In what has been considered one of the best "Star Wars" stories told since the original trilogy,
"Andor" is filled with the dark reality of what it takes to start a rebellion. The story's
ending is as complex as the characters it portrays. Warning: Spoilers ahead.
It seems only right that “Andor” would end on the same planet where it begins, Cassian Andor’s
homeworld of Ferrix. The people of Ferrix have been suffering under Imperial rule all season, so
it’s powerful that they would be the ones to rise up in symbolic resistance in the season finale.
After seeing all the characters spread across the galaxy for most of Season 1,
it’s fun to watch them all gather on Ferrix for the funeral of Cassian’s adoptive mother,
Maarva. Imperials and rebels alike come out in the hopes of catching Cassian, but his friends
and family on Ferrix have other plans. After playing a recording of Maarva’s final words,
a stirring speech telling her people to fight back, the assembled crowd storms the barricades,
showing that they’ll no longer sit quietly under the boot of fascism.
It’s not entirely clear how planned out this revolt was, but the implication is
that Ferrix came prepared. We see Wilmon Paak building pipe bombs the night before,
readying his retribution for the killing of his father. And when the funeral procession comes,
it comes much earlier than the Empire expected, and with more people ready for a fight.
Maarva Andor dies unceremoniously at the beginning of “Andor” Episode 11 -- off-screen
and without any meaningful final words. But if you thought that was the last you’d see
of Fiona Shaw’s impeccable performance, you were wrong. Maarva leaves behind a
lasting legacy of resistance, telling the citizens of Ferrix to rise up and fight,
and encouraging her son to become the hero she always knew he could be. When
the imperial officer tries to silence her hologram by throwing his coat over it,
the message plays on undeterred. It seems it’s not so easy to put out a fire once it’s been lit.
Her last words ring like a concise slogan over the entire show.
"Fight the empire!"
Though many are killed in the battle that breaks out, we understand that
their sacrifices are meaningful. Karis Nemik writes in his manifesto,
“Remember that the frontier of the rebellion is
everywhere and even the smallest act of insurrection pushes our lines forward.”
We’re told that the dead of Ferrix are burned, their ashes baked into bricks,
and those bricks put into the city's walls. But Maarva’s brick becomes a literal weapon,
with Brasso using it to strike the first blow in her funeral uprising. Nemik’s words,
likewise, become the fuel for Cassian to commit to the cause.
Against all odds, several of the Ferrix characters make it out at the end of
“Andor” Season 1. Shipyard hand Pegla gets a vessel ready and fueled up for Brasso, Wilmon,
B2EMO, and Jezzi -- another hint that the whole revolt was premeditated. What the crew couldn’t
have fully planned on, however, was Cassian’s return and successful rescue of Bix Caleen.
Of course, Cassian doesn’t come back to Ferrix to fight. He comes to complete bits
of unfinished business: Seeing Maarva laid to rest and rescuing Bix. he does both of those
things and helps ensure that the Ferrix gang gets away safely. Where they’ll go
and how safe they’ll be is unclear, but given the abject chaos of the revolt,
they have a decent chance at flying under the Empire’s radar. Hopefully,
with a bit of peace, Bix can recover from the deplorable torture perpetrated against her.
It’s a testament to Cassian Andor’s skill that he evades every one of the half-dozen
people who come to capture or kill him on Ferrix. He clocks Luthen in
the crowd early on and puts two and two together, realizing that the rebel leader
means to eliminate him to tie up loose ends. Cassian seeks out Luthen’s ship,
parked in the same spot they escaped from in Episode 3, and waits for him to return.
“You came here to kill me, didn't you?" "You don’t make it easy.”
Then Cassian hits him with the unexpected: “I will now.” Having
intentionally left his blaster for Luthen to take, Cassian gives him an ultimatum:
“Kill me, or take me in.”
