Star Wars: Skeleton Crew – Is Jude Law’s Character a Jedi or a Pirate?

Star Wars: Skeleton Crew‘s two-episode premiere was bookended by the introduction of two mysterious characters — who may well indeed be the same person. The series opened with the scene of a helmeted space pirate captain, being dethroned by his mutinous crew; Episode 2 ended with the introduction “Jod Na Nawood” (Jude Law), a prisoner in the brig of the pirate outpost that the series’ rascally kids stumbled upon in their “borrowed” starship. Nawood made his intro by supposedly using Force abilities to levitate a set of jail keys into his hand, but is the character the Jedi that he claims to be?

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Star Wars: Skeleton Crew – Who Is Jod Na Nawood, Really?

Is Jod Na Nawood a Jedi? Almost certainly not. The character synopsis that Lucasfilm put out for Skeleton Crew described Nawood as “a Force-user,” but even that description seems dubious. Even if Nawood was once a potential Force user, the other big clue we have about him suggests he is not the type of person who could become a Jedi.

The way the final scene of Skeleton Crew Episode 2 is composed, it seems pretty clear that Nawood is taking advantage of what he overheard from young Wim (Ravi Cabot-Conyers), his friend Neel (Robert Timothy Smith), and their accidental companions Fern (Ryan Kiera Armstrong) and KB (Kyriana Kratter). The way that Nawood is able to quickly and smoothly become what the kids need hints that he’s very the same helmeted pirate captain that we saw in Skeleton Crew‘s opening scene.

So if Nawood is a pirate, and not the Jedi he claims to be, what’s up with the Force powers?

First of all: who says the guys actually has Force powers? Star Wars has established any number of other technologies that could be used to pull a set of metallic keys across the room. Nawood may have figured out the key-pull trick long ago in order to get out of that cell; it was getting a ship to get him off-world that was probably the real challenge.

Star Wars has, by now, established more than enough precedent for Jedi or would-be Jedi to fall from grace and end up working on the shadier side of things. It already sets up some powerful points of resonance for the characters of Star Wars: Skeleton Crew if Nawood was someone who had the Force potential to be a Jedi, stepped away from that destiny, and became something ignoble like a pirate. It instantly creates a complex emotional arc between Wim and Nawood, as the former will almost certainly look up to the latter, and the inevitable disillusionment is what will constitute the “stakes” of the show. While Wim would have to grow about real-life vs. storybook heroes, it seems like Nawood would have to confront who he’s become and how he either chose to use his Force abilities, or what it means if he’s found to be playing on a kid’s dreams of heroes and adventure, in order to advance his own selfish agenda.

No matter how it plays out, it’s clear that Star Wars: Skeleton Crew has quickly created some good intrigue around its characters and story.

Star Wars: Skeleton Crew releases new episodes Tuesdays on Disney+.