BBY 1 is here. Concluding Andor’s second season with the events of Rogue One imminent was always going to happen, but it takes an explosive set of events to get news of the Death Star to the Rebellion’s headquarters on Yavin, and thus to send Cassian (Diego Luna) off with K-2SO (Alan Tudyk) in search of Galen and Jyn Erso. These are covered in the three-part finale: Make It Stop, Who Else Knows?, and Jedha, Kyber, Erso – this last title being a list of the place, the material, and the man key to the coming action and the events of A New Hope, the film that started it all in 1977.
This week, the time jump felt less jarring than it had in previous weeks. The (second) Ghorman Massacre and its fallout was a near-perfect mini-arc in the previous week, which saw the deaths of hundreds of rebels alongside love-to-hate petty villain Syril Karn (Kyle Soller) – who almost had a change of heart before his too-deep loyalties drew him into a final fatal fight with Cassian and the Ghorman Front. Of course, that led Mon Mothma (Genevieve O’Reilly) to finally take a stand and make an incendiary speech in the Senate, immediately fleeing to Yavin with Cassian as an escort off Coruscant. Interestingly, Cassian did not take her all the way – Luthen (Stellan Skarsgård) arranged for a second brigade for her hero’s welcome on Yavin; Cassian’s face, and skills, are saved for the more shadowy missions.
And on a personal note, at the end of last week’s Episode 9, Welcome to the Rebellion, Bix (Adria Arjona) left Cassian a video note explaining that she has to keep fighting for the Rebellion and allow him to do the same – meaning that they cannot continue to live together in a relationship. If they did, Cassian would leave the Rebellion in search of a better life for and with Bix. This selfless move sets Bix off for a kinder, less lethal send-off than many Rebels get in the final three episodes – she has grown through her pain in service of a higher cause, and makes a decision whose ramifications end up securing the future of the Galaxy. It is a shame Arjona is not in more of the finale, but her presence is consistently felt.
Indeed, Make It Stop is a Cassian-free episode, focusing instead on heart-stopping action on Coruscant when Dedra Meero (Denise Gough) finally has enough intel to make a move against Luthen and Kleya (Elizabeth Dulau). Luthen’s Imperial mole Lonni (Robert Emms) barely has time to deliver the Death Star news and its many cover-ups orchestrated by Orson Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn) before Andor kicks into high political thriller mode. Make It Stop shows just how much Luthen and Kleya had meticulously, boldly planned for all contingencies, and how far they are willing to go to see the Rebellion ultimately succeed – whether or not they themselves do. It is 2025 television’s answer to Jean-Pierre Melville’s 1969 World War II spy film Army of Shadows. In flashbacks detailing the history of their quasi-familial relationship, Luthen explains to Kleya that victories are built on the backs of many, many losses, and this plays out in an extreme case throughout this tightly-wound episode – arguably the best of the season.
But at this point, the writing and world-building of Andor is so exquisitely established that characters – even titular ones – can disappear from the narrative and reappear naturally, with no loss of continuity or presence. And crucially, absence of screen time is not absence of effect or meaning. If rebellions are built on hope, they are also built on the backs of everyone who has engaged in some small act of disobedience – the thousands of small insurgencies Nemick (Alex Lawthor, heard but not seen in Season 2) mentions in the manifesto that brought Cassian into the cause in the first place are each building blocks in a long, slow struggle towards a more free future.
As mentioned last week, the dead never fall without the camera – and by extension us, the viewers – bearing witness. This witnessing continues through the ensuing scenes and episodes, showing that these actions and endings are never in vain. Indeed, it feels a bit silly knowing that Luke Skywalker and Han Solo will be awarded with medals for blowing up the Death Star a few short weeks after the end of Andor Season 2; the medals, while deserved, feel quite trite in comparison to the litany of unsung sacrifices.
Cassian returns to the fore in Who Else Knows? and Jedha, Kyber, Erso, which clearly set up the players in charge at the start of Rogue One. It is a delight hearing Tudyk back in the mix, and if a reprogrammed droid does not have the same complicated character development of the humans around it, those humans soon learn the strengths of their new tireless companion. Interestingly, Cassian does not emerge at the end of his series as the clear-cut, Rebel leadership-anointed hero; his struggles with the Rebel leadership – often against Bail Organa (Benjamin Bratt), with Mon Mothma far more sympathetic – make it clear his personal moral compass is strong, loud, and willing to act against organised movements if his friends’ lives are at stake or debts need to be repaid. It is a rougher portrait of good versus evil than emerges in the franchise’s cinema tentpoles, and all the more thorny and compelling for it.
Many Andor characters – Bix, Luthen, Kleya, Wilmon (Muhannad Bhaier) are never mentioned by name in Rogue One. But their actions over the course of the two seasons – notably those demonstrated in its closing arc – are echoed by Cassian on his final mission to steal the Death Star plans. These clear, purposeful choices are far more powerful than any callback to the more famous heroes and villains of Star Wars. Instead of fan service, Andor delivers a cohesive, unified vision of connecting lives and fates in a galaxy far, far away.
The last three episodes are all directed by Alonso Ruizpalacios and written by Tom Bissell, but the clear presence of showrunner Tony Gilroy – somewhat of a rarity among made-by-committee franchise shows on Disney+ – is what sets Andor apart in its clarity of vision. Even a montage showing where all surviving characters have ended up feels potent, not corny. One of the masterpieces of modern television across any genre, Andor will certainly withstand multiple rewatches and continue to inspire and spark debate for a new generation of Star Wars fans.
Andor Season 2 is now streaming in full on Disney+.
Learn more about the show, including how to watch, on the Disney site for the title.
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