chart, and the holidays were the prime time for Skeleton Crew to really take off. Although, it didn’t help that the first four episodes were not the strongest, and they seemed to take the brunt of puffing out the story.

Would Skeleton Crew have fared better as a movie? I can’t imagine there aren’t very shouty conversations happening at Lucasfilm and Disney over that exact topic.