Star Wars: Andor

[Benny]

Four Wookies and Your Funeral.

[Grobbelboy]

It has been mentioned already but the small part of the doctor Gorst character is so brilliantly realized. He is fully aware of the practices of the empire and condones them fully, but his politeness isn’t a mere facade for his true personality or something, like how this sort of character would be portrayed conventionally. He is being 100% sincere. The explanation of the origins of the torture recording isn’t him trying to instill fear or be purposefully evil, he‘s just carrying out the job that needs to be done and meanwhile tells it as a fascinating tidbit.
 

A lesser writer would have him being naive of what he’s doing or involuntarily pressured into the job or something else cliched, but as written now this is such a beautifully disturbing, sinister role. 

[Harsin]

Imagine if you went back in time and, in between placing bets and buying Apple stock, told your younger self that Mon Mothma trying to keep her finances on the down low from her husband Space Hierophant was more gripping than anything in the two trilogies they made since.

[JohnC]

You only need to go back months to see it being completely written off because how could a show about this guy possibly be any good.

[yakumo]

2 hours ago, JohnC said:

You only need to go back months to see it being completely written off because how could a show about this guy possibly be any good.

Guilty as charged, did not care for Andor at all and now its one of the first things I look forward to each week.

[JoeK]

2 hours ago, Harsin said:

Imagine if you went back in time and, in between placing bets and buying Apple stock, told your younger self that Mon Mothma trying to keep her finances on the down low from her husband Space Hierophant was more gripping than anything in the two trilogies they made since.

 

I know! It's bonkers!

 

George Lucas actually might have had something with all that stuff about taxation and trade routes. If only he hadn't been let loose on actually making those god-awful movies we might have got something considerably more interesting!

[Captain Novaforce]

Watching this, was thinking "That looks like Scotland" in episode 4 and sure enough, that's Perthshire 

[NecroMorrius]

6 minutes ago, Captain Novaforce said:

Watching this, was thinking "That looks like Scotland" in episode 4 and sure enough, that's Perthshire 

 

My mate stumbled across the set in mid 2021 while on a walking holiday.

 

 

[Captain Novaforce]

2 minutes ago, Moz said:

 

My mate stumbled across the set in mid 2021 while on a walking holiday.

 

 

 

Awesome!!

[NecroMorrius]

We guessed it was Star Wars but we didn't know which one, glad it's Andor because it's 9 jabrillion times better than Obi Wan.

[pastry]

Society & schools push kids to traditional careers and away from art.. but how much more satisfying and fun would it be tasked with building that giant turret prop, or any of the other incredible stuff in this? Wish I'd known to even consider this kind of option... where were you on that, Kudos? 

[scottcr]

15 hours ago, Captain Novaforce said:

 

Awesome!!

 

My mate and his brother stumbled upon Space Cruachan as well during a hike - we didn't know much about Andor at the time, so it was cool to know mysterious Star Wars was being filmed in Scotland.

[Stoppy2000]

Quick question about episode 9 (I'll spoiler just in case)

 

Spoiler

What actually happened on level 2? Was someone released and then accidentally sent back to the same level? Or is nobody ever released? Is this just related to a new policy change or has it always been this way? I might well have just missed something really obvious...

 

[Harsin]

Spoiler

The inference is nobody is ever actually released they just get recycled to a new location. Although how that works in practice and remains a secret is beyond me as surely the risk thing they'd do is tell other prisoners.

 

[Alan Stock]

I haven't really much to add that hasn't already been said, but I'm really enjoying this now. To begin with it was slow, and as suggested I watched the first 3 episodes in a row, which helped. End of episode 3 onwards have been great though, with the highlight being episode 6 which really paid off the slow buildup. To begin with, it bothered me that Andor himself wasn't very interesting as a protagonist and just moodily sat around, but it turns out that doesn't really matter with the great supporting cast as it goes on. The effects are awesome in this and the environments all have this gritty reality feel to it, like The Mandalorian nailed. Although the multiple episode arcs make the show feel somewhat disjointed, I've found it really spices things up and keeps things fresh. You never really know what's coming next, and there's just enough of a through-line with the ongoing side plots to gel it together. And on the other hand with less interesting subplots like the one at the start of the show, you only have to wait a few episodes for it to change gear again.

 

Spoiler

Really hoping that we'll get to see Andor team up with the droid from Rogue One, when he got arrested I thought they were going to start that thread, but sadly not! 

 

I know this will never be as popular as mainline Star Wars fare but I'm glad it exists. Its a great example of how you can create different types of stories and tone if you have a rich universe to work in.

