Buy 2 Lightsabers get $100 off, or 3 Lightsabers get 150$ off ⏩ ownasaber.com/ - For those who just want to purchase 1 saber, they can use your discount code "PORG" for 20% off - As soon as the customer ads 2 or more sabers to their cart, the system will automatically take of either $100 or $150 from their order total - Special starts on November 3rd and ends on November 30th.
great content once again, Mr G Tech, you obvs do appreciate the nuance a lot of 'fans' are missing when they say this show is slow and boring as far as SW goes 🙄 I've got two small points of discussion. One is the line from a senator your draw attention to in the vid, 'If you do nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear'. This is absolutely the indoctrination the Empire wants to engender. I lived for years in an authoritarian society i wont name but is out East, and many people would parrot this EXACT sentence throughout my time there, as a justification for conformity. The question that should always follow that is, who determines what is wrong or right. The other is something you refer to in a director making sure each element portrayed in a story is relevant, I just thought to sugest you look up the concept of 'Chekovs gun' to better illustrate that point in your mind. I find these labels help in my conception anyway🤔
Hey Alan and team, Do you guys have a forum or discord? Cause this is the kind of stuff I really love about Star Wars' potential and I'd love to discuss it with people who enjoy the meatier and more realistic anthropology and sociology Alan is presenting here.
@Connor Bernier No, its a small area in every garrison where smoking tobacco is authorized. Something about sharing a vice drops any pretense of superiority between officers, NCOs, and enlisted.
As someone in the military now, i always treat my enlisted as the people they are. sure we have different titles and billets but at the end of the day, we're all just people trying to do a job. maybe if the empire did the same it would have survived lol
I've had decently casual conversations with generals. Of course we still refer to each other accordingly by rank and show that respect but at the end of the day I see most of us treat each other as regular people. You learn who to do it with and who not to.
I actually think the subtle hand displays how much more sinister the Empire really is. The Republic died the moment Palpatine got emergency powers which was in episode 2. The difference here I think is that the Empire for the first time is being displayed as a realistic government body while still being a terrifying oppressive regime. They're just not cartoonishly evil; because in the real world, even the most evil and oppressive governments in history are still run by people, and people are complicated.
This comment reminds me of an old picture that exists of the concentration camp guards on their time off. If you saw the picture and didn't know what their uniforms represented, all you would see is a bunch of college age kids having a goofy group photo.
"The Empire improves every system it touches. Judge by any metric. Safety, prosperity, trade, opportunity, peace. Compare Imperial rule to what is happening now. Look outside. Is the world more peaceful since the revolution? I see nothing but death and chaos." - The Client to Din Djarin
It's such delicious irony that the person that genuinely made that claim gets shot to bits by soldiers of the regime that he loves so much not even a few seconds later.
I think the show makes the Empire more scary by dialing it back in the beginning because a Saturday morning cartoon level of villainy is just cartoonish, but what is shown in the show is so realistic and believable it strikes you to your core.
Episode 2 of Kenobi (I think) the villain makes a speech at the space bar that was so cringey I shortly stopped watching. Cartoon level bad guy speech, how do writers even keep their jobs.
@@omnitheus5442 oh no...was that creature really meant to have been something from Tatooine's watery past?? I thought it was just another sand-dwelling animal.
@@kylemundy8871 Yeah, Kenobi was cringey all around. I really can't understand how some people were able to enjoy that crap. It's really, really bad. I forced myself through it but the terrible dialogue between the three Stogers villains in the first episode was already too much for me to take. Were we supposed to be afraid of them? Lol.
@@R.a.f.a.e.l. people feel a desperate need to belong to something...or they feel they've invested too much to walk away. Either way, eating a poop sandwich and saying it's amazing for a pat on the head is where we are as consumers lol.
Between the Aldhani Raid, Ezra's transmission from Lothal, and Phoenix Squadron taking down Tarkin's star destroyer and the Grand Inquisitor, 5 BBY must have been a big punch in the gut for the Empire.
Yeah well we see how Vader and then Thrawn were involved in the story of Phoenix Squadron after that so yeah I'd say the Empire took these events pretty seriously.
I'm interested in the change we see in not just the ISB, but the Empire as a whole. As fans we know where everything within the skywalker era goes, but seeing where the stories come from and how the entire galaxy shifted after Aldhani. At this point, we see how the galaxy is suffering, and how the Imperials have relaxed into their positions following the Clone Wars. Definitely hope this season ends in a place where we can get a second season.
I'd also like to see how the Imperial officer corps transformed in the years between the Clone Wars and ANH, and to what extent the seeds of the Empire already existed in the Republic military. We got a taste of this in Clone Wars, but I'd like to see it covered more fully.
The scariest part is that this is exactly how cartoonishly evil empires and nations get started IRL. Low-key, gentle, and insidious. Hitler, Pol Pot, Stalin, and others come to power in similar fashion. They become cartoonishly evil over time. Some start wanting to do good, others are like Sideous from the beginning. Either way, it's the slow burning gradual erosion of, not just liberty and freedom, but of personage and agency that allows them to keep their power where moving too fast would cost them everything.
First names on the list should be the UK and France. Hitler was simply following in their lead. Everything about his ideology, eugenics, imperialism, genocide to take over land, was started by them. Just look at the white settler colonies like Australia and north America.
Bix is tortured, using a device that bombards her with the dying screams of an entire alien species who were massacred by the Empire. That is some 40K levels of messed up evil
I still don't really understand what is shown that makes the empire bad. It's usually just a few cartoonishly mean guys in posistons of power. Very petty and low brown evil imo.
Woah, this really puts into perspective just how titanic the deathstar really was. Luther says" I'm a coward, I'm afraid the empire will get so strong we won't be able to stop them". If the rebellion never stood up, the deathstar would have finished un contested, and Palpatine and Vader would literally have the ability to wipe out any petty oppositionor annoyances. Combine that with Mothma's question on what their idea of wrong is, creates a very bleak dystopia where entire planets can disappear if the Empire gets annoyed or self justifies the end of a world. Tatooine would probably be the first to go, if Vader had his way, the last fragment of his past, the final reminder of all those painful memories, gone for good.
If he did that, wouldn't the Hutts declare war and no one wanted to mess with the equivalent of the Drug Cartels (even the empire knew not to mess with those bastards)? I mean even in real life, no one messes with the Cartels, if they ever united, 2-3.2 million gangsters with adequate enough training/experience... I'm pretty damn certain even the US Military would fail to quell a united paramilitary assault on that scale. On a galactic scale, HA! As if, even the Empire made deals with the Hutts, not outright conquer them. The hutts have a large enough force to apparently have the Republic, Separatists, now the Empire, to be concerned with avoiding confrontation. Like real life with actual drug cartels. If someone declared open war on them, they return the price in blood, tenfold, literally. They would turn cities into warzones, murder entire families (or sell them into slavery, organ trade, prostitution, whichever), it's probably also the tolerance of governments being on their payrolls, same with the Empire no doubt, why no one messes with a Cartel. Hutt or South American.
