Disney+ refines series premiere strategy with Andor.
Dropping three episodes after other prequel series were well underway was the right call.
The Short Take:
A methodically planned and paced three-episode premiere completely reeled me into Andor.
Image Credit: LA Times
[As is often the case with a series premiere, I will have a SPOILER-FREE SECTION first, and will make it very obvious when I shift to spoiler mode.]
The Long Take:
Andor is kinetic art.
A shifty patron asks for information in a dark, seedy club. A builder hangs up his gloves on a wall lined with dozens of other gloves. A bell ringer hurls a hammer down and a booming knell reverberates throughout town. A small business owner hustles to make a black market deal. A traveler in a jaunty hat alights a transporter. A retired explorer rocks in her chair as she looks out the window. They all move through two planets: Ferrix and Morlana One, their actions affecting one another in a living ecosystem created by Tony Gilroy.
On the day I watched the first three episodes of the newest Star Wars series on Disney+, I happened to visit the Museum of Science in Boston. This was mostly so my kids could see dinosaurs, but also because I have such fond childhood memories of it. One of the nostalgic landmarks there is a moving metal sculpture by George Rhoads called Archimedean Excogitation. It’s a towering structure made up of intricate mechanisms. A ball, for example, might roll down a ramp and knock into a ledge with another ball that might roll down and then catch on a conveyer belt to go back up again. Immediately after watching the Andor premiere, I racked my brain for a metaphor to describe what made Andor stand out for me. A beehive or anthill? Too unified and homogeneous. An antique clock? Too measured. Then it dawned on me: I’d seen the perfect metaphor earlier that day.
In Archimedean Excogitation, the whole sculpture looks like total chaos, and all the pieces are different shapes, textures, and colors. But once you force your brain to zoom in on one individual interaction between two moving parts, it’s easier to understand. Moment to moment in Andor, I felt compelled by each individual conversation, and yet I didn’t quite know what they were doing collectively, what they were all building towards. By Episode 3, all the individual mechanisms begin to sync up, and the way in which they all move individually and yet form a whole, miraculous, and intricate piece of art becomes more visible and easier to conceive. There’s a simultaneity, and there’s an energy to it all that’s mesmerizing.
I’ll admit, excogitation is a word I had to look up. (Even writing professors still use the dictionary.) It means thinking out something thoroughly, and the corner of the Star Wars Galaxy that Andor occupies certainly feels well-thought out. I frequently comment on world building in my reviews due to the types of stories I cover, but the world building in Andor stands apart from other sci fi or fantasy series or films of late because the world building manifests not through aliens or folklore but through social relationships, hierarchies, and systems. Cassian Andor, in trying to find information about his long lost sister, has a run-in with local law enforcement (who are essentially mall cops affiliated with the Empire). In an attempt to cover his tracks, he seeks out a variety of friends and associates, each with their own livelihood, their own secrets, and their own rapport with Cassian. I got Bladerunner vibes, especially from the first episode, in the best way. And not in the same way Obi-Wan Kenobi channeled vibes for one underworld planet, Daiyu. The entire series, regardless of location, feels like it’s channeling that sci fi noir feel. It’s a mood. It’s moody.
Image Credit: Vanity Fair
In order to show this world through a series of relationships, there’s a lot of Diego Luna walking quickly and with purpose. But I felt like I could watch him do that all day. I’m likely not going to get to spend much time talking about his performance elsewhere, so I’ll declare it here: he’s a dynamo. Silent and brooding one minute and charming the pants off people the next. And he makes both those qualities feel consistent within one character.
Diego Luna, of course, reprises his role as Cassian Andor, a character he originally played in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016). That makes Andor a prequel. Or a prequel to a prequel, since Rogue One itself is a prequel to A New Hope (1977).
Andor doesn’t actually feel like a prequel, though — at least so far. It feels like its own new story. The first three episodes seem completely unburdened by connecting the dots to Rogue One. Anyone who has read my reviews of Obi-Wan Kenobi knows I loved that show, but a huge — perhaps impossible — challenge of telling that story was constantly worrying about how it could fit in between the PT that came before and the OT that takes place after. Even Rogue One itself feels the need to lead us right up to the moments before A New Hope begins, bringing in iconic original trilogy characters at the 11th hour. During Andor, on the other hand, I never thought once about the plot of Rogue One or A New Hope. That was refreshing and exciting. Even liberating. It allowed me to get drawn in very quickly.
’Tis the season of prequels. With HBO’s House of the Dragon on a winning streak dramatically, and Rings of Power wowing Amazon Prime subscribers with its high gloss visual effects, it was going to be tough going head-to-head, even for Star Wars. While Disney has not officially explained their delay of the premiere, it stands to reason that the flooded nerd content marketplace might have been a factor. So the delay seemed reasonable to me. I was more curious, however, about why they felt the need to drop three episodes instead of the originally promised two. Was this simply to placate those who were upset they had to wait longer?
