In three tense and gripping episodes, Andor closes out its second and final season and, while it’s not without its rough patches, I can confidently say by the series’ close that showrunner Tony Gilroy has crafted the best Star Wars of the 21st century and an essential work of anti-fascist television.

For one final time, Andor jumps forward another year. Invigorated by senator Mon Mothma’s defection, the fledgling rebel base on Yavin IV has evolved into a bustling and disciplined military operation, and Cassian has settled into a new routine with his new droid compatriot, K-2SO (Alan Tudyk). However, the future of the rebellion is put into jeopardy when a mole placed inside the Imperial Security Bureau reveals to Luthen Rael that he’s uncovered evidence of a top-secret weapon development program of terrifying magnitude. Even worse, Dedra Meero has finally uncovered Luthen’s civilian identity and is preparing to arrest him and raid his base of operations on Coruscant. Together, Luthen and his assistant Kleya rush to cover their tracks and get the message off planet before it’s too late.

For a finale story arc in a Star Wars show, Andor’s final three-episode-run (“Make It Stop,” “Who Else Knows,” and “Jedha, Kyber, Erso”) feels remarkably restrained. Sure, there are tense hallway shoot outs, exploding speeders, and a seven foot tall droid slapping around ISB agents like they’re ragdolls, but Andor keeps its focus tight and centered on theme and character over spectacle or flashy reveals. “Make It Stop” may finally give us a peak behind the curtain on the origin of Kleya and Luthen’s partnership, but the answers are limited by circumstance and perspective. We gain a slightly better understanding of who the embattled rebel spy master is, but we don’t learn everything. Episodic writer Tom Bissell and Gilroy keep Luthen something of an enigma, which feels fitting. Even his eventual death feels atypically quiet for a Star Wars project. Rather than going out in a blaze of glory or noble sacrifice, Luthen subtly slits his wrists during his arrest before finally being silently euthanized in an Imperial hospital by an infiltrating Kleya. Andor is a show that exists within the shadows and bureaucratic margins of the Star Wars universe. Almost every major character death this season has been marked by lack of drama and agency on the part of the fallen. That’s not how wars like this work. Our cast of characters aren’t Jedi, Sith, or even ace pilots or heroic smugglers. They’re civilians caught up in galactic conflict or spies doing the dirty work our normal heroes and villains wouldn’t. Andor never loses sight of that reality, even in its homestretch.

This approach is maybe most notable in how Andor’s finale wraps up the story arcs of its villains and, in the process, delivers a sharp critique of fascist systems that feels realistically hopeful even amid the violence and loss. Due to a clerical error, Dedra Meero was granted access to a series of top secret Imperial files that finally provide her enough information to initiate an arrest warrant for Luthen, or “Axis” as she’s referred to him for the last two seasons, but in the process also reveal the existence of the Death Star project and essential details on its production. It’s just enough data for Luthen’s mole in the agency to learn the truth and pass it along in the hours before his arrest. In the process, Meero unintentionally sets the rebellion on the trail of the Death Star that will ultimately culminate in Luke Skywalker’s famous victory in A New Hope. Meero’s ambition dooms the Empire’s greatest weapon and sets into motion the series of events that will eventually topple Palpatine’s regime.

To twist the knife even further, by the time Meero has finally located Luthen’s operation, he’s no longer an essential asset to the rebellion, which has largely moved beyond him on Yavin. Meero has let her personal vendettas and career ambition cloud her judgement, and it’s for a mission that ultimately serves little purpose to the Empire other than to stroke her own ego. Her reward for her reckless treatment of Imperial intelligence is to be thrown into the very prison system she helped create back in season one. The Empire has no room for loyalty or forgiveness. Mistakes compound into disaster, and those higher in the Imperial food chain will find ways to punish those culpable below them.

Andor makes it very clear that Meero’s decision isn’t anomalous. The Empire, or any fascist government for that matter, is a system that thrives off ambition and paranoia. It rewards those that are willing to put their necks out on the line for the success of the system, but it also makes the consequences of failure abundantly clear. Everyone everywhere is looking out for themselves and only themselves. There is no trust or loyalty beyond a cynical pursuit of individual power within a system that ultimately cares little for the well-being of its members. Meero’s ambition is useful until it isn’t. She’s taunted and humiliatingly interrogated by Death Star project manager Orson Krennic, reminded that her dedication to the Imperial cause means nothing when the egos of those above her have been bruised. She and her ISB compatriots and overseers suffer quiet ends as they turn blasters on themselves behind closed doors or are shuffled away to unknown prisons to die in obscurity. And even the Imperial bigwigs like Krennic aren’t immune to this form of petty retribution. As Rogue One demonstrates, his own pet project is quickly stripped away from him by Grand Moff Tarkin as soon as it is politically useful. It’s just a violent scramble of crabs in a bucket. Only those at the top are given the freedom to keep climbing, even if they can’t fully escape.

In contrast, the rebellion plays at military discipline but it trusts its operatives enough to take risks. When Cassian, Melshi, and K-2SO go rogue and sneak off to Coruscant to rescue Kleya before she’s captured by the Empire, the rebellion warily accepts them back and is willing to hear them out despite their fears and misgivings. They’re cautious due to the nature of the conflict they fight in, but they also trust one another. There’s a marked difference between necessary paranoia driven by survival against incredible odds and paranoia driven by distrust, and that’s the final message that Andor leaves us with.

