ANDOR aka Glum Village : its own thread

Which, among other things, has this immediately relevant passage for this thread:

One of the directors said that you had a mandate, which isn’t surprising to anyone who’s been watching this show to keep the droids and aliens at the margins, in the background. Tell me about that.

I’ve heard that. I think We’ll be addressing some of that as we go along a little bit more. Sometimes it’s problematic in storytelling, where you can’t just introduce a character. You have to introduce, all their plumbing and all their health issues. People said, Why didn’t you have aliens in Narcina Five [where Andor is imprisoned]? You see the the five facilities that are in that lake there, so it’s easy for me to imagine that there’s another one that’s all aliens. But what are the mechanics of what you can do and build and hat would the bathroom be like on the factory floor? I don’t even really know. You get into a bunch of other issues that become just a little bit too complicated sometimes to go into. But we will be doing more of that as we go along.

And I understand that there’s some people that feel that’s been shaded slightly, but that’s probably the primary reason. It adds a level of complexity and it adds a level of political complexity, but we will be going there. Look, we’re going all the way to Rogue One. There’s a lot of that coming up.

I'm so excited for next week now, I'm practically HUMMING.

Ned--you of all people I wouldn't be surprised to learn had read Zahn's Blackcollar books--have you? I was obsessed w them as a younger person. It was such an interesting world that it felt like he never got to build out with the alien invasion. Maybe he did it with the SW books instead?

Sadly I did not read them; I knew the name when he first fired up for SW writing but that was about it. But I'm intrigued a bit now.

I assumed the lack of aliens could be explained as differences in circadian rhythms or some species being immune to electricity and the empire not having to build toilets that accomodate both wookies and ewoks. But it's also probably a lot cheaper to hire 50 humans than to CGI 50 different species in the backgrounds.

Also everyone in the galaxy to live in rustic outpost villages or brutalist apartments or hovels in the desert or clean industrial places or oppulent mansions; I really want to some characters who live in a suburban split level on coruscant

Hilarious that Gilroy mentions that Clerks scene

did the anti droid sentiment expressed in the original film ever get explored further?

― Muad'Doob (Moodles), Thursday, November 10, 2022 12:13 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

I always just assumed (after the fact of the prequels) that it was because of the droid armies used in the Clone Wars, but contemporaneously with the original films they didn't really get into it.

Diego Luna doesn’t get the big monologues but I’ve really appreciated his performance throughout - especially in the prev couple of episodes, where he’s not doing much other than observing, listening, planning, nudging.

It’s kind of fascinating to have as a lead character someone who isn’t shown to be a leader as such, and who wants to avoid doing anything really, but he can’t seem to help himself from inspiring others to lead and to act. Shit gets done when Andor’s around.

much thx for that Rolling Stone interview link, Ned

yeah that RS gilroy interview was great

Strongly suggest reading this one from him as well

https://scriptmag.com/interviews-features/tony-gilroy-checks-in-after-10-episodes-of-andor

Plus this from the producer and one of the key writers:

https://gizmodo.com/star-wars-andor-interviews-writer-producer-disney-1849763876

I love that he gives Babylon Berlin a shout, not enough people have watched that show

babylon berlin fucking rules fyi

It's amazing, although I found it amusing he pointed to how they managed the budget. I'm pretty sure BB was the most expensive European TV series ever made at the time.

I'd only vaguely heard of it... I should give it a shot

man Luthen's ship & getaway, Cassian at the end, new aliens that remind me of Stoors. . .

don't care/get the Mon Mothma stuff, the Cassian's mom stuff, but it def. deepens the story. . . am eager for more of this. Was kind of thinking how the Mandalorian was ok at first, but was more a "trial" for SW, can we do a SW live action TV show and have it be good. . . anyway this is fantastic and I will def rewatch

i’m PISSED that this was originally envisioned as five seasons, each covering a year’s worth of diegetic time, and the next four seasons are being squashed into one.. but with actors of this caliber (and demand) i guess it’s hard to get people to block out 5 years of their working life to something

I'm afraid to watch because then it will be over for a whole nother week and I will just want to be watching it for the first time AGAIN.

