Viewers who watched the first episode of Skeleton Crew might have noticed an Easter egg that refers to one of the most infamous parts of Star Wars lore—the 1978 Star Wars Holiday Special. One of the main characters from the series, Neel, is the blue alien kid who looks like Max Rebo, the Ortolan keyboard player from Jabba’s band in Return of the Jedi. (He’s actually from a different species, but clearly that guy was the inspiration.) One scene shows Neel’s younger siblings watching a very weird holographic circus performance. This performance looks almost identical to the one Chewbacca’s song Lumpy watched back in the day. You can watch that scene from the Holiday Special right here:
We should note, this is not a reuse of the old ’70s footage, but a recreation. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, director Jon Watts said “We recreated it. We initially wanted to see if we could get the original footage, but it’s so low resolution because it was a TV special.” The 1978 Star Wars Holiday Special wasn’t shot on film, but on low-resolution videotape, as was common then. So the footage was probably in terrible shape. Assuming it even still exists.
So, does this mean the Star Wars Holiday Special is canon to the galaxy far, far away? Well, not so fast. George Lucas famously hated it, so we’re not sure its events will ever be canon out of respect for “The Creator.” And we’ve already seen several other Easter eggs from the Holiday Special over the years, none of which canonized it. The first episode of The Mandalorian saw Mando use a fork-like weapon, just like the one Boba Fett used in the Holiday Special. And the first episode of The Mandalorian also referenced Life Day for the first time in canon. This was a shout-out to the Wookiee holy day, also introduced in the Holiday Special.
For creators who were young kids when Star Wars first came out, like Skeleton Key executive producers Dave Filoni and Jan Favreau, the Star Wars Holiday Special retains a special place in their hearts. Yes, it’s quite terrible. Staggeringly so, in fact. Even the biggest Star Wars fans have a hard time sitting through the whole thing. However, in an era when there was only one Star Wars film, and an assortment of Kenner action figures, it was all they had. So the nostalgia for it is real. If even more Holiday Special Easter eggs pop up in Skeleton Crew, we would not be the least bit surprised.
