While it was announced at Star Wars Celebration in Japan that Hayden Christensen would be reprising the Anakin Skywalker role for the second season of “Ahsoka,” we won’t be seeing Darth Vader returning for “Andor,” and we have a better idea of why creator/showrunner Tony Gilroy (“Rogue One”) chose to do that.
During a chat with Rolling Stone Magazine, Gilroy mentions already having tackled the popular antagonist and not really seeing a lot of motivation to keep using him.
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“No, that was never on my agenda,” Gilroy told Rolling Stone when asked if he’d considered including the iconic Sith Lord in the final season of “Andor” after using him in “Rogue One.” “Writing for Darth Vader is really limiting. I’ve done it. He doesn’t have a lot to say.”
Also, adding his reasoning for only mentioning the looming puppet master, Emperor Palpatine, “He was too big a piece of meat for me to introduce,” Gilory said. “It was too heavy a lift. I thought about it at one point, but it was too heavy a lift.”
It’s not like fans are going without Darth Vader; there are six feature films exploring Anakin’s journey from Jedi to Sith, then back to Jedi as a Force Ghost (returning for “Ahsoka” season two) after being redeemed at the end of “Return of The Jedi.” We even saw Vader cameoing in “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” (a scene that Gareth Edwards directed himself) and then playing a secondary villain in “Obi-Wan Kenobi,” as Christensen reunited with prequels co-star Ewan McGregor.
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What the future holds for live-action Darth Vader at Lucasfilm beyond Christensen returning as Anakin Skywalker is unknown, but there are certainly fans dying to see more and will never be satisfied, even if others are exhausted by the thought of more of him. We’re still unsure if we’ll see more stories taking place in the pre-“A New Hope” era.
“Andor” season two is currently streaming exclusively on Disney+ with three new episodes dropping every Tuesday.