Andor – Season 1 Episode 1 Recap & Review

On The Run

Episode 1 of Andor Season 1 starts in the pouring rain in the middle of the night. A cloaked Cassian Andor shows up at a club, soaked in blue lights and pulsating music. It’s his first time at this club and a couple of Imperial guards kick up a fuss when Cassian is seen to before them. Anyway, Cassian is looking for a girl from Kenari. Apparently she was working there a few months back.

Getting nowhere, Cassian leaves empty-handed… but not alone. The guards follow him down a dark alleyway and hold him up at ransom. When they approach, it turns out this was all a ruse as Cassian bests them both and steals their gun. Unfortunately, a couple of stray gunshots cause one of them to be killer. The other pleads for his life but, not wanting any witnesses, Cassian shoots him in cold blood and runs.

We then cut across to Ferrix, a free trade sector that happens to be situated in the Morlani System. A lowly red droid called B2EMO heads out to scrapyard and back to base. Anyone else getting serious Wall-E vibes here? Anyway, this droid belongs to Cassian, who happens to be sleeping and hiding out. He knows the wrath of the Empire is going to come down hard and he’s desperate to make sure his cover-story is in order. Part of that comes from visiting hiss old friend Brasso, who agrees to have his back.

Meanwhile, news of the squad commander’s death reaches Deputy Inspector Syril Karn and Chief Hyne, who learns there’s no suspects. Hyne decides to chalk it off as a “misadventure.” He asks his subordinate to make up a suitable excuse for their deaths, making sure it’s outside the Leisure Zone. They were killed in a fight at a brothel while on the job, which is a sackable offence unto itself. They died “being helpful”, Chief Hynes signs off. “Something sad but inspiring. Given there’s a review of crime rates coming up, this is swept under the rug.

Syril Karn though is not convinced. Instead, he doubles down on searching through the records, checking the logs to see anything untoward. He notices a strange ship leaving through a checkpoint and decides to look deeper into this. As a result, a bulletin asking for information from anyone who may be aware of a Kenari male on Ferrix is distributed out to the system.

Cassian next shows up to see a mechanic called Bix, desperate to offload some valuable gear. Specifically an untraceable NS-9 Starpath unit. He needs the credits so he can get out and lay low for a while. Bix is concerned, given how much this is worth, but agrees to organize a meet with her contact. The thing is, Cassian owes a lot of money, including to Nurchi who brings in his muscle, Vetch. Cassian talks his way out of trouble and continues to prep for leaving the system.

Meanwhile, a ship crash lands in the heart of Kenari. This area is full of native tribes people, who clearly scavenge what they can. They also symbolically mark their face and arms with black. After gearing up, they head out into the forest.

The Episode Review

The first episode of Andor gets off to a pretty good start. The production design for this looks fantastic and after the green-screen monstrosity of Obi-Wan – not to mention its poor story and charaterisation – this looks to be a step in thee right direction for this franchise.

With 3 episodes releasing today, this first sets the scene to follow with promise of a lot more action and drama to follow in the coming chapters. So far, it seems we’re going to be following three separate areas, that of Cassian, the drama with Kenari and the Empire’s exploits. In particular, that of the Deputy Inspector who looks to be our main antagonist.

It’s a bit too early to be casting judgment on this one abut so far this looks to be a more promising proposition in the Star Wars universe.