A much-missed ‘Rogue One’ character finally returns in ‘Andor’ better than ever

This article contains spoilers for Andor episode 8

We’ve known for a long time that Forest Whitaker’s Saw Gerrera would be appearing in Andor, and this week the much-feared Rebel warrior finally arrived. Stellan Skarsgård’s Luthen is trying to cook up his next big mission to destroy an Imperial power station on Spellhaus, and needs air support.

He turns to Gerrera, who’s hiding out with a cadre of soldiers and prototype X-Wings on Segra Milo. Saw isn’t interested in working with others, spitting out a condemnation of the various divided partisan forces – “Neo-Republicans. The Ghorman Front. The Partisan Alliance. Sectorists. Human cultists!” – before claiming to be the only one with “clarity of purpose”.

It’s a typically great performance from Whitaker, who clearly hasn’t missed a beat with the character in the six years since Rogue One (though he has reprised the character in other Star Wars media in the interim). We also know that Gerrera is heavily tied up in Jyn Erso’s backstory, so if the show is going to focus on him, we may see a younger version of Felicity Jones’ character soon.

However it pans out, fans are loving that Saw is back:

Flashbacks to Rogue One:

Saw is the galaxy’s best anarchist:

We’re guessing he wouldn’t be a sequel trilogy fan:

Whitaker really is a step up in intensity:

We feel this:

We can’t wait to see more of Saw and his take-no-prisoners tactics, so once against we’re left anxiously counting down the days until the next Andor. Here’s hoping what’s coming heavily features Whitaker’s Gerrera, as we can’t get enough of the guy.