I think is funny that Dedra, a completely regular human without any kind of force powers, can terrify another full grown adult, but Reva, a literal inquisitor, completely fails at scaring an 8 year old.
Because the audience and Leia both knew the same thing, that the inquisitor wouldn't have the balls to seriously hurt a very young child. Whereas everyone knew Dedra was serious.
And the fact that reva as an inquisitor like the others was suppose to kidnap force sensitive children but yet she didn’t even suspect that leia was force sensitive and kept one in captive without realising . She did worst than the other inquisitors who kidnapped force sensitive kids. Another overlap with andor and kenobi series is that the target that the empire was trying to find happens to be held captive without them knowing. In andor the isb agents was trying to look for cassian but yet he was apprehended and was sent to an imperial prison to do labor without the isb ever noticing. In kenobi, leia was kidnapped and held captive by the inquisitors without them knowing that leia was force sensitive. the inquisitors were trying to kidnap force sensitive children while killing off the last remaining jedi. Its a pretty weird thing to notice about the galactic empire in these two series
Reeva simply isn't intimidating as she's never going to succeed. Leia is never in any real danger, she's not remotely a threat to Vader and she'll never harm Luke. At no point do I believe she's a threat to Kenobi or most of the cast. So everything feels like empty posturing.
I was a little shocked when I eventually realized I was rooting for Deedra. "Wait, she's an imperial officer, why am I rooting for her?" And then it makes you question yourself when Deedra turns out to be a disgusting person.
You were rooting for Deedra? That’s fascinating! That’s the first time I’ve heard or saw someone do that. I was rooting against her but I found her really interesting. Her psychotic and evil nature made me not root for her but I still found her fascinating regardless.
@@willpower8289 I at least did root for her early on, when she was having quarrels with the other Imperial dude while it was clear to us that she had the right ideas about the formation of a rebel group! Afterwards I of course wasn't rooting for her anymore, but I do really love her character
@gaetanonclin7205 Same here. Sometimes I've even felt sympathy for her. When the chief ISB officer called out her rival coworker for his "lack of vision" and congratulated Deedra I was like "Hell yeah!". And then the episode with Bix happened and it made me realize she was pure evil. I'm excited about what's gonna happen to her next season.
@@willpower8289 a lot of people rooted for her because she brought logic and reason to the ISB meetings while everyone else was worried about crossing each other’s lines. We know she’s right, we know the threads she is pulling leads to something bigger.
I've actually heard a lot of reviewers say they were rooting for her, which tbh always confused me cuz I was rooting against her from the beginning - she was already clearly both evil and just a massive threat to the rebellion
I think the Dedra/Bix interrogation scene also adds to the tension later because it establishes that if the Empire gets its hands on Andor, he WILL talk because of the means they have, so the motivation of Luthen, Vel, and Cinta to kill him for opsec is much more understandable than a more loose “eh, we just need to tie up loose ends”
She is too young, bratty, and spoiled to be intimidated. Also she doesn't know better, which makes her spunk humorous for us the audience and establishes that she doesn't give a F*ck. Remember her stoicism when one of the most intimidating people in the Galaxy Darth Vader threatens her and literally blows up her home planet. And her 5' 1" ass didn't shed a tear.
Andor really reminds you how interesting your bad guys can be. Deedra is an awful person but intriguing cause she poses an actual threat to the characters around the protagonist. You actively fear for them cause you see the antagonist ever so slowly closing in on them. Her honesty makes her even more threatening, you know she will follow through with her threats.
That's one of the things I loved most about Andor: the antagonists (Cyril and Deedra) felt like real people working within a real bureaucracy. They (especially Cyril) were deserving of some audience sympathy, as both were really just trying to do their jobs... unfortunately they work for the Third Galactic Reich, so doing their jobs isn't possible within the bounds being a good person.
@@master_samwise Cyril actually felt like the "FNG", the idealist out of the academy who thinks he knows everything better than the people who have been there. His CO in the first arc is the guy who has been there and done that, even flat out already assumes correctly what had happened and told Cyril to drop it. Cyril then finds another "true believer" who also a bit disgruntled at how lax things are to him, but who actually has a bit more experience on the job. As someone who works for an agency, this all felt very realistic to me, none of these characters are themselves as being "bad" or "wrong", they all feel like they need to take certain actions for the "correct" outcome. They don't see themselves as a moustache -twirling villain. tl;dnr I went into Ando expecting to dislike it but came out the other end thinking it's pretty good SW by even pre-Disney metrics.
Deedra is the kind of antagonist that manages to fool the audience into thinking she is a protagonist. In the first episodes, people were like "oh yeah! Deedra is getting shit done!" At the end, it was more like "oh no... Deedra is getting shit done."
@@master_samwise This fact leads me to believe Cyril may become a good guy later in the series, he demonstrates that he believes he is doing the right thing; investigating a ruthless murder of his fellow officers. He is driven by a sense of justice. I expect a situation to where he sees the brutality of the machine he works for and "damning" himself to the empire by stepping in to stop it. My guess is his obvious love of Deedra will make him come in touch with his feelings, combined with his sense of justice will push him to develop as a good guy (jury's out on whether Deedra will follow).
@@arvypolanco honestly, I think it might be the opposite, that he will come to more strongly associate the procedures of the empire with his own sense of justice, which would motivate him to dehumanise the rebels in his mind. Either way, I haven't cared one jot about star wars characters for years, and now I have a show where the fate of every single character concerns me!
@@martinjrgensen8234 Ehm, I doubt the show on its own would’ve created the same following as the OT did. So, calling it the best written ever might be an overstatement. It does sound well written though, which is surprising if we compare it to other recent SW content.
@@anansi9291The quality of a product shouldn’t be based on how popular it is or would be. Andor is easily better written than the OT. Is it better? Well, no, that’s subjective. Both are masterpieces. But it shouldn’t discounted from the running just because it wouldn’t make as big of a pop culture splash as the OT did.
@@ImTheReverse I really like how you worded it. When people say that something is better than something, like say "Andor is the best written Star Wars." I’ve seen people that are like "oh so you didn’t like the OT". No? They never said that. I like how you stated that they are both masterpieces. I doubt Andor will ever make as a big a splash as the OT, but it’s still one of my favorite pieces of Star Wars media.
@@anansi9291 Objectively, Andor is far superior to the OT in writing and acting (save for Empire). The OT had novelty, mythology and mysticism to fall back on but was not as consistently executed as Andor was. Andor did have the benefit of much more screen time to build characters.
Cyril’s mother is the most terrifying character in the whole Galaxy. I think she’d have Palpatine crying while cleaning his room & Vader using the force to pick up his messes after his fights.
Another aspect that successfully builds tension in Andor is the wonderful blocking. The way Deedra moves about the room and into the frame is menacing in itself. Reva’s interrogation moves look like an assistant principal trying to get a kid to confess to smoking in the bathroom.
Something I also noticed is that the interrogation in Kenobi has shaky cam, a technique mostly used for comedy shows. It specifically reminds me of Brooklyn nine nine which is not the type of show you want to be thinking about while this interrogation is happening.
@@nont18411 well yes, come to think of it, brooklyn nine nine had quite good interrogations. Characters would even discuss why it's going poorly behind the glass. Putting Kenobi even more to shame.
Also the Reva scene itself looks like crap. It's a boring room with subfunctional lighting and noone has been properly lit to look at least interesting.
@@CptApplestrudl The boring room is not even a real problem. Interrogation rooms are extremely Boring everywhere were you have a dedicated room for that. That's part of the interrogation. and in a well made scene it would focus the viewer on the interrogation instead of "interesting room details" That you recognized the boring room just shows how bad the scene was. Because you were searching for "something more interesting like room details".
I love the role reversal with Cassian, where he remains resistant to the many times he's to pushed to rebel, until confronted with sheer horror at Narkina that brings out his inner Luthen, and he then works to convert Kino. We totally get his journey as viewers, and his devotion to rebellion at the end is so believable and rewarding. What an amazing show.
Narkina 5 brought it out. I think Marva's posthumous speech and the ensuing uprising solidified it. Re-watching that scene I noticed two things: Absolutely masterful acting and directing when it comes to all the close-up reaction shots (I love it when eyes and facial expressions alone can tell a story) and that Luthen is so... unreadable. I wonder what he's thinking in that moment as he just kind of stares at the dust rising from the aftermath. He obviously at some moment decided against killing Cassian but what exactly was it that changed his mind?
@@kevinw.6177 One of the only times I noticed Luthen out of disguise even slightly smile is when he is stopped by Marva's speech. In that moment, his entire existence is validated - He may never live to see the sun rise on a free galaxy, but here is a planet full of ordinary people he previously knew very little about rising in rebellion just like he hoped. It also gave him some pause on Andor. He knows Marva is his mother, so when he sees her standing up to the Empire even in death he learns just that much more about Andor that makes him reconsider killing him. I think his more grim disposition later is his realization of what all of this means. Ferrix doesn't have a chance in hell of defeating the Empire on the long term. This place, this culture, is almost certainly doomed. If not immediately, then through the slow crush of a bolstered Imperial occupation. He knows that this is what it takes to win a rebellion, and while he is happy to see his efforts bear fruit, he still knows deep down that ordinary people are going to be killed before the galaxy is free. This is the result of his conversations with Mon Mothma and Saw Guerrera: They both point out the obvious, that his heist job on the Imperial garrison is going to cause a surge in Imperial repression, an outcome that he sees as positive. It's easy to say and much harder to see in person. The way all of these threads come together and deliver much-needed depth to the Rebellion is masterful, to say the least.
This one scene in Ep. 1 of 'Andor' where Syril talks with the chubby security chief has better acting and more clever writing than anything we've seen in the whole 'Obi-Wan' show and it's kind of hilarious. It's day and night. Compared to 'Andor', 'Obi-Wan' feels like a sloppy fan-made project. The creators should be embarrassed.
@@master_samwise It's one of the first scenes in the show and it does a great job of setting the tone. It feels like a REAL CONVERSATION between two people, not awkwardly scripted exchange, like stuff in the Obi Wan show. Andor made the Star Wars universe feel REALISTIC and GROUNDED. I felt like I was watching a proper drama set in the SW universe.
Thank you for pointing out that audiences know when both Cassian *and* Obi-Wan die. The argument against Andor "why do we need a show about a guy who we know is dead" was tired and bad faith from the get-go. As you showed Andor takes that fact and builds its themes of sacrifice and tragedy in Cassian's life to build a masterpiece of a series. The Kenobi showrunners did not know how to explore these themes in Obi-Wan's story.
Worth noting though that the "we know is dead" bit does apply far more to Obi-Wan than Andor. Pretty much every single character in Obi-Wan has a canon death. The sole exception is the new Inquisitor, who as the main antagonist is pretty much guaranteed to have sufficient plot armor until the final episode. So Andor can have stakes because the other characters are at risk. Obi-Wan can't.
@@Axterix13 yeah, so many Andor characters stand under a big question mark, we do not know their fates, Maarva can die, Bix can die, Syril can die, Dedra can die, Luthen can die, the Aldhani crew, the prisoners like Kino, Birnok, Ulaf, and many more, and many of them in fact do, Andor is not scared to let go of their characters, because in conflict you lose many lives, on both sides the only solidified characters prior were Mon Mothma, Saw Gerrera, Melshi and of course Cassian also, there is so much tension regarding what happens to Cassian either way, he is the type of character where, as we see, they would put him in jail, you cant do that with Obiwan, he's a primary target hunted to kill on sight
It's really funny how the show makes Deedra an underdog and frankly rather sympathetic in the start of the show. When she was in conflict with that other officer, I was actually really hoping she'd come out on top. Then she did, and I realized "wait, that's bad". Similarly, I've never had any bad thoughts about Syrril. The poor guy is an antagonist, sure, but in the end he's just a sad, pathetic, brainwashed guy trying desperately to do what he thinks is the right thing. He's just another victim of the empire. It also doesn't help that he's pretty clearly autistic.
Yep, and that's what made Andor's Empire so good (and thus so bad) - it felt like a real bureaucracy with real people who were just doing their jobs... at least at first.
Yeah he is trying to do what he thinks is right. But moreso he is trying to do what will make his mother happy. The dichotomy between Eitie and Marva is brilliantly played. A confident and moral human is made from unconditional love of a parent. Marva has so many good lines. "Of course youll worry. Thats just what love feels like." "Tell him Ill always love him more than he can do wrong.' god that stuff is really powerful interpersonal development that we dont see anywhere else in SW. Cyril on the other hand had an overbearing and manipulative mother who raised a man without the wisdom to excel. He wanted to be seen as strong and smart and made poor decisions because of it.
@@stevebreedlove9760 Oh, I never thought of Syril's mom as a foil to Maarva, good catch. Syril is kind of Andor's opposite really - he comes from relative privilege, identifies with the current order, is a naive idealist and actually desperately wants to be the inspiring hero and leader - not out of any genuine connection to the world, but because he's a sheltered manchild who believed the propaganda. I wonder if, as Andor's character progresses towards a more high-minded, team-oriented, idealistic (but still ruthlessly pragmatic) persona, Syril will become more and more impulsive and unhinged as all of his repressed impulses take over and he tries to become some kind of rogue vigilante instead of trying to fit into the pre-established Imperial structures that rejected him. Can't wait for Season 2.
The main thing that I really like about Deedra as a villian is that she is good at her job. She is an incredibly skilled detective, but doesn't make absurd logical leaps to get to her end goal. Her work is steady and meticulous, she doesn't so much as make mistakes as she does the correct actions with the information she has. That means that the more information she gets the more dangerous she becomes. She is also fully in the belief that what she is doing is right, she is maintaining order and has the drive to keep it that way.
Kino had some of the best character moments in the prison arc. You think he’s just a hard ass, stoolie for the Empire. But you realize he cares for the men and wants to get out as much as everyone else. After he finds out no matter how hard you work or obey the Empire, you won’t get out. There is a moment of crisis and panic, but he decides to suppress it and help everyone else out of the prison.
