Andor Andor Season 2 Discussion (Spoliers Allowed)

An arc about Dedra's growing obsession for finding Axis would have been a crucial addition to her character. Just because the writers didn't go that way it doesn't mean that there wasn't a good story to tell there.

 

There were a lot of good stories to tell that they weren't able to. Amongst the hard decisions to be made in putting this season together, I'm okay with the choice they made.

 

I’m not only OK with it. I think it makes for a better show. The final stretch just wasn’t the time for more detective mechanics. It was the time for falls.

 

What's really the detective story there. She got handed or found some data that wasn't supposed to go to her. She went snooping over months and months and months building up files to connect Axis to Luthan. (Which ISB already seems to know and building their own swat team) Then our Imperial guy on the inside found it too and got to Luthan first.

This isn't Batman level stuff. She was basically bored and went looking through the Imperial Google Drives at work, in hopes that she could further her career.

Like I said, it kind of makes sense that we aren't privy to ALL her investigations ALL the time. Its only when OUR spies learn things, that it gets revealed to us. We knew about her prior work because those spies did. They didn't this time, until it was too late.

 

Dedra also did some private eye back round checking on Uncle Harlow using her ISB access, which I'm sure is against the rules. That little bit of info helped foreshadow/lay groundwork for her misuse of Imperial resources for personal reasons.

 

The Gungan Skull in Luthen’s shop apparently has the emblem of Revan’s Sith Empire on it. (According to internet sleuths) Weird.

 

I really hope the Gilroys, Luna (as an EP), and their writers (Willimon, Bissell, etc), or some combination of them, do at least one more Star Wars show. The response to season 2 of Andor has transcended Star Wars fandom and is becoming almost legendary online. It would be silly for Lucasfilm to not follow up on this incredible love from critics, fans, and lay audiences.

 

Yeah I hope Bob Iger uses all his powers of persuasion to get Gilroy & Co back for more, be it another show (less likely) or a film (more likely.) And by "powers of persuasion" I mean his big fat checkbook.

 

Rewatching the final arc, I wonder what ever became of Luthen's amazing Fondor Haulcraft. Obviously impounded by ISB to begin with, but I could easily see it ending up un the hands of some self-indulgent Moff who's owed a favor, or a Davo Sculdun-type character. From there, maybe rebels or pirates "relieved" that wealthy, powerful owner of his trophy and put it to good use. Maybe Kleya re-acquired it, another "artifact," so to speak.

 

Post OT or Post ST story. The ST was bereft with any realism or sense of what’s going on in the galaxy. He could ground it all.

 

I thought Dedra's story was perfect. Her obsession with Axis only grew after losing Syril. A mirror of Syril's obsession with Andor. I think the events on Ghorman broke her in some way. As if to justify losing Syril, she broke ISB protocols and rules. She accessed classified information she didn't have access too. She went after Luthen without permission or a through plan in place. Ending up in Narkina was perfect.

 

They search it in episode 11.

 

Oh, I'm aware -- I mean after that.

 

I finally finished the season today. Ep 7-9 yesterday, and 10-12 today. My God, what a show. What an emotional and amazing ride.

After being moved to tears multiple times, I am grateful that the episodes were all non-fat. What could’ve easily taken several episodes or a season to show were summed up with exquisite character interactions and such artistry in writing and acting, that one line or two told you all you needed to know. Kudos to the artists and writers for such an exemplary show.

Easily the best Star Wars show Disney has produced, and I hope these characters have futures with just as capable artists to continue to do them justice.

 

So this is really the argument people want to go with?
"Thank god we didn't get to see Dedra solving her case because it would have been boring" ?

 

I'm good with that.

 

I don't remember saying boring. I just said this isn't Batman. Dedra isn't on the hunt, working at night like Batman on the prowl. Sneaking into Imperial Offices. She's sitting at her desk and someone brought her the info mistakenly. Do we need to see that play out across an entire episode. You seem to think so, which is fine. The show didn't.

But my larger point is still...we don't seem to know about it, until our spy on the inside does. That's how information gets passed around sometimes. The series isn't about Dedra's detective work. It's a journey showing how the Rebels go from being sloppy, unorganized and leaderless, to the opposite. So when stuff like this happens - Imperials just showing up out of the blue- they now have the organization and channels to still succeed.

 

Yeah, it's intelligence work. And ultimately, she gets the info by accident. Hegseth-style It's the kind of realism Gilroy revels in with the show.

 

Season 1 actually was, to a very large extent, about Dedra's detective work.
They showed the progress of her investigation with a rather remarkable level of detail.
Then, in season 2, the focus shifted to the Ghorman project, which I have no problem with since it was done amazingly.
However, given that they chose to go back to Dedra vs Axis in the very last arc, I need to be honest about how I feel and the way the subplot was resolved wasn't very satisfactory to me.
After a whole season in which the investigation was followed closely, it felt like they had to rush to a closure because they have too little screentime left (which very likely what actually happened), and it really comes off as if they were shrugging their shoulders.

 

They set up the character pieces ahead of the final arc. In the middle two arcs they establish that Axis is an obsession more than an assignment: Dedra doesn't want to take Ghorman, because she is obsessed with Axis; she tears into Heert for not involving her in the Axis investigation; and Heert mentions that she has been in a terrible mood since getting take off Axis. In the first season it is well established that she is open to bending the rules - the end route she does around Blevin to poach PreMor, for instance. The structure of this season is that important stuff happens over the year we miss, and we learn just enough about it to inform the episodes we do get. For the story the last episodes needed to tell, it makes sense to start with Dedra at his doorstep, and reveal through dialogue how she finally got him. I understand you were invested in the investigation itself, I think that's fair, but it wasn't the story they were looking to tell. In a five season show, it probably would have been.

 

Didn't they explain how Dedra finally found Axis? Pretty sure it was just digging through old reports of interrogations and she found one that mentioned a fondor hauler with anitques or something.

 

Yup. She dug through some old reports that had been buried. That’s the kind of mundane realism that makes this show feel so real. She’s not a super spy. She’s just a meticulous obsessive. And we really didn’t need to see all the details of that obsessiveness.

 

Yes. The interrogations were Death Star related, so the original interviewers didn't care about how it tied to anything else and certainly didn't intend to pass it on to anyone else. Once the decision was made that her finding out Luthen was Axis could/should be in the "negative space" between arcs, they were able to go for less cinematic and more realistic.

 

Some random musing on K-2SO: it's interesting that although Cassian likes K, I think, I always feel an underlying tension that stops the former fully trusting the latter. Enforcer droids are often presented as the epitome of unfeeling, cold, brutal Imperial oppression (think Ghorman) - and Cassian has experienced that first hand when they're used to arrest him on false charges on Niamos. So Cassian deciding to reprogram K is an echo of Luthen's words - "I'm condemned to use the tools of my enemy to defeat them".

 

Oooh love this take