Review: Andor | Season 1, Episodes 1-3
The newest Star Wars story takes all three of its premiere episodes to warm up
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What are the hallmarks of a Star Wars story? The original trilogy, with its stories rooted in the quintessential hero’s myth, added sci-fi trappings to a tale of unadulterated good vs. evil, only gradually allowing for nuance as Darth Vader’s initially terrifying presence as the avatar of all things Evil Empire is counterbalanced by his familial connection to the plucky farmboy Luke Skywalker. But amidst the good vs. evil struggle, there were feisty robots, starships both slick and clunky, laser swords, and a massive walking, talking dog-man for good measure.
George Lucas’ prequel trilogy aimed for more complexity in its slow-motion depiction of how a chipper little orphan from a desert planet would turn into that masked behemoth Vader, while also adding in a painfully soppy romance as simplistic as anything derived from the aforementioned hero’s myth. By the time of the sequel trilogy from the Walt Disney Company, the elements from the original trilogy got a slightly quippier air thanks to the presence of writer/director J.J. Abrams, while trying to get back to the visual basics of an Empire gone to seed, with much more muck and dirt amidst the adventures.
The visual basics are one of the few hallmarks that are so far present in the latest entry in the now-burgeoning group of Star Wars TV series that want very badly to be movies. As we wait for the third official season of The Mandalorian—having had the brief interlude with The Book of Boba Fett last fall—Disney+ and Lucasfilm are delivering Andor. This new show (whose first of two seasons consists of twelve episodes) focuses on Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), the Rebel Alliance officer who was a critical character in the 2016 midquel film Rogue One, in which we learn how the plans of the Death Star were stolen by a group of ragtag heroes whose fates are ultimately doomed.
Cassian, to note, is one of those ragtag heroes who doesn’t survive to the end of Rogue One. That said, Andor seems sure to end with Cassian alive and well (both because the show’s second season is already greenlit, and…well, he has to live to take part in the events of Rogue One, hasn’t he?). Yet while this show may have direct ties to the larger Star Wars universe, if the three-episode premiere is any indication, Andor wants to be movie-like but not exactly Star Wars-like, for good and ill.
Few truly recognizable hallmarks of past Star Wars films and shows are present in Andor’s first three episodes. (Each of the three episodes was written by show creator and Rogue One co-writer Tony Gilroy, and directed by Toby Haynes, with future episodes arriving once a week.) Cassian does have a clunky robot, B2EMO, but there are few truly alien characters and very little in the form of goofy humor, quips, or the general sense of propulsive fun you’d expect to find in this world.
That Andor feels adjacent, at best, to the traditional Star Wars story isn’t really a problem. Rogue One tried to be a balance of gritty war epic and heist movie, one that couldn’t quite be fun because so many members of the audience knew these characters weren’t long for the world. So it tracks that Andor is moody, slower-paced, and taking its sweet time with teasing out aspects of Cassian’s past, courtesy of a series of subtitle-free flashbacks to his homeworld. What is a problem is that dreaded idea, one that so few shows, showrunners, or stars avoid these days: is this TV show actually a TV show or is it really just meant to be a super-long movie? Luna, at the recent D23 Expo, already has uttered the groan-inducing phrase that this 12-episode TV series is really a 12-hour film. Conceptually, of course, this is nonsense because…well, that’s not what TV is, no matter how slick it looks or how epic the action is. The greater issue is whether these episodes feel like they were written to be separate installments or are so fully conjoined at the streaming hip that it’s frustrating to watch them piecemeal over the course of a few months.
Consider that a long wind-up to say that it’s very obvious why the first three episodes of Andor were released together. Yes, Disney+ is likely very bullish on the show—at the very least, it’s a Star Wars show and you have to get the full might of their marketing team behind such an even). But of the three episodes released today, just one of them ends in a natural enough way for an episode of television, let alone a story…and that would be the third and final installment. Though Gilroy and Haynes are able to create a generally dark aesthetic throughout all three installments, it’s also worth noting that the third episode—one that a few other critics have noted is a true standout—is most memorable, because…well, because it’s the only one in which there is a notable sense of action, of tension, of propulsion. In short, it’s the only one where anything happens.
“Episode 1” and “Episode 2” end less because they’ve completed telling a discrete story, so much as because they’re the equivalent of the first two parts of an extended pilot that’s been divided in pieces to fit in well during a syndicated rerun. “Episode 1” offers setup for Cassian’s story, and “Episode 2” only elongates that setup, offering up a TV version of twiddling one’s thumbs before the action can begin in “Episode 3”. (It doesn’t help matters that the three episodes have a combined runtime of just over 100 minutes, once you remove the end credits and “Previously on” recaps.)