Funny thing is, that the whole Andor story wouldn´t have happened if that one officer had listened to his superior and not investigated the death of his colleagues. With him escalating the whole situation the Imperium literally created a black powder barrel and blew it up. Drove a lot of people to the rebellion, robbed themselves of millions, lost several lives and a prison. Pretty impressive change from the status quo before in the area shown. Compare that to Obi-Wan where the start point could literally be the end point if you take out that artificial and imo uncharacteristic mental struggle of Obi-Wan.
All of that to find “justice” for two people committing and having just committed multiple crimes. As the superior officer said if the one fellow was killed it was probably because he deserved it. The Empire isn’t bad because it is powerful. It is bad because it uses that power to obviously bad ends
Well honestly just like what the rebel manifesto said rebellion was inevitable. The empire was doomed to fail like a game of chess against God. The force was not on their side.
The key to me is that no one was asking for an Andor show. Andor was fine in Rogue One, but we don't learn an awful lot about him and it is easy to see him going to the way of so many other Star Wars background characters. Meanwhile, both Obi Wan and Boba Fett are long time fan favorites. I think the big difference between Obi Wan + Boba Feet vs. Andor comes down to this distinction; Studio executives greenlit the former two because they knew that the names alone will draw in viewers, and created a story secondary to that goal which is why they feel so messy. Andor was created not because he is a fan favorite, but because its production staff had a story to tell first which they pitched to the executives second. Obi and Boba get written on the fly to fit a schedule that has nothing to do with their quality, while Andor is produced with a very concrete story already finished and ready to go, which is why everything fits together and the characters are all developed so well.
If you listen to Tony Gilroy, there was actually an alternate Andor pitch, with Cassian and K2SO going on weekly adventures over several seasons. But they couldn't make it work so they turned to Tony's more subdued, mature version of the show. There is an alternate timeline in which Andor was just another (possibly terrible) Star Wars adventure show. And by some accounts, the suits actually didn't really care about the series, leaving Gilroy and his brilliant team free reign, which is precisely what allowed it to be as good and complex as it is.
Andor is popular because there's no fan expectations so they are more forgiving of it's problems. It wasn't bogged down by fans wanting legends or popular characters to show up or take up all the screen time. When you look at Bad Batch for example the main complaints were Sev, Boss, and Fixer not showing up, or the audience having no patience. Kenobi's big complaints were the show daring to have a secondary arc with Reva and take time from Kenobi/Anakin, and having Kenobi rescue Leia instead of Luke, despite the fact that would break canon as Leia knew who he was and Luke didn't in ANH. Boba Fett, besides getting too little time to play out the story on screen, didn't match the expectation of Boba and fans were mad he didn't match the legends counterpart.
@@TheCloneTrooperJedi Expectations certainly had a part to play in the reception of the shows, but don't mistake it for being the sole reason. Andor isn't even close to as popular as the other shows in terms of audience, but anyone who did watch it with even an ounce of critical thought knew that it was vastly superior in all levels of quality than the other shows. Andor's reputation is earned in spite of its predecessors, not because of them.
@@pwh1981 Eh. I don't really see it as "vastly superior" or even superior to the others. Superior to the Sequels, but not everything else. The first episode was really bad in terms of pacing. The Character arcs were severely lacking. Who has really started to change in the show? The only difference is that it hammers home the darker tones and everything is obvious in connecting back to its main plot besides the Sister backstory. Don't mistake the different style for being superior. It may be more of what the hardcore part of the audience wants, the more openly dark show with less heroes surviving, which has less to do with the villain quality and more with the heroes being more average. Heroes in the other stories outside of the sequels: The Chosen One, the Chosen one's son, numerous Jedi, Mandalorians, a Wookie, high-end bounty hunter, elite Clone Commandos, a gifted and experienced in war princess, and two experienced smugglers. Then compare that to Andor's list: A thief, a politician, a rebel leader, and a small team of guys that pretty much all died in the one mission they took together. In going for a more vulnerable cast of heroes, there is a huge tradeoff in less interesting new characters and less developed characters in general. Let's be real for a minute. Are any of the new characters that memorable? Do they have enough personality to be recognizable? I find most, if not all, of the cast is not dynamic and more memorable for what happened to them than who they are. Character work is Andor's big weakness, and probably why it's not popular. Going back the OT, while the plot isn't the wildest and most epic, the characters are very strong and the Original Trilogy is very popular and loved. Luke Skywalker is loved, Leia and Han Solo are loved. Vader is loved. Strong Characters make it easy to forgive a mild plot. while the style of the plot where everything immediately and obviously connects back may fit more with people desiring instant gratification, I know I at least find it much more rewarding to have strong characters and have to wait and puzzle out where the story is going. The lack of popularity isn't coming from a lack of exposure, it's coming from the weakness of the characters, and this story just doesn't connect as well as others.
By episode 3 of Andor you interested in what is going to happen. By episode 6 your convinced by the action. By episode 10 your invested by the politics. By episode 12 your emotionally involved in the story. The episodes in between go to make sure each of those feelings are earned.
I was interested the minute Cassian killed the only remaining witness to his accidental murder while he was begging for his life on his knees. No other show would have the balls to do that, and it was the instant I knew this show was going to not only be good, but different.
That's exactly what my problem was with Kenobi and what I loved about Andor. One show takes the time period and the threat of the Empire seriously and one doesn't. This time period is when the Empire should be at its most dangerous, where Jedi are hunted and murdered, where people are mercilessly killed left and right if you step one wrong way out of line. And I fully believe that is the case in Andor where we can actually see why the Empire held its hold on the galaxy for twenty years as opposed to Kenobi where none of that tension, danger and intense moments actually happen as effectively. In Andor, the Empire is a massive threat with intelligence, ruthlessness, and multiple resources to keep everyone at its mercy. Something we see often with how the writers have the Empire's ships fight in space or the scenes with the ISB where they actively discuss strategy and capture in an intelligent and fascinating manner. None of that exists in Kenobi. Everyone in the Empire is a fucking idiot. Every single one of them and it's infuriating. Unless it's Reva who is somehow smarter than everyone in there including the Grand Inquistor who has more experience and patience with hunting Jedi and it doesn't make any sense. I can't believe these two shows came out in roughly the same time frame. It's like night and day.
Andor is the first time on the screen since ROTJ, arguably ESB that the empire has actually carried an air of oppression, and that's why the conflict feels so much less contrived
I think the absolute best showcase of Imperial incompetence is in Andor, and it's not even inherent incompetence. The fact that the Empire spends so much time hunting Cassian, not knowing they've literally had him in prison that whole time. It doesn't go to show how incompetent they are completely, but it shows how bloated the Empire has become, and how their system, while effective for now, simply cannot hold up. As Nemik said, tyranny requires constant effort, and Dedra had already noticed the Empire become complacent.
To be fair to the Empire, there is no "Cassian Andor" imprisoned in their prison. He was arrested and sentenced under his fake identity name Keef Girgo.
thank you for making these. It’s encouraging to know that good star wars is still possible, I wish andor had gotten the massively positive reception it deserves
The main issue I have with the Reva interrogation scene is an issue with many of the Leia scenes. And that is that the kid doesn't seem to react to her surroundings. At the start of the story she's a precocious kid at home, then removed from her comfortable life and forced into many strange and scary situations she remains the precocious kid. So Reva just comes across as a joke trying and failing to scare a small child. Yep she kind of gets scared when she's taken to the torture chair, but it's ok because revas distracted because there's a call for her on line 2.
Late to this, but I think Leia's reaction could've been justified if the writers hadn't ignored a very obvious major plot conflict that irked me from the start: Leia is the daughter of a well-off and prominent senator and a queen, and the young Empire still has a moral authority in the eyes of some citizens - specifically those in Leia's parents' circles. If those people heard that the empire kidnapped little Princess Leia and harmed her in some way, the Empire would lose financial and political support on those planets. I think it would've helped the scene a great deal for Leia - a prominent daughter of politicians who would have been briefed on kidnapping protocol - argued that point to Reva. If they'd done that, it would've helped explain why Leia acts like she's mostly safe this whole time; she thinks her political standing will protect her from outright attack from the Empire. Then it could've changed if/when Reva says she could just make Leia disappear. It would make Reva more menacing too as she would literally be threatening a little girl with death or a lifetime of imprisonment instead of vague frustrated threats of pain. I get the feeling the little actress didn't have much in the way of director's guidance for nearly all of her scenes, but that could've been the turning point of her performance since her course of action would've been a lot more clear and given her a new emotion to show other than slightly bratty arrogance (once again, director's & writers' fault, not actress).
A huge problem for Reva as a character is she literally could not win any of her conflicts. She has a conflict against: - The Grand Inquistor. He is guaranteed to survive because he has a major story arc later on. - Fifth Brother. Same. - Darth Vader. She never had the remotest chance of laying a finger on him. - Obi-Wan. Guaranteed to make it out alive, and unscathed in major ways. - Leia. Totally fine in appearances just a few years down the line. Essentially, there are a few side characters here and there she could hurt, or even really affect. In contrast, with the exception of Cassian, Mon Mothma, and Melshi, there are almost no major characters that are guaranteed to make it out of Andor unscathed. When Bix is dragged into that interrogation with Dedra, we have no idea if she's coming out alive. When Leia is facing Reva, we know nothing can happen to her, so the scene is doomed from the start.
Why I'm not a hug fan of prequals anywhere, especially when they do a "OMG Did he survive this encouter? Find out next episode!". He's still alive in later movies! Of course he's fine!!!
I still can't believe Andor was this good given that it came from modern disney, it's genuinely exeptional and it's... sad, Andor didn't make much money, so the studio will probably take greater control in season 2 and nutor it like they did with everything else.
I don't think that will happen - it's already halfway through filming. And it IS the final series - so there's no need to ruin it just so that it might persuade people to watch a non-existant season 3. Besides, that's not how these streaming services make money They have a limited pool of resources that they divide up between shows - the better overall quality of the shows, the more people will subscribe and add to the pool of resources. If some shows clearly aren't popular, they get cancelled in advance of the next series so that the money can go to other/new shows. Andor has not been cancelled - the money is already spent, and it WILL be broadcast. Tony and Diego seem very happy with the way things are going In the long run, this show will be a jewel in the Disney+ crown that might help get them more subscribers
You mentioned Nari, and I was like "who?" and had to rewind. Wow, poor Obi Wan was a totally forgettable show, apparently. Meantime, I'm slowly rewatching Andor and just as enthralled as I was the first time around.
You’ve managed to make me love ‘Andor’ and dislike ‘Kenobi’ even more. Your point about interrogators telling the truth vs lying was excellent and something I’d never considered when thinking about these scenes. Side note, As cliché as this sounds, keep up the good work. 👍
One small contention, Deedra *did* play mind games and effectively lie to Bix. First, she lied before Bix was even brought into the room by telling the assistants to keep Pak tied to the chair so he could be hauled off in front of her; this isn’t so much a lie as it is a scare tactic, a way to hide your efficiency, and it isn’t really part of the interrogation itself. But she does essentially lie later, as she implies via the fish analogy that she would let Bix go if she confesses and gives her not necessarily Andor but Luthen (as that’s who they were really after); the reality is that she not only would be tortured anyway to confirm if what she said was true and not just a scapegoat from said torture, but also likely she would die anyway like Pak did, if not just get shipped off anyway to a prison- I mean slavery center as she would be admitting to being a thief. The really important part of this for your point and massively for the show’s credit and anyone who saw it is that Bix *saw through the lie*. Her entire point of “You’re ISB, the worst of the worst” is that she knows no matter what she says, there’s no escape, so she is just trying to endure. We don’t see her identify positively or negatively Kreeger as Luthen, we don’t even get to see if she is tortured again afterwards (though the officer’s way of saying “or we’ll get Gorst back here” heavily implies she would be), but we see her perhaps even more broken when Andor arrives to rescue her. She was just trying to survive, because that’s all she could do, until she was rescued just like Andor was, by Andor, so maybe she can help the rebellion in season 2.
I imagine not much time passed from ep 11 to the finale ep 12. Not enough time for Dr. Gorst to be recalled back to Ferrix. Cause he was not present when the riots occured.
@@westwardstar1686 There was enough time for Luthen to go talk to go from Coruscant to talk to Saw and come back to Ferrix, Dedra to come to Ferrix, Syril to learn super late and come back to Ferrix, and of course Andor to go to several planets before coming back to Ferrix. They would have interrogated her again before the Spellhouse attack which was long before, and Dedra had previously interrogated remotely as well, so no reason Ghorst even if he didn’t have the time to come out and leave again couldn’t have just played the screaming again remotely as well. He is also a very minor character that is only in one scene and only referenced once again in another (by Dedra), so I wouldn’t put it past them to just not show an explicit death scene like they did say for Nurchi. From a storytelling point, why imply they would interrogate her again if they aren’t going to for anyway for good measure? It’s not like you can say “well the writers of this show aren’t expecting you to think about these things” like the rest of Disney Star Wars.
Some effective things in Andor that I've not seen before Deidra has left her previous subject for Bix to see as she is brought in, then turning on the guards telling them to clear him out. The silence as the torture headset is placed on Bix's head, her shaking, and finally letting out an agonizing scream.
I think the general theme with the success of these shows is that when Disney knows they don't need to put in any effort to garner interest in a show, they don't, whereas if it's a relatively unknown character that they're covering, they put a lot more effort towards them. Just look at the tv shows with previously no-name characters as their main characters, Andor, Mandalorian Season 1&2, Bad Batch, Rogue One and then compare them to the shows that were too big to fail, Kenobi, Book of Boba Fett, and even Mando season 3 and Solo to a degree.
I always wondered whats this stupid bait and switch tactic. But now I see exactly what you're talking about. All the shows I thought would be good 4 years ago were all lackluster, and the few shows I said "lol what? Who cares why is this a thing?" Ended up being the best pieces of Disney's Star wars.
