Diego Luna and Genevieve O'Reilly Tease a Fledgling Rebellion in Andor

Rebellions aren't built in a day. Andor, Disney+'s latest Star Wars series, plans to take an intimate look at what inspires ordinary people to rise up against fascist regimes. The Rogue One prequel takes place five years before the events of the film, which explained how Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher) came into possession of the Death Star plans in Episode IV, the original Star Wars movie. While Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) transformed from a dubious smuggler into a martyr over the course of the film, fans will meet him at an even darker point of his life when the Disney+ series begins. 

"He's in a very selfish mode when we meet him. He's very cynical about life, just surviving, not hoping or aiming anywhere further than just making the day," Diego Luna told TV Guide ahead of the Andor premiere. Cassian at the beginning of Andor is a smuggler working on the outer rim, trying to find answers about his past. When his secret investigations put him on the wrong Empire radar, the tenuous life he has built for himself begins to fall apart and he's forced to use his skills for the greater good instead of just a quick paycheck. "He has something there, hidden in a difficult, dark, and strange personality...His actions don't seem like the actions of just anyone. There is something about what he does that people have been trying for a long time [but] Cassian doesn't realize that. He doesn't know the strength. He doesn't know what he's capable of. He needs someone else to see it from the outside."

That validation will come in the premiere, but it will still take a minute for Cassian to understand, let alone buy into, the movement that is only just beginning to pick up real speed. Before he can get there, the audience needs to understand the world that Cassian has grown up in under Empire rule. 

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"This is about the context, understanding what was life like, what is the reality of the people. What are they going through and why is there a need for an articulated reaction?" Luna continued. "[Andor] is about what triggers that. We are going to see the intimate, everyday life of people in a moment that is very obscure, where people are being marginalized, where control is all over. Freedom is gone basically. There's room for justice…It is about picturing that. It is about specific to the life of those characters that I don't think we've experienced enough in the Star Wars universe." 

Cassian will not be alone in standing up to the Empire by the end of the season, but when the series starts, the heroes of the Rebellion we know and love from later Star Wars movies have not gotten organized yet. Even Mon Mothma (Genevieve O'Reilly) is struggling to find ways to thwart Emperor Palpatine when we find her in the series. 

"What we've seen previously with her is that she's always been surrounded by a band of rebels. When we meet her in Andor, she's quite alone," O'Reilly teased about her character's entrance into the show. "She has a lonely voice and her voice is lonely in opposition. We see this in life. Sometimes you don't know that other people are thinking the same as you until you reach out, until you risk."  

The first part of Andor will reveal not only what motivates Cassian to join the fight, but also show how the whispers of an uprising turn into the movement showcased in the latter six episodes of the Skywalker tale. "The Rebellion is quite disparate when we see them in Andor," O'Reilly elaborated. "In fact, maybe it's only an idea. Maybe it's only a whisper of a rebellion but it's disconnected and it's without a central force. We've got Cassian Andor in the lead so I think that we know he will drive this. I think audiences are going to love that. When we start off, it's quite disconnected." 

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While we know how Cassian's story will ultimately end, Andor will reveal how a smuggler united the most important movement in the galaxy and inevitably makes the ultimate sacrifice to save it. 

Andor premieres Wednesday, Sept. 21 on Disney+ with the first three episodes. New episodes will be released weekly after that.