Speaker 1: Alrighty, guys, we are.
Speaker 1: You know, here in the undergrounds we are a rebel sect called the Gentle Lads and you know we are hiding from the Empire.
Speaker 1: Welcome to episode 124 of Project Geekology.
Speaker 1: And this week we are covering the first six episodes of Andor, season two.
Speaker 1: And I know, I said you know Rebel Sect of Gentle Lads.
Speaker 1: You know it's a little inside joke that we have off of the podcast.
Speaker 1: You know now it's on the podcast, so you guys have joined us.
Speaker 1: But, yes, I am one third of your host, anthony, and joining me, as always, is Dakota.
Speaker 2: And yeah, gentle Lads is the name of our text group and I will be sure to change that as soon as possible because we have to keep you guys guessing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm really excited to be talking about Andor, season two, the first six episodes, a lot of rebel sex activity and yeah, yeah, my name is Dakota and I'm joined as always with, and, yeah, my name's.
Speaker 3: Dakota and I'm joined as always with Rich.
Speaker 3: Glad to be with you guys.
Speaker 3: You know, honestly, my redonium's running a little low and I just needed a little bit more of a fix of Andor.
Speaker 3: So happy to be talking about episodes one through six with you guys.
Speaker 2: Now I'm kind of upset that I didn't start the podcast in my Saw Gerrera voice.
Speaker 3: That's pretty good.
Speaker 1: You can do that next week.
Speaker 2: Rhydonium, it's like my sister.
Speaker 3: That was wild.
Speaker 3: I was very confused, like the first time around.
Speaker 3: I was like wait, what's going on?
Speaker 3: Man Guys, this guy is.
Speaker 3: We find a lot more about Saw Gerrera.
Speaker 1: We do.
Speaker 1: But before we get into that, it's been two weeks.
Speaker 1: We had a little bit of a week off, but now we are back to it, strong, with Andor, season 2.
Speaker 1: Like I said, it's going to be the first six episodes this week and then we'll do the remaining episodes next week.
Speaker 1: Too bad, we don't wait on Rogue One, because we could have let up to Rogue One, but we already did a Rogue One episode.
Speaker 1: So after you listen to this season, you can go back to the Rogue One episode and go listen to that.
Speaker 1: But yes, like I said, it's been two weeks.
Speaker 1: I'm going to go to Rich.
Speaker 1: Rich, what have you been up to?
Speaker 1: And we do know that it's been a lot of baseball, but what else have you been doing outside of baseball?
Speaker 3: I.
Speaker 3: So I I shockingly do have outside of baseball news, although there was much baseball I.
Speaker 3: I do want to highlight that.
Speaker 3: But I got a for father's day.
Speaker 3: My son and my wife got me this.
Speaker 3: I should.
Speaker 3: It's this it looks like an action figure but it's actually like a kind of piece of plexiglass, almost that has the image inside of it.
Speaker 3: So it just has me and it says gamer dad.
Speaker 3: This is like a normal dad, but much cooler.
Speaker 3: And then the controller next to me has my son's name under it.
Speaker 3: So I got that and my son's idea was to grab me a N64 controller that connects to the Switch.
Speaker 3: And I promptly schooled him in Mario 64.
Speaker 3: I'm not going to lie, the pure jubilation.
Speaker 3: So he immediately was like this is much faster than Mario Kart Deluxe.
Speaker 3: He felt that even the 50ccs was faster for some reason.
Speaker 3: And man, I remember those.
Speaker 3: I wasn't sure if I would remember the shortcuts and where I needed to drift and where I had to stop drifting, but it all came back.
Speaker 3: You, you fell back into step.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was impressive holding that controller.
Speaker 3: It was different, like I, it felt different than playing mario kart deluxe.
Speaker 3: I, I just I really enjoyed it.
Speaker 3: And then I did something a little crazy.
Speaker 3: We've gotten my son a number of things for graduation.
Speaker 3: He's graduating fifth grade this year, even though it's just kind of a legal state requirement that everyone has to go through, because it's not much of an accomplishment.
Speaker 2: It's not like you have a choice, but anyway we got to celebrate him yeah, you can't get held back in new york state anymore at that early of an age.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so, but he's been talking about the switch to a lot and I finally I was gonna ask about that.
