I know — I’m late to this party but if you have the traditional Star Wars background and you suddenly gain full access to Andor… just do it! It’s likely in the top ten of all televisions series by itself, but when you top it off with Rogue One… it’s sublime. True art in its finest manifestation! The pairing is simply breathtaking.
I saw Rogue One in the theaters and clocked it as the finest of all the Star Wars movies — and to rewatch it after Andor and ten years… just one of the finest media viewing experiences of my life.
And Rogue One experts: is the director of Rogue One directly referencing Blue Velvet’s Frank when Sol Guerrero hits his gas?? How did I not notice this the first time. It’s amazing — and like Frank, the gas makes him crazy. It’s too close not to be intentional. Anyway… forgive me — I’m having a media high. Just want to share that! Go… do this… and may the force be with you.
Rogue One was absolute shit due to the troubled production and two disparate creative voices. It’s not just a bad Star Wars movie, it’s a bad movie entirely.
Problem #1 was they didn’t start with a script, they started with a supercut of scenes from other movies so they could determine how long each scene should be before writing it.
https://kottke.org/17/01/rogue-ones-unique-storyboard-remixed-from-100s-of-films
"Then I used dialogue from other movies to give you a sense of how long it would take in other films for someone to be interrogated. So for instance, when Jyn gets interrogated at the beginning of the film by the Rebel council, I used the scene where Ripley gets interrogated in ‘Aliens’.
So you get an idea of what movies usually do."
But the script didn’t matter because Gareth Edwards would shoot a bunch of stuff off script every day. He called it “Indie Hour” and it generated a bunch of footage that looked good, but was incomprehensible and unusable. They put a bunch of it in the trailers which ended up confusing everyone because it wasn’t ever intended to be in the movie.
https://www.radiotimes.com/movies/this-is-why-one-of-rogue-ones-most-iconic-shots-wasnt-in-the-finished-movie/
"“It was just a way for the crew of understanding, for now, we’re just going to do loads of random shit,” Edwards said. “Don’t try to ask, we can’t explain.
“It would just be things I thought were a beautiful moment or ‘This is a great idea’ and a lot of the stuff in the [first] trailer ended up through that process.”"
So, no surprise, wasting production time and money got him fired and they brought in Tony Gilroy to save the film… Who says:
"I’ve never been interested in Star Wars, ever. So I had no reverence for it whatsoever. I was unafraid about that,” said Gilroy. “And they were in such a swamp … they were in so much terrible, terrible trouble that all you could do was improve their position.”
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/star-wars-rogue-one-writer-tony-gilroy-opens-up-reshoots-1100060/
So you get conflicting scenes where Andor cold-bloodedly murders an informant as an introduction to his character (Gilroy), vs. a conflicted Andor, sent to assassinate a legitimate military target, but when the time comes he gets super sweaty and… oh… just… can… not… pull… that… trigger! (Edwards).
So which is it? Murderer of innocent informants or PTSD conflicted soldier who can’t do his one job?
Speaking of “one job”, let’s talk about the Vader hallway fight (Gilroy). Vader force grabs every one and every thing in that hallway except the ONE THING he’s there for, the Death Star Plans. Those have plot armor, they HAVE to get away. So why be so stupid as to put Vader in the same hallway? Empire’s Vader would have simply gone “Oh, don’t mind if I do!” (YOINK!)
But, again, Gilroy was never a fan of Star Wars… so we get Vader watching the plans sail away on the Blockade Runner… which directly conflicts with the classic opening of Star Wars where he states that transmissions were beamed to the ship by rebel spies… No, according to Rogue One, he personally WITNESSED that shit.
Gilroy’s position of derision for Star Wars is the polar opposite of someone like Dave Filoni or Jon Favreau and he told his Andor crew to not have reverence for the property either:
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-features/andor-creator-tony-gilroy-views-on-star-wars-1235226261/
So, no, not watching Andor. I’m sure it’s a fantastic commentary on space fascism, but it’s not Star Wars. If you want to make or watch a WWII movie, go do that, but don’t hijack another property to do it.
It is a fantastic exploration of how fascism comes into being and, unfortunately, very timely. It’s a great story that happens to use the setting of the Star Wars universe as a vehicle because that fall into authoritarianism was already built into the arc.
You’ve got the Vader scene all misunderstood by the one assumption that he had a clue what he was looking for, only that somewhere on that ship the Rebels had something that showed plans. Want to really take a logical jump? Then Vader should have just blown up all the ship then and there, then gone after the few that did get away (and might have had plans too). But see, that’s one of the messages in Andor… the arrogance of control is often its own enemy. Hell, even in Kenobi, that point was made and utilized (you probably aren’t a fan of that either).
It’s fine if you don’t partake. I just think you’re doing it because you got a bad taste from one thing and assume it’s all the same.
A bad taste from one thing and a complete lack of trust in the show runner.
He’s not interested in Star Wars, I am. That’s the key difference.
I’m sure it’s very good for what it is, but it’s not Star Wars.
It would be like if someone told me “Oh, you like salads? Man, I have a great salad recipe, you take chicken breast, cut it into pieces, marinate it in soy sauce overnight and then grill it. Take an onion bun, paint one side with peanut sauce, the other side with hoisin sauce, pile it up with shredded cabbage and carrots and cover with Thai sweet chili sauce, top it with the chicken. It’s great!”
“Yeah, but what you describe is a sandwich, not a salad.”
“Well, you know, I never liked salads, I have no reverence for them.”
(it is an AWESOME sandwich though)
That analogy doesn’t apply at all. It’s more like if a chef says, “I don’t particularly care about salads, but here’s a salad I made,” and hands me the most delicious salad I’ve ever had. I would enjoy the hell out of it and not complain that it doesn’t count as a salad because he’s not a salad fan
Except what Gilroy produced isn’t Star Wars. 😉
🙄
Sad
I agree, Rogue One was incredibly sad.
you talked about the Andor being a cold blooded killer moment at the beginning of Rogue One. I need to reply to what you are calling “conflicting scenes.”
Now… it’s obviously that you have dropped a load of hate on a movie I am telling you I now love.
I hope you have patience to hear me out.
I will refer to the television program ANDOR on all caps, and Andor the character like that.
So… ANDOR explained to me why he seems cold blooded to kill his rebel confederate. Why? ANDOR shows us the Republic has a tool that extracts the truth from rebels about the whereabouts and identities of all the rebels he has ever known.
When Andor shoots that useless turd in that first scene, it’s because if he allows him to live, the rebellion is finished.
Other folks who have watched ANDOR will bear this out.
Now… as to his not shooting Galen Irso… at the end… well… this is Andor’s humanity. Why he is a lovey character. Why the movie works so well. The girl, whose name escapes me, the daughter of Irso is ripped from irso at the beginning of the movie — Andor knows she has one chance to meet her dad, and he cannot take this from her because he loves her. That’s what’s going on there. Human love.
Is the move better after the series?? Hell yeah… so I won’t argue with you about it sucking, despite that I considered it the best of the SW movies when I saw it in theaters. Perhaps the fact that the director what not into the whole SW universe really helped.
Anyway… I’m hanks for chiming in. I hope you will watch ANDOR and rewatch Rogue One after… your perspective will change.