“Episode 1” sets the stage with Cassian on a quest to find his long-lost sister. Though years have passed since he last saw her—and Andor takes place five years before the events of Rogue One—Cassian is looking for her in the opening scene. The show kicks off with Cassian making a dark and rainy visit to another planet, Morlana One, in the eventually dashed hopes of finding her in a brothel. His failure to find his sister leads to a much bloodier event wherein Cassian inadvertently kicks his own departure into motion when he kills two “Corpos,” AKA the Star Wars version of mall cops, the pair of whom harass him before we get the first glimpse of what we know to be true from Rogue One: his deft and cutthroat abilities via both hand-to-hand combat and gunplay.
The episode’s other function is introducing us to his current home planet, Ferrix, where Cassian is besotted with flashbacks to his youth on Kenari, the now-abandoned planet where he grew up. At the same time as he’s trying to ensure that he’s not fingered for the double murder, Cassian is trying to sell a MacGuffin—‚sorry, an untraceable Starpath unit—in the hopes of getting enough money to leave. His friend Bix Caleen (Adria Arjona) is the connection point, as she knows a secretive buyer who Cassian begs her to contact. The sooner he can get it offloaded, the sooner he can leave, establishing a clear goal post for the story that we sort of inherently know won’t come for a few episodes.
While the story primarily remains on Fennix, the episode crosscuts with Morlana One to establish more stakes: though he doesn’t know it yet, Cassian is being pursued by a an extremely overzealous Corpo named Syril (Kyle Soller). Just as Syril’s told to leave things where they are (and just as he’s going to ignore that edict), Cassian’s obsession with leaving is coupled with his memory of being separated from his sister in the past, as he goes with a group of his fellow Kenaris to explore a warship that crash-landed on his planet. That ending is arguably very abrupt: even “Episode 2” ends with a bit more of something like a cliffhanger, whereas “Episode 1” ends basically because it’s hit some internal time limit and has to cut to credits.
The second episode’s cliffhanger serves as its most compelling aspect, as we learn the identity of Bix’s secret buyer: Luthen, an enigmatic older man played by Stellan Skarsgård, an actor who excels at portraying enigmatic older men. Aside from teasing us with the presence of Skarsgård, whose character Luthen lands on Ferrix alongside a chatty fellow passenger as the episode concludes, “Episode 2” also introduces us to Maarva (Fiona Shaw), Cassian’s surrogate mother with a past of her own. However, it spends much of its runtime—35 minutes including the recap and credits, the shortest of the three available today—building up potential tension between Bix, Cassian, and Bix’s co-worker/friend with benefits Timm (James McArdle), who very clearly wants to turn Cassian in.
“Episode 3”, as you might hope (if not expect), brings together the varying threads effectively in a very straightforward, reasonably suspenseful installment that still feels much like the climax to that extended pilot. Though Bix warns Luthen that the Corpos are seemingly hot on Cassian’s tail—in spite of them shrewdly only saying they’re looking for someone from Kenari, not specifying Cassian by name—Luthen is quick to meet with Cassian in an abandoned warehouse. At the same time, Syril and his forces head to Ferrix to hunt down Cassian. The flashbacks also continue, though primarily from Maarva’s point of view, as she reflects on having met Cassian after the survivors of the crash-landed warship attack blindly at the curious Kenari, leaving several dead and Cassian wounded. (Maarva, serving as a pre-Rebel Alliance freedom fighter, takes pity on the young, but reasonably confused Cassian instantly, absconding with him lest he face retribution from arriving Republic forces.)
The reason why all these threads converging in “Episode 3” winds up being so effective isn’t because Tony Gilroy is an old hand at building suspense (though his work on Michael Clayton and the Bourne films is proof that he is). It’s that, for all the reasonable grumbling we can and should make about the people behind Andor talking about it like a twelve-hour movie…well, these three episodes do feel like a movie and the serious action only kicks into gear in the final 20 minutes.
It becomes quickly apparent that while Luthen will happily pay for the MacGuffin, he knows much more about Cassian and his history than he’s letting on, and sees Cassian as a valuable piece in the Rebel Alliance…though Luthen notably doesn’t say those words. Through Gilroy’s script and Haynes’ direction—as well as editing co-credited to another of the Gilroy brood, John—there’s solid cross-cutting between Cassian making the decision to go with Luthen, Syril and his team being outflanked by the crafty title character and losing lives in the process, and Maarva reflecting on her escape from Kenari with a young Cassian in tow. To rob the parlance of a true classic, the final chunk of “Episode 3” is, thank God, when this show finally arrives at the fireworks factory.
So I ask again: what are the hallmarks of a Star Wars story? One-quarter of the way through this season, most of those hallmarks are absent, and clearly on purpose. With a couple of qualifications in mind—if, say, you hadn’t seen Rogue One and if the Lucasfilm logo wasn’t slapped in front of each episode—you might be forgotten for looking at the three-episode pilot of Andor as less of a Star Wars story and more indebted to a drier, slower form of cinematic science fiction. The early going of “Episode 1”, especially, recalls another science-fiction title featuring Harrison Ford: Blade Runner. Soon enough, the noirish undertones fall away, but what we’re left with is both a blank slate. Depending on how things shake out, Andor may have fully left Ferrix behind as we track Cassian’s evolution into a key part of the Rebel Alliance and an eventual stopping point. Just as Rogue One could only expand its story in so many ways, Andor can only do so much. Just as we know that Cassian will survive the events of this season, we know that—unless they’re hiding out somewhere—no one else from these first three episodes makes it to Rogue One.
