The Series is now over. we can now officially declare we avoided it! Not one Jedi, not one sith, not one appearance of Vader of the emperor, not one lightsaber, not one physical manifestation of “The Force”. They actually did Star wars with zero bullshit.
These couple of weeks, Hexbear has been full of Andor posts. Considering these last 3 episodes were probably the best television I’ve ever seen in my life, I figure there are gonna be a lot of people who want to share their thoughts on the finale.
I’ll be honest, until episode 10, I thought Season 2 wasn’t for me. it’s wasn’t bad but I just felt it didn’t have the punch of Season 1. that season gave us novel tropes like a gold heist, a prison break, a riot, etc. season 2 was a more character focused set up for rogue one.
but the last 3 episodes, they changed everything. every minute was amazing.
Andor is often called perfect for someone who doesn’t think they like star wars. If it was just a standalone sci-fi spy thriller, it would be still be the best thing on television, but what’s truly the crowning accomplishment is that if you do know a lot about star wars, it somehow becomes ever better. This show redeems other media in this franchise. it redeems rogue one, it even strengthens Episode 4.
How much the destruction of the death star cost. In episode 4, the audience is shown “It was a longshot, but somehow a backwater orphan pilot managed to score the killing shot and destroy the battle station.”
in Rogue One, they’re shown “Okay, it was an even longer shot than that, because before they got to that point, they had to do a big adventure culiminating in getting the plans off Scarif with just seconds to spare”
And I always thought that was sort of weak, because it’s a work of fiction. fiction naturally collects around the execution of extremely lucky acts. how ever unlikely their success was is ultimately arbitrary, they can always be written to succeed in spite of the odds.
But it’s not about their luck, it’s about their sophistication. it’s that the rebels were doing all of these things collectively and competently, that they had become what they needed to be at their finest hour, and all the contributions, all the sacrifices of every single character all lead to this being possible.
Or I’m just high an none of this makes sense.
spoiler
For spy masterminds who had a massive fortune at one point and plenty of time to figure something out, they had a shitty escape plan. And why’d he shoot Lonni?
Overall, a lot of characters felt forced in to outcomes to fit with Rogue One.
I thought there were some pretty shots, the way things where framed. I like how actors look and are lit in bright white rooms, every pore and hair follicle visible, like in THX 1138 (george lucas reference?).
I liked Draven though much more than I thought I would. He kind of wants to be Andor’s work dad, scolding him when he breaks protocol but vouching for him when he’s not present.
And when Andor gets erased from the rescuing Mon Mothma narrative, he seems heartfelt in his offer to listen to the speech with Cassian in his office.
spoiler
Luthen knew he was compromised for a long time, but stayed active on Coruscant for longer than he was safe to in order gather intel on the super weapon, which made Yavin cut ties. he still tried to escape when he got the intel, but he trusted it to Kleya as he still had to destroy his base before leaving. Lonni was a liability who would lead them directly to Luthen, though Luthen didn’t realize it wouldn’t make a difference in how quickly he’d be found. he was also behaving erratically and betrayed Luthen by not leveraging his stolen password far earlier.
Sorry, but I don’t think your facts are correct here, and I don’t get your reasoning.
They didn’t know he was compromised or that there was a super weapon until Lonni told him.
They could have had a deadman’s-switch self-destruct (as well as a booby trap for unauthorized access) rigged on the comms console. They could have had a backup escape vehicle, and at one point it sounded like they did when Luthen last met with Kleya, but then Kleya just goes and hides at the same safehouse (did they run out of money for new sets/locations?), and has to get Andor to rescue her?
They had immense resources and time to plan contingencies. Instead Luthen botches his cleanup and his suicide. It’s betrayal of the competency these characters had been established to have. Meero too. She does a silly villain monologue with an unsubdued and visibly armed Luthen.
They could have all flown out together immediately and went to Yavin, which is what Kleya ends up doing anyway. They could have brought in the equivalent of Kim Philby with firsthand knowledge to lend credibility to their intel. The only reason it didn’t go down that way is because they need to make it fit with Rogue One, and when Gilroy doesn’t know what to do with a character he kills them off in a kind of stupid avoidable way. It was Gilroy’s idea to kill off all the characters in Rogue One, btw.
Oh also Bix’s ending struck me as corny.
Just be thankful she didn’t say something like, “There, there, Cassian.”
I was waiting for that the entire time and was glad when it didn’t happen. But let’s be real, Disney’s gonna try and milk this for all it’s worth, so we’re probably getting to see Cassian Andor Jr. in his own show very soon, playing long after the Empire has fallen, and then trying to retrace his father’s steps OR he’s gonna be a cameo in the 3rd season of Ahsoka, like a playmate for Hera’s son. And Bix then probably gets mainstreamed too.
Oh, lol. I wasn’t even thinking of that, it was just so cliche I was surprised she didn’t say it. You’re probably right though.
I think one of the things lost from not have 5 seasons as initially planned is we skip over Luthen’s rise and fall in relevance to the rebellion and perhaps having time to show him starting to get sloppy under the strain.
So I agree he seemed to carry the idiot ball at the backend of the series.
Meero was fucked up enough that I could see her (especially after Cyrils’s death) confronting him for the psychosexual thrill of finally winning.
That does make sense. Thanks.