Skeleton Crew Is The Opposite Of Andor, And That's Good For Star Wars

When "Andor," the prequel series to "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story," debuted on Disney+, it quickly proved that there were plenty of untapped angles to explore in this ever-expanding universe. It was a grittier, more grounded look at the formative years of Cassian Andor and the beginning of the Rebellion against the Galactic Empire. Instead of loading up the series with action-packed adventures to new planets filled with aliens delivering one-liners, it focuses on the everyday individuals willing to put their lives on the line to fight for what they believe in. It was the "grown-up" show that many "Star Wars" fans had been craving, and is arguably one of the best original series ever produced for Disney+.

When season 1 of "Andor" was first released, "Skeleton Crew" creators Jon Watts and Christopher Ford were hard at work on their own show — an Amblin-style coming-of-age adventure comedy focused on four 10-year-olds. Folks have been comparing it to "The Goonies" but set in space, which is very much not what "Andor" was bringing to the table. "Star Wars" creator George Lucas has been saying for years that "Star Wars" is a kids movie, but I for one am grateful that we live in a timeline where both shows like "Andor" and "Skeleton Crew" are available for fans.

As it turns out, Watts and Ford feel similarly. "What was cool was that ['Andor'] was coming out while we were shooting ['Skeleton Crew'] and we hadn't gotten any advanced versions of anything, so we were just like everyone else," Christopher Ford tells me during an interview. "Just on the set of this talking about, 'How cool. Can you believe what's going on in "Andor?'" Watts also took the chance to express his love of the lesser-known areas of Lucas' expansive world. "I like anything in 'Star Wars' that explores an area of the world that you wouldn't think would be necessarily interesting, like when you get into the bureaucracy," he adds. "I love the Senate."

But in the corner of underrepresented "Star Wars" stories, there also exists the coming-of-age story.

In speaking with Watts and Ford, I mentioned that I loved both "Skeleton Crew" and "Andor" because of how different they are from one another, and they enthusiastically agreed. "It speaks to the potential of the world, how complex it is," Ford tells me. "You can just keep getting deeper and deeper into it in a way that's really fascinating." But like "Andor," the "Skeleton Crew" team wanted to keep the series grounded in a way that felt authentic to the coming-of-age experience despite its characters growing up in a world with aliens, talking droids, and intergalactic travel.

"There's a dynamic that exists between the two boys and the two girls that is definitely something that I pulled from my life, like me and my friend and then my older sister and then her friend," says Watts. "The friends, they were always just terrorizing us," he jokes. "They were so much smarter than us and they were always taking advantage of the dumb boys. We tried to bring a little bit of that spirit into the show." Ford points out that the show's two girls, Fern (Ryan Kiera Armstrong) and KB (Kyriana Kratter), are also supposed to be a year older than Wim (Ravi Cabot-Conyers) and Neel (Robert Timothy Smith), and this tiny age difference definitely points out the ol' "girls mature faster than boys" adage. "You could see on this planet you're supposed to take a test, get a job, and just become part of this machine," Ford says. "And there's something that's always been in 'Star Wars' from the start — whether it's totally nefarious like the Empire, or just about life pins you down and assigns you something that you're supposed to be doing as opposed to going off on an adventure — and it was interesting to be able to give that to Fern and KB, that they were one year closer to becoming boring and grown-ups."

This is the last adventure before possibly ending up in a similar sort of work environment as the facilities and factories on "Andor," which makes the heart of the series even more important. As Watts wisely frames it, "How do you find your own way to be a rebel?"

"Star Wars" has been a massive part of global culture for nearly 50 years, which spans multiple generations of people with different reasons as to why they love it and, possibly more importantly, different entry points. For some, their introduction to "Star Wars" was the original trilogy when it hit theaters, while others watched the animated "Star Wars: Young Jedi Adventures" series on Disney Jr. With endless possibilities of stories and a wide range of audience demographics, nothing is lost or devalued by having a "Star Wars" show or movie for everyone. I can only speak for myself, but I was feeling a little underwhelmed with the franchise after "Star Wars: Episode IX — The Rise of Skywalker" and wasn't as sold on "The Mandalorian" as many others were (I do still enjoy it, for the record), but all of that changed when "Andor" arrived and reignited my passion for the property.

That same sensation happened again when I watched the first few episodes of "Skeleton Crew" in preparation for these interviews and found myself transported back to watching the prequel trilogy as a kid on tapes rented from Blockbuster. "Skeleton Crew" isn't a show trying to relate to me as a 30-something woman, and that's okay. Having a series like "Andor" means that I have a show that can intellectually stimulate me on my level, and a series like "Skeleton Crew" exists for younger viewers who may fall in love with the world of "Star Wars" for the very first time. But that isn't to say that both shows can't also appeal to their opposite demos. "Andor" can be used as a great introductory tool for younger viewers to help teach them lessons in moral complexity, standing up for what's right, and the importance of community building, while "Skeleton Crew" can remind adult viewers that it's okay to embrace curiosity and never stop adventuring.

New episodes of "Star Wars: Skeleton Crew" drop Tuesdays at 6pm PST on Disney+.