@@alexandercorbett3095 Solo being bad fits the theme. Mando got progressively worse as he got popular. Ahsoka as a somewhat popular character was pretty mid.
that's a little bit too cynical for my taste - to me it seemed to believe its own hype a little bit too much, in the same way the sequel trilogy sometimes did.
Ironically it was the Andor show runners that were openly not huge Star Wars fans. Too often fanatics get lost in their obsession and reverence for the IP they're working on, so instead of an earnest attempt at creating an original story with in the IP what often comes out is derivative fan fiction; like a child playing with action figures.
The writing in Kenobi is so bad I started watching it just for how hilariously stupid it was. Still, it fulfilled its entire purpose of 'something new' with 'an old feel'. I like to imagine the entire benefit of the third sister story arc within the show was to give us that ultra badass Vader moment where he goes back into putting the smack down on younglings. That show also reminded me of how much actual "Jedi" story they could be squeezing out of this time period where Kenobi has just said his goodbye to Leia.. but that I'd rather see a youngish Master Luke along side other trainers at a Jedi Academy instead of just fast forwarding through it til he's an old man. Andor seems like a show where I honestly can't figure how entertaining it can possibly be. If it's not just filled with political themes then I might watch it, but I honestly can't think of any reason I'd want to if it's like some small story within the story that doesn't really include any popular characters.
The seeds were there but it never blossomed into anything substantial because of the way they wrote it. All they had to do was make an emotional, gripping and heartbreaking story of two damaged souls that were pushed down different paths by bad choices and circumstances. How One Man comes back to the force and how one is at this point just unreachable. It was all ready for them and they just completely screwed it up.
Tension was the first thing that struck out to me in Andor. I think we've been fortunate to have such excellent examples of how to build tension recently with Andor, Macbeth (2021) and Chernobyl (2019). Great how Andor shares actors with both shows.
If the Obi Wan Kenobi series had the same level of writing as Andor had, while still keeping its more light-hearted tones and connections to the greater story, it would have been a phenomenal show
hot take, it’s the best star wars period. “but we wouldn’t have it if not for the OT” yeah, but does that make the OT better? nah. Some of it is up to personal preference, but andor is better written, shot, acted, and a bunch more
To be fair I think the last 4 episodes of Clone Wars were just as good, although they had been scripted and storyboarded before Disney took over. The two shows are very different but I think both did what they were supposed to do extremely well.
I love how the constant back and forth in this video just shows how Andor is filmed at a movie level of quality and Obi Wan is the cheap tv show that it really was.
The way Kenobi's arc was written was just bizarre. They have this scene in the Inquisitor Fortress where Kenobi acts as if he has finally found the resolve to reconnect with the Force and use it to save Leia. I'm just like: Didn't he do this already in an earlier episode? Kenobi went through the same arc twice in the same show. Wtf? It's like this show was reshot during production to move the turning point for Kenobi to a different part of the story, but they forgot to re-edit the previous turning point scene out.
Also, Denise Gough, voice actor for Yennefer in Witcher 3, is FANTASTIC at playing this kind of character. Of course the writing plays a huge part (Anakin's dialog from the Prequels has entered the chat). However, Denise also has HUGE chops for playing this sort of ruthless character, which only served to increase the contrast between Reeva and Deedra's interrogation scenes.
Playing Witcher 3 in anything but Polish takes out a lot of immersion and atmosphere. It can also change our view of a character. In English version Bloody Baron sounds like a generic dickish drunkard who doesn't care about anyone making it hard to emphasise with him. In Polish version however he sounds like a broken man that's constantly mourning and regretting decisions he made.
@@sauronplugawy3866 Its the same as watching a movie that was translated to another language, with either a voice over or re-recorded lines, it isn't how the writers intended for it to be, and lowers the overall quality
One underrated thing was the scientist dude. He looks so into what he does and like a kid with a science project. Completely devoid of empathy but with a touch of creepiness of getting off on the torture. That really sent shivers down my spine
What Andor did really well compared to other Star Wars shows/movies is that they didn't try to create tension with characters we already know make out okay in the end. We already knew how and when Cassian dies, so there is no point in the writers threatening him with death. Instead, they use him as a point of view or a window to watch other characters around him develop and watch Andor become close to these people, only for them to die or break. On the other hand, the fights between Kenobi and Vader were all spectacle but barely any substance. While it was heartbreaking to listen to Vader say "I am what you made me" and "Anakin is gone. I am what remains" (I'm pretty sure those were lines), the fights themselves were for the most part pointless. At least with the first fight in the third episode it was mainly to make Kenobi realize what Anakin had turned into and made him fear Vader. The second fight in the last episode mainly just tried to recreate a similar feeling with the Anakin vs. Obi Wan fight in Rots.
Not sure if I'll be able to do that, as it's hard to talk about music without playing samples, which tends to open up the video for copyright issues, but it's worth exploring.
my favorite parts are the experimentality of Nicholas Brittell's score, the opening music of Niamos was such a shock and its SOOO GOOD, immediately felt the summer vibe in a sci-fi setting, and then the Shoretrooper uptempo, chefs kiss bro
@@alexo_pog it is one of my go to tracks when I wanna get pumped. The remix of that score plays in the brothel in the first episode and both are on the soundtrack.
I searched up Andor vs Obi-wan content because I thought you were done talking about Andor for good. I never make comments but I love your vids and I was hoping you'd make another one, and I swear when I looked up "Andor" I was visibly exicited to see you dropped a vid, FOURTEEN minutes from when I ramdomly decided to search it up. Keep up the great work! (btw Bright Reds or Yellows in thumbnails are proven to catch the Eyes of viewers with more success and things like red arrows and circles work just as well!)
@@littlesupergugel4382 Wasn't calling his thumbnails boring or anything, just in the pursuit of making my own channel I recently came across that piece of information and thought it was worth sharing, especially for growing channels.
@@Winnie_Deanie I completely understand that! I didn't assumed that you called it bringt, don't worries:) I just think that these kind of clickbaiting thumbnailes just seem so unserious... but maybe that because youtube germany is especially strong in that game and I don't like the Germans youtuber who do all this red circle etc. things.. Good luck with your channel!
Well, this was excellent, much like your others in the series. I am sharing it around at work (game dev studio) as a piece of education on story telling, as I find the comparison between the two shows aboslutely ideal! Idea for a topic in the next episode: forshadowing and existing lore. To have good character arcs, tension, and especially the release moment, one must handle forshadowing extremely well. Both shows, as mentioned in this video, have a LOT of unintential forshadowing due to the fact that they are prequels/inserted stories within a known cannon. Which means, a lot of the world they show, has been hinted that, or explored deeply, in existing lore. Badly written shows tend to have terrible forshadowing, it's usually overly obvious or, much worse, it isn't there at all. Making the denouement feel like a bad joke only the writers knew about. Good forshadowing is subtle, hidden within layers of dialogue, actor behaviour/expression, or even better, in the set themselves! Now, one of the hardest thing to do, is bring a shocker to an audience with zero forshadowing, and nail the "OMFG" moment nevertheless. Honestly, I am struggle to think of one beyond this one scene in Andor: "I can't swim." That scene floored me. The build up was perfection, the tension on point, the character arc absolutely perfect, and then they drop a nuke on the viewer without having made a single hint before. None. (some may argue that this was a reason why the character was so against escaping at first, but I find that to be way too weak as forshadowing). It's just a bomb. And it's perfect. These moments are orchestrated to stay in your minds forever. People will joke around and use this one liner in thei lives. This is how movies make it into culture (without being mocked). Another such moment, and much more forshadowed, is the fight at the end - brick with dead lady's name on it, smashed in face by an (until then) quite gentle giant. Perfection. Good forshadowing is a sign of a well constructed story, where the writer(s) knew that they were doing from the beginning - which makes an insert show even HARDER, as you have to account for all the already existing lore. Another fantastic show that did this well, is the Norsemen prequel, absolutely hilariously brilliant.
I'm glad you enjoyed it! I will have to consider foreshadowing as a topic worth exploring. That would require a lot of thought and time, but it definitely is an intriguing subject.
The ISB Boss types have always been more intimidating than ANY Inquisitor. The Inquisitors in Rebels were below the level of Padawans and except for the Grand Inquisitor, they were threatening because of their power not because of screen presence.
Just found your channel a week ago and have already watched all your Star Wars videos. You've instantly become my favorite Star Wars TH-camr. Thanks for posting all these great, entertaining videos!
Despite knowing that Syril Karn and Dedra Meero were the antagonists, I was rooting for them much of the show. Not because they were working for the "bad guys" and against the "good guys," but because they were trying to do their jobs and kept getting stifled by beauracracy at every turn. I saw myself in them--and that's crucial for tension. Because I cared about the characters and the circumstances they were in, I was invested in the show. And I appreciated that the "good guys" weren't completely innocent and pure, either. They had blood on their hands for trying to do the right thing, and there were consequences for their actions, regardless of their intentions. Andor, more than any other Disney Star Wars show or film, has real people that I can really relate to. 😊
Looking at another franchise, Star Trek The Next Gerneration two part episode "Chain of Command" is an excellent play in prisoner and interrogator. Andor is just so smartly written and doesn't dumb it down for it's audience. Watching the OG Star WArs when I was 7, I had no idea what the hell they were talking about in their political ramblings but I got the sense it wasn't good. And I think that's fine because it's something the viewer can learn to appreciate later.
Andor is just so good i rushed it in one day. Of course the plot is that the Empire is evil but at least we dont get that stupid and cliche idea of evil, we see a power structure strugling with real state problems, we see caracters like Dedra, wich are goddamn well constructed, work as heroes for their own cause. We see empire officers actually doing good work, and not being just a bunch of amateurs following nonsense orders, while we also see rebels, wich were supposed to be the pure good guys, having to make cruel decisions in order to achieve their goals, because, its a war. The tension, the action, the roughless reality of conflict, and the will to survive of both sides, just makes this series the perfect picture of what is Star Wars.
This is good analysis, and I wish it had more views. People know something is amiss, but the dominant fandom reaction is "It's KK and her politics! If we could just get rid of her, everything would be fine!" If KK spontaneously combusted tomorrow, these shows would still suck because these writers are absolute hacks. She hired Gilroy and clearly must have left him the F alone, and he produced a masterpiece, so explain that. Its not just her. And while all this is going on Filoni and Favreau are twin Space Jesuses who can do no wrong. That, and the franchise is being choked to death by a canon (Ive come to hate the term) established largely in cartoons written for children. Ive read a few interviews with Filoni, and its clear he thinks we're all idiots. He talks about the wish to cram as many characters as he can into this new movie, and how thrilling it was to work with Ahmed Best. Gimme an f'ing break. Compare that to what Gilroy talks about when asked. These people are not at all in the same league, and in spite of that, garbage like TBoBF out performs Andor. I honestly think it's hopeless.
The worst part of the duel against Vader is that Obi-Wan had him AT HIS MERCY, and fully realized the fact that his friend was truly dead...and he still couldnt finish him. Obi-Wan had good reason to believe Anakin died on Mustafar without finishing him off, but now, he is partially responsible for all the blood on Vader's hands after this point. He could have ended him and chose not to. You could claim "not the Jedi way," but that makes the Jedi moral cowards for being unwilling to do what's necessary: putting pure evil down to keep the rest of the galaxy safe. Besides, while Dooku could have reasonably been taken prisoner in Episode 3, Vader couldn't have been here. There should have been something else that interrupted their fight or some outside force that prevented Obi-Wan from tearfully executing Vader.
Dedra was a much needed bresh of fresh air amongst all the clowns, losers and traitors the Imperials are usually portrayed as in disney sw content. She stood out like a light house in the endless sea of incompetence. I hope that we get more actually dangerous villains like her.
You know what it is, a subconscious instinctive unaware use of the Force to protect herself, explains everything, explains plot armor, Storm troopers missing. If only the writers could also be aware of it and take it into account.
In a weird way, fans knew better what to expect from Andor than from ObiWan. Andor was likely to show how he became a rebel, while ObiWan more or less had to end where it started. In that way, ObiWan was doomed to stagnation. All it did was preseve the status quo: Protect the kids and stay on Tatooine. On a personal note I was negatively surprised that ObiWan, one of the greatest Jedi ever, was somehow degraded to whatever this was, just to let him magically rediscover the force on his own when you had Qui-Gon's ghost RIGHT THERE.
I definitely hadn't given it much thought when I finished Kenobi, but since watching your previous two episodes and finishing Andor, I definitely found myself supporting and enjoying Andor way more. And I'm also wanting and excited for a S2 of Andor, whereas I literally could not care less if Kenobi is just the 6 episodes.
10k soon! Glad I subscribed, your thoughtful analysis is refreshing and brings up challenges with these stories while not being overly negative. Also fun to hear someone not talking to their audience like 10 year olds who need explosions and superpowers for a Star Wars story to be engaging.
@@master_samwise i think your commentary is very balanced considering the content you are critiquing. There aren’t attacks at actors or crew, even though the writing is under heavy scrutiny you don’t name the writers. It doesn’t point fingers, it sheds light. Full honesty, it made me really sad watching this fandom hurl words at Reva’s actress despite how large an issue the narrative was. Keep up the good work man, we need more direct commentators like you. Hopefully someone up top sees how deeply we care about these shows!
You know whats funny..... I always believed prequels are very hard to invoke tension because most of the characters you can pretty much KNOW their fates if you seen the sequels beforehand. But somehow Phantom Menace did what Obi Wan failed...and that was the tension
They give Kino such a phenomenal character arc in such a short period of time. He seems very much the standard Empire stoolie foreman at first, but as the mundane horror of living in the prison unfolds you see he does care about his people, even if it comes out in the wrong way, trying to earn his and their way out. But then as the obvious tension increases and people around him start to question it, he gets increasingly reactive; for reasons unclear he seems determined to earn his way out and refuses to believe he can't. Until the moment he learns that nobody ever earns their way out - and after a short time of watching his entire world break down, he quietly shifts to helping and then leading the escape. And his final three lines reveal a hidden cause for the whole thing. He saw the water on the way in, he knew he could never escape, he knew his only hope was getting released so he HAD to believe he could get out, even as it grows doubtful. Only when that hope is broken does he change - he now knows that no matter what he will die in this prison, so he might as well die trying to break it. When he says "I would rather die fighting them than giving them what they want" he truly meant it. And the last we see of him is the look of joy at winning, at getting people out alive, turning to resigned disappointment. Hell, I even like the unnamed prisoner who is coming down the elevator in the prison break. He doesn't know anything about this prison, these people, their breakout. He doesn't know a single one of these people or have any real reason to care. But when he sees them turn from meagre resistance to actual riot, he immediately joins in, fighting for vital time so they can jam the lift before it gets him killed. In ten seconds I felt more for this one random guy than for entire secondary characters in other shows.
