Andor - Season 2 Part 4 - Review

Here we are, the final chapter of Cassian Andor’s story and the final moments that lead into Rogue One. The previous chapter saw Cassian extract Mon Mothma from Coruscant and the Ghorman operation kick off in a big way. So, another year has passed, what chaos is going to unfold this time, turns out a lot.

Some spoilers ahead

Coming into the final episodes I knew two things, one that it would connect in some way to Rogue One and two, somebody had to die. It is not a stretch to say that if a character was not in Rogue One, then their odds of survival dwindled down to single digits. So, when a character did die here, it felt inevitable, but also tragic because of who they were, but I am getting ahead of myself. The episode starting out with another meeting between Luthen and his Imperial ISB office mole was not expected, but when the mole - Lonni Jung, admitted that this meeting was so urgent that it required a face-to-face meeting in the middle of a crowded space, you knew it was big. We knew that the ISB were hunting Luthen and this could have been about that, but it was not, it was about the Death Star.

It was at this point I expected everything to go off the rails, people coming in screaming, blasters… blasting and general mayhem, but nope. The show pivoted to a flashback about how Luthen met Kleya Marki, the girl who assists him in the gallery. I won’t say anything on that storyline, but it was interesting to see it take place and it added more dimensions to both characters. This also makes Kleya’s actions even more important, because of that history the two characters share. While events on Coruscant are happening, we get to see Cassian and K-2SO doing what they do. Now last we saw, K-2 had just been activated after almost killing Cassian, so there has clearly been a lot that happened in the year we have not seen. After getting word that Luthen needs to be pulled from Coruscant, Cassian, K-2 and Melshi head off to sort it all out. There is a lot that happens in a short amount of time and I won’t say anymore, one thing I will say though is that the final moments lead right into the first time we see Cassian in Rogue One.

Each arc has given time to characters, in order to make them more than just a few key points, see Mon Mothma in the previous arc and this time it was Luthen and Kleya. Stellan Skarsgård and Elizabeth Dulau delivered some incredible performances across the episodes, both in the flashback and the present. We knew that Skarsgård was a powerful presence in the series, that scene in the first season proved that, but he was never a hard ass for the fun of it and Skarsgård put conviction into the character. But the surprise for me here was Dulau, her character to me at least, has mostly been a background spy master. Yes, she shows up during important scenes, but usually is to offer information to Luthen, or steal a recording device back from an art piece. Here though, she was able to take a fairly generic character and made me care about her, her final scenes are nothing short of heartbreaking and once you see the arc, you will understand why.

Across the arc and the season as a whole, we have spent a lot of time in Coruscant, but with each visit we got to see something different from the last, but not this time. There are a few new locales in this episode, which I won’t say anything about for obvious reasons, but we return to a few familiar ones. The one that was most interesting is the place that was the safe house that Cassian and Bix stayed in back during the second batch of episodes. The reason why this was interesting is that the building is so much more run down now, the area around it just as much, it feels like time has truly passed. But it is not just a sense of time marching forward, but how unkempt things have become, how rundown and grotty things are. It provides a real sense of oppression, as here is a planet, known for its luxury and this prominate location has been turned into one of squalor.

While the action on Coruscant was interesting, the more impressive location was that of Yavin-4. The first time we ever saw this place was in Star Wars: A New Hope and it was already an established rebel base, we also got to see more of it in Rogue One. This time though, things are still changing, at the end of the second episode in the season, we saw Cassian escape from the planet, long before it became a rebel base. Over the season we have seen it slowly evolve from a small group, into the rebellion force that we saw in the original movie.  There have been some things that caught my eye where I Leo pointing memed, but it is interesting at just how much more is going on there. All the time spent there, just makes the place feel like a real place, and seeing it evolve over the years makes the escape from it between the original movie and Empire Strikes Back, feel heartbreaking.

Coming into these final episodes of Andor, I wasn’t sure how I wanted to see it end, I knew a few characters would survive whatever happened and I knew some would not. What I did not expect was a flashback that took the history of one of the most stoic characters the series had and give them even more of a reason to fight. The episodes could have been all about putting people into the places they needed and nothing else, but they didn’t do that. Instead, we got some intense character moments, some fun action and a few heartwarming moments.

Andor proved in its first season that Star Wars did not need Jedi, Sith or Lightsabers to be good and the second season proved that you don’t need to explain every single step along the way. We finally got to see the lead character become the ruthless rebel we found to be in Rogue One, but all of the secondary characters got a chance to shine this season. With how many plots needed to find a satisfying ending, I am happy to say that they did just that, but with enough room for some characters to continue on beyond Rogue One. It has been a long journey for Cassian Andor, but it was a hell of a ride and one I would eagerly do all over again.

The Score

9.0

Review access provided by Disney

The Pros

The episodes could have been all about putting people in place for Rogue One, but instead they delivered some amazing tv

Elizabeth Dulau brought Kleya Marki from the background to the spotlight and made me care about her, with a powerful performance

The Cons

… the late stage flashback did feel a little out of place

Knowing that some of the characters made it through to Rogue One, did remove a real sense of tension