Vader, (if the Novel is to be believed) was not impressed by the Death Star and saw the will of the Force as the highest power. If the Force did not want a Battle station that could destroy planets it would find a way to remove it. A technician would trip and cause a malfunction or a design flaw would blow it up, as it would happen a Rebel pilot who was strong in the force managed to destroy it proving him right. Now this is probably non-canon now but I saw that as an interesting view as to what Vader thought of the Technological terror that the Empire was bringing.
@@TheWarmachine375 thats just it though the hutts had a whole swathe of space under their control,at least a whole 3rd of the galaxy was considered hutt space, they would've been using the deathstar on hundreds of worlds not just nar shada or nal hutta,even with the deathstar a war with the hutts isn't something that the empire would have been able to carry on very long in any successful way
The thing that I've Loved about everything Star wars is done from the last bit of the clone wars ending to the events of episode 4, is that the World building in my mind has painted a very realistic picture of how the Empire could have actually happened; in Andor you get the image of a growing bureaucratical Empire which is demonstratively improving a lot of people's lives. If you just tuck your head down as a human, you're probably ambivalent towards the abuses of the empire, perhaps even unaware of them. Dissidence against the empire are clearly fringe, violent, extremely fanatical groups, things which most moderate people are hesitant to back even if they're not fans of the In-Place power structures. I might hate fascism, and imperialism, but if I'm just living a steady life with consistent access to the goods and services I need, and that's what I see for my community around me, saw gerrera makes for an easy scapegoat to justify backing law and order (let's be real, it's Saw blowing up hospitals and infrastructure that's going to be placed all over the news, not monmouth's 30 minute long Senate address about lofty political ideals). I think this wave of new content in this era is really poignant to our current lives.... something that should make us think hard about how we live.
I think thats the beauty of Andor in comparison to other Star Wars media is that it shows how a Totalitarian fascist system of government entrenches itself in the day-to-day life of the average person, and shows how gradual of a process it is until in many cases it is too late to stop it. It is this parallel to the real world that makes the Empire in Andor so terrifying, because we've seen these strategies used on various peoples throughout history, from the forced displacement, the horribly inequal "treaties", as well as the systematic destruction of cultural and holy sites.
the parallels of the empire to our own govs are everywhere in andor. for those with eyes to see and ear to hear at least. thanks Alan always great break downs
Given that your post is so vague that it leaves me unsure what politics you were thinking of caused me to wonder what the Imperial Propaganda looked like regarding the Rebel Alliance and non human species. That would be rather fascinating to see...
Andor is REAL STAR WARS. So wish George Lucas had empowered the people who made this and allowed them to make more stuff like this in the pre-Disney era. This stuff is Canon, not necessarily only what George Lucas makes as he can stray from the essence of the original movie. The fact the original movie had nuance to its imperial officers so they are not cardboard cut outs, and had a range of disagreements with Vadar and the way the Empire operated granted it a level of realism. I wish that had not been lost, but in Andor it would seem they found it again. They deserve a Gold Star.
It's not Star Wars. It's too dirty and gritty. Also too off topic. How does it relate to the First Order or Snoke? Where is Admiral Holdo's origin? Where's General Leia? It's a burn notice ripoff with a dirty, ugly blade runner aesthetic. Dumd!
Just a thought, if even the imperial army was innocent and naive at this point- how much more does that apply to the imperial navy where we have little sign of them having faced anything close to an equal force in battle since the end of the clone wars. At least the army was occasionally having to do serious fighting, and was constantly having to make do with minimal funds to achieve their objectives with imperial budgets skewed to prioritise renewing the imperial fleet and construction of the death star
My fan theory on this is that Palpatine was intentionally sowing the seeds of chaos so he could reap life energy to make himself immortal, something he learned from studying ancient texts on Darth Tenebrae/Emperor Vitiate. At least in the EU, Palpatine had intensely studied the old Sith Empire and had used it as inspiration for some of his Empire's aesthetics.
I love how you see the corruption in the empire. With loyalty being the only factor that matters, the ranks getting filled with inept, corrupt, and self serving people is a natural outcome. I think the "soft" treatment from the empire was a desire to preserve the labor force. The planet managers care about meeting quotas. And you can not do that without workers, and the best workers are content workers. And corpses do not produce anything. I think the turning point hits at a new hope. When the Senate is dissolved and the empire goes full evil.
They were planning to make the Dhani disappear through displacement policies rather than outright sending stormtroopers to murder them all. Don't get me started with Narkina 5. "Innocent"...I guess, compared with the later "obey me or I will blow up your planet".
I like how you kind of described the three pillars of (authoritarian) stability, Legitimation (through ideology), repression and co-optation. You also hinted at what can happen if one of these begin to crumble. There's interesting literature about that :D
To be honest that last time I worked a 9to5, your description of the ISB would have worked there, too. That's pretty much _every_ working environment! At least until Rebel forces take over the break room.
I think that Andor is a very good show but i think shows like andor in star wars only work when we don't have enough of them. They have to be made once in 5 years in order to ensure that they are loved and not considered boring
I just realized something...remember when Cassian Andor thought Chirrut Imwe was a Jedi in Rogue One, does that mean he met a Jedi? Will we see a Jedi in Andor? And if so, would it be either Kanan Jarrus or Cal Kestis or another unnamed Jedi. I myself have a belief he might run into Kanan, which would make sense and it would be really awesome.
It's more likely that folk in the galaxy just associate anyone who talks about 'the force' with the Jedi. Remember that, at that stage, the Jedi would have been utterly demonised and mystified through propaganda and misinformation, so very very few people would have had a clear mental image of what they actually were/what they did/how they looked - just that they were Force followers.
@@garethmiguel yes but if you look in Rebels, Kanan Jarrus, Ezra Bridger and the rest of the Ghost crew were stationed at Yavin as well...look at the end of season 3 and 4 of Rebels
Light physical labor with the added stress that a blaster is literally to the head of your family and one of your trusted is working mg with the thief. And they have already killed to get what they want so your life your family life is definitely on the line.
And the thought that if he DOES live through this, the ISB are going to show up and demand to know WHY you lived through it and haul you and your family away for interrogation, torture by alien death-screams and then execution.
Commenting on the ISB. My mother is a professor at a University and this is how the other professors behave around each other. Everyone is out looking for themselves and some people to do the bare miminuim while others try to backstab and rat others out and fight for power. They care little about the bigger picture or the cause and more about how they can climb the ladder.
Andor himself is a great example of someone the Empire is pushing towards radicalism. He doesn't want to fight, but at the same time, he clearly has no love for the system. He was fine with stealing from the Empire until now, his own little private form of revenge. But now, he's being punished. Not for his crimes, but for simply existing. And he's seeing just how bad things can get for people in his position. His experience is exactly what Luthen wanted to happen to most people on the galaxy: Empire chokes you harder than usual, so hard that you grab for a blaster to make it stop.
I have a suspicion that Dedra Meero may not make it to the end of the series. Syril Karn seems obsessed with her as a means to get back to serving and distinguishing himself in the Empire. Their last interaction made it clear that Dedra Meero wanted nothing to do with Syril Karn and that should he try to approach her again, he would be sent to prison. The desperation with Syril Karn, despite being promoted at his job, makes me think that he won't give up in his quest to "help" and there will be a penultimate episode where both Dedra Meero and Syril Karn will catch up with Cassian Andor. Dedra Meero will want Cassian Andor alive to connect to Luthen Rael, but Syril Karn wants Andor dead for retribution. Syril Karn, in my scenario, will either kill Dedra Meero accidentally as she's trying to extract Cassian Andor (incompetence with a blaster), or deliberately kill her as she physically stands between him and Andor. Just my speculation.