The difference between these two villains is crazy. When the Kenobi trailer came out I was intrigued by the new inquisitor Reva. Now I didnt hate the show- kindve been better in a lot of areas. But her character came across as meh. At the end I was just waiting for Vader execute her....only for her to still survive. I still say its asinine that Reva survived Vader after plotting against him and openly attacking him while 2nd Sister gets axed for less!! Whatever Same thing for Dedra. I was like oh snap who is this polished, professional Imp officer in the trailer. Denise Gough slayed that role in the show. And yes Im willing to admit I felt real fear for her life when she went down during the riot. Seeing her desperatley crawl in the dirt....I felt like I was there lol the whole riot felt sooo real/chaotic. The cherry on top was her acting aftering being saved. Her intense shaking, vulnerability. Her determined, polished, ambitious front that held for every episode got broken in the finale. Excellant villain. Cant wait for S2.
I really don't know what they were trying to accomplish with the Obi-Wan series, and I feel they didn't either. I was really hoping to get a series where they strictly focused on the inner battles Obi-Wan and Anakin were going through as a master dealing with a student who descended into darkness and the student who feels he was betrayed by his master and killed the love of his life. Building up to who they were in the Last Hope.
andor stands easily on its own, even if it wasnt star wars. the only thing kenobi has is being star wars and everyone loving obi-wan going for it. i think what i love most about andor is how it fills out the background of sw, it gives really good insight into how the universe works. it's so many small pieces working to give you a big picture, wheras obi wan needs to steal attention with big pieces all the time, be that obiwan, leia, inquisitors or vader.
Andor is what Star Wars needs right now Just like first season of The Mandalorian Something completely new, not relying on nostalgia, Skywalker, Obi-wan
The major difference between the two scenes I find is also the kind of force that is employed and who it is applied to. In Kenobi we have a grown woman trying threaten outright physical torture on a child, the watcher knows that Kenobi isn't the kind of show to go that dark especially if you're meant to be rooting for Reva's redemption arc. Andor on the other hand has both Dedra and Bix be on even ground as both are adult females, but more importantly is that there is a subversion of the kind of torture being threatened. You would expect there to be physical violence, and that would fit in with what the show thus far has shown to be capable of, but it subverts that and goes for mental torment instead; which as an added kick isn't even explicitly shown to the viewer who must fill in the gaps themselves.
Andor was like a 12-episode heart attack, lol. The tension was so thick that you never knew when the other shoe was going to drop. I know shows are subjective, but I really don't get Star Wars fans who say they were bored.
If Disney gives Star Wars to Gilroy and his team, it will succeed wildly. But we know it won't happen. Too many egos in conflict at Lucasfilm and Disney. Now that's a Hollywood intrigue story that will need telling in time!
All Star Wars doesn’t have to be the same. There can be space fantasy pew pew Star Wars too, that I doubt Gilroy would be interested in. Disney just needs to up their writing, and loose its obsession with celebrity cameos and nostalgia
I don't think that just because he made one good series he should suddenly be in charge of all of it, nor that he would want to. By all accounts Gilroy doesn't care about Star Wars, he just wanted to tell this one story that aligned with his interests and he'll be off to do his own thing after that, and I respect that a lot. Andor is tonally completely unlike anything else in the series and that's great, but it's not really what SW is at its core - which is fun western/fantasy/samurai/WW2 pulp with memorable characters. At this point I'm so tired of Star Wars that I don't care what they're going to do next. As long as it's in Disney's hands, it will always be a half-assed, soulless corporate product first and foremost. I don't watch any of the shows unless they actually get good reviews (Mando S1 & S2, Andor) and I stopped watching the movies after The Last Jedi. If someone else does something cool with it again - great, but I wouldn't shed a tear if the franchise died tomorrow. We've had enough Star Wars already, and most of it is pretty shit.
Beautiful. Love these juxtapositions so much! I remember being a bit cautious starting Andor, especially with the slow burn, but when it came to the parts where they showed two different leaders competently engaging with and calling out their directs I was officially intrigued. In many movies and shows we typically see focal characters being clearly right while their leader seems dumb and rash in rejecting their theories or choices, but Andor wrote in some great, believable dialogue as well as good leadership (both for the police and the ISB). After that unfolded I began to feel officially invested and curious. There were also complexities to all of the goings-on that actually required you to think, and so not only were you invested in the characters, you were also trying to keep track of all the details as each thread played out -- another great way to put the audience in suspense! ...As you said, complex, mature, and enthralling 😃 Another skillfully composed video essay. Thank you, sir. (By the way, I literally just quoted Sid to myself earlier today and your reference made me so happy lol 😂)
you're correct in your analysis that Andor's pacing and tension were simply better, but we must remember that while both set in the SW universe, these two show were geared towards and advertised for two very different audiences. Obi-Wan Kenobi was certainly more family friendly, while in Andor we had: a character say "shit" for the first time in SW, there's also a confirmed booty-call. Andor was clearly made for adult OG star wars fans and therefore the story requires more tension.
reva makes me want to fall asleep, neero makes me want to abandon the land I love and seek asylum in another continent because of hwo fucking terrifying she is
Thank you for the video and the analysis. Very well done indeed. I completely agree with you on all accounts. Obi-Wan really fails to deliver most of the time. Clunky dialogs, no tension built up, rushed scenes and problems with continuity… to mention a few problems. I had the feeling that it was too short. Maybe with 2-3 episodes more it could’ve been good. Not to say everything about is bad, the scene where Darth Vader walks the streets trying to flush Obi-Wan out is really well done for example. Andor is just great, everything about it honestly. It really succeeds in storytelling. Leaves open possibilities, some Easter eggs, and masters in the built-up preparation for the final episode of the season also setting up the next season. It’s everything that Obi-Wan could’ve/should’ve been. Looking forward for season 2, to say the least.
Appreciate your comparative analyses of Kenobi and Andor. Keep up the good work. Dedra is a professional who is cold and calculating while Reva comes across as an amateur who doesn’t control her emotions very well.
Every character in Andor is the hero of their own story. Syril is the brave crusading cop fighting the corruption and apathy of his bosses to go after the cold blooded murderer of his colleagues. He doesn't know Cassian is the hero of another film.
Excellent analysis! I hadn't thought about comparing the two shows beyond simply "Star Wars Disney Plus shows" but I like the similarities you highlighted and made good on the overall theme of tension! Me gusta.
The writers had to throw a token integration of Leia in the story because they had to connect all the fan service dots to the OT and Leia resisted torture on the death star
I think another major issue that the Obi wan series faced, that a lot of people seem to have forgotten about is that Rebels already had an Obi Wan arc in it. And not only that but it was the conclusion to Maul and Obi Wan's storyline, so the show not only had to figure out a way to create a new compelling story around Obi Wan who is supposed to stay on Tatooine but was also going to be compared to the already existing well done Obi Wan in exile story.
Relying on nostalgia and fan service is pretty much everything Disney spew out at the moment, whether it's the multiverse of previous-actors-to-play-the-same-character, or Favreau and Filoni's obsession with cameos and Tatooine They need to just get back to good writing, which Andor proved can be done, because nostalgia is a one trick pony that can only hide so much
I like how if you watch the Kenobi series then go straight into A New Hope, you got Vader walking around with a downgraded suit and helmet. Shit looks like a halloween costume. I like to pretend it was a temp suit he got off Amazon after Kenobi jacked up the last one, and he'd just been rocking it ever since for all those years.
Andor doesn't put Andor in situations where the audience is supposed to worried he's going to die. They don't put him in situations where you're wondering if he's about to blow up the Death Star. Kenobi has Obi Wan fight Darth Vader multiple times while the audience knows full well that nothing can happen. They did not need to do this. It wasn't a foregone conclusion that you'd do that if you were writing a script to tell Obi Wan's story that he would have a pointless fight. Obi Wan could have been entirely about him facing a villain that had nothing to do with Vader. Obi Wan is not THE VADER SLAYER GUY, he's a character that does many things and, primarily, is a teacher. Both of Anakin and then Luke. He's a wise, contemplative guy that searches for truth and wisdom, torn between Qui Gon and Yoda's schools of Jedi theological thought within the order of monks that he belongs to. The order has been destroyed but he lives on, the universe is being ruled by an evil empire but he's in hiding, and his sole purpose is to protect a child whom he has responsibility over. That's a lot. What do we do with him? UHHHH IDK HE FIGHTS DARK FATHER WITH A LASER SORD BECUZ THAT'S ALL HE IS.
One of the big things that made Andor's scene more concerning was that we have no previous knowledge of Bix, but we know Leia will be just fine. Leia will be a scarless, able bodied, fully mentally functional person in another 8 years or so because she is one of the main characters of the movie we've all seen. Bix however was no one to us previously. Bix could be dismembered, flayed, left a drooling mess and it would contradict nothing. Anything could happen to her, nothing could happen to Leia- it is hard to be concerned for someone we know will be just fine. This is the problem with watching Star Wars since it is so often produced out of chronological order, we know that characters won't have anything too bad happen to them because they are just fine in the future. There can be no tension where there is no danger.
The fact that Reeva legitimately believes that a 10 year old knows the location of the secret Rebel base the entire Imperial army has been searching for is absolutely baffling. Literally the ONLY reason Leia is involved in any of this is because YOU had her kidnapped! 2 days ago she had never been off of Alderaan! Why would you believe she knows anything about the rebellion?!
Thanks for taking the time and effort to make this video! I feel like the first section of your video dragged on far too long and didn’t build any “tension” for me to want to watch the rest of the video. I’m actually not sure it was entirely necessary, since there weren’t any examples where I could go “oh yeah, you’re totally right! That was (good/bad) use of tension!” And so I already forgot the many truths that you listed off as “good”. The idea of comparing these two shows is really good and I hope you keep making videos!
While I can appreciate the thought and analysis that goes into them, and I think some of the points made are valid - what I think is lacking from these videos reviewing Star Wars media, is the recognition that different Star Wars media is produced for different audiences. It's not that one product is bad and another product is good - they're intended for different parts of Star Wars fandom. If you love one show or film, and didn't like another ... that's probably why.
Andor antagonists: “Tell me where Andor is or else I will torture you with mind-crushing technology that will make you squeal like a bantha!” 👿 Reva: “Haha little princess girl goes brr!” 🤪
I remember seeing people meme on the 'Are you a fish or a thief' line from Dedra when the first trailers for Andor were coming out, saying it sounded dumb and calling it bad dialogue writing. Turns out context is important, because that scene is chilling and the dialogue over the whole show was amazing.
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I think is funny that Dedra, a completely regular human without any kind of force powers, can terrify another full grown adult, but Reva, a literal inquisitor, completely fails at scaring an 8 year old.
Because the audience and Leia both knew the same thing, that the inquisitor wouldn't have the balls to seriously hurt a very young child. Whereas everyone knew Dedra was serious.
And the fact that reva as an inquisitor like the others was suppose to kidnap force sensitive children but yet she didn’t even suspect that leia was force sensitive and kept one in captive without realising . She did worst than the other inquisitors who kidnapped force sensitive kids.
Another overlap with andor and kenobi series is that the target that the empire was trying to find happens to be held captive without them knowing. In andor the isb agents was trying to look for cassian but yet he was apprehended and was sent to an imperial prison to do labor without the isb ever noticing.
In kenobi, leia was kidnapped and held captive by the inquisitors without them knowing that leia was force sensitive. the inquisitors were trying to kidnap force sensitive children while killing off the last remaining jedi.
Its a pretty weird thing to notice about the galactic empire in these two series
Moses Ingram didn’t deserve all that hate but Reva was just not very intimidating as a character
@@gojulas2009 But...Vader never sensed Leia's force sensitivity either.
Reeva simply isn't intimidating as she's never going to succeed. Leia is never in any real danger, she's not remotely a threat to Vader and she'll never harm Luke. At no point do I believe she's a threat to Kenobi or most of the cast. So everything feels like empty posturing.
It's crazy how Andor invented a G-rated way of torture that's more terrifying than physical torture
Really showed the creativity of the writing.
Hardly g-rated
@@liamlb6636 all they did was put a headphone on her, with 0 violences what so ever, so in terms of presentation it is G-rated
I don’t know if the dying screams of the children of an alien race being genocided should be considered g-rated.
Definitely fucking horrifying tho.
Yeah
I was a little shocked when I eventually realized I was rooting for Deedra. "Wait, she's an imperial officer, why am I rooting for her?" And then it makes you question yourself when Deedra turns out to be a disgusting person.
You were rooting for Deedra? That’s fascinating! That’s the first time I’ve heard or saw someone do that. I was rooting against her but I found her really interesting. Her psychotic and evil nature made me not root for her but I still found her fascinating regardless.
@@willpower8289 I at least did root for her early on, when she was having quarrels with the other Imperial dude while it was clear to us that she had the right ideas about the formation of a rebel group!
Afterwards I of course wasn't rooting for her anymore, but I do really love her character
@gaetanonclin7205 Same here. Sometimes I've even felt sympathy for her. When the chief ISB officer called out her rival coworker for his "lack of vision" and congratulated Deedra I was like "Hell yeah!". And then the episode with Bix happened and it made me realize she was pure evil. I'm excited about what's gonna happen to her next season.
