This text incorporates spoilers for “Andor.”
As “Andor” season 2 barrels in direction of its inevitable conclusion and units a brand new excessive water mark for “Star Wars” within the course of, it would be comprehensible for viewers to imagine that creator Tony Gilroy and his writing workforce managed to drag off a heist of their very own. In any case, this can be a season that has gotten away with depicting the Ghorman bloodbath in all its harrowing brutality, together with a dozen sequences and ideas that we have merely by no means seen from this franchise earlier than. If any film or collection represented the thought of unfettered artistic freedom inside this beloved story a couple of galaxy far, far-off … it would be this one, proper?
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Properly, we now know that is solely principally true. Even the perfect and most acclaimed collection in all of “Star Wars” needed to make just a few concessions alongside the best way. In an interview with Leisure Weekly, Gilroy opened up about one explicit path that he needed to divert from throughout the writing technique of this second and closing season. As we noticed within the newest batch of episodes, Diego Luna’s Cassian Andor makes off with the mangled physique of the Imperial enforcer droid that seems to be Ok-2SO, essentially the most cussed and troublesome (but fan-favorite) member of “Rogue One” voiced by Alan Tudyk. That origin story for the inseparable pair felt like a intelligent little bit of retconned backstory, nevertheless it might’ve been very totally different had the present’s artistic workforce adopted the unique plan.
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As Gilroy defined, his brother Dan (identified for 2014’s “Nightcrawler”) scripted one other manner for Cassian and K2 to cross paths — and it could’ve taken the collection in a way more overtly horrorifying route:
“Dan Gilroy wrote an incredible, fully self-contained episode that was episode 209. It was an incredible episode that was like a horror film.”
So, what occurred to power such a drastic change of plans? Properly, it is the identical problem that has befallen many an bold author for the reason that daybreak of storytelling itself. Cash, because it seems, proved to be the fly within the ointment.
Tony Gilroy’s authentic plan to introduce Ok-2SO was as a part of a ‘monster film’
In the event you thought “Andor” season 2 discovered essentially the most horrific solution to throw these imposing KX-series droids into motion throughout the Ghorman bloodbath, nicely, suppose once more. Slaughtering defenseless Ghorman civilians is one factor, however what if there was a fair scarier model that includes a solitary KX droid looking our heroes all through the claustrophobic confines of a single ship? That might’ve ended up being our introduction to the cantankerous Ok-2SO, had issues gone as initially envisioned. Tony Gilroy shed some extra gentle on this whereas speaking to Leisure Weekly, describing how episode 9 may’ve been a K2-centric standalone story quite than the Mon Mothma (Genevieve O’Reilly) energy hour that it turned:
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“It was the K2 story. They needed to convey this big ugly tanker ship to Yavin, and there was a KX unit that was trapped inside there looking. It was type of like a monster film with K2 on it. It was actually cool.”
Sadly, foolish and real-world constraints like “budgets” and “practicality” ended up getting in the best way and necessitated some main adjustments. Gilroy went on to elucidate why the higher-ups at Disney and Lucasfilm finally squashed what would’ve been an exorbitantly costly episode: “We couldn’t afford to do it. It was made clear that it was out of the vary, so we needed to abandon that and consolidate issues.” That included folding K2’s introduction into the Ghorman plotline and shifting different main moments, comparable to Mon Mothma’s stirring speech to the Senate, from episode 10 to episode 9. Ultimately, the ultimate model of occasions feels each inch as sprawling and epic because the collection has all the time been. But it surely’s enjoyable to think about the potential what-ifs had the studio opened up its pocketbooks much more.
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It took some convincing to get everybody on board with Andor season 2’s new route
For his half, Tony Gilroy chalked up this fiscal belt-tightening to the dramatic change in streaming mindsets amongst studio executives over the previous few years. The gold rush mentality that led to Marvel overcommitting to far too many Disney+ exhibits and Lucasfilm turning “Andor” into the most costly “Star Wars” challenge ever seemingly vanished by the point season 2 rolled round. Although that would’ve thrown less-prepared writers for a loop, each Tony and Dan Gilroy have been used to anticipating the surprising. In response to Tony Gilroy, this wasn’t too dissimilar to the scrambling they needed to do again in season 1 with the Aldhani arc culminating in the spectacular Eye of Aldhani sequence:
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“It is like what we did with Aldhani. Danny received burned twice. Danny wrote the Aldhani episode pre-Covid the place there have been 2,000 folks in Aldhani. It was like Glastonbury, this big pageant. After which by the point we received there [after Covid] they mentioned, ‘Properly, you would be completely happy if you happen to get 150 folks there.’ We have been like, ‘Oh my God, now we have to alter the entire story!’ All the things needed to change.”
Although Gilroy was fast to present credit score to each Disney and Lucasfilm for persevering with to assist his artistic targets, it took just a little extra convincing to get others to see the imaginative and prescient — comparable to K2 voice actor and motion-capture performer Alan Tudyk. Gilroy’s option to delay K2 and Cassian’s preliminary assembly meant probably rubbing each Tudyk and followers the mistaken manner, as he defined additional:
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“I feel Alan was in all probability disillusioned, and I feel there have been followers who have been disillusioned, however I used to be like, ‘Man, no matter we’ll do, we received to attend actually so long as we are able to till we introduce him.’ However then as I mentioned to Alan at first, and eventually everybody got here round on the thought: ‘Look, we’ll wait, however it will be price it, and after we get there, we’ll actually make a factor out of it and it will make sense and it will really feel proper.”
There are much more fascinating tidbits sprinkled all through the interview, so you should definitely head on over to EW to test it out in full. The final three episodes of “Andor” will drop on Disney+ streaming Tuesday, Could 13, 2025.