I lean more toward the idea she'll first be a victim of ISB politics. One way or another Andor will escape her clutches and she'll be blamed for the failure. Perhaps Blevin will see the opportunity to twist the knife. Or maybe her assistant. I do agree she will die, but it will be after a fall from grace.
"I encounter civilians like you all the time. You believe the Empire is continually plotting to do harm. Let me tell you, your view of the Empire is far too dramatic. The Empire is a government. It keeps billions of beings fed and clothed. Day after day, year after year, on thousands of worlds, people live their lives under Imperial rule without seeing a stormtrooper or hearing a TIE fighter scream overhead." (Grand Admiral Thrawn, from Galaxy of Fear: The Swarm) For 99% of the Empire that never even got swept up in large battles or schemes, most of them just had the Empire as a big, fat welfare state that gave to them what the Republic did not. Even if we factor in the trillions that died in the Galactic Civil War, the Empire ruled over 100 quadrillion subjects, so less than 1% of them would have seen Stormtroopers or TIE Fighters.
Wait didnt the rally cry by Ezra Bridger did in siege of Lothall in season 2 rallied the Rebels to fight the Empire and not Jeddah? I cant wait to see Agent Kallus in Andor, since he was an ISB Agent during the time of Andor.
Bridger's rallying cry will have inspired some to take up arms, others will have still tried to live normal lives until atrocities like Alderaan made it clear that was no longer possible
Blowing up Jeddah city angered people. It rallied people to fight the empire. The liberation of Lothal showed everyone that you can beat the empire. Blowing up Alderaan pissed people off. It rallied people to fight the empire. Blowing up the death star showed everyone that you can beat the empire. What Ezra did wasn't the sole rally cry it was just added to the pile. Not everyone in the rebel alliance was from Alderaan but a lot of people in the rebel alliance were from Alderaan.
Blevin took part in a UK Series called Taskmaster. He was quite good but did come last a few times. I suspect this didn’t please his Supervisors in the ISB.....
Andor is what great franchise media should be, it is a great piece of media on it own that does not depend on cheap cameos but it elevates everything is connected to. Andor really helped me appreciate so many other aspects of Star Wars. The Jedi as a force for good and why they are a necessity is highlighted here and this is due solely to their absence. Character's like Kanan, Cal and Luke are given suxhbgreta importance.
Operation Cinder was always an unnecessary plot device, in my opinion. What killed off the Empire after the battle of Endor was a huge power vacuum at the top. With Vader and the Emperor dead, along with some high ranking military officers, what's to stop any Admiral or Moff from unilaterally declaring themselves the new Emperor? In one moment, the Empire went from being one unified force to a disorganized collection of factions, each vying for supremacy. I would not be surprised at all if 90% of the casualties experienced by the Empire post Endor were just imperial factions fighting each other. All the rebellion really had to do was secure the core worlds and let the Empire fight itself.
Basically this was how it happened in Legends. The basically feudal nature of the Empire's society meant that without Palpatine, everyone began to fight for the scraps in something that rivaled or even surpassed the Warring States periods in places like Japan or China. You might even compare it to a Third Century Crisis kind of clusterfuck, and that's the one that nearly brought Rome itself to it's knees (and unlike in Legends, the Empire doesn't have their equivalent to Aurelian or Diocletian to right the wrongs and clean up the mess)
As someone currently deployed I can tell you a lot of times the lines between enlisted and officer are blurred. We’re all there to do a job, but we don’t have to be so uptight on the regs cause we’re all in the same shit. My OICs have given me leeway to do stuff I enjoy like coming in late the next morning after a championship for a sport I watch.
Love this analysis. And that's a credit to the writers and show runners of Andor. Putting out a great tv show or movie makes the analysis that much better especially to those critics who pay attention and actually know things outside of the material. I appreciate your work, thank you.
I think you missed the point, it was to show how complacent the garrison was, and the Empire was in general at the time. I also think the ISB interaction very much foreshadowed how sector commanders treat one another, and how the later Empire managed itself. It was a very dog eat dog system.
Luthens strategy is brilliant. It’s effectively acting as a middleman he is able to bridge the factionalism and purity spirals all the while funding and laying the groundwork for the rebellion through accelerationism.
Even Luke Skywalker aspired to enroll in the Imperial Academy, and become a pilot for The Galactic Empire. It was only his impure thoughts for his sister Leia, that caused him to change his loyalties.
What we saw in other media were usually the elite forces the empire had to offer, on ships commandeered by high ranking personnel, so some outpost on some underdeveloped world far away from every supervisor will definetely be quite chill
Great video and it touches on something Andor has done better than any Star Wars property to date: it makes the Empire more than a mustache-twirling costumed villain. The Empire is a big, overbearing system of oppression in which all the cogs go about their duty, perhaps never realizing their own culpability in oppressing society. Deedra going from an almost likeable, intelligent investigator to a cold hearted interrogator and then back again is a great example. She's not scary because she's relishing Bix's torture; she's scary because she accepts torture as just another part of her job, no different than making a presentation at today's meeting. The way she speaks to Bix and her facial expressions are merely a little play acting to achieve results. Bix isn't a person, but an obstacle between Deedra and the truth. Torture isn't an immoral act, it's simply a tool in the ISB toolbox. You want to hang someone in the square? What do I care, as long as I don't have to fill out the paperwork.
The Empire in Endor is fascist Italy which was still a ruthless dictatorship capable of great cruelty (Geonosis and Mimban/Ethiopia) but there are limits to its cruelty. However the Empire around the original trilogy is Republic Salo or Nazi Germany; an insane unrestricted cruelty and brutality for brutality's sake with no restriction.
8:12 To be honest, I experienced a sense of greed and an urge to outsmart all these guests, with the intention of taking their food. It's not that I lack sustenance, but rather it's about the satisfaction derived from exerting power and control over others at the feast. I was born with a physical disability, so it is easy to feel as though I want revenge for having one. And sometimes I have fantasies about sneaking into wedding celebrations and stealing all the food, even though I would never act on these thoughts. Now I take a step back and see that my mindset was mirroring that of the Empire itself.
The whole Operation Cinder never really made much sense. It was a poorly written situation to make the Empire look bad. With the Empire falling apart, how the hell do you think you're going to keep it together if you start burning down the worlds loyal to it. Furthermore, WHERE WOULD YOU GET RESOURCES?! It's like the writers forget that a military runs on its stomach. Just getting the food and credits to pay the current military is harder and harder let alone the parts and fuel to keep it running.