It’s a dramatic move, and the line on which “Andor” Season 1 ends. But it’s a necessary
one to prove Cassian’s newfound dedication to the rebellion. When the two men last spoke,
he was little more than a common rogue -- a man with potential, but he vocally opposed joining any
organized resistance movement. To convince Luthen of how dedicated he’s become after his experiences
on Narkina 5, he puts his very life in Luthen’s hands. This is a huge step on Cassian’s path to
becoming the man we meet in “Rogue One,” and it sets up a ton of potential for “Andor” Season 2.
One of the most interesting relationships in “Andor” Season 1 develops between Syril
Karn and Dedra Meero. Dedra is a rising star in the Imperial Security Bureau
who is consumed with rooting out rebels, trying experimental torture techniques,
and other unsightly hobbies. Syril is a single minded bureaucrat with his own
vision of justice. Together, they’re a match made in the darkest corners of the
Empire. So it's not a surprise when Syril saves Dedra’s life in the season finale.
Before the fighting on Ferrix, Dedra makes it very clear to Syril that she
wants nothing to do with him -- understandable after he stalks her to her place of work and
declares his love for her in the middle of the street. But what do you do with
a guy like that after he pulls you out of a mob that’s about to tear you to pieces?
Where these two go next is anyone’s guess, but it should be impossible to look away
from. It’s hard to imagine Syril’s heroics have really made him any more enticing to
Dedra. Will they become an evil power couple or a human timebomb? We can’t wait to find out.
In a season filled with anxious people,
Mon Mothma may be the most anxious of all, and for good reason.
Faced with the prospect of the Empire discovering she’s secretly funding the rebellion, Mon makes
an impossible choice: She agrees to introduce her teenage daughter Leida to the son of high-profile
loanshark Davo Sculdun in a Chandrillan custom that will almost surely lead to marriage. In
exchange, Davo will make all of Mon’s accounting troubles go away, protecting her from the prying
eyes of the Empire. Even though Leida seems to love the old Chandrillan traditions,
this is a hard moment to watch. Mon effectively sells her daughter for the good of the rebellion.
We also see Mon accusing her husband Perrin of gambling,
which he denies. Their driver eavesdrops on the conversation and later reports to the
ISB. Since Mon knows her driver is a spy, and since Perrin appears to be telling the truth,
this is almost certainly part of her plan. Her goal appears to be planting a false explanation
for the inconsistencies in their family accounts that will divert attention away
from the rebellion. She’s become quite adept at covering her tracks, but at what cost?
By the end of “Andor” Season 1, Mon Mothma seems to have things pretty under control on her end.
Luthen, on the other hand, is on the brink of having his cover fully blown. After narrowly
escaping from an Imperial cruiser at the end of Episode 11, he goes straight to Ferrix.
This leaves his Coruscant [KOR-uh-sahnt] shop fully in the hands of his assistant
Kleya [KLAY-uh], who at times seems like she might be the one really running the show.
Though the Empire hasn’t seen Luthen’s face yet, they have identified his ship,
the Fondor, which is a custom job. As such, he might need to be a bit more
careful if he does return to Coruscant. There’s also the fact that his ISB mole,
Lonni, seems to be getting on Dedra Meero’s bad side. Given how good Dedra is at her job,
this could be big trouble for Luthen later on. For now, though, he’s still a free man.
Two more characters who manage to make it out of “Andor” Season 1 alive are Vel Sartha and
Cinta Kaz, who reunite on Ferrix just in time to completely miss Cassian and get out amid the
chaos. While there’s clearly real love between the two of them, it’s also apparent that they’re
in very different places. Vel is a rich girl who threw her old life away to join the rebellion.
On the other hand, Cinta is someone whose entire family was wiped out by Stormtroopers.
As a result, Cinta is a diehard radical -- someone
who never thinks twice about risking everything for the cause.
"I told you upfront. The struggle will always come first. We take what's left."
