Star Wars: Andor Season 2

Star Wars: Andor

SPOILERS TOTAL. You've been warned.

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201: One Year Later 2025 April 22
(First watched 2025-04-30) Well, that definitely was Andor. Kind of what I expected--still felt like the same show as season 1, but now kind of hitting the fast forward button.

I liked the conversation at the beginning about whether betraying the Empire was worth it even if they got killed that night. The answer: you won't feel like your right self unless you are doing what you can to stop the Empire, so it's worth it just for being your true self.

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202: Sagrona Teema 2025 April 22
(First watched 2025-04-30) Rebellion-era stories have done the thing about different groups of rebels having in-fighting rather than being able to focus on the real enemy, but I don't know that they've ever done it with a group as small as 15 people getting split up. I do like that their eventual idea of a challenge to end their dispute was essentially space paper rock scissors.

If there's one thing all flavors of Star Wars have, it must be monsters. Whether it's a story about space wizards, bounty hunter dads, galactic war, or minor Rebel in-fighting, there are going to be dangerous monsters trying to eat people.

So with this season split into four parts covering four years, it kind of makes sense that each one is like its own movie... but I wasn't expecting this movie to be so many non-overlapping parts. We have the Tie Fighter story, we have the farming story, we have the wedding story, and the thing they all share is not being able to communicate with each other.

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203: Harvest 2025 April 22
(First watched 2025-04-30) I know everything's on fast forward, but I wish it wasn't so much. A lot of heavy stuff dropped in this episode, and next thing we know it's going to be another year gone by for next episode. No time for the characters and the viewers with them to process things.

Hard to imagine what a task production design had for the Chandrila stuff the last few episodes. Take a little-known culture, make up wedding rituals, make up dances that go for them, a bunch of appropriate wedding apparel. Then the rest of the stuff that goes with a wedding like some appropriate space dance music. I like the disco ball music droid.

And hey, there was Miss Belinda Chandra. I didn't remember she was in Andor, but she's now more recognizable than in 2022.

Luthen has some Garak energy. Arty friendly man, who will also have you secretly murdered. And he doesn't waste time about it, either. One day he hears one of their benefactors is having financial difficulties which could make him a liability, the next day he's arranged for him to disappear.

It is a very weird thing how in a show like this, the comic relief is... Imperial loser being annoyed by his overbearing mom.

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204: Ever Been to Ghorman? 2025 April 29
(First watched 2025-05-01) For a moment I wondered if Syril might actually be moving toward "good". We've seen stranger turns before, and with the accelerated pace of this season everybody's situation is moving fast. But no, he's faking it to try and infiltrate the opposition.

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205: I Have Friends Everywhere 2025 April 29
(First watched 2025-05-02) Starting to make the galaxy seem a bit too small with repeat connections happening. Like, Syril and Cassian both ending up on the Ghorman beat, even working with the same individuals. Wilmon getting in with Saw Gerrera, whose "daughter" Cassian will be working with in a few years.

Imperial weirdos remain weirdos.

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206: What a Festive Evening 2025 April 29
(First watched 2025-05-03) Andor is like Better Call Saul. Nominally it's a spinoff centered around one character, but there are other threads going on in parallel. You got your Mikes and your Nachos, you got your Luthens and Mon Mothmas.

So... Bail Organa sure looks different. They say it was basically a scheduling thing where they were unable to get Jimmy Smits. Too bad, I always kind of liked him in the role. Not that he was given a very big role to play. Really kind of a sidegrade, going from one 1990s New York TV cop to another.

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207: Messenger 2025 May 6
(First watched 2025-05-07) Another jump where we have to infer/headcanon what went on between. Like, sometime in the last year Cassian got a pretty bad shoulder injury that's still bothering him. But a cook at Yavin base is also a "Force healer"--clearly meant to sound similar to and in Cassian's mind as flakey as "faith healer". She actually seems to do his shoulder some good, but senses something more about him too. From the viewer's perspective we know he's going to have an important role to play; hard to say if that's what the cook is sensing.

Things are going down on Ghorman, the Empire is ready to make its move. Syril seems fed up about being kept in the dark about what's really going on. Still waiting to see if even he can be disillusioned by the Empire.

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208: Who Are You? 2025 May 6
(First watched 2025-05-08) That was Big, considering it wasn't even one of the four "season finales" of this season.

Alas, poor Syril. Forced to come to terms with how fucked up the Empire is, but before he's able to fully process it he managed to see Cassian and focus his anger on an old easy target. And doesn't last long. Even icy Dedra is shaken by what went down on the planet, and with Syril.

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209: Welcome to the Rebellion 2025 May 6
(First watched 2025-05-09) Leave it to a show like this to make giving a speech and getting out of a building tense.

Bix wasn't in Rogue One so it was only a question of how she'd disappear. I guess lucky for her she didn't get killed off, but leaving Cassian so he's kind of forced to stick with the Rebellion... ehh, that's harsh.

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210: Make It Stop 2025 May 13
(First watched 2025-05-14) It was almost a sure thing Luthen wasn't surviving the series; the question was how it would happen. Not often you see such a touching story of a daughter helping to kill her father. Though, and to be critical of the dead, Luthen could've saved her a lot of trouble by slashing his own throat rather than stabbing himself in the gut where they had an easier time trying to patch him up.

For an episode about the history of Luthen and Kleya and how much good he ended up doing, it also had the dark. His exit plan for ISB Lonni for a job well done ended up being a shot to the chest.

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211: Who Else Knows? 2025 May 13
(First watched 2025-05-14) Things are really being cut close, aren't they? This is the 1 BBY section, but really it seems like just a hair before Rogue One.

Interesting to see the Imperial version of a SWAT team, tough guys in partial stormtrooper armor. Also fun to the person investigating the communication setup Luther's shop, showing a little too much how impressed they were with how things were put together.

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212: Jedha, Kyber, Erso 2025 May 13
(First watched 2025-05-15) K-2SO made pretty short work of the SWAT team. Past that the episode was mostly sliding to conclusion. The message about the secret weapon is delivered to the Rebellion, who soon decides to act on it, and tada, Rogue One.

The very end does show that Cassian and Bix (presumably) had a child, though that doesn't really change much in the grand scheme.

Award for unintentional Rebel hero: Dedra Meero.

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