The Wild Reed: How Empires Are Built and Rebellions Are Born

Tuesday, January 28, 2025

How Empires Are Built and Rebellions Are Born

I continue this evening with my series of posts celebrating what many consider one of the best TV shows ever made; and one that given recent events here in the U.S., powerfully highlights the need for resistance to the rise of auhoritarianism.

The show I’m referring to is Andor, the second season of which returns to Disney+ on Tuesday, April 22.

Andor is a prequel to the 2016 film Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, which in turn serves as a prequel to Star Wars: A New Hope (1977).

Andor stars Diego Luna (left), reprising his role as Cassian Andor in Rogue One. Like Rogue One, Andor has a much grittier look and feel, and far more complex characters than any other movie or TV series in the Star Wars franchise. This definitely goes a long way in accounting for my interest in – and appreciation for – both Rogue One and Andor.

I also appreciate the show’s contemporary political resonance. Andor actress Fiona Shaw (right) highlights this resonance when she notes that the show’s writer Tony Gilroy has written “a great, scurrilous [take] on the Trumpian world.”

Shaw goes on to say: “Our world is exploding in different places right now, people’s rights are disappearing, and Andor reflects that. [In the show] the Empire is taking over, and it feels like the same thing is happening in reality, too. . . . I was impressed by Tony’s social-realist intentions. He’s created a whole new morality. It’s very deep and humane – there is grief, mourning, hope, fear. It’s not just primary colours here.”

The first season of Andor was released on the Disney+ streaming platform in 2022, and as I note above, the second (and final) season is scheduled for release three months from now, on April 22.

In the lead-up to season two I’m sharing a series of posts celebrating Andor. Tonight’s installment features an insightful video commentary, the conclusion of which I don’t completely agree with. (Perhops more on this in a later post.) Still, the video as a whole is definitely worth viewing. It’s put together by “Kapil” of the Show Me the Meaning YouTube channel, and in introducing his commentary, Kapil says the following.

Andor is so captivating because it reflects the 2020s in the same way the original Star Wars trilogy reflected the 1970s and ’80s. It’s a product of its age, and not trying to be something from the past. Showrunner Tony Gilroy – famously not a huge Star Wars fan – knew exactly what he was doing in telling a deeply human story that just happened to be set in the Star Wars universe. And in doing so, he explored how a rebellion rooted in hope is created through darkness – and how a tyrannical Empire is actually built by ordinary people. So today, I want to explore the journeys of Cassian Andor, Luthen, Mon Mothma, Dedra and Syril, and what it means to bring Star Wars into the 2020s. I hope you enjoy.