[Stoppy2000]

Wikipedia says this....

 

Spoiler

 Dr. Rhasiv confirms to Cassian and floor manager Kino a disturbing rumor: a prisoner supposed to be released was instead sent to a work crew on a different floor, forcing the prison to kill many work crews to cover up the mistake. 

 

[Pob]

re. Prison floor 2:

Spoiler

I don't think it's clear whether putting a man back in who was supposed to be released was 'the mistake' the doc refers to. I guess it makes sense because as @Harsinsays it wouldn't work long as a deliberate policy. When Andor says "nobody's getting out" the doc says "not now, not after this" so I think the implication is that, now the wardens have fried an entire floor to cover up an error, they won't be beyond killing everyone else to maintain the cover up or deal with the inevitable riots. It's not the case that nobody every gets released, more that there's been a recent fuck up that puts everyone in jeopardy.

 

[Vulgar Monkey]

Spoiler

Yeah, my understanding was that it was a genuine fuckup, but by the nature of things the prisoners would probably interpret it as a deliberate change to policy, at which point order breaks down and everyone kicks off, so the guards just hushed it up and hopes no-one will notice.

 

14 hours ago, pastry said:

Society & schools push kids to traditional careers and away from art.. but how much more satisfying and fun would it be tasked with building that giant turret prop, or any of the other incredible stuff in this? Wish I'd known to even consider this kind of option... where were you on that, Kudos? 

 

Admittedly it's a 'new'ish industry at the scale it now operates on. These studios will often have huge teams, and most big media projects in film or games will typically contract out a number of independent design studios to supplement their own huge design teams employed by the film-maker/game dev directly. Back in the day of the original SW movies though, most of the design work would be done by a couple of people. For most of the big iconic sci-fi designs we'd think of today, most of them wouldve been done by the same couple of big names working on various projects. Sid Mead, Ron Cobb etc. Of course then someone has to build them, a whole other thing in itself...

 

2 hours ago, Alan Stock said:

 

 

  Hide contents

Really hoping that we'll get to see Andor team up with the droid from Rogue One, when he got arrested I thought they were going to start that thread, but sadly not! 

 

I know this will never be as popular as mainline Star Wars fare but I'm glad it exists. Its a great example of how you can create different types of stories and tone if you have a rich universe to work in.

 

Spoiler

I know I posted before to the effect of 'I hope mrs andors droid doesnt meet a cruel fate, he's basically a sad old family dog bot'. BUT....thinking about it more, I do now wonder if he might play a part in K2SO being reprogrammed, I could sort of see him being some sort of gestalt personality based in part on dogbot, they sound a little similar on occasion. Which makes his ultimate fate in R1 even sadder, but still...

 

 

edit:

Just realised that the droid I have been referring to as sadbot is in fact named B2-EMO, because of course he is....

 

 

[Alan Stock]

On that subject, I know its supposed to be a serious matter, but like the Rings of Power - where's the funnies? Rogue One had some great bits of humour (mainly from aforementioned droid) but it didn't hurt the tone of the show, which maybe they are afraid of in this. I know there's stuff like cereal mum but its not quite the same as that dry sarcastic humour that can work so well. I'm not saying I need it, it works fine without, but maybe a little would help and make Andor himself seem a bit less of a sourpuss

[Vulgar Monkey]

Probably about the closest for me so far was when he was at space skegness - not even for any overt reason, just that even 'at rest' he always looks a bit sketchy and out of place, bimbling around aloof of everything not entirely unlike Captain Jack Sparrow, but less pissed. Agreed though, not so much laugh-out-loud as irreverent.

[Eighthours]

2 hours ago, Pob said:

re. Prison floor 2:

  Hide contents

I don't think it's clear whether putting a man back in who was supposed to be released was 'the mistake' the doc refers to. I guess it makes sense because as @Harsinsays it wouldn't work long as a deliberate policy. When Andor says "nobody's getting out" the doc says "not now, not after this" so I think the implication is that, now the wardens have fried an entire floor to cover up an error, they won't be beyond killing everyone else to maintain the cover up or deal with the inevitable riots. It's not the case that nobody every gets released, more that there's been a recent fuck up that puts everyone in jeopardy.

