Andor Season 1 was so good mostly because it took its time. It spent 12 episodes tracing a year in the life of its reluctant hero, Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), as he became embedded in the Rebel Alliance. Cassian’s story was originally set to run for four more seasons, each following one year leading up to his fatal sacrifice in Rogue One. But showrunner Tony Gilroy couldn’t exactly commit to that huge a series, leaving him to cram the rest of Cassian’s tale into 12 more episodes.
Gilroy recently spoke to Rolling Stone about the process of building the season out within those new parameters. The writer recalls the “breakthrough” of spreading four years of Cassian’s story across 12 episodes, with a one-year time jump occurring every three episodes. “The next revelation was, ‘Oh, my God, it would be so cool and elegant and smart if when we came back, we only came back for two or three days,” Gilroy explained. “If we came back in these really concentrated periods of time... Could we really elegantly let that negative space work in our favor?”
