I first reviewed ANDOR (2022-?) after 4 episodes, but ended up watching 8 episodes of Season 1, then my Disney subscription ran out and that was that. But 8 was more than enough and this is the updated review of Season 1. Andor follows the adage of "style over substance" yet most of the people that praise Andor think it has substance. I hear blanket praise calling this show a "masterpiece" or "best Star Wars ever" or "adult and mature" and all of this couldn't be further from the truth. What is adult and mature about this show? That implied sex scene in the first episode? Because Mon Mothma has a terrible home life? An evil Imperial officer begs for the life of his wife and child? Wow, a human person cares about his family...big whoop! Yes, because no show in TV history has ever had sex scenes or family melodrama! LOL It seems like just because a Star Wars show did "mature' things that like every other show that's ever existed has done, all of a sudden fans are calling Andor a cut above the typical Star Wars output that has Jedi and lightsabers and the Force. But even when you write things that are realistic, the writing should actually be good and the writing for this show is nowhere close to good.
Andor is full of weird characters, strange dialogue, boring monologues, bad acting, plot holes, and filler. The first thing I noticed is that there is a LOT of walking! It opens with a long scene of Andor walking agressively to some random bar on some random planet, and I remember a couple of scenes where it just followed a character walking for like 10 minutes! Just significant screen time showing characters walking and doing nothing. Why are Rebel spies and fugitives always walking around in public acting suspicious? The most egregious case is Andor himself (dubiously played by Diego Luna, whose acting in this show is as bad or worse as it was in the also-overrated Rogue One). After Andor, in all of his puny 120-lb glory, had just somehow beat up and killed those 2 guys at the bar on that random planet in the Pilot and after he does his weird-looking run to his ship, he goes back to his home planet walking around and looking and acting suspicious. On Planet Miami Beach, Andor just walks fast looking suspicious. Maybe if Andor didn't look and act shady, then the Imperial Robot would have left him alone. Andor's mechanic ex-girlfriend just walks and walks and is always looking over her shoulder looking guilty about something. Because guilty people who don't want to get caught actually walk around looking guilty like they want to get caught! And of course she's a mechanic to show that she's tough and butch even though the actress is beautiful and come to think of it, Mechanic Lady is literally the only female character from Season 1 who was remotely attractive. Notice I didn't call her by her character's name because I frankly can't remember which is the same for virtually every character on this except for the main character Andor since his name is in the title.
Secondly, the acting is awful consisting of a lot of "serious face" staring. There's Andor who has an eternal scowl on his face and I can barely understand a word he says. Somehow, Luna got a Golden Globe nod then I remembered many of the terrible non-actors over the years who have been nominated for Golden Globes and remembered that particular award doesn't have any logic or standards and will nominate any "actor" for just saying lines. Then there's Mechanic Lady who always has guilty face. Then there's the Evil Imperial Lady with her bug-eyed, clenched-face acting because she really wants to show the viewer she's evil. Then there's the weird-looking Hobbit Rebel Lady with her loud talking and funny walking style. Then there's dumb pasty-faced Cereal Guy, the incompetent Imperial officer who got fired for botching the mission to catch Andor in the third episode. Cereal Guy's speech to his soldiers on the ship in the third episode was some of the worst acting of the season with the actor saying his lines with the conviction of toddler. I call him Cereal Guy because he literally spends 3 consecutive episodes in his Mom's apartment staring at cereal! Lol Also, was Cereal Guy adopted because he and his Mom look absolutely nothing alike? It was like watching Mrs. Costanza play Mom to Chandler Bing. In one of the irrelevant flashbacks from the first 2 episodes, we find out that Andor was "adopted" as a kid when he was found in a scavenged ship by the interracial Rebel duo, who strangely looked the same age in the flashbacks as they did 30 years later in the present day scenes. Guess it was too much for Disney to hire actual young actors for the flashbacks even though Disney spent 200 million dollars on this show. To make Andor's adoptive Mom look younger, they just put a brown wig on her and called it a day. Really put a ton of effort and thought into it, didn't they? Lol Staying on the family topic, for some reason Mon Mothma inexplicably has a mean effeminate husband and nasty bratty teen daughter. It's like the show says let's have all of this irrelevant family drama just to look "realistic and mature." Also, Stellan Skarsgard and Andy Serkis are on the show for...reasons unknown. I use their real names since their characters are just as forgettable as everyone else. Serkis' presence was just a bad reminder of that atrocious The Batman from earlier in the year.
