It’s hard to feel excited about a new Star Wars show when so many of them have been so resoundingly mediocre. I have mixed feelings about what we’ve seen of Disney’s latest televised effort, Skeleton Crew – the show seems to be more referential to its audience’s childhood memories of Star Wars than to Star Wars lore proper, though that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. One thing that it’s done very well is capture the often fraught relationships between children who are still figuring out who they are.
You can read Editor-in-Chief Stacey Henley’s review of the first three episodes
here
.
It’s All About The Kids
Star Wars: Skeleton Crew departs from its typical fare by putting children front and center, which has garnered it many comparisons to Stranger Things, the other contemporary mainstream sci-fi show where children are the main characters. Each of them is endearing in their own ways.
Wim, a human who lives with his dad (it’s unclear what’s happened to his mother) doesn’t fit into the mold he’s supposed to. He wakes up late, can’t pay attention in class, and wants to be a Jedi, not an analyst. He has ADHD, obviously. Neel, who has the head of an elephant, is his somewhat anxious best friend who also provides comic relief. He has a loving family and a bustling home. In one scene, Wim looks into Neel’s house with envy and sadness – his own home is often empty and quiet, because his father’s always working.
Then there’s the girls. I haven’t quite figured KB out yet. She seems like the smart one, thoughtful and matter of fact, but there isn’t all that much else to say yet. Fern is probably the most interesting of them all. Her mother is a straight-laced government official who encourages children to find their place in the “Great Work”, presumably so they can be productive members of society.
Fern is the top student in her year, but has a strong rebellious streak. She and KB fix up old bikes and take them on joyrides. She’s aggressive and smart – she cons the boys into unearthing a dig site she’s claimed for herself, is a burgeoning droid hacker, and even convinces the droid on the ship the kids end up trapped in that she murdered his captain, making her his new master.
Related
Skeleton Crew Has Star Wars’ Best Funny Little Guy Yet
Neel is the perfect assistant for Skeleton Crew’s mischief
Boys Hate Girls, Girls Hate Boys
Of course, what makes these children interesting isn’t just their individual personalities, but the way they interact with each other. The girls dominate the conversation – they’re more mature, possibly older, and Fern even physically towers over them. The girls are best friends, and the boys are best friends, but they don’t really know each other. There’s an immediate gender divide that’s very familiar to anybody who’s ever been a kid: the girls back each other up, advise caution, and are the ones coming up with the plan.
The boys, Wim in particular, are bumbling and reckless. We see that here, the girls immediately take charge, and the boys are just along for the ride. Neel even starts to side with the girls when Wim’s thoughtlessness gets them into trouble, which Wim sees not just as a betrayal of their friendship, but likely their gender.
I grew up tomboyish, but as a kid, I was far more comfortable around girls than boys. I went almost exclusively to all-girls’ schools till I was 17, so I’m very familiar with the nature of female friendship and how brutal and chaotic it can be. Having a girl best friend was a lifeline – it was us against the world.
We thought all the boys in our lives were stupid, because they were. We knew better than them, even though the world told them they were more important than us. We fought to take up as much space as our brothers and male friends, dominating every space we could because we knew that if we didn’t, we wouldn’t be heard. We went on our own adventures, had no boys allowed zones, and acted with outlandish bravado and aggression, because we were compensating for being little girls.
The tension between these children, especially down these gendered lines, is a surprisingly astute one. It’s not as nuanced as what we see in Stranger Things – which is a masterclass in writing children – but there’s a compelling seed of something here that I’m eager to watch evolve. Skeleton Crew is about kids, but it’s also about boys and girls, and that’s worth recognising.
Star Wars: Skeleton Crew