‘Andor’ Episode 6 Defined: Slick Star Wars Heist Takes Darkish Turns

Episode 6 of Star Wars collection Andor hit Disney Plus on Wednesday, with Cassian (Diego Luna) persevering with his journey to turning into the Insurgent Alliance hero we meet in Rogue One. He appears to have earned the belief of his new insurgent buddies as they gear up for a heist on an Imperial garrison, the place they’re gonna steal an enormous pile of cash. 

Until all of it goes horribly unsuitable they usually’re slaughtered. The one one assured to outlive is Cassian.

On galactic capital Coruscant, the revolt towards the Empire is being orchestrated by Senator Mon Mothma (Genevieve O’Reilly) and recruiter Luthen Rael (Stellan Skarsgård). They’re making an attempt desperately to remain forward of the Empire’s spies and informants.

Sadly for them, Cassian’s previous thievery has drawn the eye of magnificently dressed Imperial Safety Bureau Supervisor Dedra Meero (Denise Gough), who reckons it factors to a wider revolt. She’s 100% proper, however her bureaucratic superiors will take some convincing.

Andor takes place 5 years previous to Rogue One, which depicted the occasions instantly earlier than unique Star Wars movie A New Hope. Scroll down additional if you wish to be part of a heist on all of episode 6’s SPOILERS.

The Alhani Job

ALDHANI — Very like final week’s, this episode is tremendous targeted on the insurgent crew as they make their transfer on the Imperial garrison utilizing a celestial occasion — a large, magnificent meteor present often called the Eye of Alhani — as cowl. It is in a dam, which is all the time a dramatic location on your base.

The plan is finally fairly simple — Cassian (nonetheless going by his late adoptive father Clem’s identify), the strict Taramyn Barcona (Gershwyn Eustache Jnr), the harmful Arvel Skeen (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) and the considerate, endearing Karis Nemik (Alex Lawther) enter the bottom disguised as transferred troopers, having been cleared by turncoat Imperial Lt. Gorn (Sule Rimi). 

In the meantime, group chief Vel Sartha (Faye Marsay) and the quietly intense Cinta Kaz (Varada Sethu) infiltrate the dam underwater, a bit like Obi-Wan Kenobi did in his personal present. 

The squad quietly captures Imperial Commandant Jayhold Beehaz (Stanley Townsend), his spouse, his son and a visiting engineer. Issues get tense when the engineer briefly catches Nemik at blasterpoint and calls for the rebels launch the boy, Cinta proves how harmful she is by taking the man out. 

So issues are going based on plan and the whole lot is certainly gonna be wonderful (apart from the engineer).

Imperial interference

It would not be a really thrilling TV present heist if the whole lot went easily. An Imperial comms officer grows suspicious when he discovers that their indicators are being jammed and overhears the rebels’ radio chatter. He leads a squad into the vault as our heroes drive captive Imperials to load the heavy stacks of Imperial credit onto a transport freighter.

The confrontation is all a bit a lot for the wired Commandant Beehaz, who suffers medical misery and hits the ground. Then the capturing begins, claiming the lives of Lt. Gorn and Taramyn.

Cool beneath strain (and one man’s try to choke him to demise), Cassian flies the freighter out of the bottom.  Sadly, Nemik is badly injured when one of many heavy payroll pallets rolls again within the vessel, pinning him.

Regardless of his wounds, Nemik has sufficient awesomeness left to relay a flight path that enables Cassian to navigate the lethal meteor present. The pursuing TIE fighters aren’t sufficiently superior as a result of Imperial tech is kinda low-cost and crappy, so that they get destroyed within the chase. 

Tragic victory

Having efficiently pilfering the payroll, Cassian Vel, Skeen and Nemik handle to flee Alhani.

As an alternative of going straight to the insurgent base with the cash, Skeen persuades Vel to take Nemik to a health care provider on a distant world. Because the awesomely named Physician Quadpaw (Aidan Cook dinner), who appears to have ocular implants just like Ochi of Bestoon) operates on the younger insurgent beneath Vel’s supervision, Skeen and Cassian wait exterior.

