Andor Dedra Meero

ok but if Dedra is in her mid-30's then how could she have been raised in an Imperial Kinder-block?

 

And would be totally inconsistent with the brevity the character constantly exhibits. She isn't into oversharing, there is no issue with the dialogue whatsoever.

 

Why do so many people call Dedra "DEEDdra"?

 

This is such a minor detail so the stakes are pretty low, though, to be fair, for the sake of nitpicking....
Gez kind of has a point.
Besides the technical aspects of it, they seem to suggest that Dedra essentially grew up under the Empire since a relatively early age. Maybe not since she was three, but still young enough to make the case that she grew up in such an environment.
And I love this idea from a dramatic point of view. Though, the numbers don't seem to add up.

Even if we make the generous assumption that she's in her mid 30s, let's say she's 35, that would mean that she was already in her 20s when the Empire was established (the story is now set some time around the year 14 of the Empire, to my understanding).

 

We shouldn't assume that Dedra is accurate in her facts. She may be lying, she may be wrong, who knows.

I think the general point is true -- raised by the Empire/government.

However, if her facts are wrong, there may be an interesting reason for it. I know people like to assume they are smarter than the writers, and too often with the bad writing these days that's true, but in this case, we should wait and see if there's more to her story.

 

I've never understood why people waste time arguing about such details.

When was a fictional character born?

Never.

 

I believe that the idea that her education was heavy in Empire propaganda is a rather cool idea, though unfortunately it does not match the lore, and joining the Empire is a choice she made in a relatively mature age.

 

What lore doesn't it match? How do we know what Imperials were teaching kids in kinder blocks?

 

When the Empire was established she was already in her 20s, unless we determine that in the time of Andor she was even younger than 35.
Whereas, if I could just write the character the way I like, I'd write her as someone who grew up under the Empire since early age, but that choice, dictated by my personal taste of how I see the character, would not match the actual timeline.

 

How do we know how old she was when the Empire was established?

 

The Actress is 45 so her character should be 30 at least so she woundt grow up in Imperial kinderblock

 

Presumably by analogy with the real-world name Deirdre (particularly how it's said in a British/RP accent).

 

that's what I'm thinking. Also - she told this to Syril's mom, if she is bending the truth and mom looks into it...

 

She might REMEMBER she grew up in an Imperial Kinderblock
I might also NOT BE TRUE
It is not impossible that she has been taken away from her family at an older age (16-18?) and "reconditioned"?
Or yes she is just using the actual name for it under imperial rule because you know dictatorships like to change names of all things and also erase history and previous denominations like if they never existed and persecute people who try to keep history alive by using the correct terms?
[bells ringing]
...so what was I saying?
But if she was taken in at 3 under the Republic... the questions arises: what kind of "criminals" where her parents? This is interesting, I think there is more to it if it was mentioned... were they really criminal? Were they not and it is what the empire thinks?
Where her parents jedis or early rebels and this is Dedra's cover story to expleain her lack of family because from her indoctrinated point of view they WERE criminals even if they were not?

 

It's 16 years since the Empire was established, who knows what age they stay in Imperial Kinder Block?

 

So the Empire rose about 15 years prior to Andor. However, keep in mind that The Clone Wars took place for three years, and since this was basically the rise of the Empire, many citizens and especially Imperials might see it as the beginning of the Empire.

So we have almost two decades of Empire, which could make her 10 or 15 (guessing) when the Empire is rising.

Rather than jumping to the conclusion that the writers are wrong, although that's possible, there are a number of other possibilities:

1. Dedra is lying. She just wants to persuade the mom. Do Imperials lie? Yes, regularly.
2. Dedra is confused/programmed. She may have forgotten her past -- not many remember when they are three -- made up her own false history on accident or been fed or programmed with false facts.
3. What is a kinderbloc? We have no idea. As others have pointed out, maybe she was originally in a Republic kinderbloc and it eventually became an Imperial kinderbloc. We should be careful to assume too much about this right now.
4. Dedra is older than she looks. Maybe her life has been so hard she looks ten years older than she actually is. This is common with children in a system or war torn country. Look at pictures of teenagers from previous generations; they look much older than they do now because of poor health and stress.

So no reason to jump to conclusions. We have viable narrative options to eliminate first.

 

Same for the most recent season of Stranger Things. Everyone looks 30 now.

 

I heard that season 5 of ST will have them picking up their social security checks.

 

You need to consider the context of the scene. What message is the scene trying to convey?
That Dedra had a rough childhood, and that Syril's mother is being a jerk about it.

So, of course they could have used whatever alternative word to indicate a facility that could be used in the Republic era. But it would have made the dialogue worse, because it would sound less unpleasant.

Imperial kinderblock perfectly conveys the idea that it's far from being a happy memory, so that there is no doubt in the viewers' mind about what Syril's mother means when she says "there's nothing delicate about that".

So, it's a minor inconsistency that made the dialogue better, and thus it's easy to forgive. I don't think that grasping to find an in-universe explanation for why it actually all makes sense is the right way to go here.

 

It isn’t an inconsistency, there are several obvious and plausible explanations in universe and so therefore it doesn’t need forgiving. Pretty simple.