It’s a start, but a different one for the world of Star Wars, in part because Andor is trying hard to not feel like a part of the typical Star Wars world.
Stray Observations
It would be unfair of me to say that I can’t see Fiona Shaw without thinking of Petunia Dursley, but as Myles can attest from my brackets on Twitter (and anyone reading this who follows those brackets knows), I am a very unfair person.1
Syril is arguably the most fascinating blank-slate character so far. Nothing against Diego Luna, who’s fine as Cassian once again, but Kyle Soller’s performance is a genuinely intriguing mix of zealotry and self-loathing. If there is any character I do want to know a lot more about, it’s him.
If there is any scene here that’s directly nodding to the Star Wars series, it’s the opener, in which our hero goes into a seedy bar and runs afoul of some gruff types. Of course, the difference is that in the first Star Wars, Luke Skywalker is truly at a loss. Whereas here, Cassian Andor is a lot shrewder (and his bullies are a lot more cowardly).
“That’s two lies.” B2EMO is a smart little guy, even with his Max Headroom-esque voice.
At this point, not having watched the next available episode for review, I’m of two minds with the Kenari flashbacks, which – as noted above – are subtitle-free. On one hand, what occurs in those flashbacks prior to Maarva’s arrival is clear enough to grasp without needing to know every word being spoken by these characters. On the other, I do imagine my tolerance would be lowered if we keep going back to this well throughout the next nine episodes. If Cassian’s relationship with his sister is so critical that he’s been risking his life to hopefully find her, it might be nice to see the words even if we can’t understand them.
Myles here. Thanks for reading. As with some others shows we’ve covering, there’s lots of other options, and we really appreciate that you’re here. However, if you’re looking for podcast/video content about Andor (and other shows), David Chen is covering the show with Patrick H. Willems at Decoding TV.
No lies here. -MM
I feel like we just watched something completely different. While I will assent to the point that this doesn't feel like it should've been divided into 3 episodes (felt more like a tight 90 pilot episode) I was compelled the whole way through. This is exciting stuff, but not the sort of "I recognize that" nostalgia fan bait, or hollow spectacle that most of the previous D+ Star Wars shows have been in my view. This feels like someone examining the human aspect of insurgency through the lense and palette of Star Wars. It'll be interesting to see if this moves into a more traditional TV structure (that may dictate whether I follow week to week or not) but I am onboard for the ride.
I had never really thought of Tony Gilroy as a person with an appreciable stamp to his work, but these episodes were 100% from the person responsible for Michael Clayton and the (good) Bourne movies. "Man on the run who doesn't realize how quickly the walls are closing in on him" is something he does really well, and based how well those works culminate (not to mention whatever magic he worked on the third act of Rogue One), he's one of the few writers who fully gets the benefit of the doubt from me. If he thinks he needs a three episode pilot episode to set up whatever comes next, then I trust him. Which isn't to say I didn't dig these episodes, because I absolutely did.
Even more so than Rogue One, Andor feels like what a Star Wars film detached from the nine episodic films could be. Those films were telling a single story and had to be tonally and visually consistent with each other as a result, but that doesn't mean that everything set in this universe has to do the same. Rogue One pushed it a bit, but was limited by the fact that it had to end where the familiar begins. Andor gets to be an additional step further away from what we have been trained to think of as Star Wars, and it looks to be taking advantage of that opportunity by creating aesthetics and tone all its own.
I also thought of Blade Runner and Blade Runner 2049 while watching, not just because of the noir tones, but also large-scale visuals and blown out sound design (which were far less slick than normal Star Wars sounds - much rougher and more bass-heavy). Even the music consciously pulled away from John Williams's work and style, more concerned with establishing a mood than with Mickey Mousing the action or linking characters to specific motifs. It even changed up the music over the title card with each episode so as not to establish a theme song for the show (not to mention using a drum kit as part of the orchestra, surely a Star Wars first). All of this adds up to something truly distinct. My thought when watching was "I cannot picture characters like Yoda or Ahsoka Tano existing in this show", and I think that sums up what the show was going for.
Also, I cannot put into words how much I loved the fact that the antagonists for these episodes were impotent rent-a-cops with itchy trigger fingers who, in their misguided efforts to play at real soldier, end up hurting innocents and fomenting a city-wide rebellion. I can only imagine how the "keep politics out of Star Wars!" crowd is handling that, although it's likely they don't even realize that story is a real-world reference.