Its Simply, Palpatine was being petty, as far as he was concerned The Empire belonged him and only him, everyone and everything in it was his property, He did not want to suffer the indignity of what was his falling into hands others. The result was that he wanted what was left of it destroyed out of spite. We have to remember that this guy is a genocidal megalomanic who wanted to use a Doomsday weapon to rule a galaxy through sheer terror, and was willing to destroy a planet and kill Millions of people just to make an example out of them. He did not care about moral cost of such actions because non-Sith were deemed lesser beings and he could do what he wanted to them out of virtue of being a Sith. When came to his followers, they had no right to hold what remains because they had failed and were not worthy of living, which is in accordance with Sith belief. There is a real life example of this of which Cinder was based on, Hitler's Nero decree, which was his last order before killing himself, destroy what remained of German infrastructure to leave nothing for his enemies as well as punish the Germany people for losing. It Shows how much of a monster he was and how selfish and cruel as well.
2:58 There is another reason to be restrained: It is usually cheaper, because you have to make less of an effort. Control requires constant investment.
There's something to be said about how the slow suffocation shown in Andor is very similar to the slow suffocation enacted upon marginalized communities in the real world. People will march in the streets if they watch a murder of an unarmed black man in broad daylight by a cop... But like, redlining? Who is gonna care about that, realistically?
the empire isnt soft or innocent. the show demonstrates that great evil is done not on an individual level, but on a systemic level. the work environments in the isb and imperial outposts are how you act when there isn't an immediate threat, but you still have a job to do. so overall i love how they show that every officer isnt cartoonishly evil, but they still are complicit in everything the empire does. they've been fed the wrong information their entire lives, making everyones situation understandable. this understanding however, does not excuse the evil they help perpetuate by any means.
This is a great analysis and I think you were on point with the low grade evil that was profoundly horrifying and yet too subtle to call attention. This made me think of Hannah Arendt and the Banality of Evil. It is telling of how the Empire and historical governments irl have functioned. It is more startling to find a mass grave than to count cancer levels from poisoned water. Both are forms of violence but one is banal and systemic. Again, thank you for so much food for thought!
I would argue what the Commandant is doing isn't more evil... It's more *insidious*. It's ruthless and actually very cunning in it's own way. If the empire had been able to keep this up, they might have lasted much longer. The fact that early rebels were able to put them off balance and make them overreact is a blessing in disguse for all future rebels.
For some reason this video made me realize how much they canonized the campaign from Battlefront 2 2. It was was the scene from Mando season 2 when Mayweather shot his former C.O. for being a part of it.
The infighting within the ISB actually serves a purpose and mimicks how actual similar real live regimes handled their intelligence services. By allowing infighting and forceing them to make their case to the next higher authorety on a regular basis they gain and maintain controll. For a similar reason several services with competeing juristriction (double structures) are often in place so the dictatoor can then show favor for one or the other when conflicts are brought before them.
I understood the Commandant’s pilgrimage plans differently: I thought he developed the pilgrimage trail to incentivize the Aldhanis to travel to the sacred river so the Imps could rendition them and enslave them to build their base; the reason so few make the journey was because the remaining ‘dhanis stayed home uninterested in getting kidnapped or were already pressganged Is that unfounded speculation?
The politics on Coruscant are dynamic and subtle but seem to affect the bureaucracy of the empire more slowly the further from the core worlds they are. And that bureaucracy is still finding its way having replaced most if not all of the people that ran it for the Republic.
It is insane to me how replicated the events of Star Wars happen on a smaller scale in our world. Granted, examples are taken and adapted to the medium. But, what Andor founds itself to is almost synonymous to what is current. Where neutrality was the standard for decades for the majority and now fringes are pressing against each other as the power mongers of a side push for more moving that neutral group to action. It's an eerie echo.
I've seen several comments from a specific side comparing the Empire to current events and every so often I see a comment like yours where it is harder to tell WHICH side you think the Empire is analogous to. The ones that are obvious are fascinating because it shows me that no matter what a person's beliefs are they can take media and make it fit the narrative of the side they represent. By contrast comments like yours are interesting for the puzzle they create of just whom you think the Empire represents.
Buy 2 Lightsabers get $100 off, or 3 Lightsabers get 150$ off ⏩ ownasaber.com/
- For those who just want to purchase 1 saber, they can use your discount code "PORG" for 20% off
- As soon as the customer ads 2 or more sabers to their cart, the system will automatically take of either $100 or $150 from their order total
- Special starts on November 3rd and ends on November 30th.
NO!
great content once again, Mr G Tech, you obvs do appreciate the nuance a lot of 'fans' are missing when they say this show is slow and boring as far as SW goes 🙄 I've got two small points of discussion. One is the line from a senator your draw attention to in the vid, 'If you do nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear'. This is absolutely the indoctrination the Empire wants to engender. I lived for years in an authoritarian society i wont name but is out East, and many people would parrot this EXACT sentence throughout my time there, as a justification for conformity. The question that should always follow that is, who determines what is wrong or right.
The other is something you refer to in a director making sure each element portrayed in a story is relevant, I just thought to sugest you look up the concept of 'Chekovs gun' to better illustrate that point in your mind. I find these labels help in my conception anyway🤔
Hey Alan and team,
Do you guys have a forum or discord? Cause this is the kind of stuff I really love about Star Wars' potential and I'd love to discuss it with people who enjoy the meatier and more realistic anthropology and sociology Alan is presenting here.
Porg? Really? Might as well be Porn lmao
like a bunch of kids" yes thats how it works even in real life,
As someone who was in the military I can tell you that officers and NCOS do get casual at times especially when superiors aren’t around
Definitely around the smoke pit, everyone is chill
Yeah, other than the gung-ho officers and SNCOs, mostly everyone is just normal people who happen to be in the military
@Connor Bernier No, its a small area in every garrison where smoking tobacco is authorized. Something about sharing a vice drops any pretense of superiority between officers, NCOs, and enlisted.
As someone in the military now, i always treat my enlisted as the people they are. sure we have different titles and billets but at the end of the day, we're all just people trying to do a job. maybe if the empire did the same it would have survived lol
I've had decently casual conversations with generals. Of course we still refer to each other accordingly by rank and show that respect but at the end of the day I see most of us treat each other as regular people. You learn who to do it with and who not to.
I actually think the subtle hand displays how much more sinister the Empire really is. The Republic died the moment Palpatine got emergency powers which was in episode 2.
The difference here I think is that the Empire for the first time is being displayed as a realistic government body while still being a terrifying oppressive regime. They're just not cartoonishly evil; because in the real world, even the most evil and oppressive governments in history are still run by people, and people are complicated.
well put
Andor gives us the "banality of evil", as Arendt put it.
Makes me wonder how the officers of the Final Order lived.
This comment reminds me of an old picture that exists of the concentration camp guards on their time off. If you saw the picture and didn't know what their uniforms represented, all you would see is a bunch of college age kids having a goofy group photo.
@@ColinTherac117, yep. They enjoyed wonderful Christmas Eves at home with their children, five miles down the road from their “day job”.
"The Empire improves every system it touches. Judge by any metric. Safety, prosperity, trade, opportunity, peace. Compare Imperial rule to what is happening now. Look outside. Is the world more peaceful since the revolution? I see nothing but death and chaos." - The Client to Din Djarin
It's such delicious irony that the person that genuinely made that claim gets shot to bits by soldiers of the regime that he loves so much not even a few seconds later.
Long live the Galactic Empire
Long live the Galactic Empire
Long live the empire!
