The Fluke of Andor

Andor seems to be having a moment culturally, although it’s hard for me to tell if it’s real or just my social feeds serving up my pro-Andor algorithm.

The show is so good. So good! Like a dream come true of a Star Wars kid who grew up and wanted serious adult drama set in that world from 1977.

It’s good because they got Tony Gilroy and gave him a bunch of Disney money to hire his brothers and his pals to make what they thought was best.

I was thinking what a total fluke this was. Tony Gilroy was the high-powered script doctor who they turned to in desperation when the rough cut of Rogue One didn’t play. It was such a disaster that Gilroy not only wrote reshoots, but directed some of them. And because he knew what he was doing, the film became a huge hit.

Then, evidently, Disney kicked around the idea of a TV show prequel to Rogue One, but couldn’t make it work. They wanted to do like an Andor and K-2S0 buddy show. They asked Gilroy who told them, no no no, you don’t do that, you do this story of a “roach” (Andor) who becomes a butterfly (a hero).

A few years later they still couldn’t crack their version, so they told Gilroy, “Okay, you do yours.” And that’s how we got Andor.

I don’t want to trash any show or franchise or executive in particular...not just talking about Star Wars here...because that would be bad for my precious career.

But so much stuff that gets made is just so—meh. It’s silly. It’s childish. It’s histrionic. It’s repetitive. It’s bad.

I wonder how many creators there are of Gilroy’s level who could turn them into a triumph like Andor, but they just aren’t asked, for whatever shortsighted creative or corporate reason.

And again, the only reason we got Andor is because Rogue One was in such dire straits.