Speaker 2: I found a tracker.
Speaker 3: I found a tracker.
Speaker 3: I found I started following a twitter account and there was, uh, the.
Speaker 3: There was news that they were dropping it on june 11th, so at like 11 o'clock luckily, my classes are pretty much winding down.
Speaker 3: The rumor was from 9 to 12, so I just basically was just spamming the reload button and, as luck would have it, I got myself a pickup model, so it should be arriving on friday.
Speaker 3: By the time you guys hear this, I'll hopefully already have it and unveil the news to charlie.
Speaker 3: So I'm very happy to find out that the controller is compatible with the new one, cause I was like, oh no, what if it's not compatible?
Speaker 1: but it all is.
Speaker 3: And I'm very excited.
Speaker 3: I'm going to be driving to Yonk to go grab this and luckily it's not a GameStop in Texas, because I don't know if you guys heard of the news, but it was something like $1.6 million or more than that.
Speaker 3: Switch 2s were stolen.
Speaker 3: A shipment was hijacked on its way to GameStop Texas, so something like 280,000 units or something were stolen.
Speaker 3: And just imagine if you had a pre-order and you were about to go pick that thing up.
Speaker 3: That's crazy.
Speaker 2: That's wild actually.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is actually I did.
Speaker 1: That's crazy, that's wild actually.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that is actually.
Speaker 2: I did not know that.
Speaker 2: That is awesome, though it's amazing that we hold these things like N64 controllers as pinnacles of creation, but it's one of the least ergonomical controllers.
Speaker 3: How do you hold it?
Speaker 3: It was terrible.
Speaker 3: He's like how do you hold this for racing?
Speaker 2: And I'm like oh, you got in the middle here, buddy, it makes sense, but what an era of gaming like.
Speaker 3: It was such a such a fun time.
Speaker 3: I cannot wait till I play him with what is it called slappers only in golden eye this good old slap fest golden eye session.
Speaker 3: And then you pick odd job because he's slightly shorter than the other guys and you have an unfair advantage because their chops go over your head.
Speaker 3: I can't wait to spam him that way like I'm just.
Speaker 3: I'm so excited to use my knowledge to once again assert my gaming dominance in the household yeah, but you know can.
Speaker 1: Can you beat him in diddy kong racing?
Speaker 3: oh, I mean, that was one of my favorites, I'm not gonna lie, I really loved using the helicopters in that game, loved the diddy kong racing man.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that like one of my favorites, I'm not gonna lie, I really loved using the helicopters in that game.
Speaker 1: Loved the diddy kong racing man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that like one of my favorite things about it was mario kart was fun, but diddy kong racing had like all these different types of vehicles they had like airplanes, these like hovercraft, you know regular vehicles, like it would change up and so like that was one of my favorite things.
Speaker 1: And then you had a bunch of like characters across rare that you could play.
Speaker 1: That was fun, but but yeah, um a good tracker?
Speaker 1: I don't know if I know that you said that you had been following a tracker but, there is a good one that I had used in the past called now in stock, and I had actually used that one to snag a ps5 way back when.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that one.
Speaker 3: I think I used that one because I had it.
Speaker 3: I had that one going on the computer the entire time.
Speaker 3: I was searching for a ps5 on the desktop and like that was during like pandemic time, so I was teaching from home and everything.
Speaker 3: And one late night my wife is sitting in front of the computer and I hear that beep.
Speaker 3: Look, it could have been interpreted as other things, but I launched her from that chair.
Speaker 3: Essentially I jumped like the Black Panther and just jumped to get that.
Speaker 3: I'll never forget the feeling.
Speaker 3: I mean, those were days where I was waking up at I had to teach at nine or like 830 and I would show up at Walmart in yonkers or something, because I heard rumors that there were three available, and I would walk into the store.
Speaker 3: They would just be like it's not available.
Speaker 3: I'm like thank you, have a good day.
Speaker 3: Turn around and then get back, jump in front of the computer, be like hi guys, sorry, I'm a couple minutes late, it's got back from walmart.
Speaker 3: They're like did you secured a bag?
Speaker 1: I'm like I did not, guys, I did not so you know, the the funny thing is is that, as much of a gamer as I am, I just I.
Speaker 1: I don't care to do all that.
