Summary

Tony Gilroy reveals how the Ghorman Massacre will play a vital role in Andor Season 2.

He praises Michael Wilkinson’s costume design and how it elevates the series.

Gilroy feels the pressure to get Cassian and K2’s “meet-cute” right.

We are on the verge of greatness. Andor is set to return with its second and final season in a little over a month, and Disney is going all-in on the promotion for the critically acclaimed series. Ahead of a handful of very exciting announcements hitting the airwaves today, I had the privilege of catching up with Tony Gilroy for the first time in nearly two years. During our wide-ranging conversation, we discussed some of the details revealed in the recently released Season 2 trailer and special look.
Andor is set to arrive on April 22, with a very different release schedule than Season 1. Rather than weekly releases, the series will be released in three-episode batches that culminate with an explosive finale on May 13. The final season will span approximately five years in Cassian Andor’s (Diego Luna) life, leading up to the events of Rogue One, which means the story has been condensed to fit into those time jumps—something Gilroy has discussed at length since the Season 1 finale. Tackling those three-episode time jumps are directors Ariel Kleiman, Janus Metz, and Alonso Ruizpalacios, and scribes Dan Gilroy, Beau Willimon, and newcomer Tom Bissell. The series stars Diego Luna, Adria Arjona, Stellan Skarsgård, Genevieve O’Reilly, Kyle Soller, Denise Gough, Faye Marsay, and Varada Sethu, alongside returning Rogue One cast members Forest Whitaker, Ben Mendelsohn, and Alan Tudyk.
In addition to discussing the release schedule, Gilroy also revealed how the Ghorman Massacre plays a vital role in Season 2 and how many episodes it will play out across, how the costumes of the series have changed between Season 1 and Season 2, and how Cassian is a “messianic-like” figure through the series and what that means for the characters in his orbit. You can read our full conversation below.
‘Andor’ Isn’t Trying to “Rhyme With Anything” in the Present

COLLIDER: The last time we spoke was right before the strike had started, and so much has happened since then. Rogue One is one of my all-time favorite Star Wars movies, and I always think about how pertinent it was when it came out in 2016. Now, with Andor Season 2 coming out, it is again a very pertinent story that is being told. For you, is there a degree of eeriness to working on these stories that feel, in a way, like they parallel the things we’re seeing in real life?
TONY GILROY: No one was working on the show with a newspaper at any point in time. We write so far in advance. I’ve said this before: I’ve been a student of history, as an amateur, a dinner table historian all this time, and it’s nothing but revolutions and uprisings and people being swept up into events that they weren’t ready for and people assuming heroic roles that they had never anticipated. One of the really cool things about doing this show is the opportunity to use all the 3:00 in the morning reading I’ve wasted over my life to do that. So, it’s not trying to rhyme with anything…
It seems to parallel quite well. I do think that’s why I like Andor so much because I am a historian and an anthropologist by trade. Seeing the echoes of history flowing through these stories is what’s always made Star Wars so remarkable.
GILROY: It comes up in every interview. We were just talking with someone about how Mon Mothma and Vel come off Chandrila, and you’re thinking about, “Oh my god, all the early Christians and the Roman Empire of the elite. What was that like? People breaking away?” The sorry truth is—here’s a cliche—history repeats itself. So, I want to make the show timeless, I suppose.
And it works! From everything we’ve seen so far, the costumes seem to be next-level this season, and they were already impeccable in Season 1. Can you talk a little about the evolution of the clothing and the story that is telling for these characters?
GILROY: I think the upgrade is just the matter that we’re moving to different planets and moving it in a different way. We’re swapping out Ferrix for a much more fashion-forward, let’s say, planet. The connective tissue is [costume designer] Michael Wilkinson—just a god. I really don’t try to think about awards or any of that stuff much at all, but I really am going to be severely disappointed if Michael Wilkinson does not get recognized for the show. I don’t know how much more you can do to both world-building and elegance and aspirational clothing, functional clothing, and badass clothing and combat clothing, and do it all every week on a scale that’s just so… It’s him. It’s Michael.
And it’s not just the main characters. It’s all the background performers. Everything just comes to life in such a very real way, even just looking at the teaser.
GILROY: You’re going to see more than you can anticipate when the full show is revealed, and it works all off the frame. And it’s his whole department. Bow down to Michael Wilkinson.
‘Andor’ Season 2 Will Clear Up the “Confusion” Surrounding the Ghorman Massacre