 

 

I took it that following the raid on the Imperial payroll and the Empire's subsequent crackdown, they had stopped releasing prisoners (presumably because some of them would be inclined to join the new rebellion). They sought to hide this policy for now by recycling 'released' prisoners into different prisons or areas of the same prison where they had never been before. I think where the logic falls down a bit is that this would rely on these prisoners not talking. Maybe they're promised release at some point in the future as long as they stay schtum? But anyway, a mistake was made - I think that the Level 4 prisoner was known on Level 2, and therefore in a panic they were all zapped. And now, because the rumour has spread, it's definite that no one's ever getting out.  

 

Absolutely fucking great episode, by the way. I've just caught up, and for me this is the best that Star Wars has ever been. I hope more people find the show as word of mouth grows about how awesome it is. It's just so grown up and sophisticated compared to the other recent shows (which I have also enjoyed, although not like this) - it's the evolution of Star Wars that I wanted. This is as imaginative and exciting as the original trilogy was to me when I was young, but it's evolved to appeal to an adult who has watched a lot of prestige TV! It still trades in nostalgia but not the fan service kind. It takes very interesting designs and concepts that were buried in the OT - particularly from that scene with Tarkin in A New Hope and some of the tone of Empire Strikes Back - and makes them front and centre. Such a great show. I massively hope it ends up succeeding so that we get more stuff with this level of ambition in the future.

[ZOK]

2 hours ago, Alan Stock said:

On that subject, I know its supposed to be a serious matter, but like the Rings of Power - where's the funnies? Rogue One had some great bits of humour (mainly from aforementioned droid) but it didn't hurt the tone of the show, which maybe they are afraid of in this. I know there's stuff like cereal mum but its not quite the same as that dry sarcastic humour that can work so well. I'm not saying I need it, it works fine without, but maybe a little would help and make Andor himself seem a bit less of a sourpuss

The last thing this needs is self-aware snaps all over the shop. The humour is at homeopathic levels, and that’s just fine.

 

What days do new eps come out?

[JohnC]

11 minutes ago, ZOK said:

The last thing this needs is self-aware snaps all over the shop. The humour is at homeopathic levels, and that’s just fine.

 

What days do new eps come out?

Wednesday, 8am.

[ZOK]

Danke!

[Popo]

7 hours ago, Stoppy2000 said:

Quick question about episode 9 (I'll spoiler just in case)

 

  Hide contents

What actually happened on level 2? Was someone released and then accidentally sent back to the same level? Or is nobody ever released? Is this just related to a new policy change or has it always been this way? I might well have just missed something really obvious...

 

 

7 hours ago, Harsin said:

  Hide contents

The inference is nobody is ever actually released they just get recycled to a new location. Although how that works in practice and remains a secret is beyond me as surely the risk thing they'd do is tell other prisoners.

 

Isn’t the implication that

 

Spoiler

You daren’t tell anyone in your new room, because if you do everyone is killed, including you. 
 

It’s possible that few make it to another round, because the mortality rate is so high. 

 

[Popo]

4 hours ago, Eighthours said:

I think that the Level 4 prisoner was known on Level 2, and therefore in a panic they were all zapped.

I think you’re right. 

[Argh]

1 hour ago, JohnC said:

Wednesday, 8am.

 

Yes, but why isn't it on now, at now o'clock? FFS.

[NecroMorrius]

On 07/11/2022 at 13:23, Harsin said:

  Hide contents

The inference is nobody is ever actually released they just get recycled to a new location. Although how that works in practice and remains a secret is beyond me as surely the risk thing they'd do is tell other prisoners.

 

 

For anyone still confused at all,

Spoiler

the slightly bigger picture is that the prisoners on level 2 found out someone had been recycled, started to riot and they fried the lot of them, which is why the power dipped. The empire now needs those prisoners to build parts for the upcoming war effort, implying they are not just overreacting in cruelty with extended sentences but worried about an uprising and working at speed to quell it by ramping up the production of parts unexpectedly. 

I took it that they haven't been recycling people into new levels (edit: prisons) for long, and it's probably a relatively new change due to the increase in production efforts.  Relying on people to keep quiet out of fear of repercussions was never going to work indefinitely and the massacre of an entire level to keep it secret seems like an overreaction, because they didn't have a well thought out contingency plan for this new development in an understaffed prison. But it also shows the Empire's blindspot where they are overconfident in their ability to intimidate, predict and control people and so they don't anticipate all angles of dissent. It's another careful observation of how fascist systems operate and try to correct for their own limitations in the worst way possible, only creating more chaos and dissenters.

 

That scene is absolutely masterful, the confusion, shock, fear spreading, the sense of chaos and wrongness growing among the men.

Spoiler

Andy Serkis

goes through more character development in 60 seconds than Rey goes through in 3 films, and really sells it.

