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All new Star Wars stories, like the denizens of a vast coral reef, need to inhabit nooks and crannies in the universe and narrative created by George Lucas. But there are better and worse ways to do this.
Disney has produced two kinds of Star Wars products: new and original stories and cynical, safe, nostalgic remakes. Four out of five of Disney’s Star Wars movies fell into the safe and cynical camp. (See my reviews of The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, The Rise of Skywalker, and Solo.) But Rogue One directed by Gareth Edwards was a surprise pleasure: a genuine war film with a darker, more adult tone and an engaging visual style.
At that point, Disney really should have broomed out Jar Jar Abrams and his like and handed Gareth Edwards the keys to the Star Wars “franchise.” But when Solo flopped due to a Gamergate-style fan boycott, the Mouse decided to cancel a host of movie projects and instead concentrate on series to be streamed on Disney+.
The first of these series, The Mandalorian, started out with promise but quickly ran out of ideas and self-confidence. I can’t even remember if I watched to the end of the second season. Thus, although I think it is important to follow at least one pop-culture franchise as a way of monitoring mainstream media propaganda, I gave the other Disney+ Star Wars series a pass.
But then my friend Morgoth recommended Andor, a prequel series focusing on Cassian Andor, the rebel intelligence officer in Rogue One.
Andor is the creation of Tony Gilroy, the co-author of the screenplay of Rogue One, and thus remains entirely faithful to the characters and feel of the film. Andor is a genuinely excellent series. In fact, I regard it as one of the best science fiction series ever, up there with Firefly and the reboot of Battlestar Galactica.
Andor follows the intertwined stories of six principal characters.
Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) is a small-time criminal and outsider. He apparently grew up with other orphaned or abandoned children on a planet devastated by a mining disaster. He was then rescued and adopted by junk scavengers from off-world. He has difficulty trusting others and being honest with them, even his adoptive mother and closest friends.
Syril Karn (Kyle Soller) is an overzealous corporate security officer on a remote planet. He’s the kind of petty power-worshipper and indignation addict who would bark at you for not wearing your mask on the tram. He’d have a Pfizer tattoo and wish death upon the unvaccinated.
Luthen Rael (Stellan Skarsgård) is a ruthless and Machiavellian rebel organizer operating under the cover of a fey, glad-handling antiques dealer. This is one of Skarsgård’s best roles. He beautifully depicts the loneliness that comes with sacrificing everything personal to a political cause.
Senator Mon Mothma (Genevieve O’Reilly) is a mainstream political opponent of Emperor Palpatine who is secretly helping the rebellion and growing increasingly desperate as Imperial surveillance and control tighten around her. O’Reilly is a poised and subtle actress who is finally given space to breathe life into her role. I also enjoy the characterization of Mon Mothma’s world, Chandrila, a hierarchical and traditionalist civilization with a somewhat Japanese aesthetic but populated by good-looking white people.
Maarva Andor (Fiona Shaw) is Cassian’s adoptive mother. Her relationship with Cassian is poignant, because both are involved in the rebellion, but neither knows it — largely because of Cassian’s difficulty with being open even with his own mother.
You can buy Trevor Lynch’s Classics of Right-Wing Cinema here.
Dedra Meero (Denise Gough) is an ambitious supervisor in the Imperial Security Bureau who is hunting Luthen and believes that Cassian is connected to her quarry. She’s a discomfiting mirror for liberals and feminists, since they will root for her as a career girl, even though her career involves torturing and killing people.
Andor is a wonderful depiction of life in an emerging totalitarian society which provides an unsettling mirror to our own, in which COVID hysteria and Trump Derangement Syndrome have led to increasingly repressive and paranoid measures to monitor and suppress dissent. Andor is especially sensitive to how creeping totalitarianism leads to the breakdown of social trust and solidarity, which then generates new demands for surveillance and control.
Andor shows that totalitarianism doesn’t just come down from the top. It also bubbles up from below, demanded by hysterics, moralists, and idealists, as well as egged on by terrorists, some of them genuine dissidents, surely some of them regime operatives.
Meero is the totalitarian pincer that comes from above, whereas Karn is the pincer that comes from below. Luthen and Mothma work to bring about revolution from above. Cassian and Maarva work from below.
Andor’s 12 episodes fall into four acts. The first act introduces the major characters and ends with a botched corporate security raid on Cassian’s home planet, Ferrix. In the second act, Cassian joins a rebel band to pull off a huge heist of Imperial assets. In the third act, Cassian is imprisoned in a nightmarish facility but eventually escapes. In the fourth act, all the main characters converge on Ferrix for an explosive finale.