Speaker 1: I'm like no, I'm sorry, but no, you're just gonna wait till it's.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna wait until I can get one.
Speaker 1: That's just my thing and dakota knows like I am the gamer of this podcast or like for the longest time.
Speaker 1: Like you know, I I talk about all the time that's my thing.
Speaker 1: You like where you guys are like watching stuff, I'm feeling that time gaming.
Speaker 1: But when it came to the ps5, I wasn't gonna go try to go to some back alley behind walmart and do a handshake deal to get a ps5.
Speaker 1: I'm not doing all that.
Speaker 1: I saw that they had them available to buy at gamStop.
Speaker 1: One time I happened to go online.
Speaker 1: I ordered it and picked it up and called it a day other than that.
Speaker 1: I'm not doing all that.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I just don't get into the FOMO like that.
Speaker 1: When I get the PS5, I get the PS5, you know well, to be fair, I can't remember what game it was.
Speaker 3: There had to be a wrestling game or something.
Speaker 3: There's always a reason.
Speaker 3: Or maybe it was FIFA.
Speaker 3: There was a reason why I needed to get the ps5, not because I wanted the ps5, but because I think that fifa wasn't releasing one game.
Speaker 3: And maybe it wasn't fifa.
Speaker 3: There was a game that was not going to be releasing on ps4 anymore.
Speaker 3: Maybe it was marvel and with the switch.
Speaker 3: Honestly, the only reason I did this is because of charlie.
Speaker 3: So, yeah, no, I get that this one.
Speaker 3: I actually was like telling him like, dude, the launch titles are weak.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, mario kart's gonna be fun, but like, then it's over, that's it.
Speaker 3: Like, you know, you don't need to rush to get this blah blah, but he's been watching all those videos on.
Speaker 3: He's got, you know, watches youtube as much as the rest of us.
Speaker 3: So he's like, oh and, and the way the controllers go?
Speaker 3: Like he's.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, dude, you gotta stop watching reviews of the console, you're gonna go crazy are you?
Speaker 1: did you get the mario kart world bundle one?
Speaker 1: Or yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, okay, that, honestly, that's the smart play right there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because mario kart world is 80 on its own, but when you get the bundle, you're getting it for 30 cheaper oh, I'm glad that happened, yeah, yeah so.
Speaker 1: So the system itself is 450, the bundle is 500.
Speaker 1: So mind you, you buy the 450, say you get the 450 bundle, and then you buy the game.
Speaker 3: You know you're spending an extra 30 and, gentle lads, I left this part out.
Speaker 3: You know what happens with the Switch 1, right?
Speaker 3: This guy right here just got a new Switch 1 to play, so it's the very first hand-me-up in my family that's going to happen.
Speaker 3: Where he's going to hand me up the Switch, oh, I like that.
Speaker 2: He doesn't know this yet, but yeah, it's mine so I just find it so funny that we've gotten to a point in, like tech cycles that you know we have to make back alley deals, like they're like drugs, you know, like my precious right.
Speaker 3: So yeah, it just makes you wonder it makes me feel like I was part of the rebellion, honestly like I feel like I could be hanging out with andor and bix and cintra not, not val.
Speaker 3: I don't, she doesn't.
Speaker 3: I don't like her much I don't.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's a little harsh.
Speaker 3: I feel bad for her on occasion, but she's a little harsh yeah, what were you up to the last couple weeks dakota, last couple weeks, dakota.
Speaker 2: Last couple weeks yeah, because it's been two weeks since we recorded last but you know, not a whole lot.
Speaker 2: I in my personal life my, you know, secular work I am training.
Speaker 2: Right now I'm doing like a bunch of test prep for my journeyman's license, so I'm excited about that.
Speaker 2: That should be coming two Saturdays from now that I take that test, and so just a lot of like studying learning diagrams, understanding Ohm's law, stuff like that, and, yeah, a lot of like last minute.
Speaker 2: Not a lot, you know for riches and a lot, but for me it is a lot of baseball games.
Speaker 2: I've just been supporting my local New York teams.
Speaker 2: One team won and the other team lost, but I enjoyed myself.
Speaker 2: Baseball is fun.
Speaker 2: I went to two games.
