How Andor Retcons Star Wars the RIGHT Way
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- čas přidán 24. 09. 2022
- The opening moments of Andor retcon an admittedly small detail from Cassian's past. But it is a retcon. However, I think the series absolutely nails the balance between making up something new to tell the best possible story while also acknowledging what came before, even if the small details are from a reference book only a small percentage of Star Wars fans read.
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impressive that they faked cassian's home planet so hard it made it into our world
Lol
I like when the corpos search for Cassian in the database, they're referring to 6 year old information. Idk if it was intentional but 6 years ago was when we learned anything of note about Cassian's past
Tony Gilroy has said he's now a star wars fan he just wasn't one growing up. Regardless, I loved that they did this, I only knew about Fest through this channel so that was a really clever and honestly on brand thing for what the show is going for. Brilliant.
Yeah I hate people keep saying he’s not a fan. He is now, he just wasn’t obsessed with Star Wars and thinks it doesn’t have to be one vision.
Tony has been a great addition to the star wars universe
Tony Gilroy is brilliant. He wrote movies featuring a guy in my profile pic. And he also directed and wrote Michael Clayton, which is a masterpiece. Dude is based. Good to see SW getting explicitly political again like George Lucas would have wanted.
@@thatrandomnoob8611 I agree. When a filmmaker says they weren't a "Star Wars Fan" they mean to that hardcore fan level - Tony Gilroy being a filmmaker, it's almost impossible that he is not very aware of Star Wars and respectful of what it did for cinema, etc. Of course he's a fan, he's just not THAT kind of fan. I do like that he definitely respects the little things though - that's cool, though not strictly necessary either.
I'd honestly be more wary of people in those positions claiming they were a fan from the get go.
I remember both J.J Abrams and Rian Johnson saying they were fans before working on Star Wars.
I am not a deep enough star wars nerd to have seen this change, but it makes me happy to hear that this level of detail is being worked into the new series!
such a deep cut for a guy who probably knows just the surface of the universe. that is clever use of tools right there. good on the director
The way it was handled it almost doesn't even seem or feel like a retcon at all. Masterfully done 👍👏
I was so enthusiastic about Fest being his homeworld, thank to something so silly as "i looove mountains and snowy places" . Since i saw the trailer i was like " ohhh they are going to retcon that u.u " . But somehow they managed to put it in the show, and so for the rebellion they have that origin for him, Fest.
I really expected to see the separatist side background, but the series as far so many things to show us, im happy and waiting wednesday.
Btw i love your videos!
THIS is how you retcon right! I remembered Cassian was’t from Kenari but I rolled with it, thinking it could be me misremembering since it’s been a while since I read the R1 Visual Guide. I also like how this is like breaking the fourth wall in a way - that the book we’re getting is like a file from the Imperials/Rebels and the information about him being from Fest is so strong it just appeared everywhere and the show is what ACTUALLY happened. Hats off to Tony Gilroy who was able to make a compromise with Lucasfilm Story Group and rewarding us hardcore fans for this. I just wish Lucasfilm would give us an order of canon rank so retconning would be a little less painful since at this time right now all media (so movies, live action shows, animated shows, shorts, novels, comics, manga, video games and reference books) all have the same level of importance. It’s also kinda surreal to receive this “scraps to the dogs” kind of information drop in Star Wars because this is extremely common in the other fandoms I’m in (information hubs online for plot, characters, lore and others is entirely and I mean ENTIRELY fan run, and our reference books can be poorly translated) and I’m not used to this in Star Wars, where we have databases at our fingertips from official sources.
Now, we need to know why they have to lie about where Cassian is from.
One of the most intriguing questions, for sure.
We re probably gonna get more flashbacks with him and maarva that explain that
It seems like his homeworld had an event occur that would make survivors of the event like Andor at risk of being imprisoned
They’re hiding something…
"Nothing happened at Kenari Square. Well there's some mining accidents, but definitely not a massacre. You all know the Reps are good guys. They'd never do that"
Watching Alex be happy about this honestly makes me happy
YES! Retcons are more than fine as long as there is ANY effort to acknowledge and reconcile with the previous lore!!
