Created by Tony Gilroy
This review has spoilers
Andor is all about the rebellion of Star Wars. It is the best thing to come out of the Star Wars universe. It is Star Wars without the force. When you remove the Force, then there is no Jedi, no Vader, no Sith, it is now all about an emperor who is tyrannical and about citizens who are rebelling against the tyranny. It is now a story of every fascist regime, every dictatorial govt, a story of ordinary people rising up and asking for their rights.
Andor takes us behind the scenes. How does Tyranny work? In season 2, the whole Ghorman saga covers propaganda, manufacturing dissent, raw use of power to suppress free speech, oppression, and the greater-good. Behind the emperor, at a planet level, at a city level, there are ordinary citizens who are following orders and participating in the tyranny with their free will and believing the BS that is fed to them.
Andor takes us behind the scenes of how a rebellion works? How recruitment works, how planning is done, how they get money, who are these people and what drives them? How well known folks are taking risks to fund the rebellion. When ordinary folks rise up against the tyranny, you know it is less to do with the hatred against the evil, but more to do with the love of their closed ones.
Andor talks about sacrifice.
Calm. Kindness. Kinship. Love. I've given up all chance at inner peace. I've made my mind a sunless space. I share my dreams with ghosts. I wake up every day to an equation I wrote 15 years ago from which there's only one conclusion: I'm damned for what I do. My anger, my ego, my unwillingness to yield, my eagerness to fight, they've set me on a path from which there is no escape. I yearned to be a savior against injustice without contemplating the cost and by the time I looked down there was no longer any ground beneath my feet. What is my, what is my sacrifice? I'm condemned to use the tools of my enemy to defeat them.
I burn my decency for someone else's future. I burn my life to make a sunrise that I know I'll never see. And the ego that started this fight will never have a mirror or an audience or the light of gratitude. So what do I sacrifice? Everything!
Look at the writing above. Look at the writing of the Nemik's manifesto above. Andor is a writer's show. It is at par with Sorkin's TWW. While the acting, direction, story is great, the writing and the set-design including costumes, is at another level. The sets and costumes transport you to the galaxy, to different planets and make them believable. It is stylish.
But the writing is just another level. Let me share another example, this is the Mon's speech in the penultimate episode.
Fellow Senators, friends, colleagues, allies, adversaries. I stand before you this morning with a heavy heart. I’ve spent my life in this chamber. I came here as a child. And as I look around now, I realize I have almost no memories that pre-date my arrival and few bonds of affection that cleave so tightly. Through these many years, I believe I have served my constituents honorably and upheld our code of conduct. This chamber is a cauldron of opinions and we’ve certainly all had our patience and tempers tested in pursuit of our ideals. Disagree as we might, I am hopeful that those of you who know me will vouch for my credibility in the days to come. I stand this morning with a difficult message. I believe we are in crisis. The distance between what is said and what is known to be true has become an abyss. Of all the things at risk, the loss of an objective reality is perhaps the most dangerous. The death of truth is the ultimate victory of evil. When truth leaves us, when we let it slip away, when it is ripped from our hands, we become vulnerable to the appetite of whatever monster screams the loudest. This Chamber’s hold on the truth was finally lost on the Ghorman Plaza. What took place yesterday… what happened yesterday on Ghorman was unprovoked genocide! Yes! Genocide! And that truth has been exiled from this chamber! And the monster screaming the loudest? The monster we’ve helped create? The monster who will come for us all soon enough is Emperor Palpatine!
The other thing that is unique and great to Andor is that it is prequel to the movie Rogue One. The movie came out before the TV series. So, in a way, you know the final chapter of Andor's journey. So, when season 2 ends, its ends hit harder. Rogue one was in-turn prequel to the original Star wars trilogy. But, once I have seen Andor, all Star Wars movie feel gimmicky. The movies do not acknowledge how the rebellion started, and it gives importance to people who can leverage the Force. But, the real heroes of the rebellion are the ordinary people. Nemik's manifesto gives voice to those nameless and the faceless.
The TV series format also allows us to spend longer with these folks, that also goes to Andor's favor.
One of the reasons why Andor is also so popular is how much closely it resembles our current times. While the emperor is fascisct, the tyranny is carried out by ordinary people. In Andor, this means that a junior officer is recruited to infiltrate and spread the wrong information to rebels. But he feels that he is doing the right thing. This junior officer's realization that his service, which is his life, has been a lie is done masterfully. This junior officer's superior (Dedra) is the architect to sow dissent. She ends up in prison because of her own arrogance. To demonstrate her bravado, she tries to capture a key rebel enemy solo, this mission ends up in failure and she is put in prison with the allegation that she was colluding with the rebels. Dedra's superior is shown to kill himself because of his failure to spot/remove the rebels. Dedra's superior's superior is killed by the same weapon (Death Star) that he helped create. The people who work for the empire are not happy, living and doing under fear, and eventually, all pay the price of understanding that the regime is not on their side. The empire does not care about its citizens, and they are also eventually citizens. If you compare this to what is happening in the political ecosystem, how many of Donald's supporters are getting prosecuted, the resemblance is uncanny. Andor came before this. It still resonates because the story of dictatorial regimes are similar everywhere. The template is same. History is merely repeating itself.
I have now seen Season 1 once and Season 2 twice. But, I have appetite for rewatch, multiple re-watches. The show is cult!
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