Thirdly, what is it with all of the yelling on this show? In like every other scene, there's very unnatural incessant yelling and most of it is with very thick British accents to make sure they viewers know these characters are VERY British. In the fourth episode, that Imperial officer was yelling at the 3 incompetent subordinates and the guy was just stringing a bunch of big words together to sound smart and important. In the scene of Skarsgard delivering Andor to the Rebel group to be their pilot, why do Skarsgard and Hobbit Lady engage in a shouting match? The rebels needed a pilot and Andor is a pilot. Why are they surprised that Skarsgard brought them a pilot 2 days before the mission when they were in desperate need of one? Also, they needed a fourth body to play Imperial soldier and Andor is this fourth person, so again, why are they surprised he's there? Also, why did they need Andor to tell them that they all needed to carry their weapons on the right? They've supposedly been preparing this mission for MONTHS and just 2 days before the mission they need the newbie to tell them how to march? When Andor was caught and arrived at the prison facility, the guards were yelling and shouting loud enough for the entire galaxy to hear them. I get it, you're evil and mean Imperial prison guards, but dial it down about 10 notches! Lol Also, the costumes and hairstyles are way overdone on this show. Why are shopworkers and homemakers sporting fancy hairstyles and wearing formal outfits to sell crap and stay at home all day? Also, some of the costumes look cheap, like those uniforms looked ridiculous on Cereal Guy and his squad of Incompetents in the third episode.
Finally, this show is full of plot holes. In RO, Andor told Erso that he's been part of the Rebellion since he was SIX years old. Yet here we see Andor as a deadbeat scoundrel who mooches off his adopted Mom, steals and scavenges and doesn't pay his debts, and he doesn't join the rebellion until he's middle-aged! And it's all because of this manifesto nonsense by that puny rebel weirdo kid who died midway through the season. Speaking of puny, I notice that all of these Rebel characters are slight, including Andor. How do all these puny men and women manage to handle themselves in fights and beat up men twice their size? Andor himself looks like he could barely lift a 10-lb weight if he had to. Why are the higher Imperial officers just ignoring Evil Imperial Lady's warning about a rebel network spreading? This show is supposed to take place only a couple of years prior to RO, so for the better part of 20 years did the Empire not know there was actually a Rebellion? Since Andor ditched Hobbit Lady after the mission was over and he was the only pilot in the crew, who flew the ship to Coruscant to give the stolen money to Skarsgard? Couldn't have been her since she's not a pilot and they can't trust anyone other than their inner circle. Why does Mon Mothma look nothing like she does in RO? Andor looks considerably older here than in RO even though this show takes place before. Why are characters using terms that have never been used in any Star Wars content? Right, to sound "realistic and mature."
Given that so many people actually praise the incredibly overrated RO, it shouldn't be surprising that they also like Andor, but both outputs are littered with boring and forgettable characters and retconned storytelling. It's like overly dramatic yelling and shouting, constant serious face, nonstop walking, and scenes of literally nothing happening are being mis-labelled as brilliant, slow-burn, mature storytelling. But at the end of the day, Andor is just another bog, dreary-looking, forgettable sci-fi tale. And what's really sad is that Disney is using the Star Wars name while making sure that this show is nothing like Star Wars, and many fans have confusingly bought what Disney is selling. And of course also being Disney, the show has to push agendas with implied racism, adoptive non-nuclear families, and lesbian romance. I also notice that the show's defenders engage in hyperbole and unqualified praise, while detractors can give specific examples as to why it's bad. Andor is just as bad as other Disney Star Wars shows, it's just doing a better job of fooling the masses with a the old "style over substance" gimmick. The bad news is that there will be a Season 2. The good news is that will be the end of this awful series. Small favors!
Andor is full of weird characters, strange dialogue, boring monologues, bad acting, plot holes, and filler. The first thing I noticed is that there is a LOT of walking! It opens with a long scene of Andor walking agressively to some random bar on some random planet, and I remember a couple of scenes where it just followed a character walking for like 10 minutes! Just significant screen time showing characters walking and doing nothing. Why are Rebel spies and fugitives always walking around in public acting suspicious? The most egregious case is Andor himself (dubiously played by Diego Luna, whose acting in this show is as bad or worse as it was in the also-overrated Rogue One). After Andor, in all of his puny 120-lb glory, had just somehow beat up and killed those 2 guys at the bar on that random planet in the Pilot and after he does his weird-looking run to his ship, he goes back to his home planet walking around and looking and acting suspicious. On Planet Miami Beach, Andor just walks fast looking suspicious. Maybe if Andor didn't look and act shady, then the Imperial Robot would have left him alone. Andor's mechanic ex-girlfriend just walks and walks and is always looking over her shoulder looking guilty about something. Because guilty people who don't want to get caught actually walk around looking guilty like they want to get caught! And of course she's a mechanic to show that she's tough and butch even though the actress is beautiful and come to think of it, Mechanic Lady is literally the only female character from Season 1 who was remotely attractive. Notice I didn't call her by her character's name because I frankly can't remember which is the same for virtually every character on this except for the main character Andor since his name is in the title.
