Andor Episode 9 review: Star Wars has never been this bleak

Andor Episode 9 is the bleakest Star Wars has ever been, showing how tyranny either corrupts the soul of anyone who can’t bear its weight or forces infuriating obedience, like lap dogs of the Empire.

I saw a tweet the other day which described Star Wars as a project that’s managed to sneak through the studio system, in that it has the essence of the franchise we love, but it stands so deeply apart that we’re almost struggling to understand how it ever got made.

Andor isn’t about the Dark Side, nor does it view the Rebels on the pedestal of the light. It unfolds in the grey, with the sneeriest Imperial soldiers afforded the space to exasperate in private, and heroes shown to be cold and calculating when required.

Episode 9 is exceedingly miserable, though it feels we’re arriving at a key turning point, not just for the future of the series, but the Rebellion being built each week.

Spoilers for Andor Episode 9 to follow…

Andor Episode 9 review: Kids are torture

Episode 9 picks up immediately with Dedra Meero (Denise Gough) interrogating Bix Caleen (Adria Arjona), quizzing her on the identity of “Axis”, aka Luthen, and the last time she saw or spoke to Cassian.

As any good Rebel would, she resists her questioning, so Dedra brings in Dr. Gorst (Joshua James) to crack her out of her shell. “You’re in my net… are you a fish, or are you a thief,” she says, to which Bix replies: “You seem to enjoy this.”

One of the strongest aspects of Gough’s performance is her quiet hostility; those eyes are like laser beams. “The very worst thing you could do right now is bore me,” she says with hushed anger.

Alas, Dr. Gorst applies his unique brand of torture: a tight headset that exclusively plays the excruciating wails, cries, and screams of children found in a crawl space in a past massacre. We’re spared the sound of their fear, with the episode’s sound suddenly drawing on Bix’s pants and terror alone. We can only imagine what she heard, and that’s why it’s so unnerving.

Andor Episode 9: The seed of an uprising

Back at Narkina 5, Cassian (Diego Luna) and his band of workies (including Melshi from Rogue One) are working away on the factory line, but Ulaf (Christopher Fairbank) is growing increasingly feeble with every shift, clutching his hands after each crank and screw. Cassian tells the prisoners to swap places to give him a break, which earns him some hesitant approval from Kino (Andy Serkis), who basically growls through every stare.

Later, Cassian heads to the bathroom and removes a panel from the wall, where he’s been scraping away at one of the pipes. It’s reminiscent – surely intentionally – of Clint Eastwood’s wall-grate tinkering in Escape from Alcatraz, another testament to the practical design and atmosphere in the show.

He’s planning some sort of ambush, but it’s clear nobody is ready for it. At night, Cassian presses Kino for details about how many guards there are in each station, but he dismisses him bluntly: “You’re on your own here.” Kino is clearly somebody hardened by the system; whether he operates on rage, fear, or depression isn’t clear, but he’s quicker to quell hope than nourish it.

Andor Episode 9: Mon Mothma has a closer ally than we knew

Again, the main criticism of Episode 9 is the ration of Mon Mothma content, especially since we take another short trip to the Imperial Senate, where she complains about the “complete unchallenged authority” of Palpatine’s sentencing directive.

Tay Kolma (Ben Miles) brings up an issue: the Aldhani heist and subsequent credit withdrawal through Mon could incriminate her if her tax records are ever scanned, so he appeals to her to get a loan from someone named Davo, a “thug” who’s especially rich, even for Coruscant.

There’s also a somewhat major character development: Vel (Faye Marsay) is revealed to be Mon’s cousin, and she pays her a visit at her home. Mon is worried about her, but Vel knows risk is the price to pay for “fighting against the Dark and making something of our lives.” Their scene ends with Mon’s most chilling shot so far: her standing along under the chandelier of her palace, a sparkly prison from which she can never escape, lest her facade crumbles.

Andor Episode 9: A harrowing end lights the fuse

We get a brief, icky scene between Dedra and Syril Karn (Kyle Soller), who waits for her outside the bureau building. The subtext is that he clearly fancies her, but he speaks about how her passion for law, order, and justice gave him the will to live again, and that it’s a “dream worth clinging to” as he grabs her harm. She threatens to have him “locked in a cage in the outer rim” if he pulls anything like this again, but it remains to be seen whether their relationship will be developed further.

The episode ends in a harrowing fashion, with Ulaf collapsing at his station and being euthanized in one of the tunnels back to the cells. It’s the first time we see Kino expressing anything other than bitterness and competitiveness, pleading with the doctor to save him, but “there’s nothing left to save,” he says.

After his earlier resistance to rebellion, this pushes Kino over the edge. Both him and Cassian what happened on Level 2, where there was some earlier commotion in the episode. It’s revealed that a prisoner from Level 4 had just been released, but was put straight back in on Level 2. When the other prisoners found out, they lost their minds, and they were all “fried” on the floors. “Nobody’s getting out, are they?” Cassian asks.

Serkis’ performance felt a bit one-note at first, sketched to a despicable mini-boss. Here, his pain over Ulaf’s death and the mistreatment of the Empire is a howl, with tears and fear dripping from his face. The episode ends on his alliance with Cassian, and a plan is finally afoot.

Andor Episode 10 will be available to stream on November 10. You can sign up to Disney+ here.