I like it how so far this show seems to really be respecting lore and previously told stories.
Its amazing how all it takes is just one sentence of dialog, and it fixes, fits, and ties everything together. Thats a show of good writing, attention to detail, and understanding of the setting of the story.
Similarly how battletech rpg retconned the tv show. Retcons are inevitable, but if they make them creative and that it fits? Beautiful.
I was way too excited over this, they didn’t need to do this but they did.
Some things in Canon people have treated as retcon I see differently.
Take what happened with Caleb Dume/Kanan Jarrus in the first episode of The Bad Batch: People went nuts and said it was a retcon of what occurred in Kanan - The Last Padawan.
I accept both stories as pure Canon.
People forget a key element of Star Wars we've known since the first Trilogy:
It's all from a Certain Point Of View.
Kanan told the story from his memories.
The Bad Batch tells it from their's.
Both viewpoints are right and we get a larger viewpoint because of it.
Causing Fest to be a cover story is great! It keeps Canon intact while explaining differences. I love it!
I'm really excited to see what we get for the fourth episode this week. I'm completely hooked on this series!
If ever there was a lesson in how to enjoy something and resist being a toxic fan, this is it! Thank you from those of us recovering from being jerks to other fans by showing us another way to appreciate the great stuff that's there. Your content is so important, and I can't thank you guys enough!
Thx for that, had to ignore SW online for years, was looking for some way to be in a conversation that wasn’t all negative for all the wrong reasons. Or indeed all positive. So hard to find! Yep, I have issues with the sequels tbh, but had no place to discuss them. So glad to know we can get past all that. Love this series for so many things, here is another one.
As a Mexican, I can imagine that the idea of retcon Andor's origins to make him an immigrant from a "native" planet was from Diego Luna.
He and Tenoch Huerta (Namor, from Black Panther) are very proud of being latin americans that moves from his own country to find success in a better place. I can see an allegory there.
I saw an interview where Diego wanted to explain why Cassian had a Mexican accent seeing as most humans in Star Wars have accents that are either English or American.
@@patkohler9695 right!
I guess that that's why, in the series, we can see that English is not the original language of Casian, and so is the Kenari native language.
What's interesting too is like Tony Gilroy the creator for KOTOR 2 wasn't a star wars fan at first but went on to write one of the best star wars stories.
I dont understand
Tony gilroy created kotor 2?
Im pretty sure that isnt true
Pretty sure it was a video game writer named chris avellone who created it
@@kungalexander829 bad punctuation on my part i meant to say like Tony Gilroy; the creator for KOTOR 2 (in this case Chris avelone) they were similar in that way
I had the same reaction as you, but it's because I watch your channel so consistently and have done so for years.
I didn't read the visual guide so I only knew cassian was from fest because I watch your channel.
So at the end of the day, I perked up from that brilliant retcon too
This has been one of the best live action Star Wars experiences thus far, feels like a mature SW movie. I wish the marketing was better though since it seems like not many non SW fans don’t even know what Andor is :/ I sold it to folks by saying a man is on his knees literally begging for his life before being executed lmao. I think non Star Wars fans create really great unique content.
I totally love that he/they made your "little nerd heart explode". That care and attention to detail is wonderful. I never would have noticed it on my own and never read the reference books, but I celebrate with you on your behalf. :)
You will always and forever be my favorite star wars youtuber. Love you and Molly!
Hot take: Tony Gilroy not being a hardcore Star Wars nerd is a good thing.
100% everything you say. The glory of respect and nods to the lore while maintaining a good story, the willingness to work with and grow with the Star Wars verse, the smoothness of the retcon itself.
Really love this. It acknowledges the hardcore fans and makes it feel like being into Star Wars on that level isn’t a waste. Also fits into the “from a certain point of view” approach that I love to see in Star Wars.
Totally missed that! Bits of story callouts like that are so exciting to see!
