Things are finally coming full circle in the galaxy far, far away as Tony Gilroy’s Andor is careening into the events of Gareth Edwards’ Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. The 2016 epic is held as one of the best things Star Wars has ever done, and while the ending of Andor has been somewhat spoiled as Gilroy told Empire Magazine that Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and K-2SO (Alan Tudyk) will head out to the Rings of Kafrene to kickstart the events of Rogue One, there are still plenty of twists to come. As well as clearing up what happens to characters like Denise Gough’s Dedra Meero and Stellan Skarsgård’s Luthen Rael, who are mysteriously MIA past this point in the timeline (RIP to Kyle Soller’s Syril Karn), Andor is expected to further tie into the origins of the Rebel Alliance.
While you think you might know how the story goes, both seasons of Andor have served as a masterclass on how to expand the already sprawling mythos of Star Wars. Season 1 gave us epic set pieces like the Aldhani Heist, the reveal of how the Death Star was built, and delved into downtrodden planets like Ferrix, while we got to learn a bit more about how Coruscant ticked along during these troubled times. Season 2 has done much of the same, with the crux of the story centering around the fabled Ghorman Massacre, which was a throwaway mention in Star Wars Rebels. The animated Star Wars shows sometimes get a bad reputation as being for ‘kids’, but with Andor rewriting the story, you might want to give one key episode of Rebels a rewatch.
A Rebels rewrite
Hardcore Star Wars fans will know all about the From a Certain Point of View anthologies that tell important events that we all think we know from the perspective of others. Andor brilliantly delivers its own live-action version of this as May 8’s "Welcome to the Rebellion” ran concurrently with Rebels season 3 episode 18. “Secret Cargo” had the crew of the Ghost escort Mon Mothma (Genevieve O’Reilly in Andor) to Yavin 4 after she defected from the Senate and finally joined the Rebel Alliance as a full-time member. Rebels featured Mon under the escort of Gold Squadron, but when her transport was damaged by Grand Admiral Thrawn’s forces, she was forced to buddy up with the Rebels gang. After safely evading Thrawn, Mon then gave an epic speech that plays out a little differently in Andor.
Cassian has witnessed the atrocities of the Ghorman massacre, but when he agrees to do one last mission for Luthen and Kleya (Elizabeth Dulau), little does he know that it’s getting Mon to safety after she denounces the Emperor in front of the entire Senate and paints a target on her back. Fusing the worlds of live-action and animation, episode 9 has Cassian rescue Mon from the Senate, which ties these two important rebels together for the first time. The ISB tries to unsuccessfully shut down Mon’s speech, but as it’s broadcast across the galaxy, she ignites the spark of the rebellion. After evading Senator Bail Organa's (played by Benjamin Bratt) corrupted squadron, they hide out until she’s picked up by Luthen’s Gold Squadron, and she delivers her original Rebels speech while on the way to Yavin 4. The episode of Andor is one of its most epic, especially with the shot of Organa standing in the Senate as the lights go out.
Mon Mothma finally gets her time to shine
Rebels featured Mon delivering a similar speech, but like Andor canonized two Ghorman massacres, a few tiny timeline tweaks mean she gets to rally the troops twice. As Kleya says, "They want to rewrite the story," which takes Cassian’s crucial role in saving Mon out of the history books and instead solidifies Gold Squadron’s legacy as part of the Rebel Alliance. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Gilroy explained why Andor muddies the already murky waters of canon to tweak Mon’s Ghorman Massacre speech. The showrunner told the outlet how he and writer Dan Gilroy wanted to do something different: "We are hijacking canon. In canon, she's rescued by the Gold Squadron and the speech that they gave in the cartoon, which was a canonical show, [is on that ship]. And Danny's like, 'Do I have to stick to this f--ing speech?'" Giving us the best of both worlds, Gilroy concluded: "In a really sneaky way, we're minimizing what they did in Star Wars Rebels, but we're keeping it consistent. We're just saying you don't really know the whole story of what happened."
O’Reilly’s revised version sees her take direct aim at Sheev Palpatine, foreshadowing the Emperor's looming presence in the Skywalker Saga and what will eventually lead to that divisive, "Somehow, Palpatine returned," moment. In Andor’s stirring speech, O’Reilly finally gets her time in the spotlight after 20 years of playing the Chandrila senator, telling the Senate: "The monster who will come for us all soon enough is Emperor Palpatine." Of course, her words will go unheard by many, although it’s the Ghorman Massacre that helps her recruit Organa to the Rebel Alliance. With this leading into Princess Leia’s role in the original trilogy, and that factoring into Luke Skywalker becoming a Jedi Knight, Andor is feeding into the story we all know and love.
Some are now referring to “Secret Cargo” as its own bonus episode of Andor, with old and new fans alike being told to go and watch the 2017 outing. While it’s disappointing we don’t get to see Mon make it to Yavin 4 in Andor episode 9, the fact that it becomes her base of operation for Rogue One and the attack on the Death Star means we’ll likely be seeing a lot more of the iconic planet in the final arc of episodes. As much as we’d like to see another live-action Rebels crossover like when Steve Blum reprised his role as Zeb in The Mandalorian, it makes sense that Andor continues to strike out on its own and tell its own story from a ‘certain point of view’. The ever-vigilant Star Wars community won’t let you mess with their canon, but as Gilroy and the team continue to prove, that doesn’t mean you can’t improve it with a little creative license.