Three years after the show’s debut, Andor is back with a second season, which sadly is also its last. According to the first reviews of its return, the Star Wars prequel series is ending with a bang, offering more evidence that this is one of the best pieces of the franchise ever. Diego Luna reprises his titular role, again delivering an award-worthy performance, while showrunner Tony Gilroy carries on George Lucas’s political sci-fi tradition with some fresh ideas of his own.
Here’s what critics are saying about Andor season 2:
It’s triumphant… Andor joins The Empire Strikes Back, The Last Jedi, and Rogue One as top-tier Star Wars.
It’s not only some of the best Star Wars to come out since Disney took over Lucasfilm, but some of the very best Star Wars period.
Season 1 of Andor was already by far the most exciting output of the venerable franchise’s streaming TV era. With season 2, Andor cements itself as the gold standard of what modern Star Wars can be.
This second season doesn’t just cement the show’s standing as the best Star Wars project ever made. It’s also the rare spinoff that deepens the best parts of the franchise around it.
Andor is a perfect Star Wars show and a masterclass in crafting a prequel.
A stunning example of what Star Wars can be at its very best.
Somehow, Tony Gilroy and his brilliant writing team have outdone even themselves with season 2.
If Andor season 1 was the match to light the fires of the Galactic Rebellion, then Andor season 2 lights the fuse to the powder keg.
Gilroy wasn’t shy about using revolutionary history as one of the primary influences on the first season, but season two uses World War II as an even more explicit reference point.
Andor season 2 has all of the exquisite touchstones that made season 1 such a cult hit.
People will compare this to season 1 and many will wonder “Is it better?” or “Is it worse?” and all I can say is that it is neither. It is a perfect continuation of the first season. It is just as good.
Much like the first season’s prison episodes, the strongest story arcs are in the middle sections.
Episode 11, in particular, is one that gave me literal chills and made the hair on my arms stand on end.
(Photo by ©Lucasfilm)
Gilroy and Lucasfilm go into some brave and uncharted territory for Star Wars, and I honestly can’t believe that they had the courage to go there.
This remains a series that goes much further than any other franchise offering ever has, looking the fascism of the Empire right in the eye and showing it in all of its evil, rather than flinching away or merely gesturing towards it in the vaguest of terms.
This is Star Wars at its most bleak.
It’s certainly more adult than any other Star Wars show or film I’ve seen, with drug use and the threat of sexual assault, as well as moments of intense violence.
Andor stands out, even while fitting in, and it does so with style and urgency rarely felt in our conformist era of dreary I.P.
There is a massive reveal in season 2 that will certainly excite fans.
You might think you know what is coming, but I promise you, your world is about to be flipped upside down.
The last moments of Andor season 2 literally took my breath away, in a way that this Saga hasn’t done since Darth Vader revealed himself to Luke Skywalker on that scaffold on Bespin.
Like The Empire Strikes Back before it, this series takes the preconceptions audiences have about mainstream art and actually dares to challenge them.
In its second season, Andor shows us what a good story can accomplish — its capacity to dull empathy or amplify it, to placate people or awaken them.
The storytelling remains intelligent and focused, never dipping into melodrama, and consistently sharp in its pacing and character development.
The beauty of the writing is that it doesn’t shy away from letting characters be messy, difficult, and conflicted.
The scripts [are] full of meaty, mature dialogue.
The best art demands we look inward and then back out into the world to confront our place in the systems around us and imagine what kind of change is possible and what we’re willing to do to get it. This second season of Andor achieves that and more.
No other series this year confronts our real world as boldly or as accurately as Andor.
When I say that Andor season 2 is timely, these episodes feel ripped straight from today’s headlines and are bound to be some of the most controversial moments of Star Wars yet.
(Photo by ©Lucasfilm)
While a few familiar aspects of Star Wars make their way into the narrative, it’s done in a way that feels fresh, new, and important to the story at hand.
Fans won’t miss all the usual Star Wars traits they could possibly want, from a surprising amount of humor in the early going to creative choices that only make movies like Rogue One (and even A New Hope) better in retrospect.
As bleak as Andor can sometimes be, it’s still Star Wars. The set-pieces all sizzle like a lightsaber cutting thick metal, with one of the best letting Gilroy dig into his screen credits to gleefully turn Cassian into intergalactic Jason Bourne.
Diego Luna is brilliant.
As good as Diego Luna was in the first season, he is even better this time around.
Diego Luna should win an Emmy for his work here… It’s a meaty, complicated role, and Diego Luna makes the most of it.
Luna gives an Emmy-winning performance in each episode, with depth afforded even to the moments with minimal dialogue.
All the performances are outstanding, but the ones that’ll knock your socks off are by Kyle Soller and Denise Gough.
The most fascinating performance this season may be Gough’s as Dedra.
The biggest surprise is Elizabeth Dulau, who gets an upgrade in screen time as she stages an elaborate break-in during one of the seasons’ most intense episodes.
Watch for Forest Whitaker’s dynamic performance as an extreme radical rebel who is more than willing to sacrifice everything in the name of the cause.
Visually, the show makes slight improvements from its 2022 predecessor, though some CGI still falters.
It’s also beautifully produced. The costume design is simply without parallel.
Luke Hull’s production design is magnificent and continues to make every corner of the galaxy look lived-in and real.
Luke Hull’s production design has truly leveled up with season 2.
Non-fans will see it for the high drama it brings and will inspire them to continue the rest of the story.
Andor’s subtlety probably won’t work for large swathes of the demographic coalition that Star Wars traditionally serves, so reliant on fan service or an errant Skywalker to juice devotion.
(Photo by Des Willie/©Lucasfilm)
There were many times during this season that I was moved to tears, then shock, and even anger… It is devastating, rich with emotion, and full of great drama.
I found myself broken at the end, sobbing for characters I know and love.
The end is, perhaps, the most devastatingly tragic and yet hopeful finale that will ever come out of Star Wars.
The only flaw in the entire series is the fact that it’s over now.
We’ll get no more Andor, and it’s unclear if Tony Gilroy and his team will make any other Star Wars content in the future. That’s a shame, simply because this is so much better than anything else we’ve seen in this universe.
Andor: Season 2 premieres on Disney+ on April 22, 2025.
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