Image via Disney+

The latest teaser for the series revealed that we’re going to see Ghorman, which some Star Wars fans know for the devastating Ghorman Massacre. When you’re looking at the references to these various events that we have only heard of, what went into the decision to choose which to show us?
GILROY: It’s the five years. I get those five years. So, in those five years, there’s a couple of really big… You map it out on a calendar, on a piece of paper, “Okay, here’s where I’m going to go. Here are my four blocks. Here’s where these things happen.” Mon Mothma leaving the Senate is canonical. There are a couple of other events in here. The development of Yavin is canonical. Obviously, the discovery of the Death Star and whatever intelligence there is, espionage, that leads to the beginning of Rogue One is canonical. I had to get to all those things.
Ghorman, interestingly, is canonical but completely undescribed. It’s a total blank slate.
There’s also a bit of confusion about the Ghorman Massacre, and what is the Ghorman Massacre? There’s a lot of confusion within canon. So, it was an opportunity to rebuild in a really significant way. It’s a very significant part of our show that can do a lot of different things for us. Quite honestly, it’s very expensive to build, so we really want to use it as much as possible so it carries over five different episodes. I’m really confident that the really deep, passionate Star Wars community will appreciate how we’ve straightened out that story.
That concept, just hearing you describe it, is what works so well. Because in a situation like a massacre like that, there are different kinds of points of view and how it’s disseminated throughout the galaxy and how that story is told. So, finding a way to show it is going to be, I think, interesting for audiences. With the season being more condensed, were there situations where you found yourself having to truly kill your darlings to make the story work within those time jumps?
GILROY: The writers on the show and myself, it’s a pretty fancy bunch of writers, really, in a way. Everybody’s very experienced. We only get together for five or six days in the beginning to talk about the story, and then we kind of go, and they do their thing, and then they go away. But I always have them as a reference to call upon. The idea of killing darlings always seemed like such a rookie thing to me, like something you get used to doing early on. I’m always happy when I’m cutting and editing, and so that’s sort of a natural thing. There are places where there were things that we might have done that were economically impossible for us to do, so in that sense. But, no, it was mostly exciting to write it. It was mostly exciting to have the year-long gaps. None of us had ever had the opportunity to do that before, deal with that much negative space.
It’s exciting. This season has a different release model, as well. Was that something that was planned as the series was being developed and shot for the season, or something that came together organically once the season was finished?
GILROY: We heard about that as we finished. We finished the show in November. We finaled the show in November, so we really had to wait for Skeleton Crew. It’s a Disney decision. There’s an internal logic behind it. They have their reasons. It’s kind of cool. I mean, it puts a burden on podcasters. What are they going to do? It’s a movie a week, you know?
Exactly! I’m excited for it. As somebody who will be recapping it for Collider, I’m very excited for the challenge of that much story hitting every week.
GILROY: I thought about that later on. I know there are a couple of people that are going to be like, “Oh my god, I’ve got to stay up late tonight.”
I know when Season 1 had finished airing, you mentioned that you were going to release the Season 1 scripts. Is that something that’s still possibly happening in the future? Because I know people still bring it up every so often, like, “When is it happening?”
GILROY: I wanted to do it. We put it together. It’s really cool. I’ve seen it, I loved it. AI is the reason we’re not. In the end, it would be 1,500 pages that came directly off this desk. I mean, terribly sadly, it’s just too much of an X-ray and too easily absorbed. Why help the fucking robots anymore than you can? So, it was an ego thing. It was vanity that makes you want to do it, and the downside is real. So, vanity loses.
Tony Gilroy Feels the Pressure to Get Cassian and K2’s “Meet Cute” Right

Image via Lucasfilm

Speaking about robots who are good, I’m very excited for K2.
GILROY: Good segue!
Perfect segue! Fans have obviously loved B2EMO, but we’re very ready for K2. I feel like there’s a certain degree of pressure, maybe, at least from fan perception of that first meeting of Cassian and K2. What can you preview about that?
GILROY: Yeah, man, the bar is high. No, I knew it. Just by delaying it off the first season, the controversy of that. Nobody was happy about that. I don’t think Disney was happy about that, I don’t think the fans were happy about that. But there was a reason for it, a really, really good reason for it. But it does mean that I definitely have to deliver on the meet-cute, so we’ll see how it goes. We’re happy with what we have.
I love that. “Meet-cute.” Going into Rogue One, we all sort of knew that it was a suicide mission, more or less, for a lot of those characters. Now, with Andor, there are a whole lot of characters whose fates we don’t actually know the end of yet. Should fans have tissues prepared for some of these characters we grew very attached to in Season 1? Is it the same sort of emotional gut punch?
GILROY: Yes. But not even in matters of life and death. I will say that, as we finish the show, when we’re mixing and doing color, when you’re mixing, and you’re really in there, and now you’re at the end, all the people who worked on the show, the effective time, over 24 episodes, over five years of these intense circumstances that these characters go through with these amazing actors and all the material that we’ve had to deal with, it’s not just whether you live or die. It’s the damage. It’s the sacrifice you’ve made or the sacrifice you haven’t made.
The five women, what they go through…Cassian is sort of Star Wars Jesus running through there—this messianic character running through the middle. We know that story, and it has its own complexities. But, really, I think the surprising and shocking, emotional punch will come from from the collateral damage and triumph of the people all around him.
I’m not sure I’m emotionally ready for it yet, but I am very excited.
GILROY: If I don’t make you cry, I will be very unhappy.
After ‘Andor,’ What’s Next for Tony Gilroy?

Image via Lucasfilm

You made me cry with Season 1, so I can only imagine Season 2 will make me cry even more. Speaking of the amount of time that has gone into making Andor, recently, Kathleen Kennedy was asked about whether or not you might come back to do more Star Wars in the future. Is that something that’s still on the back burner once you’re done with Andor, once you’ve decompressed from all of this, that you might come back either as a writer or a director for something in the future?
GILROY: It’s not really part of my plan. I’ve been peripherally involved for 10 years and intensely involved for six years, so that’s a pretty big chunk of my life. There are other things to do. I think when it’s done, I will have left a pretty big piece of Star Wars real estate behind. I’m feeling guilty about not chipping in.
You’ve given a lot. You’ve given your blood, sweat, and tears to the franchise. What’s next for you after Andor? Are you going back to film, television?
GILROY: There’s a movie I’m trying to make. I want to direct. I’d like to direct before I forget how. So, I have a movie I’m trying to get off. We’ll see if I get the money for it. I’m in a whole other world again. I’m back out there with my hat in my hand, trying to raise money.
Is it a political thriller style that you’ve done before?
GILROY: No, not at all. It’s a movie about movie music.
Andor Season 2 debuts on Disney+ on April 22. Stay tuned for more details about the series, and Disney’s exciting roll-out for the series.

Andor

Release Date

2022 – 2024

Network

Disney+