Star Wars: Andor Season 2 is in the works, and the cast and crew of the show have been confidently boasting that this second season is going to be even better than the groundbreaking first one. That’s really saying something: Andor Season 1 continues to see its reputation grow as more Star Wars fans and mainstream fans alike are pulled in through word of mouth and the awards acclaim. Andor Season 1 received 8 Emmy Award nominations (including “Outstanding Drama Series”), and has since become many fans top-ranked Star Wars Disney+ series, by far.
Andor Season 2 has a much more challenging task ahead of it: This next season has much closer ties to established Star Wars canon – specifically the series of events that set Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) on the hunt for the Empire’s secret super-weapon (the Death Star), and eventually leads him toward the scientist behind the Death Star’s superweapon, Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen) and his daughter Jyn Erso (Felicity Jones) in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. In fact Andor Season 2 has already been teased as having a finale that will lead right into Cassian’s first scenes in Rogue One – which is quite a runway to land on, given how Andor Season 1 was largely successful by cutting so many ties to the Star Wars canon.
Well, Andor star Adria Arjona (who plays Cassian’s ally/friend/sometimes-lover Bix Caleen) says that she knew Andor Season 1 was something special when she first read the scripts; she’s now teasing an even bigger reaction to reading the Season 2 scripts:
“Oh man, when I read season one, I pinched myself, and when I started reading season two, I was like, ‘[Tony Gilroy] can’t outdo [season one].’ I was again like, ‘It’s not going to be as good.’ But it’s f*cking better. It’s so much better. It is,” Arjona told THR in no uncertain terms. “What he has crafted and created is mind-blowing, and I can’t believe I got to be a part of it. He’s so talented, and he really outdid himself for season two.”
(Photo: Lucasfilm/Disney+)
Andor cut away the more fantastical parts of Star Wars lore in order to examine a more grounded question: how does something as nefarious as fascism take root and spread – and what choices must everyday people make in the face of that oppressive force? It made the Empire into something comparable to real-world socio-political events, instead of sci-fi archvillains. It also gave Star Wars fans a much-needed palette cleanser from the usual kind of nostalgia-bait we’ve gotten from the Star Wars Disney+ series. If Adria Arjona is telling things right, Season could end up being the best of both approaches.
There’s already talk of Andor also getting a spinoff series, so this Star Wars spinoff series roll may not end with Season 2…
Star Wars: Andor streams on Disney+.
