Andor Season 1 recap: Here's what you need to remember as season 2 approaches

As Andor season 2 gears up for release, now is the time to refresh what happened in season 1. For the uninitiated, a spin-off of the 2016 prequel movie, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, the solo spin-off series takes place five years before the events of the movie. The first season follows the titular character, Cassian Andor, who begins the series on a personal journey but finds himself in the center of a galaxy-wide rebellion.

Season 1 streamed on Disney+ between September 21, 2022, and November 23, 2022. Consisting of twelve episodes, the first season of Andor enjoyed both critical and popular acclaim. It was also nominated for several Primetime Emmy Awards.

Some critics were able to watch the entirety of Andor Season 2, and if they are to be believed, the upcoming second season is just as good as the first season.

"“Andor” Season 2 will see the characters and their relationships intensify as the horizon of war draws near and Cassian becomes a key player in the Rebel Alliance. Everyone will be tested and, as the stakes rise, the betrayals, sacrifices and conflicting agendas will become profound."

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Andor Season 1 recap:

Here are some of the major events in Andor Season 1:

Cassian Andor joins the rebellion

It makes sense to begin the recap with the titular character. We learn that Cassian "Kassa" Andor was part of a primitive tribe on the planet Kenari. He is taken to another planet named Ferrix by salvagers, Clem and Maarva. It was at Ferrix that Cassian experienced the Empire's cruelty through the death of his adopted father, Clem, who was convicted unjustly for a crime and hanged.

At the start of the series, Cassian was searching for his biological sister, whom he had been separated from in Kenari. It is during this search that Andor encounters two corrupt officers trying to shake him for a bribe. But Cassian shoots the two cops and then escapes to Ferrix. At Ferrix, Cassian requests his friend Bix to connect him with a black market buyer, who will turn out to be Stellan Skarsgård as Luthen Rael, one of the founding members Rebel Alliance.

Luthen Rael hires Cassian to steal the Imperial payroll from the planet called Aldhani. This event causes a ripple effect and inspires rebels across the galaxy. After a brief return to Ferrix, Cassian goes for a vacation to the tropical planet Niamos. But this vacation is short-lived.

The Empire falsely profiles and arrests Cassian, but not for his involvement in the Aldhani heist. From there, he is imprisoned for six years in a hard labor camp named Narkina 5, an island prison. He meets the prison floor manager, Kino Loy, and fellow prisoners who are working on an unknown specific machinery. Kino and several other prisoners keep their heads down and are just trying to serve their time.

But two things happen. Firstly, Kino and fellow prisoners learn about a prisoner who was released from one floor, only to be imprisoned on the other floor. Meaning, none of the prisoners will ever get out of here. Secondly, Ulaf, one of Andor and Kino's fellow prisoners, dies of a stroke. This jolts Andor and his fellow prisoners, as they realize that they are never getting out.

Thus, Cassian inspires Kino and other prisoners to break out of prison, which finally happens in the tenth episode of Andor Season 1, "One Way Out". After this, Andor learns about the death of his adopted mother, leading him towards Ferrix, where danger lurks in the form of Luthen Rael and the ISB (Imperial Security Bureau).

Maarva Inspires a rebellion in death

While Maarva never realized that Andor participated in the Aldhani heist, she was nevertheless inspired by it. Thus, Maarva records a speech that her droid B2EMO plays during her funeral. This speech goes like this:

"My name is Maarva Carrassi Andor. I’m honored to stand before you. I’m honored to be a Daughter of Ferrix, and honored to be worthy of the stone. Strange, I… feel as if I can see it. I was six, I think, first time i touched a funerary stone. Heard our music, felt our history, holding my sisters hand as we walked all the way from Fountain Square. Where you stand now, I’ve been more times than I can remember. I always wanted to be lifted. I was always eager, always waiting to be inspired. I remember every time it happened, every time the dead lifted me… with their truth. And now I’m dead, and I yearn to lift you. Not because i want to shine or even be remembered. It’s because i want you to go on. I want Ferrix to continue. In my waining hours, thats what comforts me most. But I fear for you. We’ve been sleeping. We’ve had each other, and Ferrix, our work, our days. We had each other and they left us alone. We kept the trade lane open, and they left us alone. We took their money and ignored them, we kept their engine churning, and the moment they pulled away. we forgot them. *(SIGH)* Because we had each other. We had Ferrix. But we were sleeping. I’ve been sleeping. And I’ve been turning away from the truth I wanted not to face. There is a wound that won’t heal at the center of the galaxy. There is a darkness reaching like rust into everything around us. We let it grow, and now it’s here. It’s here and it’s not visiting anymore. It wants to stay. The Empire is a disease that thrives in darkness, it is never more alive than when we asleep. It’s easy for the dead to tell you to fight, and maybe it’s true, maybe fighting is useless. Perhaps it’s too late. But I’ll tell you this, if I could do it again, I’d wake up early and be fighting those bastards from the start! Fight the Empire!"