@@willpower8289 a lot of people rooted for her because she brought logic and reason to the ISB meetings while everyone else was worried about crossing each other’s lines. We know she’s right, we know the threads she is pulling leads to something bigger.
I've actually heard a lot of reviewers say they were rooting for her, which tbh always confused me cuz I was rooting against her from the beginning - she was already clearly both evil and just a massive threat to the rebellion
I think the Dedra/Bix interrogation scene also adds to the tension later because it establishes that if the Empire gets its hands on Andor, he WILL talk because of the means they have, so the motivation of Luthen, Vel, and Cinta to kill him for opsec is much more understandable than a more loose “eh, we just need to tie up loose ends”
Wow that's brilliant. Every detail is so well thought out in this show.
She is too young, bratty, and spoiled to be intimidated. Also she doesn't know better, which makes her spunk humorous for us the audience and establishes that she doesn't give a F*ck. Remember her stoicism when one of the most intimidating people in the Galaxy Darth Vader threatens her and literally blows up her home planet. And her 5' 1" ass didn't shed a tear.
Andor really reminds you how interesting your bad guys can be. Deedra is an awful person but intriguing cause she poses an actual threat to the characters around the protagonist. You actively fear for them cause you see the antagonist ever so slowly closing in on them. Her honesty makes her even more threatening, you know she will follow through with her threats.
That's one of the things I loved most about Andor: the antagonists (Cyril and Deedra) felt like real people working within a real bureaucracy. They (especially Cyril) were deserving of some audience sympathy, as both were really just trying to do their jobs... unfortunately they work for the Third Galactic Reich, so doing their jobs isn't possible within the bounds being a good person.
@@master_samwise Cyril actually felt like the "FNG", the idealist out of the academy who thinks he knows everything better than the people who have been there. His CO in the first arc is the guy who has been there and done that, even flat out already assumes correctly what had happened and told Cyril to drop it.
Cyril then finds another "true believer" who also a bit disgruntled at how lax things are to him, but who actually has a bit more experience on the job.
As someone who works for an agency, this all felt very realistic to me, none of these characters are themselves as being "bad" or "wrong", they all feel like they need to take certain actions for the "correct" outcome. They don't see themselves as a moustache -twirling villain.
tl;dnr I went into Ando expecting to dislike it but came out the other end thinking it's pretty good SW by even pre-Disney metrics.
Deedra is the kind of antagonist that manages to fool the audience into thinking she is a protagonist. In the first episodes, people were like "oh yeah! Deedra is getting shit done!" At the end, it was more like "oh no... Deedra is getting shit done."
@@master_samwise This fact leads me to believe Cyril may become a good guy later in the series, he demonstrates that he believes he is doing the right thing; investigating a ruthless murder of his fellow officers. He is driven by a sense of justice. I expect a situation to where he sees the brutality of the machine he works for and "damning" himself to the empire by stepping in to stop it. My guess is his obvious love of Deedra will make him come in touch with his feelings, combined with his sense of justice will push him to develop as a good guy (jury's out on whether Deedra will follow).
@@arvypolanco honestly, I think it might be the opposite, that he will come to more strongly associate the procedures of the empire with his own sense of justice, which would motivate him to dehumanise the rebels in his mind. Either way, I haven't cared one jot about star wars characters for years, and now I have a show where the fate of every single character concerns me!
Andor is the absolute BEST written Star Wars we have received from Disney, hands down
I would even say it is the beat written Star Wars full stop. And the best acted.
@@martinjrgensen8234 Ehm, I doubt the show on its own would’ve created the same following as the OT did. So, calling it the best written ever might be an overstatement. It does sound well written though, which is surprising if we compare it to other recent SW content.
@@anansi9291The quality of a product shouldn’t be based on how popular it is or would be. Andor is easily better written than the OT. Is it better? Well, no, that’s subjective. Both are masterpieces. But it shouldn’t discounted from the running just because it wouldn’t make as big of a pop culture splash as the OT did.
@@ImTheReverse I really like how you worded it. When people say that something is better than something, like say "Andor is the best written Star Wars." I’ve seen people that are like "oh so you didn’t like the OT". No? They never said that. I like how you stated that they are both masterpieces. I doubt Andor will ever make as a big a splash as the OT, but it’s still one of my favorite pieces of Star Wars media.
@@anansi9291 Objectively, Andor is far superior to the OT in writing and acting (save for Empire). The OT had novelty, mythology and mysticism to fall back on but was not as consistently executed as Andor was. Andor did have the benefit of much more screen time to build characters.
I'm ALL IN if the character is eating Cereal with their mother.
Cyril eats Cereal...
@@Сайтамен i realized it the first time i saw it, i hope this was intended as it would’ve showed attention to detail
When a show knows how good its writing is, even a character eating cereal in front of his mother can be intriguing to watch.
Cyril’s mother is the most terrifying character in the whole Galaxy. I think she’d have Palpatine crying while cleaning his room & Vader using the force to pick up his messes after his fights.
@@411bvRGiskard🤣🤣🤣
Another aspect that successfully builds tension in Andor is the wonderful blocking. The way Deedra moves about the room and into the frame is menacing in itself. Reva’s interrogation moves look like an assistant principal trying to get a kid to confess to smoking in the bathroom.
Something I also noticed is that the interrogation in Kenobi has shaky cam, a technique mostly used for comedy shows. It specifically reminds me of Brooklyn nine nine which is not the type of show you want to be thinking about while this interrogation is happening.
@@maarchalk2840 Except that the very best scene of Brooklyn Nine Nine is an interrogation scene.
@@nont18411 well yes, come to think of it, brooklyn nine nine had quite good interrogations. Characters would even discuss why it's going poorly behind the glass. Putting Kenobi even more to shame.
Also the Reva scene itself looks like crap. It's a boring room with subfunctional lighting and noone has been properly lit to look at least interesting.
@@CptApplestrudl The boring room is not even a real problem. Interrogation rooms are extremely Boring everywhere were you have a dedicated room for that. That's part of the interrogation. and in a well made scene it would focus the viewer on the interrogation instead of "interesting room details" That you recognized the boring room just shows how bad the scene was. Because you were searching for "something more interesting like room details".
I love the role reversal with Cassian, where he remains resistant to the many times he's to pushed to rebel, until confronted with sheer horror at Narkina that brings out his inner Luthen, and he then works to convert Kino. We totally get his journey as viewers, and his devotion to rebellion at the end is so believable and rewarding.
What an amazing show.
Narkina 5 brought it out. I think Marva's posthumous speech and the ensuing uprising solidified it. Re-watching that scene I noticed two things: Absolutely masterful acting and directing when it comes to all the close-up reaction shots (I love it when eyes and facial expressions alone can tell a story) and that Luthen is so... unreadable. I wonder what he's thinking in that moment as he just kind of stares at the dust rising from the aftermath. He obviously at some moment decided against killing Cassian but what exactly was it that changed his mind?
@@kevinw.6177 One of the only times I noticed Luthen out of disguise even slightly smile is when he is stopped by Marva's speech. In that moment, his entire existence is validated - He may never live to see the sun rise on a free galaxy, but here is a planet full of ordinary people he previously knew very little about rising in rebellion just like he hoped. It also gave him some pause on Andor. He knows Marva is his mother, so when he sees her standing up to the Empire even in death he learns just that much more about Andor that makes him reconsider killing him.
I think his more grim disposition later is his realization of what all of this means. Ferrix doesn't have a chance in hell of defeating the Empire on the long term. This place, this culture, is almost certainly doomed. If not immediately, then through the slow crush of a bolstered Imperial occupation. He knows that this is what it takes to win a rebellion, and while he is happy to see his efforts bear fruit, he still knows deep down that ordinary people are going to be killed before the galaxy is free. This is the result of his conversations with Mon Mothma and Saw Guerrera: They both point out the obvious, that his heist job on the Imperial garrison is going to cause a surge in Imperial repression, an outcome that he sees as positive. It's easy to say and much harder to see in person.
The way all of these threads come together and deliver much-needed depth to the Rebellion is masterful, to say the least.
It’s honestly crazy how many similarities there are in the themes in there shows. Andor just followed through with good writing.
This one scene in Ep. 1 of 'Andor' where Syril talks with the chubby security chief has better acting and more clever writing than anything we've seen in the whole 'Obi-Wan' show and it's kind of hilarious. It's day and night. Compared to 'Andor', 'Obi-Wan' feels like a sloppy fan-made project. The creators should be embarrassed.
That is honestly one of my favorite scenes in the whole show. It channels The Wire really well, and I deeply appreciate that.
@@master_samwise It's one of the first scenes in the show and it does a great job of setting the tone. It feels like a REAL CONVERSATION between two people, not awkwardly scripted exchange, like stuff in the Obi Wan show. Andor made the Star Wars universe feel REALISTIC and GROUNDED. I felt like I was watching a proper drama set in the SW universe.
Any scene with Syril and his Mom is better than Obi-Wan.
Thank you for pointing out that audiences know when both Cassian *and* Obi-Wan die. The argument against Andor "why do we need a show about a guy who we know is dead" was tired and bad faith from the get-go. As you showed Andor takes that fact and builds its themes of sacrifice and tragedy in Cassian's life to build a masterpiece of a series. The Kenobi showrunners did not know how to explore these themes in Obi-Wan's story.
Exactly. This is literally a franchise where the prequels came *after* the original trilogy. The excuse not to watch Andor is really dumb tbh
Worth noting though that the "we know is dead" bit does apply far more to Obi-Wan than Andor. Pretty much every single character in Obi-Wan has a canon death. The sole exception is the new Inquisitor, who as the main antagonist is pretty much guaranteed to have sufficient plot armor until the final episode. So Andor can have stakes because the other characters are at risk. Obi-Wan can't.
@@Axterix13 yeah, so many Andor characters stand under a big question mark, we do not know their fates, Maarva can die, Bix can die, Syril can die, Dedra can die, Luthen can die, the Aldhani crew, the prisoners like Kino, Birnok, Ulaf, and many more, and many of them in fact do, Andor is not scared to let go of their characters, because in conflict you lose many lives, on both sides
the only solidified characters prior were Mon Mothma, Saw Gerrera, Melshi and of course Cassian
also, there is so much tension regarding what happens to Cassian either way, he is the type of character where, as we see, they would put him in jail, you cant do that with Obiwan, he's a primary target hunted to kill on sight
Why do we need a show about the least interesting character from Rogue One?
@@joshuaperrine2019 assuming thats true, the answer is because its good, premise is insignificant compared to execution
It's really funny how the show makes Deedra an underdog and frankly rather sympathetic in the start of the show. When she was in conflict with that other officer, I was actually really hoping she'd come out on top. Then she did, and I realized "wait, that's bad".
Similarly, I've never had any bad thoughts about Syrril. The poor guy is an antagonist, sure, but in the end he's just a sad, pathetic, brainwashed guy trying desperately to do what he thinks is the right thing. He's just another victim of the empire. It also doesn't help that he's pretty clearly autistic.
Yep, and that's what made Andor's Empire so good (and thus so bad) - it felt like a real bureaucracy with real people who were just doing their jobs... at least at first.
Autistic people act much worse than syrril. he's fine
Dedra&Cereal have enough decent qualities, that you can imagine them being non evil bureaucrats in a more benign system.
Yeah he is trying to do what he thinks is right. But moreso he is trying to do what will make his mother happy. The dichotomy between Eitie and Marva is brilliantly played. A confident and moral human is made from unconditional love of a parent. Marva has so many good lines. "Of course youll worry. Thats just what love feels like." "Tell him Ill always love him more than he can do wrong.' god that stuff is really powerful interpersonal development that we dont see anywhere else in SW.
Cyril on the other hand had an overbearing and manipulative mother who raised a man without the wisdom to excel. He wanted to be seen as strong and smart and made poor decisions because of it.
@@stevebreedlove9760 Oh, I never thought of Syril's mom as a foil to Maarva, good catch. Syril is kind of Andor's opposite really - he comes from relative privilege, identifies with the current order, is a naive idealist and actually desperately wants to be the inspiring hero and leader - not out of any genuine connection to the world, but because he's a sheltered manchild who believed the propaganda. I wonder if, as Andor's character progresses towards a more high-minded, team-oriented, idealistic (but still ruthlessly pragmatic) persona, Syril will become more and more impulsive and unhinged as all of his repressed impulses take over and he tries to become some kind of rogue vigilante instead of trying to fit into the pre-established Imperial structures that rejected him. Can't wait for Season 2.
The main thing that I really like about Deedra as a villian is that she is good at her job. She is an incredibly skilled detective, but doesn't make absurd logical leaps to get to her end goal. Her work is steady and meticulous, she doesn't so much as make mistakes as she does the correct actions with the information she has. That means that the more information she gets the more dangerous she becomes. She is also fully in the belief that what she is doing is right, she is maintaining order and has the drive to keep it that way.
Kino had some of the best character moments in the prison arc. You think he’s just a hard ass, stoolie for the Empire. But you realize he cares for the men and wants to get out as much as everyone else. After he finds out no matter how hard you work or obey the Empire, you won’t get out. There is a moment of crisis and panic, but he decides to suppress it and help everyone else out of the prison.
Yes! And then we find out that he *can't even swim*! He knew from the beginning of the breakout he wasn't getting out. So good.
Funny thing is, that the whole Andor story wouldn´t have happened if that one officer had listened to his superior and not investigated the death of his colleagues.
With him escalating the whole situation the Imperium literally created a black powder barrel and blew it up. Drove a lot of people to the rebellion, robbed themselves of millions, lost several lives and a prison. Pretty impressive change from the status quo before in the area shown.
Compare that to Obi-Wan where the start point could literally be the end point if you take out that artificial and imo uncharacteristic mental struggle of Obi-Wan.
All of that to find “justice” for two people committing and having just committed multiple crimes. As the superior officer said if the one fellow was killed it was probably because he deserved it. The Empire isn’t bad because it is powerful. It is bad because it uses that power to obviously bad ends
The slow snowball effect in Andor is top notch.
