Okay, I was wondering where it would wind up on the Andor --> Boba Fett spectrum. Suffice to say, this kind of show is why Hollywood writers should be worried about AI taking their jobs.
This is going to be a very critical, spoiler-filled review of Episode 1, so don't keep reading if that's going to bum you out.
Seriously, I really didn't like it, and I am going into detail about why. Get out now, or you have only yourself to blame if you don't like my review. Art is subjective, so just because I think this episode was thick as bricks, your opinion is just as valid. Maybe it is I who is thick as bricks!
Last chance. I'm really going to lay into it.
Okay. So, I haven't watched much of the animated stuff, but I've seen all the live action. Regardless, I judge any show by how well it stands on its own merits - you might miss some Easter Eggs, but the main beats of the story, character motivations, etc. should all make sense within the confines of the show you are currently watching. None of the story beats or character motivations in this episode of television made any sense.
Right, we start with a text crawl, which is fine, I guess - it's a (somewhat lazy) Star Wars tradition that lets us start in media res - followed by a massive spaceship coming across the screen - let's generously call this an homage to the first film, and not pandering. Then we have someone who is apparently smart and talented enough to be made captain of this brand new capital ship doing the dumbest thing imaginable and bringing two suspected Imperial agents aboard so that they can kill a bunch of people and rescue a highly valuable prisoner. Who could have seen that coming! Other than everyone who has ever seen a movie? This is the worst kind of writing: characters doing painfully stupid things in service of an utterly predictable plot beat, which is why I think AI could probably have done better.
Okay, then we have Ahsoka searching for a space map in a bunch of ruins that will lead her to General Thrawn, who apparently has been missing and thought dead for several years. I have so many questions:
1. What is with recent Star Wars properties and the whole "secret space map to a missing person" motif? It was dumb enough in The Force Awakens, but Ahsoka decided to go full Rise of Skywalker and have the space map hidden in some ancient ruins. Because no one thought that was ridiculous at all!
2. Okay, so someone made this space map (let's just call it the MacGuffin from now on), then brought it to these ancient ruins where they could hide it in some kind of elaborate (but instantly solvable) Indiana Jones set-up, totally unguarded. Like, that was their plan for this top secret information? How does that make sense on any level? And the effort they must have gone to!
3. How does Ahsoka know exactly how to solve that elaborate set-up? I mean, for all the challenge it poses, the villains should have just left the MacGuffin in a gift-wrapped box. The crumbly black pillar thing that encased it is the space equivalent of wrapping paper, I suppose; it certainly doesn't serve any protective purpose. Looks kind of cool, I guess?
Next some evil droids show up so that Ahsoka can demonstrate how badass she is without any actual blood being shed or sweating any moral dilemmas about killing. Except Star Wars has always shown us that androids are sentient, so using them for these antiseptic battles is super lazy (compare to Andor, which had our protagonist kill two living people right up front and then have to deal with the moral and practical consequences of that choice for the rest of the series). Anyhow, this leads to a ticking clock situation where they will explode and kill her unless she can outrun the explosion to get to her spaceship at conveniently the last second...phew, I can't believe she made it - my pulse was really racing! No cliches there (and the android pilot being out of position but circling back just in the nick of time could be called an Aliens rip-off, but again we'll be generous and go with homage). So far I have yet to see one original idea in this show. Maybe the next big scene...
Nope. We have a big ceremony where apparently Sabine Wren is to give a big speech but, oops, she's not there so the governor or whatever calls out the guards to go get her. Did no one notice that she was gone before he introduced her? Did she agree to do this thing but then just bail for no apparent reason? That's kind of terrible. We meet her on a motorcycle thingy which, again for no good reason, she uses to engage in an extremely dangerous game of chicken with the spaceships sent to retrieve her before they inexplicably decide "nah" and let her go with a wink - ah, Sabine, you psychopathically reckless scamp! As an audience member I think I'm meant to see her as cool and rebellious but she initially comes off as an extraordinarily self-involved jerk. Maybe her CGI cat is supposed to make her relatable?
However, all is instantly forgiven as soon as she shows up to meet Ahsoka, who thinks Sabine can solve the unsolvable MacGuffin because reasons. Sabine wants to know if she can take the incredibly vital Macguffin elsewhere to a super insecure location by herself for no good reason, which is an obviously terrible idea. To her credit, Ahsoka says "no, that is an obviously terrible idea"...and then leaves Sabine alone with the incredibly vital MaGuffin, only to discover, when she returns, that Sabine has vanished with it. I was shocked, SHOCKED by this turn of events. Ahsoka then has a holographic conversation with her bigwig general friend who is all, "Nah, don't sweat her taking off with the incredibly vital MacGuffin that could restart the war, I'm sure it will be fine," which again begs the question of whether there is a maximum allowable IQ for positions of high authority in the New Republic. Also, is it just me or are Ahsoka and Republic general kind of vibing together? Are they a couple, or former couple situation?
Oh yeah - there is a scene of villains expositing for us and then the Bad Jedi Master sends the Bad Jedi Apprentice after Sabine, the Good Jedi Apprentice, whose address is unfortunately in the space directory or something. I like the way Bad Jedi Apprentice's bangs and heavy eyeliner make it clear just how Bad she is. Show, don't tell!
So, right, Sabine gets the MacGuffin to her secret desert tower/trashy chic apartment (the location of which we establish is easily discoverable to everyone in the universe), and then solves the unsolvable lock in like two seconds. Hey, earlier we saw that the Bad Jedi could open locks just with force powers, like when they rescued the prisoner - why didn't Ahsoka just do that to open the MacGuffin? Reasons, I guess. Anyway, you won't believe this but RIGHT AFTER Sabine solves the MacGuffin, the bad guys show up and take it from her. It's Bad Apprentice vs. Good Apprentice and Ahsoka arrives just a little too late to save Sabine from being impaled in an obviously non-lethal location that totally doesn't set up a rematch for the last episode of the series. This turn of events obviously sets up a race against the baddies to see who can get to Thrawn first, which was the whole point of the episode.
So yeah. I thought it mostly looked great, and Rosario Dawson is incapable of being bad in a show, but the writing is just so painfully basic and predictable. I challenge anyone to identify one original idea in this whole episode of television. It mildly irritates me that my Star Wars nostalgia is so strong that I still feel somewhat obliged to watch at least the next episode. It greatly irritates me that Andor showed how good a Star Wars series can be, and then we get this.