By depriving you of your rights, land, and if you’re too troublesome, your life. Fuck the Empire.
I think the show makes the Empire more scary by dialing it back in the beginning because a Saturday morning cartoon level of villainy is just cartoonish, but what is shown in the show is so realistic and believable it strikes you to your core.
Main thing I love about andor is that it forces me to think about how the characters behave and why and it doesn't come off as cringe in a way
Episode 2 of Kenobi (I think) the villain makes a speech at the space bar that was so cringey I shortly stopped watching. Cartoon level bad guy speech, how do writers even keep their jobs.
@@kylemundy8871 surprised you got past the Millenia old sushi. That’s when I opted out…
@@omnitheus5442 oh no...was that creature really meant to have been something from Tatooine's watery past?? I thought it was just another sand-dwelling animal.
@@kylemundy8871 Yeah, Kenobi was cringey all around. I really can't understand how some people were able to enjoy that crap. It's really, really bad. I forced myself through it but the terrible dialogue between the three Stogers villains in the first episode was already too much for me to take. Were we supposed to be afraid of them? Lol.
@@R.a.f.a.e.l. people feel a desperate need to belong to something...or they feel they've invested too much to walk away. Either way, eating a poop sandwich and saying it's amazing for a pat on the head is where we are as consumers lol.
Between the Aldhani Raid, Ezra's transmission from Lothal, and Phoenix Squadron taking down Tarkin's star destroyer and the Grand Inquisitor, 5 BBY must have been a big punch in the gut for the Empire.
Yeah well we see how Vader and then Thrawn were involved in the story of Phoenix Squadron after that so yeah I'd say the Empire took these events pretty seriously.
I'm interested in the change we see in not just the ISB, but the Empire as a whole. As fans we know where everything within the skywalker era goes, but seeing where the stories come from and how the entire galaxy shifted after Aldhani. At this point, we see how the galaxy is suffering, and how the Imperials have relaxed into their positions following the Clone Wars. Definitely hope this season ends in a place where we can get a second season.
They've already committed to at least 2, 12 episode seasons. Production on S2 starts at the end of the month
Sarsgaard claimed he'd signed on for 3 seasons. Fingers crossed
Disney has already stated its a two season series, 12 episodes each.
@@IamHomelander I knew Sarsgaard was a dirty liar
I'd also like to see how the Imperial officer corps transformed in the years between the Clone Wars and ANH, and to what extent the seeds of the Empire already existed in the Republic military. We got a taste of this in Clone Wars, but I'd like to see it covered more fully.
The scariest part is that this is exactly how cartoonishly evil empires and nations get started IRL. Low-key, gentle, and insidious. Hitler, Pol Pot, Stalin, and others come to power in similar fashion. They become cartoonishly evil over time. Some start wanting to do good, others are like Sideous from the beginning. Either way, it's the slow burning gradual erosion of, not just liberty and freedom, but of personage and agency that allows them to keep their power where moving too fast would cost them everything.
@the Learner makes me wonder who this show is for....the rebels or the Overlords....and which is which, when comparing it to society now .
First names on the list should be the UK and France. Hitler was simply following in their lead. Everything about his ideology, eugenics, imperialism, genocide to take over land, was started by them. Just look at the white settler colonies like Australia and north America.
"absolute power will corrupt absolutely"
Naive? Yes.
Innocent: Definitely Not. The occasional "good" Imperial like Thrawn or Pellaeon doesn't change that the system is inherently problematic.
The system lead to people like Tarkin being put in charge of a super laser which accounts for most of the rebels' battle cries.
Bix is tortured, using a device that bombards her with the dying screams of an entire alien species who were massacred by the Empire. That is some 40K levels of messed up evil
Shows like Kenobi are enough to make me want to join the empire
@@kylemundy8871 good for you 👍😊
I still don't really understand what is shown that makes the empire bad. It's usually just a few cartoonishly mean guys in posistons of power. Very petty and low brown evil imo.
Woah, this really puts into perspective just how titanic the deathstar really was.
Luther says" I'm a coward, I'm afraid the empire will get so strong we won't be able to stop them". If the rebellion never stood up, the deathstar would have finished un contested, and Palpatine and Vader would literally have the ability to wipe out any petty oppositionor annoyances. Combine that with Mothma's question on what their idea of wrong is, creates a very bleak dystopia where entire planets can disappear if the Empire gets annoyed or self justifies the end of a world.
Tatooine would probably be the first to go, if Vader had his way, the last fragment of his past, the final reminder of all those painful memories, gone for good.
If he did that, wouldn't the Hutts declare war and no one wanted to mess with the equivalent of the Drug Cartels (even the empire knew not to mess with those bastards)? I mean even in real life, no one messes with the Cartels, if they ever united, 2-3.2 million gangsters with adequate enough training/experience... I'm pretty damn certain even the US Military would fail to quell a united paramilitary assault on that scale. On a galactic scale, HA! As if, even the Empire made deals with the Hutts, not outright conquer them. The hutts have a large enough force to apparently have the Republic, Separatists, now the Empire, to be concerned with avoiding confrontation.
Like real life with actual drug cartels. If someone declared open war on them, they return the price in blood, tenfold, literally. They would turn cities into warzones, murder entire families (or sell them into slavery, organ trade, prostitution, whichever), it's probably also the tolerance of governments being on their payrolls, same with the Empire no doubt, why no one messes with a Cartel. Hutt or South American.
Vader, (if the Novel is to be believed) was not impressed by the Death Star and saw the will of the Force as the highest power. If the Force did not want a Battle station that could destroy planets it would find a way to remove it. A technician would trip and cause a malfunction or a design flaw would blow it up, as it would happen a Rebel pilot who was strong in the force managed to destroy it proving him right. Now this is probably non-canon now but I saw that as an interesting view as to what Vader thought of the Technological terror that the Empire was bringing.
@@SgtHawk45 Hutts would get Death Star annihilated too next
@@TheWarmachine375 thats just it though the hutts had a whole swathe of space under their control,at least a whole 3rd of the galaxy was considered hutt space, they would've been using the deathstar on hundreds of worlds not just nar shada or nal hutta,even with the deathstar a war with the hutts isn't something that the empire would have been able to carry on very long in any successful way
@@angelohowardii8907 Yes, the Hutts are like paper before the storm.
And the Empire is the storm that is approaching.
The thing that I've Loved about everything Star wars is done from the last bit of the clone wars ending to the events of episode 4, is that the World building in my mind has painted a very realistic picture of how the Empire could have actually happened; in Andor you get the image of a growing bureaucratical Empire which is demonstratively improving a lot of people's lives. If you just tuck your head down as a human, you're probably ambivalent towards the abuses of the empire, perhaps even unaware of them. Dissidence against the empire are clearly fringe, violent, extremely fanatical groups, things which most moderate people are hesitant to back even if they're not fans of the In-Place power structures.
I might hate fascism, and imperialism, but if I'm just living a steady life with consistent access to the goods and services I need, and that's what I see for my community around me, saw gerrera makes for an easy scapegoat to justify backing law and order (let's be real, it's Saw blowing up hospitals and infrastructure that's going to be placed all over the news, not monmouth's 30 minute long Senate address about lofty political ideals).
