The 2016 film “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” was a critical and commercial success at the time, but hasn’t had much staying power in the cultural consciousness. A prequel to “A New Hope” extrapolated from that movie’s iconic opening crawl, “Rogue One” was vestigial by design. The subtitle also announced the project as one of a planned series of standalone films to pad out Disney’s release schedule; when that effort fizzled along with beleaguered origin story “Solo,” “Rogue One” was left marooned as a largely forgotten blip.
One of the many, many impressive accomplishments in “Andor,” the Disney+ series that will conclude its two-season run in the coming weeks, is that it retroactively transforms “Rogue One” from a trivial footnote into a thrilling conclusion. A prequel to a prequel named for a protagonist who (spoiler alert!) dies in a successful attempt to steal the plans for the Death Star, “Andor” sounded even more minor than its jumping-off point. But that marginality would turn out to be the show’s greatest strength. Not only did low story stakes and a set endpoint give creator Tony Gilroy the leeway to realize his full authorial vision; they also became the central subjects of a story chiefly concerned with the ordinary, anonymous, essential cogs on both sides of a struggle between insurgent rebels and fascist oppressors. Season 1 of “Andor” was already by far the most exciting output of the venerable franchise’s streaming TV era. With Season 2, “Andor” cements itself as the gold standard of what modern “Star Wars” can be.
Two seasons is a seemingly awkward length for a show — too long to be a miniseries, too short to settle into a groove. Here, once again, “Andor” defies the odds. The first volume, which aired in the fall of 2022, brought Diego Luna’s eponymous hero from self-interested outlaw to committed revolutionary. The second closes the half-decade gap between those events and “Rogue One,” breaking the 12-episode order into four blocks, each set a year apart. (The release schedule of three-episode chunks dispersed over four weeks makes sense in light of this narrative structure, not just the Emmy eligibility window.)
Only the last of these blocks falls victim to the burden of exposition, seeding the characters and setup of “Rogue One” rather than serving as a climax in its own right. But even this decision reads more like tying “Rogue One” into “Andor” than the other way around. Gilroy supervised reshoots on “Rogue One,” and while his exact contributions may never be known, the writer and director has claimed credit for the ending, in which almost every protagonist gives their life for the cause. In Season 2, “Andor” doubles down on this theme of sacrifice and the question of choice versus destiny, while maintaining Season 1’s focus on the everyday mechanics of resistance and repression.
It’s amazing, for example, how much space and attention “Andor” affords to corners of the galaxy too quiet or mundane for the blockbuster treatment. At a family wedding hosted by Senator Mon Mothma (Genevieve O’Reilly), an institutional reformist forced to get comfortable with radical action, we learn the rigorously thought-out rituals of Mon’s native planet Chandrila. When zealous Imperial functionary Syril Karn (Kyle Soller) introduces his overbearing mother (Kathryn Hunter) to his girlfriend — the dogged, uptight officer Dedra Meero (Denise Gough) — we watch him prepare a dinner with ingredients that somehow seem both alien and familiar. As much as “Andor” is in pointed contrast to so many “Star Wars” conventions, it’s simply too engrossed by its setting — infectiously so — to come off as disinterested or derisive toward the larger enterprise.
Besides, things don’t stay quiet for long. The action of Season 2 centers on the planet Ghorman, a humble textile manufacturing base with the misfortune of possessing mineral deposits the Empire needs for its top-secret weapon. (Last season’s postscript revealed Cassian’s prison labor was manufacturing panels for the Death Star — repetitive, exploitative piecework as an essential tool of authoritarian control.) To manufacture an excuse for violent resource extraction, Meero proposes stoking “a radical insurgency you can count on” to “do the wrong thing.”
This plan puts Ghorman in the crosshairs of Meero on one side and rebel leader Luthen Rael (Stellan Skarsgard), Cassian’s mentor and recruiter, on the other. But without the Jedi — and the binary conception of the Force that comes with them — as major players, “Andor” is never black-and-white in its morality, even as the show is clear-eyed about the larger issues at play. Within the anti-Imperial side, there are fierce debates over peaceful protest versus armed opposition, and a gradual, uneasy transition from a scattered guerilla network to an organized Rebel army. It’s the abstract stuff of history books rendered through characters we’ve come to care deeply about, like Cassian and his love interest Bix (Adria Arjona), now traumatized by torture and living as a fugitive.
The Ghorman powder keg eventually explodes in spectacular fashion. In everything from dress (beret-like hats by costume designer Michael Wilkinson) to industry (heritage crafts) to language (an original one designed for the show), Ghorman is analogous to France, giving “Andor” reference points like World War II-era Resistance, the Revolution and even “Les Misérables.” Were Gilroy and his fellow writers (Beau Willimon, brother Dan Gilroy and author Tom Bissell each get credit for one three-episode arc, paired with directors Ariel Kleiman, Janus Metz and Alonso Ruizpalacios) not so clearly engaged with history, it would be tempting to accuse them of ripping from the headlines. Season 2 touches on immigration, genocide, and bad-faith excuses for state overreach. Yet its scripts were written years ago. “Andor” isn’t copying the news, but anticipating it by studying timeless dynamics of power and social change.
“Andor” is richly satisfying as a complete work, though it leaves “Star Wars” as a whole at a crossroads after the impending departure of Lucasfilm head Kathleen Kennedy. But Gilroy and his collaborators leave behind them a map for how the franchise could move forward. Obviously, not every “Star Wars” show can be an adult drama that dabbles in political theory. It can, however, focus on a narrow corner of George Lucas’s sprawling cosmology, leave out what doesn’t suit the story and combine what’s left with the creator’s own interests. Leslye Headland’s “The Acolyte” is the closest Disney has come to replicating this approach; that series wasn’t perfect, but it deserved far better than an abrupt cancellation after one season. Perhaps, like “Andor,” “Star Wars” can look to and learn from the past. Hasn’t it paid off?
The first three episodes of “Andor” Season 2 will premiere on Disney+ on April 22, with new episodes premiering three at a time on Tuesdays.
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