Leftist movements can’t afford to let our guards down, but we win by listening to and trusting one another. Fascist governments will always implode. The environment of corruption, narcissism, and distrust that they foster is not sustainable. Mistakes will be made and systems will crumble, and it’s the job of those fighting back to press that advantage and look out for one another in the process. In doing so, Andor, despite all the darkness that has preceded it over the past two seasons, sets the stage for a hopeful future as the Star Wars timeline moves directly forward into Rogue One and eventually the aptly subtitled 1977 original film.

That said, if Andor stumbles anywhere in its final moments, it’s in this series’ inescapable connection to Star Wars’ larger continuity. No matter how much Gilroy has injected this series with a sense of individual identity and purpose, a large amount of its narrative was always going to be resolved in Rogue One, an almost decade-old movie that’s, unfortunately, not that great. I know the film has a passionate fan base, and I’d hoped a post-Andor rewatch might improve my opinions, but I’m still as lukewarm on it as ever. Sure, I now view Cassian and a few scattered background characters with a lot more interest and affection, but this does little to improve the film’s awkwardly paced first two acts or make Jyn Erso a more interesting protagonist.

It’s the inevitable downside to any fictional universe that’s as sprawling and prolific as Star Wars. The good, the bad, and the mediocre are all inextricably tied to one another, and sometimes an A+ television series cannot completely escape the shadow of a B- movie. On a practical level, this simply means that a good chunk of Andor’s finale, “Jedha, Kyber, Erso” is committed to setting up the different moving parts of Rogue One rather than spending more time with its own characters and plot. The fact that Gilroy and his collaborators are able to craft a satisfying conclusion despite this is a testament to the quality storytelling across not only these three hours but the past two seasons.

Gays in Space

When we passed through the first two episodes of Andor’s final arc without even a cameo from Vel Sartha, I mentally prepared myself for the possibility that we’d get next to nothing from our resident space lesbian in the finale. There was so much narrative ground to cover in “Jedha, Kyber, Erso” that I just couldn’t see how Gilroy and co. could make room for a satisfying end for Vel. But! I was wrong!

Cassian and Vel have a unique bond in that they, by series end, are the only two survivors of the Aldhani heist that more or less served as the opening salvo of Luthen’s shadow war against the Empire. They were witnesses to what will end up being a pivotal moment in the war effort, and although the two butted heads throughout that particular mission, they’ve emerged from it as respecting comrades with shared history and trauma. It makes sense that not only would Vel’s cousin, Mon Mothma, seek her council in verifying the terrifying intel that Cassian brings back from Coruscant, but that the two of them would feel comfortable enough with one another to talk candidly about Luthen Rael’s last contribution to the Alliance. Vel already trusts her fellow rebel-in-arms and the would-be interrogation instead morphs into a wonderfully understated toast to their fallen comrades and loved ones, including her deceased partner Cinta Kaz.

I would’ve settled with Andor closing out Vel’s story with a quiet acknowledgement of her partner’s passing but, in keeping with the episode’s themes of looking forward to an uncertain but hopeful future, there’s more to her story to come. Shaken by Luthen’s death and her violent extraction from Coruscant, Kleya finds it difficult to imagine a future with the Yavin rebels, who have long left her and her mentor behind. Elizabeth Dulau does a wonderful job here of portraying Kleya’s exhaustion and grief, but also her genuine discomfort at the prospect of starting a new stage of her life. It’s not until Vel finds her wandering aimlessly through the rainforest at night that she begins to look at ease. Both women share a cup of tea, and Vel slowly coaxes Kleya into the idea that maybe she deserves to let her guard down a little and acknowledge that there are people here who care about her and will keep her safe. Faye Marsay and Dulau have an easy, quiet chemistry here that wonderfully undercuts the tense and often biting exchanges that the two fired at one another while under Luthen’s employ. It hints towards a less hostile, more trusting future for both of these women.

And maybe more? I know I’m reaching here, but, as some of you were quick to point out after the season premiere, Kleya absolutely flirts with, or at the very least suggestively teases, Vel during Leida’s wedding, a move which isn’t really shut down by either party. Andor has planted the seeds for a potentially more intimate relationship between the two in the months and years to come. And, while I am always hungry for more explicitly gay Star Wars, I think this hinting and uncertain ending for the two works. While I’m not sure if the audience or Vel as a character are fully ready for her to move on from Cinta, it gives me comfort to know she might find some companionship in Kleya down the line. Both women deserve some kind of comfort and respite after the sacrifices they’ve given to the rebellion. Regardless, Kleya feels safe enough with Vel to fall asleep in her bed, and that alone is gay enough to sustain me until Disney/Lucasfilm finally give me a lesbian space rebel spinoff series or at least a novel (or comic series or video game or animated anthology show or audio drama).

It feels like a small miracle that a show like Andor got to exist. An expensive as hell, explicitly anti-fascist, openly queer, and intelligently plotted spy thriller set in one of the biggest media franchises in history feels like it shouldn’t exist, but it did, and it was wonderful. I hope Disney, Lucasfilm, or really any other major studio picks up on the deservedly glowing reception this series has received over the past few years. IP-based media does not need only be mass-appeal entertainment. There is a hunger for smart, political stories told in familiar settings. I’m not entirely optimistic about the slate of Star Wars shows and films headed our way in the near future (the never-ending and oddly lifeless Mandalorian saga and a film directed by the artistic genius behind Free Guy and Deadpool and Wolverine), but hopefully lessons are learned, and examples are followed. Andor should be an inspiration to not only do better politically, but creatively as well. And if not, well, at least we’ll still have these two masterful seasons of television. That might just have to be enough.

Before you go! Autostraddle runs on the reader support of our AF+ Members. If this article meant something to you today — if it informed you or made you smile or feel seen, will you consider joining AF and supporting the people who make this queer media site possible?

Join AF+!