  

On 07/11/2022 at 18:51, ZOK said:

The last thing this needs is self-aware snaps all over the shop. The humour is at homeopathic levels, and that’s just fine.

 

Yeah, this is absolutely a show about fascism. It's a world away from the lovable Mr Bean fascists of the new trilogy, in which whole planets are exploded for fun but the experience of living under fascism is never examined. I don't think I'd change a thing about Andor, it's fantastic.

[Pistol]

9 minutes ago, Moz said:

 

For anyone still confused at all,

  Hide contents

the slightly bigger picture is that the prisoners on level 2 found out someone had been recycled, started to riot and they fried the lot of them, which is why the power dipped. The empire now needs those prisoners to build parts for the upcoming war effort, implying they are not just overreacting in cruelty with extended sentences but worried about an uprising and working at speed to quell it by ramping up the production of parts unexpectedly. 

I took it that they haven't been recycling people into new levels for long, and it's probably a relatively new change due to the increase in production efforts.  Relying on people to keep quiet out of fear of repercussions was never going to work indefinitely and the massacre of an entire level to keep it secret seems like an overreaction, because they didn't have a well thought out contingency plan for this new development in an understaffed prison. But it also shows the Empire's blindspot where they are overconfident in their ability to intimidate, predict and control people and so they don't anticipate all angles of dissent. It's another careful observation of how fascist systems operate and try to correct for their own limitations in the worst way possible, only creating more confusion and dissent.

 

That scene is absolutely masterful, the confusion, shock, fear spreading, the sense of chaos and wrongness growing among the men.

  Reveal hidden contents

Andy Serkis

goes through more character development in 60 seconds than Rey goes through in 3 films, and really sells it.

My take on it was:

 

Spoiler

Since the introduction of the new POB(?) rules that several characters have mentioned, the empire haven’t been releasing prisoners; once they’ve “completed” their sentence, they are relocated to another facility. Presumably, a far worse one, because by that point they would know they’re never getting out - as would the other prisoners. So from that point forward they are slaves.

 

It would make sense that you wouldn’t relocate within the same facility. I’d say that the facility Andor’s in is a (comparatively) low security facility for making parts; the empire can get useful work out of the prisoners here, because they still have a bit of hope that they’ll get out eventually if they keep working.

 

Once their sentence is up you’d have to move them to somewhere far more secure, and they’d likely just work them to death in mines or something. Hence, accidentally relocating a prisoner from one floor to another instead of to somewhere else entirely was a big mistake, as it blows the lid on the policy. Hence killing an entire floor to try and cover it up.

 

[NecroMorrius]

Spoiler

Good thinking, it could definitely be that all previous recycled prisoners were moved to new facilities since POB, but they messed up on this one and put him back in the same facility on a different level. Perhaps again because the prisons are understaffed and somewhat forgotten about, with underqualified men running them and relying on the reputation of Empire (and the electric floors, of course) to keep the peace. Hadn't thought about that. There's definitely some merit in the idea that the Empire is on the back foot producing materials for a war effort I think, having been so surprised by the attack on Aldhani and how it might convert dissenters into rebels. The show is all about the effects and limits of fascist systems, not to mention the difficulty groups have in agreeing on strategies to counter them. We all know where Mon Mothma ends up and how fruitless her above-board attempts to slow the rise of fascism end up to be. It's interesting to remember that Mon, Luthen and Saw are technically all on the same side of this brewing war, but vastly different in approach compared to the militaristic and ordered Empire.

 

The other thing is that now they've committed the heinous act of killing a bunch of prisoners to hide their mistake, they know the rest of the prisoners will find out eventually. It means that there's zero chance of anyone in that prison making it out alive, even if POB is relaxed or they're all given pardons, because they can announce the mistreatment of prisoners to the outside world. Hence the change in Kino, who understands this. The Empire is still operating under the guise of order and diplomacy, their darker moves are shrouded in secrecy (like carefully plotting to oust the indigenous farmers of Aldhani, or scuttling the ship they found and staging a dead pilot rather than simply blowing him out of the sky). They haven't embraced presenting as overtly fascist yet as it doesn't suit their needs. Which poses an interesting question - does the rebellion accelerate the adoption of outward/overt fascism from the Empire? Given their overreaction to Aldhani, that seems very likely, and some of the rebels are counting on it. Extremism breeding extremism on both sides, or at least normalising it in a never-ending cycle.

 

It's likely I'm reading and extrapolating too much from it, but it's great that I can do this with a Star Wars show. Obi Wan held about as much interest as an empty crisp packet.