Vel has more reservations and spends a lot of time
thinking about what life could be like if they didn’t have to fight. Will the
demands of revolution tear Vel and Cinta apart? Only time will tell.
Vel and Cinta aren’t the only rebel agents who head out for parts unknown at the end of
“Andor” Season 1. Ruescott Melshi says goodbye to Cassian on Niamos at the end of Episode 11,
telling him that they need to split up to increase their chances of survival. Melshi
seems enlivened to tell the story of what happened on Narkina 5. He wants the galaxy
to know how the Empire is making up prison sentences to create an endless labor pool.
If you’ve seen “Rogue One,” you’ll know that Melshi’s passion makes him a loyal soldier
of the Rebel Alliance later on. He fights alongside Cassian on Scarif at the end of
“Rogue One,” so it’s likely that he’ll pop up again in “Andor” Season 2. The revolt on
Narkina 5 ultimately becomes a flashpoint moment for the larger show, revealing how
sacrifice and mass mobilization can carry the downtrodden to victory over their oppressors.
It’s possible that more escapees from the Narkina 5 prison break could join the rebel cause later
on as well. Though his heartbreaking declaration in Episode 10 that he can’t swim suggests a grim
fate, Kino Loy could still be alive. We never see him die, and the fates of the other escaped
prisoners are left ambiguous. One thing’s for sure, though, with the Empire becoming more
oppressive than ever, the rebellion should have an ample supply of new recruits going forward.
Series creator Tony Gilroy has said that he didn’t write “Andor” to be a political
thinkpiece. He prioritized the story and the characters, and that focus shows. However,
it’s hard to write a grounded narrative about rebels rising up against a fascist
regime and not pick up some larger philosophy along the way. By the end
of the finale, Season 1 almost reads like a guidebook on how to build a revolution,
right down to the stirring manifesto. Nemik writes in his political treatise,
"Freedom is a pure idea. It occurs spontaneously, and without instruction.
Random acts of insurrection are occurring constantly throughout the galaxy. There are
whole armies, battalions that have no idea they’ve already enlisted in the cause."
This is the idea that the season finale brings to the forefront: That no regime,
no matter how powerful, can stand up to the strength of the people if they all join forces.
Nemik insists that the rich and powerful few are no match for the impassioned many,
echoing another manifesto from our own world quite clearly. He also writes,
“Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks. It leaks. Authority is brittle.”
When the people of Ferrix stand unified against their oppressors, their enemies break indeed.
“Andor” Season 1 does a lot to make the Empire scary again. It shows the coldness of Imperial
rule, the dehumanization, and the way that local populations are scattered,
weakened, and stripped of their traditions. It demonstrates the cruelty of the Empire’s
hard-fisted military rule, and in doing so evokes the atrocities committed by
empires in real-world history. It’s no secret that George Lucas largely based Palpatine’s
fictional regime on both the British Empire and American imperialism of the 20th century.
“Andor” returns that inspiration to the forefront, and the effect is powerful.
For all its might, however, the Empire in “Andor” still makes many mistakes.
Princess Leia’s words to Grand Moff Tarkin ring like an overture over the whole show:
“The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.”
If the Empire didn’t push such extreme prison sentences, if they didn’t double
down on military occupations, if they didn’t insist on being so extreme in their dominance,
then maybe they would have lasted longer. But by increasing their tactics to such violent degrees,
they push the citizens of the galaxy to the point of desperation. What’s the only thing
left to do when a normal life becomes impossible to live? Fight. And that’s exactly what happens.
Nemik’s manifesto speaks powerful truths about the struggle against the Empire. Every act of
insurrection matters, and that freedom is always worth fighting for. However,
“Andor” also emphasizes that such a revolution requires sacrifices. Throughout Season 1,
we see nearly every character give up something in the interest of the greater good.