Well honestly just like what the rebel manifesto said rebellion was inevitable. The empire was doomed to fail like a game of chess against God. The force was not on their side.
The key to me is that no one was asking for an Andor show. Andor was fine in Rogue One, but we don't learn an awful lot about him and it is easy to see him going to the way of so many other Star Wars background characters. Meanwhile, both Obi Wan and Boba Fett are long time fan favorites. I think the big difference between Obi Wan + Boba Feet vs. Andor comes down to this distinction; Studio executives greenlit the former two because they knew that the names alone will draw in viewers, and created a story secondary to that goal which is why they feel so messy. Andor was created not because he is a fan favorite, but because its production staff had a story to tell first which they pitched to the executives second. Obi and Boba get written on the fly to fit a schedule that has nothing to do with their quality, while Andor is produced with a very concrete story already finished and ready to go, which is why everything fits together and the characters are all developed so well.
If you listen to Tony Gilroy, there was actually an alternate Andor pitch, with Cassian and K2SO going on weekly adventures over several seasons. But they couldn't make it work so they turned to Tony's more subdued, mature version of the show. There is an alternate timeline in which Andor was just another (possibly terrible) Star Wars adventure show. And by some accounts, the suits actually didn't really care about the series, leaving Gilroy and his brilliant team free reign, which is precisely what allowed it to be as good and complex as it is.
No one asked for SW or most (probably nearly all) of the things you like either.
Andor is popular because there's no fan expectations so they are more forgiving of it's problems. It wasn't bogged down by fans wanting legends or popular characters to show up or take up all the screen time. When you look at Bad Batch for example the main complaints were Sev, Boss, and Fixer not showing up, or the audience having no patience. Kenobi's big complaints were the show daring to have a secondary arc with Reva and take time from Kenobi/Anakin, and having Kenobi rescue Leia instead of Luke, despite the fact that would break canon as Leia knew who he was and Luke didn't in ANH. Boba Fett, besides getting too little time to play out the story on screen, didn't match the expectation of Boba and fans were mad he didn't match the legends counterpart.
@@TheCloneTrooperJedi Expectations certainly had a part to play in the reception of the shows, but don't mistake it for being the sole reason. Andor isn't even close to as popular as the other shows in terms of audience, but anyone who did watch it with even an ounce of critical thought knew that it was vastly superior in all levels of quality than the other shows. Andor's reputation is earned in spite of its predecessors, not because of them.
@@pwh1981 Eh. I don't really see it as "vastly superior" or even superior to the others. Superior to the Sequels, but not everything else. The first episode was really bad in terms of pacing. The Character arcs were severely lacking. Who has really started to change in the show? The only difference is that it hammers home the darker tones and everything is obvious in connecting back to its main plot besides the Sister backstory. Don't mistake the different style for being superior. It may be more of what the hardcore part of the audience wants, the more openly dark show with less heroes surviving, which has less to do with the villain quality and more with the heroes being more average.
Heroes in the other stories outside of the sequels: The Chosen One, the Chosen one's son, numerous Jedi, Mandalorians, a Wookie, high-end bounty hunter, elite Clone Commandos, a gifted and experienced in war princess, and two experienced smugglers.
Then compare that to Andor's list: A thief, a politician, a rebel leader, and a small team of guys that pretty much all died in the one mission they took together.
In going for a more vulnerable cast of heroes, there is a huge tradeoff in less interesting new characters and less developed characters in general. Let's be real for a minute. Are any of the new characters that memorable? Do they have enough personality to be recognizable? I find most, if not all, of the cast is not dynamic and more memorable for what happened to them than who they are. Character work is Andor's big weakness, and probably why it's not popular. Going back the OT, while the plot isn't the wildest and most epic, the characters are very strong and the Original Trilogy is very popular and loved. Luke Skywalker is loved, Leia and Han Solo are loved. Vader is loved. Strong Characters make it easy to forgive a mild plot.
while the style of the plot where everything immediately and obviously connects back may fit more with people desiring instant gratification, I know I at least find it much more rewarding to have strong characters and have to wait and puzzle out where the story is going. The lack of popularity isn't coming from a lack of exposure, it's coming from the weakness of the characters, and this story just doesn't connect as well as others.
By episode 3 of Andor you interested in what is going to happen.
By episode 6 your convinced by the action.
By episode 10 your invested by the politics.
By episode 12 your emotionally involved in the story.
The episodes in between go to make sure each of those feelings are earned.
I'm gonna be honest, I was invested in the politics by episode 4 at the latest
I was interested the minute Cassian killed the only remaining witness to his accidental murder while he was begging for his life on his knees. No other show would have the balls to do that, and it was the instant I knew this show was going to not only be good, but different.
That's exactly what my problem was with Kenobi and what I loved about Andor. One show takes the time period and the threat of the Empire seriously and one doesn't. This time period is when the Empire should be at its most dangerous, where Jedi are hunted and murdered, where people are mercilessly killed left and right if you step one wrong way out of line. And I fully believe that is the case in Andor where we can actually see why the Empire held its hold on the galaxy for twenty years as opposed to Kenobi where none of that tension, danger and intense moments actually happen as effectively.
In Andor, the Empire is a massive threat with intelligence, ruthlessness, and multiple resources to keep everyone at its mercy. Something we see often with how the writers have the Empire's ships fight in space or the scenes with the ISB where they actively discuss strategy and capture in an intelligent and fascinating manner. None of that exists in Kenobi. Everyone in the Empire is a fucking idiot. Every single one of them and it's infuriating. Unless it's Reva who is somehow smarter than everyone in there including the Grand Inquistor who has more experience and patience with hunting Jedi and it doesn't make any sense.
I can't believe these two shows came out in roughly the same time frame. It's like night and day.
Andor is the first time on the screen since ROTJ, arguably ESB that the empire has actually carried an air of oppression, and that's why the conflict feels so much less contrived
I think the absolute best showcase of Imperial incompetence is in Andor, and it's not even inherent incompetence. The fact that the Empire spends so much time hunting Cassian, not knowing they've literally had him in prison that whole time. It doesn't go to show how incompetent they are completely, but it shows how bloated the Empire has become, and how their system, while effective for now, simply cannot hold up. As Nemik said, tyranny requires constant effort, and Dedra had already noticed the Empire become complacent.
To be fair to the Empire, there is no "Cassian Andor" imprisoned in their prison. He was arrested and sentenced under his fake identity name Keef Girgo.
thank you for making these. It’s encouraging to know that good star wars is still possible, I wish andor had gotten the massively positive reception it deserves
The main issue I have with the Reva interrogation scene is an issue with many of the Leia scenes. And that is that the kid doesn't seem to react to her surroundings. At the start of the story she's a precocious kid at home, then removed from her comfortable life and forced into many strange and scary situations she remains the precocious kid. So Reva just comes across as a joke trying and failing to scare a small child. Yep she kind of gets scared when she's taken to the torture chair, but it's ok because revas distracted because there's a call for her on line 2.
Late to this, but I think Leia's reaction could've been justified if the writers hadn't ignored a very obvious major plot conflict that irked me from the start: Leia is the daughter of a well-off and prominent senator and a queen, and the young Empire still has a moral authority in the eyes of some citizens - specifically those in Leia's parents' circles. If those people heard that the empire kidnapped little Princess Leia and harmed her in some way, the Empire would lose financial and political support on those planets.
I think it would've helped the scene a great deal for Leia - a prominent daughter of politicians who would have been briefed on kidnapping protocol - argued that point to Reva. If they'd done that, it would've helped explain why Leia acts like she's mostly safe this whole time; she thinks her political standing will protect her from outright attack from the Empire. Then it could've changed if/when Reva says she could just make Leia disappear. It would make Reva more menacing too as she would literally be threatening a little girl with death or a lifetime of imprisonment instead of vague frustrated threats of pain.
I get the feeling the little actress didn't have much in the way of director's guidance for nearly all of her scenes, but that could've been the turning point of her performance since her course of action would've been a lot more clear and given her a new emotion to show other than slightly bratty arrogance (once again, director's & writers' fault, not actress).
A huge problem for Reva as a character is she literally could not win any of her conflicts.
She has a conflict against:
- The Grand Inquistor. He is guaranteed to survive because he has a major story arc later on.
- Fifth Brother. Same.
- Darth Vader. She never had the remotest chance of laying a finger on him.
- Obi-Wan. Guaranteed to make it out alive, and unscathed in major ways.
- Leia. Totally fine in appearances just a few years down the line.
Essentially, there are a few side characters here and there she could hurt, or even really affect.
In contrast, with the exception of Cassian, Mon Mothma, and Melshi, there are almost no major characters that are guaranteed to make it out of Andor unscathed. When Bix is dragged into that interrogation with Dedra, we have no idea if she's coming out alive.
When Leia is facing Reva, we know nothing can happen to her, so the scene is doomed from the start.
Why I'm not a hug fan of prequals anywhere, especially when they do a "OMG Did he survive this encouter? Find out next episode!". He's still alive in later movies! Of course he's fine!!!
I still can't believe Andor was this good given that it came from modern disney, it's genuinely exeptional and it's... sad, Andor didn't make much money, so the studio will probably take greater control in season 2 and nutor it like they did with everything else.
I don't think that will happen - it's already halfway through filming. And it IS the final series - so there's no need to ruin it just so that it might persuade people to watch a non-existant season 3.
Besides, that's not how these streaming services make money
They have a limited pool of resources that they divide up between shows - the better overall quality of the shows, the more people will subscribe and add to the pool of resources.
If some shows clearly aren't popular, they get cancelled in advance of the next series so that the money can go to other/new shows.
Andor has not been cancelled - the money is already spent, and it WILL be broadcast.
Tony and Diego seem very happy with the way things are going
In the long run, this show will be a jewel in the Disney+ crown that might help get them more subscribers
@@jazzx251Makes one wonder how good a bejewled, shiny crown is, if it sits upon the head of a no-good, rotten king?
You mentioned Nari, and I was like "who?" and had to rewind. Wow, poor Obi Wan was a totally forgettable show, apparently. Meantime, I'm slowly rewatching Andor and just as enthralled as I was the first time around.
You’ve managed to make me love ‘Andor’ and dislike ‘Kenobi’ even more. Your point about interrogators telling the truth vs lying was excellent and something I’d never considered when thinking about these scenes.
Side note,
As cliché as this sounds, keep up the good work. 👍
One small contention, Deedra *did* play mind games and effectively lie to Bix. First, she lied before Bix was even brought into the room by telling the assistants to keep Pak tied to the chair so he could be hauled off in front of her; this isn’t so much a lie as it is a scare tactic, a way to hide your efficiency, and it isn’t really part of the interrogation itself. But she does essentially lie later, as she implies via the fish analogy that she would let Bix go if she confesses and gives her not necessarily Andor but Luthen (as that’s who they were really after); the reality is that she not only would be tortured anyway to confirm if what she said was true and not just a scapegoat from said torture, but also likely she would die anyway like Pak did, if not just get shipped off anyway to a prison- I mean slavery center as she would be admitting to being a thief.
The really important part of this for your point and massively for the show’s credit and anyone who saw it is that Bix *saw through the lie*. Her entire point of “You’re ISB, the worst of the worst” is that she knows no matter what she says, there’s no escape, so she is just trying to endure. We don’t see her identify positively or negatively Kreeger as Luthen, we don’t even get to see if she is tortured again afterwards (though the officer’s way of saying “or we’ll get Gorst back here” heavily implies she would be), but we see her perhaps even more broken when Andor arrives to rescue her. She was just trying to survive, because that’s all she could do, until she was rescued just like Andor was, by Andor, so maybe she can help the rebellion in season 2.
I imagine not much time passed from ep 11 to the finale ep 12. Not enough time for Dr. Gorst to be recalled back to Ferrix. Cause he was not present when the riots occured.
@@westwardstar1686 There was enough time for Luthen to go talk to go from Coruscant to talk to Saw and come back to Ferrix, Dedra to come to Ferrix, Syril to learn super late and come back to Ferrix, and of course Andor to go to several planets before coming back to Ferrix. They would have interrogated her again before the Spellhouse attack which was long before, and Dedra had previously interrogated remotely as well, so no reason Ghorst even if he didn’t have the time to come out and leave again couldn’t have just played the screaming again remotely as well. He is also a very minor character that is only in one scene and only referenced once again in another (by Dedra), so I wouldn’t put it past them to just not show an explicit death scene like they did say for Nurchi.
From a storytelling point, why imply they would interrogate her again if they aren’t going to for anyway for good measure? It’s not like you can say “well the writers of this show aren’t expecting you to think about these things” like the rest of Disney Star Wars.
Some effective things in Andor that I've not seen before
Deidra has left her previous subject for Bix to see as she is brought in, then turning on the guards telling them to clear him out.
The silence as the torture headset is placed on Bix's head, her shaking, and finally letting out an agonizing scream.
Reva interrogation in a nutshell: “Tell me where those people are, or else I’ll… uhm… I’ll be really mad at you.”
I think the general theme with the success of these shows is that when Disney knows they don't need to put in any effort to garner interest in a show, they don't, whereas if it's a relatively unknown character that they're covering, they put a lot more effort towards them. Just look at the tv shows with previously no-name characters as their main characters, Andor, Mandalorian Season 1&2, Bad Batch, Rogue One and then compare them to the shows that were too big to fail, Kenobi, Book of Boba Fett, and even Mando season 3 and Solo to a degree.
This makes a ton of sense, why put effort in something when you know tons of people will watch it anyways
I always wondered whats this stupid bait and switch tactic. But now I see exactly what you're talking about. All the shows I thought would be good 4 years ago were all lackluster, and the few shows I said "lol what? Who cares why is this a thing?" Ended up being the best pieces of Disney's Star wars.
Solo was pretty bad and all of Mando was very bland and boring. Ashoka was kinda ok but only because of Thrawn
@@alexandercorbett3095 Solo being bad fits the theme. Mando got progressively worse as he got popular. Ahsoka as a somewhat popular character was pretty mid.