Great video, I absolutely love when fans are rewarded for exploring the deeper Star Wars canon so I hope we get more of this
Tony Gilroy also retcon rogue one, in the movie Andor says "I've been in this fight since I was six years old", and now in the series it's showned that he joins the rebellion 5 years before rogue one, lol
I hate Fest because, of all the things the rebels could have stolen there, they chose three stupid AT-PTs that are so hard to protect on their escape.
Love the nerdy takes here & in yr other vlogs. Esp your kindness about this sort of thing, can I say it’s unusual in the YT sphere? This was a good one to know, thx!
Fun fact the youtube subtitles correct Kinari to Qunari - from the Dragon Age games. Weird it recognises one but not the other
I simply stated "perhaps the archives are incomplete" when they mentioned Kenari
Excellent commentary! Thanks!
Thought, insightful and entertaining. You sir are a great reviewer.
Love a good in universe retcon
It's nice how Gilroy actually seems to have respect enough for the Star Wars universe to not only craft one amazing little corner of this universe filled with interesting and diverse aliens, cultures, machinery, factions and people, but to also not retcon in the way many creators do - by simply pretending a certain information has never been revealed before. He knows he has to respect canon and to build a new work adding to it instead of altering it and retconning previously known information while also fulfilling his purpose of writing a new story. I hope in the five spanning years Andor will cover, we hear of events that take place in Star Wars Rebels for instance, as we're once again diving into the same timeframe as that show. Of course he shouldn't focus on Rebels events or characters since that story has already been told, but I'm sure he'll tell a fresh and totally new story while respecting canon and not contradicting anything that happens in Rebels or any other previously told story that takes place during those five years.
Damn def didn't know that the only thing I remembered about his past wsa him saying his parents were Seperatists which the tribal planet made me wonder what was going on but super awesome that they took 10s to acknowledge what was printed before... I feel like it doesn't take mjch to play within the lines previously drawn and I really appreciate it when the creatives take the itme to do it.
I didn't notice it, so I follow you because I always learn new things.
Thank you for this video.
In my honest opinion, people get too worked up over retcons. Now I LOVE it when all the details line up no problem at all, I also celebrate when that happens but when it doesn't, I just take a moment to try and reconcile it and move on. Obviously there are limits to this depending on the severity of the retcon but I also recognise that this is just a storytelling thing that happens and happens a lot and when it does, it just falls to me as a fan to deal with it. Every single TV show I have watched ever has retconned something from an early season that was established about a character in a much later season and when I catch it, I have to find a way to make it fit. It's not that hard to do most of the time and sometimes it's even fun but I feel like people would just prefer to get mad about something rather than try and engage with the story being told. I think that's what's prepared me for situations like this, as you said it happens in Star Wars as well.
To give some examples, in TCW S3, the show killed Jedi Master Even Piell in the Citadel arc *but* his death had already been told in a novel during the Jedi Purge. So that threw out an entire book back in the day. More recently, The Bad Batch changed some details about Kanan's history, such as the fact that Depa Bilaba's lightsaber was blue (which it was always meant to be anyways.) You compared this to Poe's backstory being changed in TROS in the Q&A. While I agree it would have been nice if they'd kept it consistent and it's good that Tony Gilroy is (so far) seeming very collaborative, I also feel it's important to recognize that JJ and the writers of that movie were fighting a deck stacked against them with the production, they lacked the freedom that Gilroy currently has so I think that's being unfair in the comparison. If Gilroy was well within his right to change certain details, then so was JJ back then. It doesn't necessarily mean that JJ didn't care or didn't try to collaborate with Lucasfilm and was being egotistical about it, there's a lot we don't know about the production process of these things. And I also don't know either of them personally, I'm just willing to give both the benefit of the doubt. I just think it's interesting that we've got two similar situations where details of a character's past were altered and one is being praised while the other was highly critiqued and even condemned by some. I've seen that comparison made a bit since Andor dropped so it's been making me think about it and make some observations
It's probably praised because less people care about Cassian and the show is better than TROS
The Kanan retcon on the other hand only made the story worse than the comic
great! thanks Alex!
keep it up!