Speaker 2: It wasn't a Mets versus Yankees game, it was Yankees versus Red Sox.
Speaker 2: They won.
Speaker 2: And I went to a Mets game and they lost, but the food was better.
Speaker 2: The food was better than Yankee Stadium.
Speaker 2: That's what matters in the end.
Speaker 1: I know you made Rich proud by going to see the Mets.
Speaker 2: I will also make Rich proud by announcing that I had two hot dogs at the Yankee Stadium and I had two hot dogs at Mets Stadium.
Speaker 2: The two dogs at Yankee Stadium were the worst glizzies of my life.
Speaker 2: Like they were just it was like pre-made, like wrapped hot dogs and the buns were like squished, like they were like rolled into little burritos.
Speaker 2: I was and I was like what is?
Speaker 2: This is the worst.
Speaker 2: The condiment station sucked, so that was rough, but I I had a pretty good hot dog, two hot dogs actually at that stadium.
Speaker 2: So, and listen, you know if you ever field, if you ever.
Speaker 3: If you ever feel in randy and you want to go out on a tuesday?
Speaker 3: All right, on tuesdays they got five dollar dogs and if you hang with me I have a 15 discount.
Speaker 3: All right, so that's even.
Speaker 3: You're getting better guzzies at a discount price wow, it's like 425 a dog.
Speaker 3: That's crazy, I am honestly wowed that you were able to do that math in.
Speaker 3: Never in a million years would I have a time.
Speaker 3: I just get really happy.
Speaker 3: Whenever I use the discount, I'm like, oh, look at that.
Speaker 2: I never have a conception of what I actually don't know if that math is correct.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna look that up really quick.
Speaker 2: Five times 0.15.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was right.
Speaker 2: Wow, oh, 4.25 a dog Plus tax baby Can't beat that, anthony.
Speaker 3: you got to come up here, man, just for the glizzies on Tuesdays, does it?
Speaker 3: It's actually really good, just fly up from my, I'll pick you up from LaGuardia.
Speaker 3: It's right outside the stadium.
Speaker 3: All right him, all right, and then we'll go grab some dogs, and then you know and then maybe watch some people throw a ball around.
Speaker 2: Anyway, anthony, what have you been up to this past couple weeks?
Speaker 1: tell me, tell me I'm gonna be honest with you, though.
Speaker 1: Like hot dogs are, like not even my favorite.
Speaker 1: Like if they're.
Speaker 1: If I'm at a party and there's a choice between hamburgers and hot dogs, I'm going burger all the time.
Speaker 1: That's fair.
Speaker 1: I'm a burger guy.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you a question, anthony.
Speaker 3: He's not in new york you're walking in new york you're walking through washington dc, you're walking through apalachia, you're walking through vegas all that have been hit by nuclear bombs.
Speaker 3: When you're walking around those locales, you know what you never see.
Speaker 3: You never see a hamburger.
Speaker 3: But you know how many hot dogs I've seen in fallout 76.
Speaker 3: My friend, the structural integrity is fine.
Speaker 3: Here's the thing about hamburgers.
Speaker 3: That person at that party do you know if they know how to cook a burger the right way?
Speaker 3: What if you get slightly ill from the temperature of the meat?
Speaker 2: hot dogs, or or the opposite, the opposite.
Speaker 2: You can be like having, you know, a cookout with my father-in-law and you get served some hockey pucks.
Speaker 3: There you go but hot dogs you can't really.
Speaker 3: They're already cooked, man, they're already.
Speaker 3: You don't even need to really warm them up, man, you can just eat them.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, man, but it just I mean and and honestly, like if, if you're gonna go fallout, dude, there's still brahmin, I mean you can ground that beef, but that's true, all right.
Speaker 1: So what I've been up to these past couple of weeks is that.
Speaker 1: So I had a con that was a sandwich between this hot dog.
Speaker 1: No sandwich between.
Speaker 1: Like these two weeks, like I got to go to Otaku Fest.
Speaker 2: Nice, tell us.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I had Otaku Fest.
Speaker 1: It's con time.
Speaker 1: Cons are kicking in the tickets for this convention.
Speaker 1: I actually had won them back in February by cosplaying Obi-Wan Kenobi.
Speaker 3: Oh, that's right, I've seen that picture.
