Star Wars Showrunner Defends 1 Decision That Disappointed Andor Fans

Star Wars: Andor is arguably Lucasfilm’s greatest project since being acquired by Disney. The Emmy-winning series impressed viewers with its thoughtful exploration of mature subject matter, becoming a breath of fresh air for the Star Wars franchise. However, while Andor (rightfully) earned a plethora of accolades during its two-season run, there are still aspects some fans might have found disappointing. Perhaps a testament to how strong the character dynamics were on Andor, some viewers were hoping to see more of specific pairings together, that didn’t come to pass. Now, showrunner Tony Gilroy has provided an explanation as to why.

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Gilroy addressed why Bix Caleen did not accompany Cassian Andor on a mission on screen in Season 2 and if the budget played a role in that creative choice. “No, but there are other things that we did for budgetary reasons. I put a [Bix and Cassian mission] off screen,” he said. “In the first scene at the safe house [in 204], they’re talking about a mission they just came off of where he killed somebody who saw their faces. So often in films or whatever, it’s not what you want to say; it’s where you can say it. Where’s the opportunity to do it? It certainly would’ve been fun and easy to write interesting things for them to do together, but where do you put it? How does it fit? What’s its application? So it happens to take place off screen in the year before the Coruscant safe house.”

Andor‘s Budget Is Something Streaming Will Never See Again

As great as it might have been to see Cassian and Bix embark on a mission for the Rebellion together, Gilroy makes smart points. When crafting the narrative for a movie or TV show, it’s important for everything on screen to fit together. Andor Season 2 sports a unique structure; it incorporates multiple year-long time jumps between four mini arcs (each arc consists of three episodes each), so there’s likely a lot that happened off screen. Gilroy and Co. had to decide what needed to be shown for the purposes of the stories they were trying to tell. Each Season 2 arc is very specific, and it’s difficult to see where a Cassian/Bix mission could have fit. Andor is a show that never leans on fan service as a crutch, so Gilroy wouldn’t include something like that unless it served the narrative.

It isn’t surprising to hear the Andor team made some concessions for budgetary reasons. The Andor production budget was reportedly a whopping $650 million (around $290 million of that went to Season 2). That figure makes it seem like money wasn’t an issue, but Disney told Gilroy that “streaming is dead” because budgets had spiraled so far out of control and money was tightening up. With that in mind, Gilroy had to be mindful to not add anything extra to an already significant sum of money. In a vacuum, the budget itself may not have been an issue for shooting a potential Cassian/Bix mission, but there’s no telling what kind of domino effect that might have had on the rest of the season.

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Because of Andor Season 2’s storytelling structure, the first episode of each new arc essentially needed to act like the opening moments of a movie, catching viewers up with how things currently stand. The conversation Bix and Cassian have in the beginning of “Ever Been to Ghorman?” establishes they’ve been active in the field and their work is taking a toll on them emotionally, setting the stage for the next arc. Even though we don’t actually see the mission being referenced, it’s an efficient way of bringing viewers up to speed, and we can easily fill in the blanks to draw our own horrifying conclusions about what happened.

Andor was truly lightning in a bottle, not only in its bold storytelling approach but just in the amount of resources that went into making the show a reality. Gilroy doubts something like it will ever happen again. “Will someone ever spend that kind of money to make something live again [on streaming]?” he said in his interview. “I don’t know if that will ever happen again, but what a great thing it is to be able to have done it. We got away with it, and we feel pretty good about it.” Looking at the current entertainment landscape, a case can be made that the peak streaming era is over, forcing studios to implement new strategies moving forward. In Lucasfilm’s case, they seem to be pivoting back to theatrical features, so new streaming shows may not be as big of a priority moving forward. It’s highly unlikely Disney throws $650 million at a TV series again.

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