I now see that Disney/Lucasfilm decided to drop three episodes instead of one because the arc of this thread of episodes works so well. And after constantly shifting the weekly release day and/or the number of episodes in a premiere so many times, with both Star Wars and Marvel shows, it’s nice to finally see them get it right. The crescendo that slowly builds across the three episodes makes for a sensational finish. I would definitely recommend watching them all back to back if you have the time. For some, the pacing may seem slower in the first two episodes, especially if they’ve become accustomed to the six-episode formula Disney+ series have established, more or less. I say slower because the show gets more granular and goes so in-depth with Andor’s relationships with multiple characters. I don’t say slower to imply that nothing happens. So, perhaps, incremental is more the word I’m looking for. Incremental yet kinetic, as the story always keeps moving (just like its titular character).
[SPOILERS INCOMING! The rest of my breakdown gets specific about what happens in the episode.]
The interconnected, ecological structure of the series, ultimately, pays large dividends because it leads to the most compelling, organic proto-rebellion I’ve ever seen in Star Wars (and that’s saying something, considering how big a fan of Rebels I am). I got chills when I began to hear the tinny, rhythmic drumming by so many echoing all over Ferrix. My friend Director Bennic (@zenkenobi) passed along the idea that the clanging may be a reference to “el cacerolazo,” a form of protesting with pots and pans used in Puerto Rico and other Latin American countries. A behind the scenes detail like this is a testament to the series’ ability to cultivate authenticity and depth in its world building.
Seeing all these minor characters who then band together when one of their own is under threat was as inspiring as it was thrilling. Plus, all the characters being different people doing different things makes their act of rebellion all the more powerful. Brasso is just a regular Joe doing a job and seems to be friends with Cassian; yet he becomes so pivotal in foiling the security conglomerate, Preox-Morlana.
Caked within this story of planet-wide rebellion, however, is a spy recruitment story, and I have to say that personally this was the most indulgent aspect of the series for me. Stellan Skarsgard is the best spymaster. When he starts saying, “Rule number one” to Cassian, I wanted to say, “Yes! Tell us all the rules, please!” I want to see him teach Diego Luna how to be a better spy, and I hope that we get a healthy serving of that in future episodes. As a character, Luthen has the right amount of mystique at this point. I blindly trust him and accept him as an authority figure, and yet I wonder where he comes from and what his actual role is in the broader Galactic goings-on. He obviously wants to keep a low profile because he parks his ship in a remote location, and yet when he’s with Andor he doesn’t seem particularly concerned about concealing his face from anyone. The show is very careful to not place him too close to any of the Preox-Morlana officers, but he also doesn’t stress about their arrival. Does this mean he’s not a public figure, and yet still might be a powerful one? Consider me intrigued.
Image Credit: TV Line
In retrospect, the writing for Cassian up until he gets his offer from Luthen was so meticulous because when Luthen calls him a great talent he doesn’t want to waste, I can look back at Cassian’s squirreliness throughout the previous episodes and 100% believe why Luthen would think that. Andor has shown he can charm and manage assets, make deals, rebuff threats (the scene where that one guy enlists a burly alien to shake Cassian down made me laugh a lot), obtain information, stay under the radar, fight his way out of jam, and make a quick escape. And yet, Luthen does a great job of pointing out how Andor is still rough around the edges and has a lot to learn. I repeat, I want all the espionage training they can give me. Give me Spy Game but make it Star Wars.
Image Credit: TV Line
While on the subject of telling Cassian Andor’s story, I should mention that these episodes also elegantly weave flashbacks of Andor’s childhood on Kenari with his present timeline on Morlana One and Ferrix. Those parallel shots of the two ships taking off — Maarva’s ship with a young Kassa (who has basically been kidnapped from his family/tribe, but I don’t have enough space to critique the optics of that here) and an older, more seasoned Cassian Andor voluntarily leaving with Luthen to begin his life as a Rebel spy — were chef’s kiss in their editing. Overt but not heavy-handed. That’s how it’s done.
Image Credit: LA Times
In terms of what lies ahead, I do think that we will get some kind of resolution of the Kenari storyline this season. Whether or not we have to wait until the end of the season to find Cassian’s sister is up for debate. And I think we should brace ourselves. I don’t think we’re going to find Cassian’s sister alive; I think we’re going to find out what happened to her and it’s not going to be a happy tale. We also need to find out what happened to Kenari before the flashbacks, and that may be equally tragic. What was the mining disaster that some of the mall cops refer to? Why was Cassian’s tribe basically Peanuts meets a more harmonious version of Lord of the Flies, with no adults in sight? And was the jaundice-like disease that took down the shuttle that Cassian investigates related to any of it or just a coincidence? I suspect we should also brace for impact in the weeks ahead.