Secondly, the acting is awful consisting of a lot of "serious face" staring. There's Andor who has an eternal scowl on his face and I can barely understand a word he says. Somehow, Luna got a Golden Globe nod then I remembered many of the terrible non-actors over the years who have been nominated for Golden Globes and remembered that particular award doesn't have any logic or standards and will nominate any "actor" for just saying lines. Then there's Mechanic Lady who always has guilty face. Then there's the Evil Imperial Lady with her bug-eyed, clenched-face acting because she really wants to show the viewer she's evil. Then there's the weird-looking Hobbit Rebel Lady with her loud talking and funny walking style. Then there's dumb pasty-faced Cereal Guy, the incompetent Imperial officer who got fired for botching the mission to catch Andor in the third episode. Cereal Guy's speech to his soldiers on the ship in the third episode was some of the worst acting of the season with the actor saying his lines with the conviction of toddler. I call him Cereal Guy because he literally spends 3 consecutive episodes in his Mom's apartment staring at cereal! Lol Also, was Cereal Guy adopted because he and his Mom look absolutely nothing alike? It was like watching Mrs. Costanza play Mom to Chandler Bing. In one of the irrelevant flashbacks from the first 2 episodes, we find out that Andor was "adopted" as a kid when he was found in a scavenged ship by the interracial Rebel duo, who strangely looked the same age in the flashbacks as they did 30 years later in the present day scenes. Guess it was too much for Disney to hire actual young actors for the flashbacks even though Disney spent 200 million dollars on this show. To make Andor's adoptive Mom look younger, they just put a brown wig on her and called it a day. Really put a ton of effort and thought into it, didn't they? Lol Staying on the family topic, for some reason Mon Mothma inexplicably has a mean effeminate husband and nasty bratty teen daughter. It's like the show says let's have all of this irrelevant family drama just to look "realistic and mature." Also, Stellan Skarsgard and Andy Serkis are on the show for...reasons unknown. I use their real names since their characters are just as forgettable as everyone else. Serkis' presence was just a bad reminder of that atrocious The Batman from earlier in the year.
Thirdly, what is it with all of the yelling on this show? In like every other scene, there's very unnatural incessant yelling and most of it is with very thick British accents to make sure they viewers know these characters are VERY British. In the fourth episode, that Imperial officer was yelling at the 3 incompetent subordinates and the guy was just stringing a bunch of big words together to sound smart and important. In the scene of Skarsgard delivering Andor to the Rebel group to be their pilot, why do Skarsgard and Hobbit Lady engage in a shouting match? The rebels needed a pilot and Andor is a pilot. Why are they surprised that Skarsgard brought them a pilot 2 days before the mission when they were in desperate need of one? Also, they needed a fourth body to play Imperial soldier and Andor is this fourth person, so again, why are they surprised he's there? Also, why did they need Andor to tell them that they all needed to carry their weapons on the right? They've supposedly been preparing this mission for MONTHS and just 2 days before the mission they need the newbie to tell them how to march? When Andor was caught and arrived at the prison facility, the guards were yelling and shouting loud enough for the entire galaxy to hear them. I get it, you're evil and mean Imperial prison guards, but dial it down about 10 notches! Lol Also, the costumes and hairstyles are way overdone on this show. Why are shopworkers and homemakers sporting fancy hairstyles and wearing formal outfits to sell crap and stay at home all day? Also, some of the costumes look cheap, like those uniforms looked ridiculous on Cereal Guy and his squad of Incompetents in the third episode.
Finally, this show is full of plot holes. In RO, Andor told Erso that he's been part of the Rebellion since he was SIX years old. Yet here we see Andor as a deadbeat scoundrel who mooches off his adopted Mom, steals and scavenges and doesn't pay his debts, and he doesn't join the rebellion until he's middle-aged! And it's all because of this manifesto nonsense by that puny rebel weirdo kid who died midway through the season. Speaking of puny, I notice that all of these Rebel characters are slight, including Andor. How do all these puny men and women manage to handle themselves in fights and beat up men twice their size? Andor himself looks like he could barely lift a 10-lb weight if he had to. Why are the higher Imperial officers just ignoring Evil Imperial Lady's warning about a rebel network spreading? This show is supposed to take place only a couple of years prior to RO, so for the better part of 20 years did the Empire not know there was actually a Rebellion? Since Andor ditched Hobbit Lady after the mission was over and he was the only pilot in the crew, who flew the ship to Coruscant to give the stolen money to Skarsgard? Couldn't have been her since she's not a pilot and they can't trust anyone other than their inner circle. Why does Mon Mothma look nothing like she does in RO? Andor looks considerably older here than in RO even though this show takes place before. Why are characters using terms that have never been used in any Star Wars content? Right, to sound "realistic and mature."
Given that so many people actually praise the incredibly overrated RO, it shouldn't be surprising that they also like Andor, but both outputs are littered with boring and forgettable characters and retconned storytelling. It's like overly dramatic yelling and shouting, constant serious face, nonstop walking, and scenes of literally nothing happening are being mis-labelled as brilliant, slow-burn, mature storytelling. But at the end of the day, Andor is just another bog, dreary-looking, forgettable sci-fi tale. And what's really sad is that Disney is using the Star Wars name while making sure that this show is nothing like Star Wars, and many fans have confusingly bought what Disney is selling. And of course also being Disney, the show has to push agendas with implied racism, adoptive non-nuclear families, and lesbian romance. I also notice that the show's defenders engage in hyperbole and unqualified praise, while detractors can give specific examples as to why it's bad. Andor is just as bad as other Disney Star Wars shows, it's just doing a better job of fooling the masses with a the old "style over substance" gimmick. The bad news is that there will be a Season 2. The good news is that will be the end of this awful series. Small favors!
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