I think this wave of new content in this era is really poignant to our current lives.... something that should make us think hard about how we live.
I think thats the beauty of Andor in comparison to other Star Wars media is that it shows how a Totalitarian fascist system of government entrenches itself in the day-to-day life of the average person, and shows how gradual of a process it is until in many cases it is too late to stop it. It is this parallel to the real world that makes the Empire in Andor so terrifying, because we've seen these strategies used on various peoples throughout history, from the forced displacement, the horribly inequal "treaties", as well as the systematic destruction of cultural and holy sites.
The Empire didn't truly reach its peak until Palpatine dissolved the Imperial Senate.
the parallels of the empire to our own govs are everywhere in andor. for those with eyes to see and ear to hear at least. thanks Alan always great break downs
Given that your post is so vague that it leaves me unsure what politics you were thinking of caused me to wonder what the Imperial Propaganda looked like regarding the Rebel Alliance and non human species. That would be rather fascinating to see...
Andor is REAL STAR WARS. So wish George Lucas had empowered the people who made this and allowed them to make more stuff like this in the pre-Disney era. This stuff is Canon, not necessarily only what George Lucas makes as he can stray from the essence of the original movie. The fact the original movie had nuance to its imperial officers so they are not cardboard cut outs, and had a range of disagreements with Vadar and the way the Empire operated granted it a level of realism. I wish that had not been lost, but in Andor it would seem they found it again. They deserve a Gold Star.
Andor reminds me of what kind of new shows I hoped for when I first started reading the EU books back in the day.
@@TheInfinitecheese It compares favorably with the somewhat cheesy Imperial portrayals in Obi-Wan Kenobi, at any rate.
It's not Star Wars. It's too dirty and gritty. Also too off topic. How does it relate to the First Order or Snoke? Where is Admiral Holdo's origin? Where's General Leia? It's a burn notice ripoff with a dirty, ugly blade runner aesthetic. Dumd!
@@BungieStudios the og trilogy was dirty and gritty. I don't care how it relates to the first order because the Disney wars ducking suck.
@@TheInfinitecheese I'm sorry you feel that way, but this is not Star Wars.
the ww2 parallels in this series are INCREDIBLE. also the little nods to Leto The Second, The Great Worm and The Golden Path.
What nods?
Im curious can you explain more?
@@thenewstanza9069 russian - Ukraine, even in the background, wheat and blue sky...or thats just me, to creditable?
I mean, Star Wars is just Space Opera WWII. Basically.
""Speedshil Mileetairdy Ooperayshom" fucking got me good.
Just a thought, if even the imperial army was innocent and naive at this point- how much more does that apply to the imperial navy where we have little sign of them having faced anything close to an equal force in battle since the end of the clone wars. At least the army was occasionally having to do serious fighting, and was constantly having to make do with minimal funds to achieve their objectives with imperial budgets skewed to prioritise renewing the imperial fleet and construction of the death star
My fan theory on this is that Palpatine was intentionally sowing the seeds of chaos so he could reap life energy to make himself immortal, something he learned from studying ancient texts on Darth Tenebrae/Emperor Vitiate. At least in the EU, Palpatine had intensely studied the old Sith Empire and had used it as inspiration for some of his Empire's aesthetics.
I love how you see the corruption in the empire. With loyalty being the only factor that matters, the ranks getting filled with inept, corrupt, and self serving people is a natural outcome.
I think the "soft" treatment from the empire was a desire to preserve the labor force. The planet managers care about meeting quotas. And you can not do that without workers, and the best workers are content workers. And corpses do not produce anything.
I think the turning point hits at a new hope. When the Senate is dissolved and the empire goes full evil.
"innocent and naive" is a nice way to put it lol
They were planning to make the Dhani disappear through displacement policies rather than outright sending stormtroopers to murder them all. Don't get me started with Narkina 5.
"Innocent"...I guess, compared with the later "obey me or I will blow up your planet".
This channel honestly deserves way more subs
I like how you kind of described the three pillars of (authoritarian) stability, Legitimation (through ideology), repression and co-optation. You also hinted at what can happen if one of these begin to crumble. There's interesting literature about that :D
Andor is good at showing the complacency of people during a time of relative peace. Reminds me of how people/Govt were pre-9/11.
I hope you don't mean to imply that the public hysteria after 9/11 was justified when it reached the federal level.
To be honest that last time I worked a 9to5, your description of the ISB would have worked there, too. That's pretty much _every_ working environment! At least until Rebel forces take over the break room.
Yeah I was wondering how high school was any different from any other childish office politics.
Those soldiers at 1:53 had big "can we have class outside" energy.
I think that Andor is a very good show but i think shows like andor in star wars only work when we don't have enough of them. They have to be made once in 5 years in order to ensure that they are loved and not considered boring
I’m looking forward to seeing that transition unfold on screen.
I love the longer videos like this, please keep it up!
That "Special military operation" got me cracking up so hard 😂
I just realized something...remember when Cassian Andor thought Chirrut Imwe was a Jedi in Rogue One, does that mean he met a Jedi? Will we see a Jedi in Andor? And if so, would it be either Kanan Jarrus or Cal Kestis or another unnamed Jedi. I myself have a belief he might run into Kanan, which would make sense and it would be really awesome.
In that era, few people remember or know what a Jedi actually looks like and how they act.
@@TammoKorsai but that actually that provides more confirmation on Cassian Andor meeting Kanan Jarrus
It's more likely that folk in the galaxy just associate anyone who talks about 'the force' with the Jedi. Remember that, at that stage, the Jedi would have been utterly demonised and mystified through propaganda and misinformation, so very very few people would have had a clear mental image of what they actually were/what they did/how they looked - just that they were Force followers.
@@garethmiguel yes but if you look in Rebels, Kanan Jarrus, Ezra Bridger and the rest of the Ghost crew were stationed at Yavin as well...look at the end of season 3 and 4 of Rebels
@@Colombiarican31 lol Gilroy said no lightsabers or fan service
“Yo dudes the empire is pretty chill maybe you could join it or something?”- Darth Vader
Light physical labor with the added stress that a blaster is literally to the head of your family and one of your trusted is working mg with the thief. And they have already killed to get what they want so your life your family life is definitely on the line.
And the thought that if he DOES live through this, the ISB are going to show up and demand to know WHY you lived through it and haul you and your family away for interrogation, torture by alien death-screams and then execution.
Commenting on the ISB. My mother is a professor at a University and this is how the other professors behave around each other. Everyone is out looking for themselves and some people to do the bare miminuim while others try to backstab and rat others out and fight for power. They care little about the bigger picture or the cause and more about how they can climb the ladder.
That type of thinking is so prevalent. Sounds incredibly depressing.
Andor himself is a great example of someone the Empire is pushing towards radicalism. He doesn't want to fight, but at the same time, he clearly has no love for the system. He was fine with stealing from the Empire until now, his own little private form of revenge. But now, he's being punished. Not for his crimes, but for simply existing. And he's seeing just how bad things can get for people in his position. His experience is exactly what Luthen wanted to happen to most people on the galaxy: Empire chokes you harder than usual, so hard that you grab for a blaster to make it stop.