I just finished "Better Call Saul" which has the mother of all character arcs!
Such an amazing show!!!
Obi-wan Kenobi show seems to have been written by people who watched Star Wars for the first time a week before they started writing the show.
that's a little bit too cynical for my taste - to me it seemed to believe its own hype a little bit too much, in the same way the sequel trilogy sometimes did.
Ironically it was the Andor show runners that were openly not huge Star Wars fans. Too often fanatics get lost in their obsession and reverence for the IP they're working on, so instead of an earnest attempt at creating an original story with in the IP what often comes out is derivative fan fiction; like a child playing with action figures.
The writing in Kenobi is so bad I started watching it just for how hilariously stupid it was. Still, it fulfilled its entire purpose of 'something new' with 'an old feel'. I like to imagine the entire benefit of the third sister story arc within the show was to give us that ultra badass Vader moment where he goes back into putting the smack down on younglings. That show also reminded me of how much actual "Jedi" story they could be squeezing out of this time period where Kenobi has just said his goodbye to Leia.. but that I'd rather see a youngish Master Luke along side other trainers at a Jedi Academy instead of just fast forwarding through it til he's an old man.
Andor seems like a show where I honestly can't figure how entertaining it can possibly be. If it's not just filled with political themes then I might watch it, but I honestly can't think of any reason I'd want to if it's like some small story within the story that doesn't really include any popular characters.
The seeds were there but it never blossomed into anything substantial because of the way they wrote it. All they had to do was make an emotional, gripping and heartbreaking story of two damaged souls that were pushed down different paths by bad choices and circumstances. How One Man comes back to the force and how one is at this point just unreachable.
It was all ready for them and they just completely screwed it up.
I think it's simply that they were incompetent for the job. A good writer could write for any story, 40 year old cult following or not.
Tension was the first thing that struck out to me in Andor. I think we've been fortunate to have such excellent examples of how to build tension recently with Andor, Macbeth (2021) and Chernobyl (2019). Great how Andor shares actors with both shows.
I have been ridiculed for being so critical of Star Wars writing. This series says exactly what I can't put into words. Subscribed.
If the Obi Wan Kenobi series had the same level of writing as Andor had, while still keeping its more light-hearted tones and connections to the greater story, it would have been a phenomenal show
andor is the best star wars that Disney has made besides animated projects in my opinion, the story telling, writing and acting is on POINT
hot take, it’s the best star wars period. “but we wouldn’t have it if not for the OT” yeah, but does that make the OT better? nah. Some of it is up to personal preference, but andor is better written, shot, acted, and a bunch more
To be fair I think the last 4 episodes of Clone Wars were just as good, although they had been scripted and storyboarded before Disney took over. The two shows are very different but I think both did what they were supposed to do extremely well.
I love how the constant back and forth in this video just shows how Andor is filmed at a movie level of quality and Obi Wan is the cheap tv show that it really was.
The way Kenobi's arc was written was just bizarre. They have this scene in the Inquisitor Fortress where Kenobi acts as if he has finally found the resolve to reconnect with the Force and use it to save Leia. I'm just like: Didn't he do this already in an earlier episode? Kenobi went through the same arc twice in the same show. Wtf? It's like this show was reshot during production to move the turning point for Kenobi to a different part of the story, but they forgot to re-edit the previous turning point scene out.
Plausible. Leia got kidnapped and rescued twice.
There was a rumour that Kenobi was originally a movie that was rewritten as a tv show which does explain a lot
Also, Denise Gough, voice actor for Yennefer in Witcher 3, is FANTASTIC at playing this kind of character. Of course the writing plays a huge part (Anakin's dialog from the Prequels has entered the chat). However, Denise also has HUGE chops for playing this sort of ruthless character, which only served to increase the contrast between Reeva and Deedra's interrogation scenes.
Moses Ingram would've been great if she was given something to work with. Which she was not, unfortunately.
Playing Witcher 3 in anything but Polish takes out a lot of immersion and atmosphere. It can also change our view of a character. In English version Bloody Baron sounds like a generic dickish drunkard who doesn't care about anyone making it hard to emphasise with him. In Polish version however he sounds like a broken man that's constantly mourning and regretting decisions he made.
@@sauronplugawy3866 Its the same as watching a movie that was translated to another language, with either a voice over or re-recorded lines, it isn't how the writers intended for it to be, and lowers the overall quality
One underrated thing was the scientist dude. He looks so into what he does and like a kid with a science project. Completely devoid of empathy but with a touch of creepiness of getting off on the torture. That really sent shivers down my spine
What Andor did really well compared to other Star Wars shows/movies is that they didn't try to create tension with characters we already know make out okay in the end. We already knew how and when Cassian dies, so there is no point in the writers threatening him with death. Instead, they use him as a point of view or a window to watch other characters around him develop and watch Andor become close to these people, only for them to die or break.
On the other hand, the fights between Kenobi and Vader were all spectacle but barely any substance. While it was heartbreaking to listen to Vader say "I am what you made me" and "Anakin is gone. I am what remains" (I'm pretty sure those were lines), the fights themselves were for the most part pointless. At least with the first fight in the third episode it was mainly to make Kenobi realize what Anakin had turned into and made him fear Vader. The second fight in the last episode mainly just tried to recreate a similar feeling with the Anakin vs. Obi Wan fight in Rots.
Can’t wait for the part that will compare the non existent music of the Kenobi fan series and the great music of Andor!
Not sure if I'll be able to do that, as it's hard to talk about music without playing samples, which tends to open up the video for copyright issues, but it's worth exploring.
I agree, Andor's music is excellent. The show should have won so many emmys.
my favorite parts are the experimentality of Nicholas Brittell's score, the opening music of Niamos was such a shock and its SOOO GOOD, immediately felt the summer vibe in a sci-fi setting, and then the Shoretrooper uptempo, chefs kiss bro
@@alexo_pog it is one of my go to tracks when I wanna get pumped. The remix of that score plays in the brothel in the first episode and both are on the soundtrack.
niamos and maarva march are wonderful
Kenobi... the music during the final duel is ok I guess
I searched up Andor vs Obi-wan content because I thought you were done talking about Andor for good. I never make comments but I love your vids and I was hoping you'd make another one, and I swear when I looked up "Andor" I was visibly exicited to see you dropped a vid, FOURTEEN minutes from when I ramdomly decided to search it up. Keep up the great work! (btw Bright Reds or Yellows in thumbnails are proven to catch the Eyes of viewers with more success and things like red arrows and circles work just as well!)
Haha talk about good timing! I appreciate the thumbnail advice!
@@master_samwise honestly, I love your current thumbnails... they seem more serious and not as clickbaiting...
@@littlesupergugel4382 Wasn't calling his thumbnails boring or anything, just in the pursuit of making my own channel I recently came across that piece of information and thought it was worth sharing, especially for growing channels.
@@Winnie_Deanie I completely understand that! I didn't assumed that you called it bringt, don't worries:) I just think that these kind of clickbaiting thumbnailes just seem so unserious... but maybe that because youtube germany is especially strong in that game and I don't like the Germans youtuber who do all this red circle etc. things.. Good luck with your channel!
Deedra’s interrogation actually gave me nightmares after I watched that episode
Well, this was excellent, much like your others in the series. I am sharing it around at work (game dev studio) as a piece of education on story telling, as I find the comparison between the two shows aboslutely ideal!
Idea for a topic in the next episode: forshadowing and existing lore. To have good character arcs, tension, and especially the release moment, one must handle forshadowing extremely well. Both shows, as mentioned in this video, have a LOT of unintential forshadowing due to the fact that they are prequels/inserted stories within a known cannon. Which means, a lot of the world they show, has been hinted that, or explored deeply, in existing lore.
Badly written shows tend to have terrible forshadowing, it's usually overly obvious or, much worse, it isn't there at all. Making the denouement feel like a bad joke only the writers knew about. Good forshadowing is subtle, hidden within layers of dialogue, actor behaviour/expression, or even better, in the set themselves!
Now, one of the hardest thing to do, is bring a shocker to an audience with zero forshadowing, and nail the "OMFG" moment nevertheless. Honestly, I am struggle to think of one beyond this one scene in Andor: "I can't swim."
That scene floored me. The build up was perfection, the tension on point, the character arc absolutely perfect, and then they drop a nuke on the viewer without having made a single hint before. None. (some may argue that this was a reason why the character was so against escaping at first, but I find that to be way too weak as forshadowing). It's just a bomb. And it's perfect. These moments are orchestrated to stay in your minds forever. People will joke around and use this one liner in thei lives. This is how movies make it into culture (without being mocked).
Another such moment, and much more forshadowed, is the fight at the end - brick with dead lady's name on it, smashed in face by an (until then) quite gentle giant. Perfection.
Good forshadowing is a sign of a well constructed story, where the writer(s) knew that they were doing from the beginning - which makes an insert show even HARDER, as you have to account for all the already existing lore. Another fantastic show that did this well, is the Norsemen prequel, absolutely hilariously brilliant.
I'm glad you enjoyed it! I will have to consider foreshadowing as a topic worth exploring. That would require a lot of thought and time, but it definitely is an intriguing subject.
Funny how an ISB agent can be far more intimidating than an Inquisitor. Even without the force, Dedra needs a promotion XD
The ISB Boss types have always been more intimidating than ANY Inquisitor. The Inquisitors in Rebels were below the level of Padawans and except for the Grand Inquisitor, they were threatening because of their power not because of screen presence.
Just found your channel a week ago and have already watched all your Star Wars videos. You've instantly become my favorite Star Wars TH-camr. Thanks for posting all these great, entertaining videos!
I really like these analysis videos. They help me learn to think critically and appreciate good filmmaking and storytelling.
Keep up the good work!
Despite knowing that Syril Karn and Dedra Meero were the antagonists, I was rooting for them much of the show. Not because they were working for the "bad guys" and against the "good guys," but because they were trying to do their jobs and kept getting stifled by beauracracy at every turn. I saw myself in them--and that's crucial for tension. Because I cared about the characters and the circumstances they were in, I was invested in the show. And I appreciated that the "good guys" weren't completely innocent and pure, either. They had blood on their hands for trying to do the right thing, and there were consequences for their actions, regardless of their intentions. Andor, more than any other Disney Star Wars show or film, has real people that I can really relate to. 😊
Looking at another franchise, Star Trek The Next Gerneration two part episode "Chain of Command" is an excellent play in prisoner and interrogator. Andor is just so smartly written and doesn't dumb it down for it's audience. Watching the OG Star WArs when I was 7, I had no idea what the hell they were talking about in their political ramblings but I got the sense it wasn't good. And I think that's fine because it's something the viewer can learn to appreciate later.
Andor is just so good i rushed it in one day. Of course the plot is that the Empire is evil but at least we dont get that stupid and cliche idea of evil, we see a power structure strugling with real state problems, we see caracters like Dedra, wich are goddamn well constructed, work as heroes for their own cause. We see empire officers actually doing good work, and not being just a bunch of amateurs following nonsense orders, while we also see rebels, wich were supposed to be the pure good guys, having to make cruel decisions in order to achieve their goals, because, its a war. The tension, the action, the roughless reality of conflict, and the will to survive of both sides, just makes this series the perfect picture of what is Star Wars.
“Whatever nerd stuff I decide to talk about” is an amazing outro. Very nice writing comparison. Subscribed.
This is good analysis, and I wish it had more views. People know something is amiss, but the dominant fandom reaction is "It's KK and her politics! If we could just get rid of her, everything would be fine!" If KK spontaneously combusted tomorrow, these shows would still suck because these writers are absolute hacks. She hired Gilroy and clearly must have left him the F alone, and he produced a masterpiece, so explain that. Its not just her. And while all this is going on Filoni and Favreau are twin Space Jesuses who can do no wrong. That, and the franchise is being choked to death by a canon (Ive come to hate the term) established largely in cartoons written for children. Ive read a few interviews with Filoni, and its clear he thinks we're all idiots. He talks about the wish to cram as many characters as he can into this new movie, and how thrilling it was to work with Ahmed Best. Gimme an f'ing break. Compare that to what Gilroy talks about when asked. These people are not at all in the same league, and in spite of that, garbage like TBoBF out performs Andor. I honestly think it's hopeless.
couldnt agree more
I love your analysis, thank you!
The worst part of the duel against Vader is that Obi-Wan had him AT HIS MERCY, and fully realized the fact that his friend was truly dead...and he still couldnt finish him. Obi-Wan had good reason to believe Anakin died on Mustafar without finishing him off, but now, he is partially responsible for all the blood on Vader's hands after this point. He could have ended him and chose not to. You could claim "not the Jedi way," but that makes the Jedi moral cowards for being unwilling to do what's necessary: putting pure evil down to keep the rest of the galaxy safe. Besides, while Dooku could have reasonably been taken prisoner in Episode 3, Vader couldn't have been here.
There should have been something else that interrupted their fight or some outside force that prevented Obi-Wan from tearfully executing Vader.
Dedra was a much needed bresh of fresh air amongst all the clowns, losers and traitors the Imperials are usually portrayed as in disney sw content. She stood out like a light house in the endless sea of incompetence. I hope that we get more actually dangerous villains like her.
Great work Master Samwise, good points.
You know what it is, a subconscious instinctive unaware use of the Force to protect herself, explains everything, explains plot armor, Storm troopers missing. If only the writers could also be aware of it and take it into account.
In a weird way, fans knew better what to expect from Andor than from ObiWan.
Andor was likely to show how he became a rebel, while ObiWan more or less had to end where it started.
In that way, ObiWan was doomed to stagnation. All it did was preseve the status quo: Protect the kids and stay on Tatooine.
On a personal note I was negatively surprised that ObiWan, one of the greatest Jedi ever, was somehow degraded to whatever this was, just to let him magically rediscover the force on his own when you had Qui-Gon's ghost RIGHT THERE.
I definitely hadn't given it much thought when I finished Kenobi, but since watching your previous two episodes and finishing Andor, I definitely found myself supporting and enjoying Andor way more. And I'm also wanting and excited for a S2 of Andor, whereas I literally could not care less if Kenobi is just the 6 episodes.
