The Mouse House is taking a huge gamble with Andor, a story set before the events of Rogue One and centering around the titular thief-turned-Rebellion-spy Cassian Andor. But Diego Luna apparently thinks this opportunity to return to the galaxy far, far away “felt right” due to a number of reasons, reasons he outlined in a recent chat with SFX magazine.
Per GamesRadar, here’s what the Mexican actor recently said to the outlet when asked about how he reacted to Lucasfilm calling him up and proposing a return to Star Wars.
“‘I thought it felt right, and that it was a great idea,’ he said. ‘It was an open space for creativity, complete freedom, because very little had been said about Cassian and about his story, so we had room to come up with great ideas, with a great team lead by Tony Gilroy. The show lives where I like stories to live, where the grey areas are, where contrast happens, and where nuances are important and quite vast.’”
Gilroy, who served as the lead writer on Rogue One, is helming this new Disney Plus series as its showrunner. Luna thinks Andor does a wonderful job of portraying Cassian’s backstory and his motivations for joining the half-formed and infantile Rebel Alliance.
“It’s quite interesting that no one speaks like him in Rogue One – no one has that accent, no one seems to come where he comes from. It must be hardcore not to have those kinds of connections – it’s like [knowing] everything can be taken away from you. Imagine having that certainty, and that’s the kind of character we’re talking about.”
Andor will see the return of many familiar faces, like Mon Mothma and Saw Gerrera, but perhaps most importantly, the story is about how a simple man such as Cassian himself can be inspired to fight back against the tyranny of Palpatine’s rule.
The show is holding a three-episode premiere event on Sep. 21, while the rest of the 12-episode season one will follow on their heels on a weekly basis.