Before hope was found and before the Empire fell, rebels were born in the new Disney+ series Andor.
Any prequel of a major film franchise like Star Wars faces the challenge of creating tension and suspense when the main character’s fate is already known. Disney apparently has enough confidence in its new prequel series, Andor, to release a two-and-a-half minute “special look” prior to the series premiere this Wednesday—reminding us all of exactly what’s in store for our titular hero in his canonical future. Spoiler alert: he’s a tragic hero.
We know that the story of Andor begins with the Empire’s destruction of Cassian Andor’s (Diego Luna) home world and will depict his transformation from a “revolution-averse” cynic to a major player in the nascent rebellion who is willing to sacrifice himself to save the galaxy. Andor has been described as a “tense, nail-biting spy thriller,” with Tony Gilroy, who co-wrote Rogue One, serving as showrunner. And everything we’ve seen so far seems to fit that description.
The ensemble cast also includes Genevieve O’Reilly as Mon Mothma, a senator of the Republic who helped found the Rebel Alliance, as well as Forest Whitaker reprising his Rogue One role as Clone Wars veteran Saw Gerrera. Stellan Skarsgård (as Luthen) and Adria Arjona co-star as the resistance fighters who recruit Andor to the cause. Other cast members include Kyle Soller, Denise Gough, Fiona Shaw, Robert Emms, and David Hayman.
We had our first look at the series with a behind-the-scenes teaser in December 2020 during Disney’s Investors Day. We then viewed a short teaser earlier this year at Star Wars Celebration and a full trailer in August. Luna himself was on hand to introduce the final trailer at Disney’s annual D23 Expo earlier this month.
YouTube/Disney+
And now we have this latest “special look,” the bulk of which consists of select scenes from Rogue One and A New Hope, bracketed by footage from Andor. Rogue One is one of my favorite of the Star Wars movies, and who doesn’t love A New Hope? So I personally enjoyed taking a quick tour of the events of those two earlier (in terms of release, not timeline) films, including that devastating final embrace between Cassian and Jyn. This latest teaser doesn’t have a ton of new footage, but it does effectively remind us what’s ultimately at stake for this fledgling Rebellion. And was that a lightsaber-equipped starfighter we spotted zooming by?
The first three episodes of Andor debut on Disney+ on September 21, 2022.
Listing image by YouTube/Disney+