Andor is filmed in the United Kingdom, and most of the actors are from the British Isles. The whole cast is excellent, with especially compelling performances from Stellan Skarsgård and three Irish actresses: Genevieve O’Reilly, Fiona Shaw, and Denise Gough.
There are also many outstanding performers in smaller roles, especially Anton Lesser as Imperial Security Bureau Major Partagaz and Andy Serkis as Kino Loy, one of Cassian’s fellow prisoners.
This being Disney, there is some annoying diversity casting, but none of it harms the series because it isn’t especially prominent, and the non-white actors are all competent. The major non-white actor is Forest Whitaker reprising the role of Saw Gerrera from Rogue One.
Rogue One pioneered Star Wars for grownups, and Andor remains faithful to that vision. Andor stands out for its well-drawn characters. These are not comic-book heroes and villains. Each act of Andor is beautifully paced, slowly developing characters and introducing events to lay the groundwork for a fast-paced and exciting finale. This is not pulp science fiction, racing from one contrived chase or fight to another. The result is genuinely absorbing drama, which is often quite emotionally moving. When was the last time you got choked up over Star Wars?
The first season of Andor is set five years before Rogue One. The second season will take us up to the beginning of Rogue One. Frankly, though, Andor is so good, I hope Disney decides to milk it for a few more seasons. The fans are owed some reparations, and Disney deserves to be rewarded for doing something good for a change.
Andor keeps Star Wars clichés to an absolute minimum. There’s only one battle in space, and it is quite unique. There’s no cantina scene. There isn’t much in the way of cutesy droid antics. Nor are there Gungans, Ewoks, and the like. And, most surprisingly, there are no Jedi, no Sith, and no light sabers either. But if I hadn’t mentioned that, most of you wouldn’t have noticed their absence. The music, by Nicholas Britell, is adequate but not outstanding, and not a note of it sounds like John Williams.
Tony Gilroy doesn’t need to fall back on clichés and nostalgia because he has a rich and original story to tell. I have spared you spoilers because I want you to actually see it.
15 comments
Also not good from a racial perspective. The main male character (played by Mexican actor Diego Luna) is a swarthier Spanish/Mediterranean type whereas the women are all predominantly Central/Northern European white.
This “arrangement” is becoming pretty much commonplace in contemporary cinema (especially American but also, increasingly, British and other parts of Europe) and is yet another symptom of the gradual darkening and descent of the white world into Brazil-like status.
We need big-budget films where both the males and females are predominantly of Central and Northern European looks, especially the leading actors (which actually still existed, to some extent, in the United States until about the 2000s).
The Nordicists just never give it a rest, do they.
For the record, Diego Luna’s only love interest in the series (an ex) is a model from Central America.
While it’s somewhat regrettable that he is Mexican, his mom was English and Scottish. He doesn’t look very Amerindian. But then again you seem to have an issue with people who aren’t entirely Northern European. It’s sad that when you scratch many supposed White Nationalists, you injure a Nordicist.
I am aware that his mother is Northwestern European, however, his father is Mexican (and looks at least part Amerindian), and, as is usually the case, the darker genes are much more predominant in the offspring.
As for Diego Luna not looking Amerindian, that’s debatable – in any case, I never said he looked Amerindian. I said he looks Mediterranean, which he most certainly does. I don’t know what you mean by my having an “issue” with anyone who is not Northern European, however, my focus is primarily on the peoples of Central, Northern and parts of Eastern Europe (Europe approximately to the Alps). Southern Europe, for the most part, is a different world – genetically, culturally, climatically, etc. (Not that there aren’t plenty of individual people from Southern Europe who genetically fit in much better in Central/Northern Europe, however, I’m talking about general trends, not individual exceptions. In fact, those individual exceptions are welcome to come live in Central/Northern Europe, if they so wish).
I am aware that Counter Currents is a broadly “white nationalist” site and doesn’t fully agree with my views above (although, judging by some of the comments, many individuals here do), however, I also understand that there is a broad diversity of views here and so I am simply being honest regarding the racial, intellectual and geopolitical framework behind my comments.
From what I understand, many of the people at Counter Currents are focused on creating the foundations for a broadly “white” ethnostate in North America. I understand that. It’s certainly one geopolitical option for turning many of the intellectual ideas presented here into practical reality (although, as I’ve said, there are a wide variety of views presented here), however, for those readers who might be looking for a slightly different (or complimentary or parallel) geopolitical project, I present the idea for a different kind of white ethnostate – one based in Central, Northern and parts of Eastern Europe. Demographically, these parts of Europe are in much better shape than North America, and already have a realistic foundation for such a project in the European Union (despite some of the latter’s negative aspects). However, to tie this into my comments in the first paragraph, I believe there should be a separate union for Southern Europe – a kind of Southern Union, to allow the Southern Europeans to chart their own course.