The speech is stirring enough to inspire a rebellion, as every officer working for the Empire is attacked by the people of Ferrix. Her speech moves even someone as cold and calculated as Luthen, who is here to kill Cassian, so that he doesn't divulge Rael's identity to the ISB. Cassian meets Rael at the latter's spaceship and offers Luthen two choices: Either kill Cassian and save his identity or take him in as one of the rebels.

Luthen smiles at Andor, and thus begins Cassian's journey as a rebel who we meet in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

The Rebels are divided

It is imperative to note that we don't get a united Rebel Alliance in the first season of Andor. This is an event we will probably see in the upcoming season 2. The first season instead makes a point to show the different bands of rebels who fight the Empire in their own ways. However, the Ghorman Massacre, which is a major event in the upcoming season 2, might unite all these different factions.

One of the rebels that might openly join the Rebel Alliance is Mon Mothma, who throughout the entirety of Andor Season 1 at a great personal cost. Mothma is an idealist who aims to rebel in a morally correct way, but her fellow rebel collaborator Luthen is her literal opposite. Showrunner Tony Gilroy had some choice words about this character in a 2022 interview with The Hollywood Reporter.

Gilroy sat down for an interview with Brian Davids after the tenth episode of the first season, “One Way Out”. In that interview, the showrunner described Andor's Luthen Rael as:

"Well, he’s a chess player, man. He’s sacrificing a castle to protect his queen. So I don’t think the Kreegyr story is over yet. Luthen is in a very tough spot, and his position over the next five years is only going to get more complicated, because how do you build this network? Earlier on, he says that he’s been building it for 10 or 12 years, but all of a sudden, with Aldhani, they’re going loud. All of a sudden, they’re going to expose themselves. And in a classic political sense, he’s an accelerationist. He believes in the fact that you have to make it hurt really bad in order to bring people to change. Once you make that announcement [via the Aldhani heist in episode six], once you do that, you’re no longer in charge of the thing that you’ve put out there. So how do you juggle your paranoia? How do you maintain your secrecy? How do you go big and stay small and tight? How do you expand while expansion makes you more vulnerable? Those are going to be issues. You’re seeing the beginning of those issues in episode ten and in this tranche. That’s also one of the major food groups that we’ll be dealing with in the second season."

Gilroy went on to explain the meaning of the word "accelerationism":

"Yeah, it’s called accelerationism. I think that’s the dialectical term. It covers all sides of the political spectrum. It could be left, right; it could be anywhere. But it’s the idea of, “I can’t get people to do something unless they really feel it.” And that’s a classic revolutionary leadership move all the way through. I mean, you could go back 2000 years and find people that were doing that."

So, considering Luthen's accelerationist leanings, he will probably be involved in the Ghorman Massacre in Andor season 2, which will accomplish two goals. The divided Rebel Alliance will be united under a single umbrella. Secondly, this is the event that caused Mon Mothma to resign from her position as a senator and join the rebellion openly.

The ISB identifies an "axis" of rebel activities

Dedra Meero, one of the Imperial Security Bureau (ISB) agents, realizes that all the disparate and random rebel uprisings might not be all that random after all. She theorizes that there is someone at the center of all these rebel activities. For now, it is unclear if they have identified Luthen or not, but they know Andor. Therefore, the ISB is trying to capture Cassian to catch the bigger fish, Luthen.

In the season 1 finale, the Empire's troops, including the ISB officers, are there at Ferrix to catch Cassian, who is attending Maarva's funeral. But Maarva's speech sparks a rebellion in Ferrix, helping Cassian get away.

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The first three episodes of Andor Season 2 will be available on Disney+ from Tuesday, April 22, 2025.