I have a suspicion that Dedra Meero may not make it to the end of the series. Syril Karn seems obsessed with her as a means to get back to serving and distinguishing himself in the Empire. Their last interaction made it clear that Dedra Meero wanted nothing to do with Syril Karn and that should he try to approach her again, he would be sent to prison. The desperation with Syril Karn, despite being promoted at his job, makes me think that he won't give up in his quest to "help" and there will be a penultimate episode where both Dedra Meero and Syril Karn will catch up with Cassian Andor. Dedra Meero will want Cassian Andor alive to connect to Luthen Rael, but Syril Karn wants Andor dead for retribution. Syril Karn, in my scenario, will either kill Dedra Meero accidentally as she's trying to extract Cassian Andor (incompetence with a blaster), or deliberately kill her as she physically stands between him and Andor.
Just my speculation.
I lean more toward the idea she'll first be a victim of ISB politics. One way or another Andor will escape her clutches and she'll be blamed for the failure. Perhaps Blevin will see the opportunity to twist the knife. Or maybe her assistant. I do agree she will die, but it will be after a fall from grace.
Appreciating the Andor content….
Shhh, don't tell anyone, but Andor is the most subversive series currently in production. Kind of hilarious it's on Disney plus of all places.
This seems like the first show that tells the story from the empire's perspective. I might have to watch it now
"I encounter civilians like you all the time. You believe the Empire is continually plotting to do harm. Let me tell you, your view of the Empire is far too dramatic. The Empire is a government. It keeps billions of beings fed and clothed. Day after day, year after year, on thousands of worlds, people live their lives under Imperial rule without seeing a stormtrooper or hearing a TIE fighter scream overhead." (Grand Admiral Thrawn, from Galaxy of Fear: The Swarm)
For 99% of the Empire that never even got swept up in large battles or schemes, most of them just had the Empire as a big, fat welfare state that gave to them what the Republic did not. Even if we factor in the trillions that died in the Galactic Civil War, the Empire ruled over 100 quadrillion subjects, so less than 1% of them would have seen Stormtroopers or TIE Fighters.
Andor is a great show
Yeah they seem to care more about public opinion turning against them more than I ever would've guessed based on what we've seem previously
Those supervisors are sooo drinking Starbucks.
Good analysis on how the Empire’s hardline policies create the very Rebellion they are trying to eliminate.
A very interesting analysis of co-dependancy and forming your own being of the responses of others. Thankyou for this analysis :)
1:42 - I'm afraid that is how you will find it at most intelligence agencies.
This Generation Tech guy seems like a pretty cool fellow
Nah, he's okay, I guess. 🤪
Just want to say thank you Allen great channel binged loads of you vids on Star Wars keep it up they are almost as good as Andor!
Wait didnt the rally cry by Ezra Bridger did in siege of Lothall in season 2 rallied the Rebels to fight the Empire and not Jeddah? I cant wait to see Agent Kallus in Andor, since he was an ISB Agent during the time of Andor.
Bridger's rallying cry will have inspired some to take up arms, others will have still tried to live normal lives until atrocities like Alderaan made it clear that was no longer possible
Unfortunately Agent Kallus was KIA in terminal list
@@V.B.Squire lol, Agent Kallus havent even joined the Rebels at the time of Andor. Agent Kallus is protected by the indestructible plot armor.
Blowing up Jeddah city angered people. It rallied people to fight the empire.
The liberation of Lothal showed everyone that you can beat the empire.
Blowing up Alderaan pissed people off. It rallied people to fight the empire.
Blowing up the death star showed everyone that you can beat the empire.
What Ezra did wasn't the sole rally cry it was just added to the pile. Not everyone in the rebel alliance was from Alderaan but a lot of people in the rebel alliance were from Alderaan.
@@MercenaryPen good point.
Blevin took part in a UK Series called Taskmaster. He was quite good but did come last a few times. I suspect this didn’t please his Supervisors in the ISB.....
Andor is what great franchise media should be, it is a great piece of media on it own that does not depend on cheap cameos but it elevates everything is connected to. Andor really helped me appreciate so many other aspects of Star Wars. The Jedi as a force for good and why they are a necessity is highlighted here and this is due solely to their absence. Character's like Kanan, Cal and Luke are given suxhbgreta importance.
Operation Cinder was always an unnecessary plot device, in my opinion.
What killed off the Empire after the battle of Endor was a huge power vacuum at the top.
With Vader and the Emperor dead, along with some high ranking military officers, what's to stop any Admiral or Moff from unilaterally declaring themselves the new Emperor?
In one moment, the Empire went from being one unified force to a disorganized collection of factions, each vying for supremacy.
I would not be surprised at all if 90% of the casualties experienced by the Empire post Endor were just imperial factions fighting each other.
All the rebellion really had to do was secure the core worlds and let the Empire fight itself.
Basically this was how it happened in Legends. The basically feudal nature of the Empire's society meant that without Palpatine, everyone began to fight for the scraps in something that rivaled or even surpassed the Warring States periods in places like Japan or China. You might even compare it to a Third Century Crisis kind of clusterfuck, and that's the one that nearly brought Rome itself to it's knees (and unlike in Legends, the Empire doesn't have their equivalent to Aurelian or Diocletian to right the wrongs and clean up the mess)
As someone currently deployed I can tell you a lot of times the lines between enlisted and officer are blurred. We’re all there to do a job, but we don’t have to be so uptight on the regs cause we’re all in the same shit. My OICs have given me leeway to do stuff I enjoy like coming in late the next morning after a championship for a sport I watch.
7:40 That had me rolling on the floor laughing my ass off.
Love this analysis. And that's a credit to the writers and show runners of Andor. Putting out a great tv show or movie makes the analysis that much better especially to those critics who pay attention and actually know things outside of the material. I appreciate your work, thank you.
Both Aldhani and Ezra call to arms were pivots in the Galaxy.
Terrific analysis. Thanks, Allen!
I think you missed the point, it was to show how complacent the garrison was, and the Empire was in general at the time. I also think the ISB interaction very much foreshadowed how sector commanders treat one another, and how the later Empire managed itself. It was a very dog eat dog system.
You touched on this at the end of the video
Luthens strategy is brilliant. It’s effectively acting as a middleman he is able to bridge the factionalism and purity spirals all the while funding and laying the groundwork for the rebellion through accelerationism.
As prior service, I promise you, the interactions amongst the imperials are ON POINT.
Im rewatching Andor now (on DVD). It is an absolute masterpiece.
Even Luke Skywalker aspired to enroll in the Imperial Academy, and become a pilot for The Galactic Empire. It was only his impure thoughts for his sister Leia, that caused him to change his loyalties.
What we saw in other media were usually the elite forces the empire had to offer, on ships commandeered by high ranking personnel, so some outpost on some underdeveloped world far away from every supervisor will definetely be quite chill
Great video and it touches on something Andor has done better than any Star Wars property to date: it makes the Empire more than a mustache-twirling costumed villain. The Empire is a big, overbearing system of oppression in which all the cogs go about their duty, perhaps never realizing their own culpability in oppressing society. Deedra going from an almost likeable, intelligent investigator to a cold hearted interrogator and then back again is a great example. She's not scary because she's relishing Bix's torture; she's scary because she accepts torture as just another part of her job, no different than making a presentation at today's meeting. The way she speaks to Bix and her facial expressions are merely a little play acting to achieve results. Bix isn't a person, but an obstacle between Deedra and the truth. Torture isn't an immoral act, it's simply a tool in the ISB toolbox. You want to hang someone in the square? What do I care, as long as I don't have to fill out the paperwork.