Cassian sees Bix tortured and Ferrix occupied as a result of his actions. Mon Mothma risks
the safety and stability of her own family. Nemik, Taramyn, Lieutenant Gorn, and countless
prisoners from Narkina 5 give their lives for the cause of freedom. But perhaps the most memorable
commentary on sacrifice comes at the end of “Andor” Episode 10 in a monologue from Luthen.
“Calm. Kindness. Kinship. Love. I burn my decency for someone
else’s future. I burn my life to make a sunrise that I know I’ll never see.”
It’s a powerful moment that resonates through the remainder of the season. In a franchise
that’s historically been about heroes doing the right thing, “Andor” is about the dark,
violent, and difficult things that are necessary to defeat an empire.
“So what do I sacrifice? Everything!”
Themes of sacrifice and questionable morality permeate “Andor.” They
underscore the dark time in which the show is set -- a time when desperation,
not ethics or altruism, is the driving force in the rebellion.
Luthen’s conversations with Saw Gerrera and Mon Mothma show just how divided the
existing rebels are, and how afraid they are to take larger steps. The
best way to sum up this era of the rebellion might be the fact that no
one ever utters the slogan of the Rebel Alliance: “May the Force be with you.”
In the original “Star Wars” trilogy, the Force is frequently invoked by rebel leaders. It’s a
rallying cry; an optimistic invocation that their cause might be a righteous
one. But during the era of “Andor,” there is no such optimism -- no such reverence.
As the story of the show continues in Season 2, we’ll likely see the rebellion transform into the
one seen in the original films. In “Rogue One,” Jyn Erso uses hope as a rallying cry for Cassian
and the other rebels, and it seems like they’ve almost forgotten the meaning of the word. Now,
we see the reasons why. Hard, dirty work is necessary to get to a place where hope can thrive,
“Andor” seems to say. And that work is far from done at the end of Season 1.
In a “Star Wars” show that eschews Easter eggs and cameos, it might be surprising to learn that
“Andor” actually has a post-credits scene. If you watch through to the end of the season finale,
you’ll be treated to a grim glimpse of what lies in store for Cassian and the rebellion.
A close-up shot shows droids of some sort assembling what appears to be a massive
plate or dish of some kind. Look closely, and you’ll recognize the connector pieces
they’re installing as the same devices the prisoners of Narkina 5 were forced to build
day after day. The camera then zooms out to reveal that the thing being constructed
is a part of the in-progress Death Star -- specifically, the superlaser itself.
The fact that Cassian was forced to help build the very thing that would
ultimately kill him is dark, but there’s also a triumph in remembering that he
gets the last laugh. By successfully stealing the Death Star plans with Jyn,
he ensures the station’s destruction. There’s a nice symmetry in tying these disparate
plotlines together, and that intentionality will surely remain in “Andor” Season 2.
“Andor” Season 2 is already on the way, with Tony Gilroy telling Collider in early
November 2022 that production would begin on November 21 -- two days before the Season 1
finale dropped on Disney+. That means things are already in motion, which is great news
for fans. Unfortunately, we may be waiting a while before “Andor” Season 2 premieres.
Speaking with TheWrap in September 2022, Gilroy said that production for Season 2 won’t end until
August 2023, and that post-production could take as long as another whole year afterward. That
would mean a premiere date sometime in the late summer or early fall of 2024, at the earliest.
As for what “Andor” Season 2 might look like, we already have a lot of clues. In
an interview with Rolling Stone, Gilroy discussed how Season 2 will cover the remaining four years
leading up to “Rogue One,” saying that the season will start with a one-year time jump.
“The next four years are not about becoming a revolutionary. They’re about learning to be a
leader and how difficult it is to put the alliance together and what happens to people who are the
original gangsters versus the establishment and a lot of different other issues.”
Given the way Season 1 ends, that makes a lot of sense. The showrunner added,
"Really, the second half is about, what does time do to these people?
People grow up and people get tired and people betray each
other and people change their minds and people get weak and people get crazy."