Excellent analysis as always
Keep it up!
10k soon! Glad I subscribed, your thoughtful analysis is refreshing and brings up challenges with these stories while not being overly negative. Also fun to hear someone not talking to their audience like 10 year olds who need explosions and superpowers for a Star Wars story to be engaging.
*looking at you jj 👀
Being balanced and fair is my goal! I obviously am biased and don't always attain to my own standards of objectivity, but I try. Glad you're here!
@@master_samwise i think your commentary is very balanced considering the content you are critiquing. There aren’t attacks at actors or crew, even though the writing is under heavy scrutiny you don’t name the writers. It doesn’t point fingers, it sheds light. Full honesty, it made me really sad watching this fandom hurl words at Reva’s actress despite how large an issue the narrative was. Keep up the good work man, we need more direct commentators like you. Hopefully someone up top sees how deeply we care about these shows!
You know whats funny..... I always believed prequels are very hard to invoke tension because most of the characters you can pretty much KNOW their fates if you seen the sequels beforehand. But somehow Phantom Menace did what Obi Wan failed...and that was the tension
They give Kino such a phenomenal character arc in such a short period of time. He seems very much the standard Empire stoolie foreman at first, but as the mundane horror of living in the prison unfolds you see he does care about his people, even if it comes out in the wrong way, trying to earn his and their way out. But then as the obvious tension increases and people around him start to question it, he gets increasingly reactive; for reasons unclear he seems determined to earn his way out and refuses to believe he can't. Until the moment he learns that nobody ever earns their way out - and after a short time of watching his entire world break down, he quietly shifts to helping and then leading the escape. And his final three lines reveal a hidden cause for the whole thing. He saw the water on the way in, he knew he could never escape, he knew his only hope was getting released so he HAD to believe he could get out, even as it grows doubtful. Only when that hope is broken does he change - he now knows that no matter what he will die in this prison, so he might as well die trying to break it. When he says "I would rather die fighting them than giving them what they want" he truly meant it. And the last we see of him is the look of joy at winning, at getting people out alive, turning to resigned disappointment.
Hell, I even like the unnamed prisoner who is coming down the elevator in the prison break. He doesn't know anything about this prison, these people, their breakout. He doesn't know a single one of these people or have any real reason to care. But when he sees them turn from meagre resistance to actual riot, he immediately joins in, fighting for vital time so they can jam the lift before it gets him killed. In ten seconds I felt more for this one random guy than for entire secondary characters in other shows.
"I will assume I'm already dead" hits different after you learn he can't swim, doesn't it?
The difference between these two villains is crazy. When the Kenobi trailer came out I was intrigued by the new inquisitor Reva.
Now I didnt hate the show- kindve been better in a lot of areas. But her character came across as meh. At the end I was just waiting for Vader execute her....only for her to still survive. I still say its asinine that Reva survived Vader after plotting against him and openly attacking him while 2nd Sister gets axed for less!! Whatever
Same thing for Dedra. I was like oh snap who is this polished, professional Imp officer in the trailer. Denise Gough slayed that role in the show. And yes Im willing to admit I felt real fear for her life when she went down during the riot. Seeing her desperatley crawl in the dirt....I felt like I was there lol the whole riot felt sooo real/chaotic. The cherry on top was her acting aftering being saved. Her intense shaking, vulnerability. Her determined, polished, ambitious front that held for every episode got broken in the finale. Excellant villain. Cant wait for S2.
I really don't know what they were trying to accomplish with the Obi-Wan series, and I feel they didn't either. I was really hoping to get a series where they strictly focused on the inner battles Obi-Wan and Anakin were going through as a master dealing with a student who descended into darkness and the student who feels he was betrayed by his master and killed the love of his life. Building up to who they were in the Last Hope.
andor stands easily on its own, even if it wasnt star wars.
the only thing kenobi has is being star wars and everyone loving obi-wan going for it.
i think what i love most about andor is how it fills out the background of sw, it gives really good insight into how the universe works. it's so many small pieces working to give you a big picture, wheras obi wan needs to steal attention with big pieces all the time, be that obiwan, leia, inquisitors or vader.
Andor is what Star Wars needs right now
Just like first season of The Mandalorian
Something completely new, not relying on nostalgia, Skywalker, Obi-wan
The major difference between the two scenes I find is also the kind of force that is employed and who it is applied to. In Kenobi we have a grown woman trying threaten outright physical torture on a child, the watcher knows that Kenobi isn't the kind of show to go that dark especially if you're meant to be rooting for Reva's redemption arc. Andor on the other hand has both Dedra and Bix be on even ground as both are adult females, but more importantly is that there is a subversion of the kind of torture being threatened. You would expect there to be physical violence, and that would fit in with what the show thus far has shown to be capable of, but it subverts that and goes for mental torment instead; which as an added kick isn't even explicitly shown to the viewer who must fill in the gaps themselves.
Andor was like a 12-episode heart attack, lol. The tension was so thick that you never knew when the other shoe was going to drop. I know shows are subjective, but I really don't get Star Wars fans who say they were bored.
If Disney gives Star Wars to Gilroy and his team, it will succeed wildly. But we know it won't happen. Too many egos in conflict at Lucasfilm and Disney. Now that's a Hollywood intrigue story that will need telling in time!
All Star Wars doesn’t have to be the same. There can be space fantasy pew pew Star Wars too, that I doubt Gilroy would be interested in. Disney just needs to up their writing, and loose its obsession with celebrity cameos and nostalgia
I don't think that just because he made one good series he should suddenly be in charge of all of it, nor that he would want to. By all accounts Gilroy doesn't care about Star Wars, he just wanted to tell this one story that aligned with his interests and he'll be off to do his own thing after that, and I respect that a lot. Andor is tonally completely unlike anything else in the series and that's great, but it's not really what SW is at its core - which is fun western/fantasy/samurai/WW2 pulp with memorable characters.
At this point I'm so tired of Star Wars that I don't care what they're going to do next. As long as it's in Disney's hands, it will always be a half-assed, soulless corporate product first and foremost. I don't watch any of the shows unless they actually get good reviews (Mando S1 & S2, Andor) and I stopped watching the movies after The Last Jedi. If someone else does something cool with it again - great, but I wouldn't shed a tear if the franchise died tomorrow. We've had enough Star Wars already, and most of it is pretty shit.
It would be immensely exciting to witness an adult SW movie. Just like some superhero movies (too few, unfortunately) evolve towards more realism.
Beautiful. Love these juxtapositions so much! I remember being a bit cautious starting Andor, especially with the slow burn, but when it came to the parts where they showed two different leaders competently engaging with and calling out their directs I was officially intrigued. In many movies and shows we typically see focal characters being clearly right while their leader seems dumb and rash in rejecting their theories or choices, but Andor wrote in some great, believable dialogue as well as good leadership (both for the police and the ISB). After that unfolded I began to feel officially invested and curious. There were also complexities to all of the goings-on that actually required you to think, and so not only were you invested in the characters, you were also trying to keep track of all the details as each thread played out -- another great way to put the audience in suspense! ...As you said, complex, mature, and enthralling 😃 Another skillfully composed video essay. Thank you, sir.
(By the way, I literally just quoted Sid to myself earlier today and your reference made me so happy lol 😂)
you're correct in your analysis that Andor's pacing and tension were simply better, but we must remember that while both set in the SW universe, these two show were geared towards and advertised for two very different audiences. Obi-Wan Kenobi was certainly more family friendly, while in Andor we had: a character say "shit" for the first time in SW, there's also a confirmed booty-call. Andor was clearly made for adult OG star wars fans and therefore the story requires more tension.
reva makes me want to fall asleep, neero makes me want to abandon the land I love and seek asylum in another continent because of hwo fucking terrifying she is
As usual, A quality comparison by Master Samwise 🎉 🔥
I do what I can! Glad you liked it.
Thank you for the video and the analysis. Very well done indeed. I completely agree with you on all accounts. Obi-Wan really fails to deliver most of the time. Clunky dialogs, no tension built up, rushed scenes and problems with continuity… to mention a few problems. I had the feeling that it was too short. Maybe with 2-3 episodes more it could’ve been good. Not to say everything about is bad, the scene where Darth Vader walks the streets trying to flush Obi-Wan out is really well done for example.
Andor is just great, everything about it honestly. It really succeeds in storytelling. Leaves open possibilities, some Easter eggs, and masters in the built-up preparation for the final episode of the season also setting up the next season. It’s everything that Obi-Wan could’ve/should’ve been.
Looking forward for season 2, to say the least.
Appreciate your comparative analyses of Kenobi and Andor. Keep up the good work. Dedra is a professional who is cold and calculating while Reva comes across as an amateur who doesn’t control her emotions very well.
This is an interesting comparison video 👍
Every character in Andor is the hero of their own story. Syril is the brave crusading cop fighting the corruption and apathy of his bosses to go after the cold blooded murderer of his colleagues. He doesn't know Cassian is the hero of another film.
This video literally says every reason why I loved Andor and disliked Kenobi and I am here for it. Subscribed
Excellent analysis! I hadn't thought about comparing the two shows beyond simply "Star Wars Disney Plus shows" but I like the similarities you highlighted and made good on the overall theme of tension! Me gusta.
The writers had to throw a token integration of Leia in the story because they had to connect all the fan service dots to the OT and Leia resisted torture on the death star
I think another major issue that the Obi wan series faced, that a lot of people seem to have forgotten about is that Rebels already had an Obi Wan arc in it. And not only that but it was the conclusion to Maul and Obi Wan's storyline, so the show not only had to figure out a way to create a new compelling story around Obi Wan who is supposed to stay on Tatooine but was also going to be compared to the already existing well done Obi Wan in exile story.
Andor is a masterclass in Star Wars telling.
Relying on nostalgia and fan service is pretty much everything Disney spew out at the moment, whether it's the multiverse of previous-actors-to-play-the-same-character, or Favreau and Filoni's obsession with cameos and Tatooine
They need to just get back to good writing, which Andor proved can be done, because nostalgia is a one trick pony that can only hide so much
Poor girl was forced to listen to baby shark for hours. That’s torture for you
I like how if you watch the Kenobi series then go straight into A New Hope, you got Vader walking around with a downgraded suit and helmet. Shit looks like a halloween costume. I like to pretend it was a temp suit he got off Amazon after Kenobi jacked up the last one, and he'd just been rocking it ever since for all those years.
Andor doesn't put Andor in situations where the audience is supposed to worried he's going to die. They don't put him in situations where you're wondering if he's about to blow up the Death Star.
Kenobi has Obi Wan fight Darth Vader multiple times while the audience knows full well that nothing can happen. They did not need to do this. It wasn't a foregone conclusion that you'd do that if you were writing a script to tell Obi Wan's story that he would have a pointless fight.
Obi Wan could have been entirely about him facing a villain that had nothing to do with Vader. Obi Wan is not THE VADER SLAYER GUY, he's a character that does many things and, primarily, is a teacher. Both of Anakin and then Luke. He's a wise, contemplative guy that searches for truth and wisdom, torn between Qui Gon and Yoda's schools of Jedi theological thought within the order of monks that he belongs to. The order has been destroyed but he lives on, the universe is being ruled by an evil empire but he's in hiding, and his sole purpose is to protect a child whom he has responsibility over. That's a lot. What do we do with him? UHHHH IDK HE FIGHTS DARK FATHER WITH A LASER SORD BECUZ THAT'S ALL HE IS.
@16:55 made me laugh and shake my head. It was so perfect!
Deedra was done how thrawn should have been. Intelligent, yet not too politically savvy.
Any one single scene in Andor is better and more entertaining than the entirety of Kenobi.
One of the big things that made Andor's scene more concerning was that we have no previous knowledge of Bix, but we know Leia will be just fine. Leia will be a scarless, able bodied, fully mentally functional person in another 8 years or so because she is one of the main characters of the movie we've all seen. Bix however was no one to us previously. Bix could be dismembered, flayed, left a drooling mess and it would contradict nothing. Anything could happen to her, nothing could happen to Leia- it is hard to be concerned for someone we know will be just fine. This is the problem with watching Star Wars since it is so often produced out of chronological order, we know that characters won't have anything too bad happen to them because they are just fine in the future. There can be no tension where there is no danger.
I was genuinely rooting for Deedra because even if she is an enemy, goddamnit is she competent, and I respect that.
The fact that Reeva legitimately believes that a 10 year old knows the location of the secret Rebel base the entire Imperial army has been searching for is absolutely baffling.
Literally the ONLY reason Leia is involved in any of this is because YOU had her kidnapped! 2 days ago she had never been off of Alderaan! Why would you believe she knows anything about the rebellion?!
this video is brilliant! brilliant, i say!!!
Thanks for taking the time and effort to make this video! I feel like the first section of your video dragged on far too long and didn’t build any “tension” for me to want to watch the rest of the video.
I’m actually not sure it was entirely necessary, since there weren’t any examples where I could go “oh yeah, you’re totally right! That was (good/bad) use of tension!” And so I already forgot the many truths that you listed off as “good”.
The idea of comparing these two shows is really good and I hope you keep making videos!
Could you imagine of Terentino wrote/ directed a star wars project....that would be something
While I can appreciate the thought and analysis that goes into them, and I think some of the points made are valid - what I think is lacking from these videos reviewing Star Wars media, is the recognition that different Star Wars media is produced for different audiences. It's not that one product is bad and another product is good - they're intended for different parts of Star Wars fandom. If you love one show or film, and didn't like another ... that's probably why.
Andor antagonists: “Tell me where Andor is or else I will torture you with mind-crushing technology that will make you squeal like a bantha!” 👿
Reva: “Haha little princess girl goes brr!” 🤪
I remember seeing people meme on the 'Are you a fish or a thief' line from Dedra when the first trailers for Andor were coming out, saying it sounded dumb and calling it bad dialogue writing. Turns out context is important, because that scene is chilling and the dialogue over the whole show was amazing.