by Angua Lupin
Please be advised that the following contains spoilers through S02E06 of Andor and all four seasons of Rebels.
We come into Andor knowing how it will end. That is a blessing: to paraphrase writer David Kajganich, once you remove the question of whether characters die, you get to explore how they live. But it also means that at its core, one of the functions of Andor is to get us from Point A to Point B. In this instance, A is what we know about the Rebellion in 5 BBY, and B is Rogue One and A New Hope (or as we call it in my household, Rogue Two). In other words, we need to get from a formless, incoherent mess of individual rebel cells to a cohesive military unit that has capital ships and a centralized command: we need to end up in a place where the Rebellion can fight the Battle of Atollon[1], the Battle of Lothal[2], the Battle of Scarif[3] and the Battle of Yavin[4] – all battles fought with capital ships and on the pretext of equal footing.
And, of course, we know the proximate cause of the coalescence of the Rebellion: Mon Mothma in the Ghost, making a radio call to all the disparate rebel cells. The ships are popping in, one by one, as the music swells. But what about the ultimate cause? What can Andor tell us about what makes a rebellion capable of fighting its extremely overpowered oppressors, and what doesn’t?
Andor does nothing without a reason. In Season 2, we have been given a view of three different rebel cells; these cells must lead us to Scarif. We have: 1) the remnants of the Maia Pei Brigade on Yavin 4; 2) the Ghorman Front; and 3) Saw Gerrera’s band. (I am not including Luthen and his machinations because a) I wouldn’t describe his operation as a cell; and b) his story could go any one of a myriad of ways, so I’m not drawing any conclusions about his overall narrative function until it’s done.) Each of these tells us something foundational about rebellion.
1) The Maia Pei Brigade. The remnants of the Maia Pei Brigade are, explicitly, a joke. They cannot perform the most basic functions of survival without arguing; they let emotions dictate their actions; they are incapable of forward thinking, let alone connecting their actions to a bigger whole; they decide a life-and-death situation by playing Rock, Paper, Scissors. They are laughable and played for laughs. But under the levity, there is a truth and a tragedy: this is what rebellion is. Not the only thing it is, of course, but absolutely one of the things rebellion is.
The Maia Pei Brigade was clearly a rebel cell built around one person (Maia Pei), with no succession planning or command structure. Unsurprisingly, when she (presumably) died, it all fell apart. This is the peril of building rebellion around the Charismatic Leader model; it is, unfortunately, all too common. No one is left who can think beyond their immediate struggle for power. The result is always the same: anarchy in the jungle; starvation and hopelessness; the survivors being picked off by a literal monster as a metaphor for the futility of their actions against the Empire. The Rebellion on display here is at its lowest, most useless point.
2) The Ghorman Front. In contrast, the Ghorman Front appears respectable. They are civilized, in the strict definition of the word; they are city dwellers. They are dressed well, culturally sophisticated, and articulate. They have a morally just cause for which they are fighting. They are, crucially, not a group of people you would expect to solve matters of life and death with a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors; metaphorically speaking, there is no monster in the forest waiting to blindside them. And yet.
They are also, inarguably, a failure: they are determined to carry out an extremely foolish mission despite being told exactly how foolish it is by people with considerably more experience in the rebellion than them; they are incapable of following orders from those very same people; as a consequence, they play directly into the Empire’s hands. Most importantly, they are a failure for the same reason as the Maia Pei Brigade: they are incapable of seeing the larger picture. The Ghormans are incapable of seeing beyond the destruction of their world, beyond their pain and loss. They cannot ask the question, “how does what we’re doing fit into the larger movement against our oppressors”, let alone the question, “why is the Empire destroying my world, and what do they hope to get out of it?”. Because they cannot look beyond their pain, because they cannot ask the bigger questions, they are easily manipulated by the Empire, and they all end up dead, having accomplished none of their goals.
The Ghorman Front comes after the Maia Pei Brigade because we need to see that respectability does not buy you effectiveness. Not being “a joke where the punchline is you get eaten by monsters” does not mean you are Doing Rebellion Right. Crucially, the Ghorman Front is not a through-line to the Battle of Scariff, except that Mon is given the pretext she needs to defy the emperor by their deaths. Acting alone, incapable of seeing beyond your pain to connect with the wider world, ignoring what other rebels have learned through bitter experience: this does not buy you capital ships and the ability to go toe-to-toe with your oppressor.
3) Saw Gerrera. Saw’s primary narrative function is spelled out not here (so far), but in Rebels, when Mon Mothma gets into a shouting match with Saw’s giant holographic head on Yavin 4. (If you haven’t seen Rebels, trust me, it’s exactly as trippy as it sounds.) That is: Saw represents the Rebellion with its hands dirty; Mon, dressed in a truly improbable shade of white for a jungle planet, represents the Rebellion with its hands clean. “I hope, Senator, after you’ve lost, and the Empire reigns over the galaxy unopposed, you will find some comfort in the knowledge that you fought according to the rules,” Saw says to Mon.
And the thing is, Saw is not wrong. To fight purely Mon’s way is to lose, because the Empire does not play fair. But to fight Saw’s way is also to lose, because Saw’s way is to reject the unity that Mon is offering, the cohesiveness that the Rebellion needs. Like the other rebel cells we have seen so far, Saw is a failure: he also does not lead to capital ships, an X-wing bomber run, and an exploded superweapon. His inability to work with the other rebel cells, his inability to look at the bigger picture, even (especially) his inability to trust and be trusted, means that he can never produce the kind of rebellion that can go toe-to-toe with the Empire and win[5]. When Saw says, “rebellions are not fought by the sane,” he is again not wrong. Still, he is also not right: they may not be fought by the sane, but there must be more sanity than what Saw brings to the table if they want to accomplish anything other than chaos.
So, where do we stand, halfway through S2, in the year 3 BBY? The Rebellion is a joke; it is plagued by infighting and a lack of trust; it is playing into the Empire’s hands. But, once again, we know where we end up: with Scarif, Yavin, and the planet killer destroyed. Somewhere out there, Admiral Sato is playing cat-and-mouse with Thrawn and winning; somewhere out there, Radus is gathering the scattered Mon Calamari fleet; somewhere out there, Galen Erso is sending an awful lot of emails. (Somewhere out there, Chopper is murdering 55,000 people.) And here, in front of us, Mon Mothma is deciding that her time in the Senate is ending. The impending Ghorman Massacre might be a pretext, but it is a pretext Mon badly needs: she needs to be on the Ghost, calling all those disparate rebel cells together into one cohesive unit. We need her to remind us that success comes from working together, looking at the bigger picture, moving past our pain, and asking what the galaxy needs of us.
I’m looking forward to it.
[1] Lost
[2] Won, but on a technicality
[3] Lost
[4] Won, but on a different technicality
[5] Even on a technicality.