The Acolyte ends mid July. I'm guessing a first trailer for Skeleton Crew then debuts at D23 the weekend of August 9th (with a simultaneous online release), where we'll also get an official release date announcement. As of now, only "Christmas" has been confirmed, which could of course mean anytime between late November and late December.
However, more importantly, I'm hoping this series will mark the beginning of an upward trend again for the franchise. If only because it can't get any lower than where we are right now, considering the current negativity (warranted or not) and toxicity surrounding The Acolyte (though I do maintain that most of the hate is coming from a vocal minority).
Skeleton Crew is from Jon Watts, director of the past three Spider-Man movies, the first two episodes of FX's The Old Man, and the upcoming Wolfs, starring George Clooney and Brad Pitt. In other words, Watts knows how to deliver the goods, and the additional directors he has in his stable for this are pretty damn good...
- Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (Everything Everywhere All at Once)
- David Lowery (Pete's Dragon, The Old Man & the Gun, The Green Knight)
- Jake Schreier (Marvel's Thunderbolts)
- Bryce Dallas Howard (The Mandalorian)
- Lee Isaac Chung (Minari, Twisters)
As mentioned above, there's a certain Amblin/Spielberg quality to the (bootleg) footage shown so far, and coupled with a holiday release, I really do think this has the potential to bring that fun-for-the-whole-family vibe back to the franchise. In less of a made-explicitly-12-year-olds kind of way, and with more of that E.T. / Stranger Things / Indiana Jones magic.
With Skeleton Crew then ending next February or so (it's eight episodes total), I'm guessing Andor season two will be a massive summer 2025 Disney+ release (following Marvel's Daredevil: Born Again in the spring), with twelve episodes across ten-ish weeks.
So right there we could have back-to-back Disney+ series that get fans excited all over again and earn back some of that good will for the franchise. Then less than a year after that, come May 2026, is when Star Wars finally returns to the big screen, in a string movies over the next several years, movies Lucasfilm has been developing for years now, in stark contrast to the infamously rushed sequel trilogy.
Anyway, I just saw that tweet above, got excited all over again, and wanted to say that despite the current state of affairs, I genuinely believe that better days are ahead...