As for the American white ethnostate, I just hope all of your leaders don’t end up looking like Joe Rogan (who is predominantly southern Italian).
Isn’t much of central Europe filled with Muslims? I don’t care that you are a Europe based Nordicist, I just find it strange that your on an American White Nationalist/pan-European website. As the Turks and Arabs gradually Islamize you guys at least you can say “but at least we’re blond, unlike those Joe Rogan looking Americans”! Good luck.
Most of Central Europe does not (yet) have a Muslim, or any large nonwhite, problem. The Muslim problem, specifically, is concentrated in Western Europe and, to some extent, in Northern Europe. The Muslims (and nonwhites in general) are the biggest problem in the Netherlands, Belgium, Western Germany and the big city areas of France and the UK (especially the Paris and London metro areas). Basically, the heavily urbanized parts of Western Europe.
Central Europe includes Czechia, Slovakia, Poland, Slovenia, Hungary, Eastern Germany, Southern Germany (Bavaria) and Austria. Apart from the latter two, who do have some nonwhite immigration problems, Central Europe is currently the whitest part of the planet (with the white population also being one contiguous whole, not scattered such as in the US). One can expand the definition of Central Europe to include an even larger area of white population (especially going east, i.e., into the Baltics, Ukraine, even Belarus and the white parts of Russia), however, the current definition is sufficient to answer your question – that is, we are in no present danger of being “Islamized” by “the Turks and Arabs”.
As to your comment about why I am on an American site – I like a lot of the content here and, as I said in an earlier comment, I am offering an alternative (or parallel) geopolitical project, especially for those white, racially aware North Americans who might be thinking about relocating to Central Europe (in fact, I think a great project would be to set up some kind of organization to assist and guide people who are looking to make such a move).
Here we go again with the incredibly silly “Nordic Suppremacist” balderdash!… For the record, the so-called “swarthy mediterraneans” that this nordicist imbecile so stupidly despises were the very creators of Western Civilization, while the northern Europeans, until very recently, basically contributed NOTHING woth noticing to European Heritage as a whole. While the Nordics, Celts and Slavs were busy perpetually slaughtering each other, and living in the most repulsive filth and squalor, the Sumerians, the Egyptians, the Greeks and Romans were building magnificent cities, producing outstanding Artworks, and enjoying a refined lifestyle that was light-years in advance, compared to that of the supposedly “superior” Nordics, Celts and Slavs… LOL!
As someone who doesn’t consume Hollywood content, I appreciate the article. The most surprising part is how highly you regard this series. I wouldn’t have suspected a story that good coming from the Star Wars franchise.
“In fact, I regard it as one of the best science fiction series ever, up there with Firefly and the reboot of Battlestar Galactica.”
I wrote Star Wars off years ago, and Disney too, but that is high praise indeed.
Never liked all those fairy tales, which have nothing common with normal sci-fi.
As much respect as I have for “Trevor Lynch,” I’m afraid we’re never going to see eye to eye on films. I absolutely hated The Force Awakens. It was basically A New Hope except with a disjointed and senseless back story, and of course minus the struggle that Luke went through, which is of course what made the first one interesting. Rogue One is actually one of five movies in my life that I’ve walked out of the theater during rather than finishing. I couldn’t bring myself to watch any of the other Disneyfied films in the series.
I still have a soft spot for the original trilogy and will sometimes watch them when they are on, but I suspect that has more to do with childhood nostalgia than being a cinephile. My older brother taking me to the movies in 1977 and waiting in line for two hours (and him warning me not to complain about the wait or we would leave) to see this weird looking but exciting movie remains a stand-out boyhood memory for me.
Evidently, you haven’t read my review of The Force Awakens. https://counter-currents.com/2015/12/star-wars-episode-vii-the-force-awakens/
What? You’re saying that The Force Awakens is not the greatest happening in science fiction since Asimov’s Foundation? Heresy! Rank heresy, I say! Daisy Ridley and John Boyega should’ve gotten an Academy Award handed to them by the Pope, I tell you!
I’ve always enjoyed the film review content on CC, but this one especially introduced me to something I really enjoyed. I’d be interested to read a CC or Trevor Lynch review of season 2. I still enjoyed it but I obviously noticed all the propaganda they stuffed into it.
Imagine how good Star Wars/scifi could be in film industry run by our people, in a country run by our people?
I liked the second season less. I plan to rewatch it sometime, though, so maybe I will write about it then.
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