Speaker 2: Clever, clever.
Speaker 1: Best show on TV?
Speaker 2: Yeah, man always I mean, you know how it is man.
Speaker 1: I always have a good time going to conventions and stuff man yeah, you're definitely a con man I am a con man you should come up to nycc man.
Speaker 3: I just procured tickets.
Speaker 3: The fam and I are definitely going on friday up here oh, and they started selling tickets yeah, yeah, I secured the pro pass or educators pass, and then they got the friday passes well, nice I mean I have been wanting to go to new york comic-con.
Speaker 1: It's been a while but yeah, I went up there and I I went with dakota and gen one year anthony, listen, we're thinking about going as thunderbolts.
Speaker 3: Okay, I was gonna be bucky.
Speaker 3: All right, my wife is going to be elena, my son is going to be.
Speaker 3: Who do you want to be?
Speaker 3: I'm blanking out right now, but we need a red guardian.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, he wants to be century.
Speaker 3: You could be red guardian man.
Speaker 3: I've seen you bald, like, I think a little good, and I can be the leader.
Speaker 1: Let's go all you have to do is just get stung by a dozen of bees.
Speaker 1: Jen could be the that betsy that look like him who's betsy?
Speaker 3: she's got some relation to the hulk.
Speaker 3: Betsy ross somehow is related to hulk.
Speaker 3: Maybe, uh, jen could be bety Ross.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: Somehow, some way.
Speaker 3: Something about there's some relationship to Hulk.
Speaker 3: I don't know what it is.
Speaker 3: Is that his estranged daughter?
Speaker 2: No, that's the nurse that stuck him with Gamma.
Speaker 2: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, she sucks.
Speaker 3: Well, maybe we should.
Speaker 3: Sorry, but I think we've deviated.
Speaker 2: Alright, go ahead, tell us about otaku con or otaku fest otaku fest man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, dude, just straight.
Speaker 2: Otaku tastic man, you know so, for those of you who don't know, this is a anime themed convention, correct?
Speaker 1: yeah, I mean, you know you can there.
Speaker 1: There's always going to be stuff that's not anime related there, but it's definitely a little bit more geared towards that when you think of otaku.
Speaker 1: You know obviously that's.
Speaker 1: You know they're.
Speaker 1: They're using that japanese word that kind of describes somebody who's like obsessive over, you know, nerdy stuff.
Speaker 1: And yeah, man, it was good it.
Speaker 1: They had moved it back to the original convention center that it was at.
Speaker 1: I guess it had outgrown it and so they tried to like move it to another one, but that one was way too big for it and I think that it costed a lot more money.
Speaker 1: So now they moved it back to its original space.
Speaker 1: The problem with the last time when it was in that space, I think they oversold.
Speaker 1: It's just crazy that these places like they oversell and their tickets and stuff, you know yeah, oh question, anthony.
Speaker 3: You said that you were seeing how to train your dentist over the weekend how to train your dentist these guys, these guys all right, wait, wait, rich explain it so I'm, you know we have a group chat going on and anthony goes hey guys, I think I'm gonna go see ht how to train.
Speaker 3: Yeah, httyd, and I'm I'm racking my brain over here.
Speaker 3: Guys, I have no idea.
Speaker 3: I'm like, and after just like an hour, I think, of pulling my hair, I was just like can someone please tell me what hd?
Speaker 3: So now they go off with uh, how to train your dentist?
Speaker 2: it's just how to train your dog.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 3: I got the message loud and clear after that, but I felt a you know.
Speaker 3: I guess I just completely forgot because I think in my worldview it doesn't feel like that long ago that I saw how to Train your Dragon.
Speaker 1: You know, like my son we watched it Same for me, so like.
Speaker 3: I've seen it within the last five or six years, so I didn't know that there was a need for another one.
Speaker 2: It's a it's, so it's a live action version of the animated film and it's very, very closely like, linked to the animated film.
Speaker 2: Apparently.
Speaker 2: That did you.
Speaker 2: Did you watch it, anthony?
Speaker 2: I haven't so.
Speaker 1: So that was the plan with my group of friends, but we ended up not being able to go and see it.
Speaker 1: We just got caught up in in our own stuff.
Speaker 1: But it was the plan, but by the time that time kind of rolled around, we're too tired from you know just just living.