The Empire in Endor is fascist Italy which was still a ruthless dictatorship capable of great cruelty (Geonosis and Mimban/Ethiopia) but there are limits to its cruelty.
However the Empire around the original trilogy is Republic Salo or Nazi Germany; an insane unrestricted cruelty and brutality for brutality's sake with no restriction.
The imperials in Episode 6 were evoking the European experience of Colonialism, from the 19th century.
8:12 To be honest, I experienced a sense of greed and an urge to outsmart all these guests, with the intention of taking their food. It's not that I lack sustenance, but rather it's about the satisfaction derived from exerting power and control over others at the feast. I was born with a physical disability, so it is easy to feel as though I want revenge for having one. And sometimes I have fantasies about sneaking into wedding celebrations and stealing all the food, even though I would never act on these thoughts. Now I take a step back and see that my mindset was mirroring that of the Empire itself.
"Special Military Operation". Brilliant.
The whole Operation Cinder never really made much sense. It was a poorly written situation to make the Empire look bad. With the Empire falling apart, how the hell do you think you're going to keep it together if you start burning down the worlds loyal to it. Furthermore, WHERE WOULD YOU GET RESOURCES?! It's like the writers forget that a military runs on its stomach. Just getting the food and credits to pay the current military is harder and harder let alone the parts and fuel to keep it running.
Its a sith thing
Its Simply, Palpatine was being petty, as far as he was concerned The Empire belonged him and only him, everyone and everything in it was his property, He did not want to suffer the indignity of what was his falling into hands others. The result was that he wanted what was left of it destroyed out of spite. We have to remember that this guy is a genocidal megalomanic who wanted to use a Doomsday weapon to rule a galaxy through sheer terror, and was willing to destroy a planet and kill Millions of people just to make an example out of them. He did not care about moral cost of such actions because non-Sith were deemed lesser beings and he could do what he wanted to them out of virtue of being a Sith. When came to his followers, they had no right to hold what remains because they had failed and were not worthy of living, which is in accordance with Sith belief. There is a real life example of this of which Cinder was based on, Hitler's Nero decree, which was his last order before killing himself, destroy what remained of German infrastructure to leave nothing for his enemies as well as punish the Germany people for losing. It Shows how much of a monster he was and how selfish and cruel as well.
@@cane6074 Yep. "Let him rule over charred bones and cooked meat. Let him be the king of ashes! Burn them all!"
Excellent video essay!
As a social scientist, your analysis is spot on… keep it up!
Glad to see that you still fly the blue sky and golden weat fields of Ukraine in the backgroud!
2:58 There is another reason to be restrained: It is usually cheaper, because you have to make less of an effort. Control requires constant investment.
Funny way to put it with the title
There's something to be said about how the slow suffocation shown in Andor is very similar to the slow suffocation enacted upon marginalized communities in the real world. People will march in the streets if they watch a murder of an unarmed black man in broad daylight by a cop... But like, redlining? Who is gonna care about that, realistically?
I like your assessment of this series. It makes a lot of sense.
Soft and squishy Empire is a good Empire.
the empire isnt soft or innocent. the show demonstrates that great evil is done not on an individual level, but on a systemic level. the work environments in the isb and imperial outposts are how you act when there isn't an immediate threat, but you still have a job to do. so overall i love how they show that every officer isnt cartoonishly evil, but they still are complicit in everything the empire does. they've been fed the wrong information their entire lives, making everyones situation understandable. this understanding however, does not excuse the evil they help perpetuate by any means.
I seriously love the show I wish I could just hang out and talk about that shit all day
Excellent assessment and commentary.
This is a great analysis and I think you were on point with the low grade evil that was profoundly horrifying and yet too subtle to call attention. This made me think of Hannah Arendt and the Banality of Evil. It is telling of how the Empire and historical governments irl have functioned. It is more startling to find a mass grave than to count cancer levels from poisoned water. Both are forms of violence but one is banal and systemic.
Again, thank you for so much food for thought!
From the guy who punched a fish to supervisor Blevin a long way for Doc Brown
I would argue what the Commandant is doing isn't more evil... It's more *insidious*. It's ruthless and actually very cunning in it's own way. If the empire had been able to keep this up, they might have lasted much longer. The fact that early rebels were able to put them off balance and make them overreact is a blessing in disguse for all future rebels.
Does nobody else notice the Lego tie interceptor changing position every episode?
For some reason this video made me realize how much they canonized the campaign from Battlefront 2 2. It was was the scene from Mando season 2 when Mayweather shot his former C.O. for being a part of it.
How come Han's stormtrooper Uniform didn't even cover his face
Because he was Imperial Army, NOT Stromtrooper Corps………
ah yes we'll be talking about the grey boys in our next episode
The infighting within the ISB actually serves a purpose and mimicks how actual similar real live regimes handled their intelligence services. By allowing infighting and forceing them to make their case to the next higher authorety on a regular basis they gain and maintain controll. For a similar reason several services with competeing juristriction (double structures) are often in place so the dictatoor can then show favor for one or the other when conflicts are brought before them.
Love the TV, keep it up
You must’ve never worked in corporate America…it’s all back stabbing and snitching. I always think to myself this reminds me of school.
That is because adults are just more layered kids. There children nature doesn't go a way. Just more layers are add
Aldhani Battle Cry: STICK IN YOUR EYE!
Actually, it’s EXACTLY on point 😂
Grade school nonsense is exactly what to expect at the nerve center of large organizations
You described fascism perfectly through star wars. Well done
It's the guy for Endeavor
I understood the Commandant’s pilgrimage plans differently: I thought he developed the pilgrimage trail to incentivize the Aldhanis to travel to the sacred river so the Imps could rendition them and enslave them to build their base; the reason so few make the journey was because the remaining ‘dhanis stayed home uninterested in getting kidnapped or were already pressganged
Is that unfounded speculation?
Just
a comment for the algorithm
The politics on Coruscant are dynamic and subtle but seem to affect the bureaucracy of the empire more slowly the further from the core worlds they are. And that bureaucracy is still finding its way having replaced most if not all of the people that ran it for the Republic.
7:40 topical humor lol.
It is insane to me how replicated the events of Star Wars happen on a smaller scale in our world. Granted, examples are taken and adapted to the medium. But, what Andor founds itself to is almost synonymous to what is current. Where neutrality was the standard for decades for the majority and now fringes are pressing against each other as the power mongers of a side push for more moving that neutral group to action. It's an eerie echo.
I've seen several comments from a specific side comparing the Empire to current events and every so often I see a comment like yours where it is harder to tell WHICH side you think the Empire is analogous to. The ones that are obvious are fascinating because it shows me that no matter what a person's beliefs are they can take media and make it fit the narrative of the side they represent. By contrast comments like yours are interesting for the puzzle they create of just whom you think the Empire represents.