I had the same reaction as well I love the reference books so I knew they retconned it but hearing them mention fest made me happy
I wondered about this myself and this is pretty cool
Loved this! Can you recommend some reference books?
This is what a man who feels respected looks like. Gilroy or whoever made that happen did so because they care and respect the star wars fans, at least enough to do this.
As deep of a cut as Han Solo's beard, but less shaggy looking
Exactly. Changes can be made without sacrificing the fan base if one makes some effort. And I agree that this made logical sense as well. If you are trying to keep your identity a secret from the Empire (ISB), Corpos, etc..., why would you NOT have some degree of falsified info in your bio? 😀 The technical manual and references are still "accurate" by the in-universe explanation, but creative liberties can still be taken for what the current story needs. Sure, doing this all the time would eventually get old --but since it hasn't really been done much, this sort of retcon was great to keep both long term fans happy and also not spend much time on something few of us would have noticed. So, win-win! 😁
It probably won’t happen this season, but i’m fully expecting this show to retcon Cassian and K2’s first meeting. Granted, the comic which showed their first meeting was mediocre and underwhelming, so retconning it probably won’t break any hearts, but I do wonder if it’ll be referenced at all.
Maybe even just keeping the name of the planet they met on or something minor like that.
Very weird when they retcon things in comics despite claiming all media is equally canon. And then refuse to acknowledge any inconsistency?? It's pretty weird, I wish they'd just be upfront about the retcon.
This is what makes Star Wars lore unique...everything is true...from a certain point of view.
I didn’t know about the retcon but this is why i watch your channel
This is actually really cool. I'm trying to think of another example of this happening in nerd culture.
The Clone Wars reference to how Maul's homeworld used to be Iridonia in the original EU.
I have owned the reference book for a year and haven’t read it yet. What Gilroy did is for sure the best way to retcon something because usually retcons can be annoying af
Love it.
I normally am not a fan of retcons, but if they contribute to the story, that's what I think is better. Poe being a criminal in his youth before choosing to help others? That's a twist I like, as it serves his development much better, and adds to his arc of fear. Destruction of Kamino? Perfect sad way to end the story of the Clones. I like The Force Unleashed 2, but I am fine with it being retconned for the Bad Batch. Plus, headcanons can work!
The force unleashed was never part of Disney Canon so it's not a retcon at all
I’d put money on Tony Gilroy having written a different planet than Fest, and a story group member came in and asked if they could change that name to Fest to nod to the previous canon.
😮😮😮 How tf didn't I notice such writing?
man, your t-shirts are always good.
I didn't know that, neat and glad that Tony is doing stuff like that. Its stuff like that, that makes me happy. I'll admit not every Star Wars project Disney has made has been grand but. If they can get it nailed down and keep stuff like these retcons to make both sides happy.
Then well. I will be willing to get Disney+ just to watch shows like Andor more often.
Which projects are you referring to when you're talking about film making ignoring the story group?
I mean, not the film making group, but Dave Filoni retconned Kanan's backstory in the Bad Batch when it was showing differently in the Kanan Comics
Book of Boba Fett showed us Luke having Yoda's lightsaber, but Yoda's was destroyed by Mas Amada in the Vader Comics to show that the age of the Jedi was over
As much as I like Dave Filoni, he has very little respect for the stories of other works such as the novels and comic books
@@arcadia7459 the second one isn't actually a retcon crimson Reign #3 mentions yoda had many sabers
The first episode of The bad batch Legitimately messed me up for a bit
@@ImJeSsYMaRtY huh, didn't know that!
I haven't read the comics in a good bit so I'll cop that one
Imagine what the sequels could have been if they had Gilroy instead of Johnson.
Probably just as endlessly mid as the series.
I noticed I had just read the book last month got it from the library great book and I figured it would come up what’s going to be cool it finding out about that ship with the yellow dudes on it what that was about
good video
I only know this because you noticed it. It shows his dedication to honoring the what has come before.
Wow! Star Wars is saved!
Yeah I noticed and and I thought it was genius.
Cool T-shirt. Where to get it?
