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Andor Season 2 Review
Image Credit: Lucasfilm Ltd
Loading...Author’s Note: This is a non-spoiler review for Andor Season 2 based on screeners provided to us by Disney Studios.
The acclaimed Star Wars television series Andor returns for its highly anticipated second season. Season 2 continues with Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and his rebel allies continuing in their harrowing fight against the Galactic Empire. While Season 1 acted as an origin story for Andor, along with showcasing the Empire’s widespread tyranny across the galaxy, Season 2 connects the dots of the timeline as it marches to where audiences first meet Andor and his reprogrammed KX droid ally, K-2SO (Alan Tudyk), in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. Viewers should be forewarned. This is not the fun, whimsical, and adventurous Star Wars of old. Andor is Star Wars for cynical adults, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Much like the first season, Andor showcases Emperor Palpatine’s tyrannical Empire at the height of its power. The Empire’s cruelty and callousness are boundless. Early episodes reintroduce Director Orson Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn, reprising his role from Rogue One) and select members of Imperial Security Bureau, including the first season’s Dedra Meero (Denise Gough) and Major Lio Partagaz (Anton Lesser), who casually plot a propaganda campaign involving how they will shift the blame regarding horrendous acts of genocide.
Series creator, executive producer, and lead writer Tony Gilroy excels with Andor by showcasing other sides of the Empire at its absolute worst, how widespread their cruelty has become, and the trauma imposed on the everyday civilians who are simply trying to live in peace. Gilroy builds a tone of suffocating anxiety throughout Andor, creating an empathetic feeling shared by Andor and his close friends, who must live in hiding. The slightest mistake by any anti-Empire collaborators or Rebel Alliance partisans could mean a horrendous death, or possibly something even worse, at the hands of the Empire.
Gilroy uses Andor to highlight a galaxy in strife. The Empire strips the freedom, liberty, and rights from the people of the galaxy. The only thing that remains for Andor and his allies is hope, which the Empire tramples upon constantly. The only triumphant aspect of Andor showcases some resolute individuals struggling to find a sense of meaning when all hope appears lost.
Andor Season 2 takes some time to find its groove. Much like the first season, the twelve episodes unfold in three-episode arcs. However, Season 2 contains gaps and jumps in between arcs as the series progresses closer to the events of Rogue One. The fascinating narrative progression, with the season beginning one year after the end of Season 1, provides a nice setup and countdown of sorts for the characters. Although the initial arc in Season 2 features a promising start, depicting Andor purloining an experimental Imperial TIE Fighter, the first arc constantly meanders, wasting time with Andor getting imprisoned by some dimwitted, disorganized partisan rebels.
Fortunately, the series picks up about midway through, when it focuses more on spy-craft and ISB machinations, culminating in some intense action sequences. Gilroy constructs most of the season like a World War II political thriller and imbues the series with a pervasive sense of dread. It comes off as if Emperor Palpatine’s oppressive gaze is watching the characters’ every move, not just for enemies of the Empire, but even their most loyal allies.
The series works best when revolving around Andor and the Rebel Alliance spymaster, Luthen Rael (Stellan Skarsgård). They present an interesting dichotomy. However, Luthen’s work demands sacrifice. He wants all of his partners ready to give their lives for the cause of freedom at a moment’s notice. Luthen is willing to abandon his humanity if it means a victory for the Rebel Alliance. That makes Andor’s role within the Rebel Alliance murky. The first season showed Andor as a dissenter to the Empire, but he was not ready to join the Rebel Alliance. Season 2 starts with Andor as an experienced operator, but he still struggles to follow Luthen’s orders. Luthen is willing to sacrifice a group of allies, or even an entire planet, if it means a long-term victory. Andor refuses to accept such outcomes because he often fights in the trenches with those allies, coming to know them, their dreams, hopes, and fears. Luna and Skarsgård deliver incredible layered performances in their respective roles, and Season 2 exceptionally peels back more layers of the mysterious, chameleonic Luthen.
Another aspect where Season 2 suffers is the significant time dedicated to the Imperial sycophant, Syril Karn (Kyle Soller), the most underwhelming character of the first season. Star Wars never needed an equivalent version of a Woody Allen-type character and his overbearing mother, but unfortunately, both Syril and his mother, Eedy Karn (Kathryn Hunter), return in Season 2. Season 2 nearly delivers something interesting with Syril that would have redeemed the character’s entire woeful subplot, but regrettably, Syril’s arc makes for another letdown in Season 2. That said, Dedra Meero makes for a far more interesting character in showcasing the humanity and mindset of an Imperial loyalist dedicated to crushing any Rebel opposition. Andor demonstrates how an individual such as Meero becomes indoctrinated and a true believer as a cog in a ruthless fascist machine.
One of the more regrettable aspects of Andor involves the recasting of a crucial legacy character. The recasting is somewhat strange, considering how Andor brings back many actors who previously appeared in Rogue One, including Davits Draven (Alistair Petrie) and Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker). It makes the major franchise legacy recasting that much more confusing.
Andor does not look like a cheap series, and the production values are impressive, building a fully immersive world, showing more corners of the Star Wars. An interesting thing about Andor concerns its expansion of the views of familiar and historic locations in the mythology, depicting previously unseen and unexplored areas of Coruscant, Yavin, and more. New worlds previously unseen in the galaxy also appear.
Once again, an issue prevalent in the first season rears its head. In the first season, the lack of non-human characters became very noticeable. In Imperial settings, it makes sense to have fewer or no non-human characters. However, in Andor, it seems there are very few non-human characters in areas where they should be more, even during the Empire’s reign. There are non-human extras, but they only appear sporadically in featured extra roles. Perhaps this was one of the limiting aspects of Season 2’s reported $290.9 million. In Star Wars, seeing non-human characters constantly mix and appear on various worlds represents the norm, the small amount of non-human characters, especially in prominent speaking roles, becomes very noticeable throughout Andor.
Andor Season 2 brings an emotional conclusion to the story, serving as a bridge to the events of Rogue One. The series is not without its flaws and features some bumps and turbulence along the way, but Gilroy largely succeeds in showcasing the fragility of hope and the fight for freedom in a galaxy ruled by fear and tyranny. Andor Season 2 travels an intense, powerful journey as Cassian Andor comes full circle, transforming into the legendary Rebel soldier fighting to hold onto something after the galaxy has stripped everything away from him. Andor imbues the audience with the same weight Andor fights to carry.
Andor Season 2 debuts its first three episodes on April 22 on Disney+.