I can play anything on Disney+ right now exCEPT the new Andor episode which just stalls three seconds in. Make it make sense.

did you get it sorted nashwan?

am i understanding right that andor’s partner in crime, currently being tortured by the empire, is being asked if krieger is “axis”?

yup. they’re asking her if Krieger was her contact and, depending on what she says and how the ISB trap plays out, things could go several ways

Just ask the axis

god the fucking STAKES now are knife-edge in almost every scene, it’s so exciting & scary

also Andor losing his mum makes an interesting point in his journey to the diehard rebel we see in Rogue One … i love the slow progression, like stones slowly added to the jar of who he is becoming … more subtle than expected but v powerful

It’a a hell of a thing. Next week will be even more so. Phew.

grieving droid was rather heartbreaking

i thought it was absurd, in that i guess droids would be doing lots of things other than droiding if this was a known ai property of droids. and just now i sadly am distracted at the thought of the emotional life of sw universe droids as a thing, and i am V SURE it's a thing as all things in sw are things. good show

R2-D2 and C3PO definitely showed a variety of emotions and seemed attached to their owners as well, and there was the whole thing about droids agitating for liberty in SOLO.

are there any properties that really focus on the droid community. they could call it i robot. or we robots

Droids!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars:_Droids

presumably droids have different types of emotional AI depending on what they’re for. B2EMO (…) seems kind of like a companionship droid? so it makes sense that he’d grieve

did you get it sorted nashwan?

no and it was awful I had to watch thru macbook to tv - another one for the backward steps tech thread

episode p much made up for it tho - skarsgard stratospheric skirmish <3

it was v good

the stormtroopers standing at attention the entire time was hilarious for some reason. nameless empire twits astride massive battleships getting outwitted by rebel skunk tech will never not be immensely gratifying and this was an excellent addition to the canon

i love that the basic concept of Empire middle-managers has remain unchanged since the first star wars movie: always pass-agg perma-irritated pasty British dudes, i love it so much

that was a cool scene, although it made me wonder how he's the only person who has giant spaceship lightsaber attachments

He literally owns a shop that specialises in rare weapons and collectibles, and is in regular contact with sources of stolen Empire tech!

Yeah trying to guess the scope of Luthan’s omniscience and access and arms is really fun. Skarsgård’s good at shlub/badass transformation

I liked the plot device of having the weapon charging What kind of countermeasure is charging? Is it going to be ready in time? Calibrating tractor force!

Another fine example of this show only telling you what you need to know when you need to know it (and if they can get away with showing it in context, even better -- my moment from last night might have been how Genevieve O'Reilly said everything in the conversation with Vel with just a very subtle look on her face at one point).

i didnt recognize Vel at first with her glam studio-54 makeover

Another great episode.
But about Luthen’s tricked out ship… I feel like the lightsaber on wings thing is rather impractical. You’d need those two ships flying right at you in a very specific way… why wouldn’t they just shoot him instead of flying past him on either side?!

It's a v minor detail but what's the deal with Andor's place on Niamos, where there's a different random alien each time he visits and he keeps his important secret things in a visible and easy but awkward to access box?

yeah that was very dream logic-ish

i assumed that snoozing tentacle thing was like a lodger?

i loooved the alien-shaped beach umbrellas

apparently those beach scenes were filmed near blackpool lol

The round building you see at the resort is reminiscent of a real one somewhere like Odessa I think.

I was wondering why there were no feds there this time? Maybe it was like 5am?

i assumed that snoozing tentacle thing was like a lodger?

I thought it was one of the fishers who brought them there, maybe sleeping off gratitude pints before heading off again. Husband assures me this wasn't the case. I still like it as an idea, though, and will never rewatch too closely so I can't be proved wrong.

Yeah it's just an AirB&B they both rented at different times and Andor broke in to get the thing.

ok that does make sense. i feel like there's quite a lot deliberately elided in this show, the viewer has to put in a bit of effort to join the dots. which is fine!

I feel like the lightsaber on wings thing is rather impractical. You’d need those two ships flying right at you in a very specific way

didn't he do a kind of barrel roll? that could be pretty effective but yeah they have to be right next to your ship for it to do anything, kind of weird

i still said "whoa" when it happened though

xp

I thought it was some tentacle alien sleeping with the girlfriend from before and they were knocked out after some hard partying. The big box of cash just sitting there untouched was rather strange though.

I think the same snoozing-tentacles thing was in an early scene in Rogue One too - maybe when Jyn was in the prison transport truck.
Incidentally I assume Jyn isn't with Saw Gerrera because it's post whatever situation he abandoned her in. (I recently rewatched RO rather than having a deep knowledge of the lore.)

Rewatching Rogue One for the first time in a while this exchange really jumps out even more now

Chirrut: "We've been in worse cages than this one."
Andor: "This is a first for me."

The Auralnauts strike again
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9Pccq0DZVc