The first three episodes of Andor were good. Tony Gilroy has done a good job in crafting a good story that will appeal to both hardcore and casual fans.
when is episode 4 out!
I was curious when this series happens like was this before rebels
Andor starts around the same time as Rebels starts
It's concurrent to Rebels. They both begin 5 years before A New Hope and end in the same year as the destruction of the first Death Star.
The first episode of andie shows that it takes place in 5BBY. First season of rebels shows the empires 15th anniversary which is in 5BBY
Where is it being shown?
I like this, I don't feel that reference books should be taken as hard canon, for example Revan has technically been canon for some time, but he didn't really matter until Shadow of the Sith, but it's nice to see them get referenced. Pun intended.😉
OK, I guess it's less of a pun and more simply ironic, but still, it's funny that people are referencing reference books.
so i assume the separatist badge and them being "republic" is going to obviously be a red-flag/red hairing, (idk if we got an answer to it yet cuz im not caught up) but like if they have a attention to mention a retconned note in a reference book, there's no way a glaringly obvious mistake would've got missed by literally everyone involved
"I was a little worried he was going to swoop in and do his own thing and not work with the story group… we have seen it happen before." Gee, who could he possibly be referring to?
Cool 😊👍🏻🇨🇷
That group - they were all under 30 - sooo Little Lamplight (fallout3) - or some other such sinister thing happened
Gilroy seems to be more careful about this kind of thing than people whose names rhyme with Fave Miloni.
What does it say on your t-shirt in this video?
It says Star Wars in Aurebesh
I'm prbly one of the biggest sw fans in the world, and I personally don't read the reference books, I just go with the lore on the TV shows or whatever. But this is probably the first example of a writer caring about past sw lore and that makes me really happy🥰
I think if a movie or show "retcons" something from a book or a comic, it's not retconning as much as correcting what turns out not to have been true to begin with. In Star Wars, film is canon over other media.
Not how they sold us new canon in 2014
That's how it used to be. Supposedly in current canon all media is equal
@@user-yq9im9dk9z Yeah, but it was never really gonna go that way, for better or worse.
I agree, Star Wars was never supposed to be based on books/comics it is about making a film/ space opera about a whole universe and lore with it’s different interpretations, like obiwan said, truths from certain points of view
JJ Abrams has left the chat
What about his Separatist background and his father dying in the protest at the Carida Academy?
4 eps?
You could say that what the reference book said was true... from a certain point of view.
I just accepted the fact that Tv and movies are the only stuff that is canon
I care far more about good stories than keeping minor details consistent. As long as book or comic is entertaining than I’m good.
@@cm275 of course, but Disney and LF promised a cohesive canon, argument that they have ignored because ultimately there’s a tier, and thus retcons.
Now, I wanna reconcile the "I was in this fight since I was 6 years old!" contradiction. How?
I still think he was not from a planet that had always been primitive, but was destroyed by the Empire leaving only a tribe of kids who were able to survive the destruction of their civilization. Which is why they were so primitive.
The Empire doesn't exist yet during the flashbacks, they're dealing with the Republic
That could be the case, the tribe did have some more modern clothes, and there was a bunch of old tech laying around.
@@Candlemancer I am not sure, the empire was about 20 years old when Luke destroyed the Death Star, and Cass was around 10? In the flashbacks? Though the Separatist were stopped at the time the Empire was renamed from the Republic and the people in the ship were wearing patches showing Separatist, you could be right. Since they didn't show the bby date hard to be sure.
So was it also a lie and or cover up when he said he's "been in this fight since I was six years old"?
Seems like the Republic has been a nuisance on his home planet for a while at least
Swems like it might be another "from a certain point of view" moment
@@Ivan2294 Or someone. My bet is on Skeevy Palps’ people, who could be said to be Republic, Separatist, or neither.
The retcon I’m more worried about is “I’ve been in this fight since I was six years old!”
That was in the movie and it seemed to be a bit of a defining characteristic of Cassian. I hope all the adults of the village were murdered by Republic forces when Cassian was six.