Interesting to Cassian’s mercenary tendencies, Skeen suggests they betray the rebels and run off with the stolen 80 million credit. They’re going to cut up them evenly and go their separate methods. Seems Skeen’s extraordinarily sympathetic story about his brother being wronged by the Empire and taking his personal life was a grimy huge lie too.

“So no revolt for you?” a disillusioned Cassian asks, earlier than capturing Skeen dramatically as he relays his sneaky plan.

Nemik dies on the working desk, similar to Vel predicted (seems Skeen was simply taking the chance to make his transfer). 

Mere moments after the younger insurgent’s demise, a disillusioned Cassian waves his blaster in Vel and Quadpaw’s faces, demanding his lower so he can get away from all this unsettling ethical ambiguity. He offers the kyber crystal necklace to Vel to return to Luthen, seemingly symbolizing his rejection of the revolt.

Nevertheless, Vel offers Cassian Nemik’s tremendous compelling insurgent manifesto. That and the Empire stomping down on his family members again on Ferrix will in all probability persuade Cassian he has to do a Rogue One.

Shaking the galaxy

CORUSCANT, THE GALACTIC CAPITAL — The Empire freaks out concerning the heist, so sharply dressed Dedra Meero and her equally spiffy colleagues are referred to as into an emergency gathering on the Imperial Safety Bureau.

“I would like each Star Sector and Planetary Emergency Retaliation plan within the constructing prepared for presentation by midnight,” says Main Partagaz (Anton Lesser).

Hope nobody had plans.

Mon Mothma addresses an almost empty Senate — hinting that Emperor Palpatine has been stripping away democratically elected representatives’ powers — however even the few politicians who bothered to indicate up are distracted by the information alert concerning the heist (presumably from the Coruscant Instances or one thing). 

Within the vintage store he makes use of as his cowl, Luthen hears concerning the assault from a buyer and laughs with aid.

Sadly, one can count on the Empire to strike again fairly onerous subsequent episode.

All the identical

Except for the cool heist motion, this episode subtly highlights how related individuals are on this universe regardless of their allegiances and backgrounds. After the heist is finished, native Dhanis and Imperials alike are awestruck by the Eye of Aldhani’s magnificence. Even Cinta, who remained behind as the opposite rebels escaped, calmly steps out and joins the viewing get together.  

Very like actual life, all of us love shiny, fairly stuff.

Sadly, additionally like in actual life, individuals all the time stomp on others. Missing respite for the Dhanis, Commandant Beehaz is main an effort to govern them into giving up their traditions and submitting to Imperial rule. Some traditional disgusting colonialism there.

Beehaz is pushed to this by a reasonably primary, relatable human want. He is keen to facilitate the Empire doing horrible issues if it will get his household off this backwater world and into a little bit extra consolation.

And it is fairly disagreeable to see his spouse and son being taken hostage by the rebels — it is harking back to the horrible company safety drive goons bullying Cassian’s mom again on Ferrix. It is unlikely Beehaz survived his medical incident, however hopefully his household is alright. 

Rogue ideas, unanswered questions and Easter eggs

• This episode might be essentially the most visually beautiful episode of Star Wars we have seen on Disney Plus thus far, with the Eye of Aldhani lighting up the sky fantastically. The sound of the meteorites zipping by is great too.
• Not less than the Dhanis appear to have a superb time chanting and dancing. Hopefully, the Empire does not kill them or completely destroy their world.
• I used to be absolutely anticipating the dam to interrupt in some unspecified time in the future.
• Taramyn is so convincing as an Imperial as a result of he was a stormtrooper. Cinta’s household was apparently killed by stormtroopers, so it is fairly spectacular that they might work collectively. I would like to have seen them having a dialog about it.
• There’s some fairly sturdy foreshadowing to Nemik’s demise, with Cassian’s assurances the youthful man will likely be wonderful. He will not be wonderful Cassian, you might be the angel of demise.
• Mon Mothma is speaking about Ghorman within the Senate, having beforehand talked about the planet’s delivery lanes being lower off.  
• The Empire will finally kill harmless protesters on Ghorman, pushing Mon to publicly blame Palpatine and declare open revolt round three years after this level within the timeline. We’ll in all probability see the Ghorman incident in a future episode of Andor.

Come again for extra Easter eggs and observations on Oct. 19, when episode 7 of Andor hits Disney Plus.