If, like me, you grew up with the original Star Wars movies as a kid then you will love Andor. It’s the backstory of Cassian Andor, a Rebel Alliance intelligence officer we first met in the Rogue One: A Star Wars Story film, and his five year journey from scavenger and thief to passionate revolutionary that leads up to the events of the film. In a way, his journey parallels Han Solo’s transformation from smuggler to General in the Rebel Alliance.
Unlike other recent offerings from the Disney Star Wars universe, like Skeleton Crew and The Acolyte, which while fun are really made for kids, Andor is a Star Wars TV show that’s aimed squarely at the Gen X audience who were there for the original Star Wars trilogy.
Andor season 2 is set to launch on Disney+ on April 22 in the US and April 23 for those in the UK and Australia. Not sure if the new Star Wars Disney Plus show is for you? Here are three good reasons why you won’t want to miss it.
1. It captures the magic of the original Star Wars
It’s hard to explain what it was like to see the original Star Wars in a cinema as a child. From the opening shot showing an absolutely huge Star Destroyer chasing down a Rebel Alliance vessel you were transported to another universe. Everything about Star Wars was believable, from the grisly way a lightsaber could cut through flesh to the constantly malfunctioning droids. I’d never seen anything like it before and I didn’t want it to end.
Looking back, and with the benefit of hindsight, I think the Ewoks in Episode VI – Return of the Jedi were a foreshadowing of the way things were going to go further down the line with Star Wars franchise, but I wasn’t emotionally prepared for the chasm of despair (Darth Maul aside) that the George Lucas’ Episode I, II and III films were going to create in my soul.
Sure, I can accept that they were made for children who were the same age as I was when I watched the original trilogy, but they were very different films and the fact that George Lucas himself had happily gone down the route of CGI-laden slop with zero emotional connection to the characters just made it all the worse.
2. It’s part of the Rogue One universe, one of the best Star Wars movies ever made
When the third trilogy of films kicked off with Episode VII – The Force Awakens, I was interested again. It had promise. It laid the groundwork for some interesting plot developments and the characters were intriguing. Then, Gareth Edwards’ Rogue One appeared out of nowhere filling in the story before A New Hope started, and it had that same thrill and excitement that the original Star Wars movies had given me as a kid. Things were looking up again.
Sadly, Episode VIII – The Last Jedi and Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker seemed utterly pointless and directionless, casually throwing away good story lines and demoting key characters to mere bit parts, destroying my faith in the Star Wars universe.
Until, that is, Andor, one of the way-too-many Star Wars spin-off shows that Disney had invested in, appeared in 2022 and changed everything. I didn’t really know anything about Andor when I started watching it, but I was instantly hooked.
In a way each Star Wars TV show or movie has its own universe. Andor exists in the serious Star Wars universe of Rogue One. It’s not made for kids and it tackles the big issues of life. We get to revisit the characters we met in Rogue One and find out exactly how they got there, what events shaped their lives, and what sacrifices they had to make along the way.
It’s highbrow, but in a good way
It’s been noted that the first season of Andor was a Marxist allegory. It follows a group of characters dealing with an oppressive regime (the Empire) and we can watch how a revolution by the proletariat begins, but you don’t need a degree in politics to appreciate the show. What matters is how well it’s made.
Series one of Andor apparently cost Disney a staggering $271.6 million, which was all money well spent if you ask me. It looks amazing, the acting is first rate, the plot is gritty, and the characters are believable. While it moves at a slower pace than the modern world often demands and expects, Andor delivers the kind of emotional punch that you only get from slow burn introductions to fully fleshed-out characters that you really care about.
As much as I loved the original Star Wars films, the concept of the light side of the force vs the dark side that underpinned the whole trilogy was laughably simplistic. In Andor you are asked to inhabit a world of complexity where nothing is truly black and white. Good people have to occasionally do bad things and bad people can still have redeeming features.
If you need further persuading to join the resistance and fight the empire, the first season of Andor has a 96% critics rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and an 87% audience score, and if you haven’t seen it then there’s still time to watch it before season two drops.
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