I don’t see it as a retcon much, more like he used that information to say how about in all records (including reference books) it says he’s from fest but the actual truth is it’s a cover, that’s how I see most of the comics or books being changed it’s a certain point of view on who’s telling it or what is commonly known the actually seeing what happened in shows and movie, since EU books before legends, it was used the same way as today nothing different lots of changes that are retcon labeled, some of them are picked to be true from the other, it’s always been that way
Maybe it's for the best that Star Wars has more detached showrunners. I'm tired of Easter eggs, references, and cameos all the time. I just want to see a good story.
Has “I’ve been in this fight since I was 6 years old” been retconned now it seems that Cassian spent the vast majority of his life not working with the rebels?
Been wondering about this too - I don’t think the fight he refers to is strictly with the Rebels but perhaps just against the Empire? Also, I feel like he’s older than 6 when we first see him…
I think he was 6 in the flashbacks but they needed a older actor to play cassian in a better way
I think we need to wait for the rest of the story to unfold to decide whether that’s a retcon. We have no idea what year the flashbacks are, how old he is, or what he and his village have already been fighting.
@@amaranthpaean Even if it is a retcon I'll meet the show on its own terms and enjoy it as much as I can. I do think it'd be a shame because that line in the movie is, I would say, one of the best ones as a culmination to a really interesting part of plot.
Also I'd like to be clear that I don't mean "he looks 10 in the flashbacks so it's a retcon because he originally said 6", I'm saying he implied he'd been, in some way, fighting the Empire/Republic maybe, since he was a child, so I had assumed that like Saw Gerrera, he'd been involved in some sort of anti-Empire group since he was young. But the show seems to indicate that he only got involved with battling the empire a few years before Rogue One.
i was looking forward to andor since 2018 when it was announced, cassian has been my favourite star wars character since rogue one and so i have read basically every reference book that has any information about him, this detail made me SO happy, and you really described how i felt about it - just that you so much for this video!! and i couldn't agree with you more
Tony works the same way the old eu/legends writers did. This tells me this show is in good hands
I dunno about it. I mostly remember legends authors constantly retconning and ignoring each other, which combined with George himself not giving much of a crap about legends meant the whole thing tended to fall into a mess unless you were very careful about what you read and kept in mind it might not be canon tomorrow. Some writers back then would've done something like this this - judicially incorporating something from a guidebook in a positive way while working through their own story - but they were rare, just like they are now.
It's the same all over. Some writers are good at adaptations and playing well with other writers having their own toys in the box, and some aren't - and the first group are the ones who really shine.
But Star Wars are for kids...HA!
Mark Hamill says it best, Star Wars is for kids of all ages
@@tylerscott4396 KUDOS!!!
Didn't Cassia say he'd been on the fight since he was six years old? He looks more like 13 in andor so Im wondering what fight he means then
And there in lies the problem. A Non Star Wars fan in charge of a Star Wars story. If you have a car you want fixed you don’t take it to a plumber. And or has so many problems it sad, not even angering just sad
I keep seeing people say 4 episodes. Did he see an extra episode somewhere?
Speaking of retcon, I think there are fans who would love nothing more than seeing a sequel movie trilogy to get some retcons to make canon lore make sense between Mandoverse & sequels
They 100% would
Too bad never happening. The lore connecting mando and sequels makes sense those fans are too blind
This might be asking more than can logically be done, but could you make a video going through and listing the biggest retcons in Disney’s canon? I don’t want to say ALL of the retcons because I don’t know how often things like reference books get glossed over, but personally the only MAJOR retcon I can think of in canon is Caleb Dume’s experience of Order 66 in the bad batch. And the only reason I call that “major” is because it was retconning a comic series, which, while still only being read by a minority of Star Wars fans, it’s probably a more significant minority than people who read the reference books. Things like that, which are retconning previously told stories. As opposed to “here’s your wookieepedia summary.” (Cuz like I love the reference books but that’s pretty much what they are, an encyclopedia)
Compared with The Book Of Bobba Fett, I thought Andor did a great job working the flashback scenes into the story. My favorite is when the ship leaves the planet at the end of episode 3.