The history of real-world warfare and spying is littered with countless instances of near-misses and close calls, where only sheer luck and happenstance saved entire operations from total calamity at the worst possible moment. No matter how skilled or well-prepared they may be, nobody tends to get the last laugh on luck. Even “Star Wars” characters have to learn this hard lesson on occasion, especially on a show like “Andor” that’s utterly bereft of narrative “cheat codes” like lightsabers or the Force.
Nobody knows this better than Luthen, the lifelong servant of the rebel cause who ends up in the most amount of mortal danger he’s experienced since his extraction of Cassian way back in the earliest episodes on Ferrix. Though some may have wished for a more dramatic outcome, it’s not some backstabbing traitor or an unnecessary risk that nearly dooms the mastermind of the early Rebellion … it’s, essentially, a traffic stop.
Returning from his meeting with Saw, Luthen runs afoul of a routine inspection by an Imperial cruiser. Of all potential targets to bully, the Empire decides to flex their muscle by unwittingly picking on the central figure (codenamed by Denise Gough’s Dedra Meero as “Axis”) of the Imperial Security Bureau’s hunt for Cassian and other rebel activity. Lifelong spies, both fictional and otherwise, have seen their life’s work come crumbling down through similarly as mundane circumstances, but there would’ve been something keenly tragic about seeing Luthen taken down in such undignified fashion — particularly after his show-stopping monologue last week.
Instead, “Andor” allows us at least one moment of victory when this inglorious dilemma instead becomes a fist-pumping catharsis, letting Luthen get away in badass style. By staying fiercely committed to the little details, both failures and triumphs loom larger in “Andor.”