Speaker 1: Yeah, just tired of living just living yeah but it is, it is a plan.
Speaker 1: I do want to see it.
Speaker 1: I mean, maybe I might I could go and see it tomorrow, because I don't work tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Tomorrow is juneteenth and since it's a federal holiday, you know, the bank follows the federal holiday and so we all have it off awesome, cool awesome, you got that you have tomorrow off as well, rich right yeah, actually I got a sweet four-day weekend because my son's graduation on friday.
Speaker 1: So well, you should be finishing school up soon, right?
Speaker 1: Next Friday is the last day.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there you go, the kids down in South Florida.
Speaker 1: They've been done with school for a week or so now.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but they go back a little earlier, I think.
Speaker 3: I think you guys, they go back, yeah, they start earlier, yeah, they do.
Speaker 1: But yeah, that's what I've been up to, but we're a bit deep into the recording.
Speaker 1: Shall we talk about and or season two?
Speaker 3: episodes one through six just call it an episode.
Speaker 3: I think this is good.
Speaker 3: This was fun.
Speaker 3: Uh, we'll see you guys next week.
Speaker 3: Thanks for uh being thanks for listening.
Speaker 3: Leave.
Speaker 2: Leave a review for four stars, we'll make an and or season two, one through six mini.
Speaker 2: So that is not sorry guys.
Speaker 1: Let's start talking about that, right, donium boys no, you have to say it the right way, dakota let's start talking about the right donium boys.
Speaker 2: No, that was a bad.
Speaker 2: That was a bad one.
Speaker 2: I I'm really good at like redoing his lines, but I can't just create new lines for him, like if that makes sense.
Speaker 2: But yeah, so Andor is back and potentially better than ever.
Speaker 2: A lot of people are saying that this is the best season of the two seasons.
Speaker 2: You know, it's not a super, it is a high bar, but it's not like an incredibly high bar because there's only one other season.
Speaker 2: What do you guys think of the start to this season?
Speaker 2: Some people are like in the camp where first six episodes are boring.
Speaker 2: Some people are like, you know, getting on their knees and just like bowing down, like it's, it's the best thing since sliced bread.
Speaker 2: What do you guys think?
Speaker 1: I think it was pretty good.
Speaker 1: I would say, like the the first.
Speaker 1: To me it starts off a little bit stronger than maybe the first season of andor, and the first season of andor was really good anyway.
Speaker 1: But you have to get those characters established.
Speaker 1: But now that you have those characters that are established, it was able to go.
Speaker 1: You know a little bit, you know start a little bit.
Speaker 1: You know start a little bit stronger.
Speaker 1: You know we don't have to figure out who Luthan is, we don't have to figure out who Bix is, because they were explained in that first season.
Speaker 1: I would say the first season crawled so that this season could run not walk but run and it was solid.
Speaker 1: I mean, I liked the first six episodes and there's a lot of parallels to things that happened in real life that I definitely picked up on in these episodes.
Speaker 3: Rich.
Speaker 3: What are your thoughts?
Speaker 3: So I think I would have been in the first camp after my first watch through, because I think that I appreciated some of the relationships more.
Speaker 3: I mean, I love the series.
Speaker 3: I just think that it would the.
Speaker 3: It's difficult for me to just say like this first six are slow, because I think once you watch the whole thing on second rewatch and of course I did like a third rewatch, but it's all the interactions are so what's the word pregnant, that there's so much to them that you don't even know until you finish the series.
Speaker 3: And then you go back and now these moments, the way they're playing off each other, the moments between the Imperial, the ISB and kind of that dance that's going on there, even the dance between Deirdre and Cyril's mother, between Deirdre and Cyril's mother, I mean everything like once you know more just becomes.
Speaker 3: They did such a great job of setting the groundwork for the series to have a really impactful end and I mean that cutaway scene from the wedding, you know, is just.
Speaker 3: It's amazing how they made that just be something.
Speaker 3: That was so.
Speaker 3: Even though I already watched it, I was on the edge of my seat again.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you're talking about the cutaway to the wedding, specifically in episode three.
Speaker 2: I'm assuming it's the scene where everyone's dancing.
Speaker 2: Yes, correct, yeah.
Speaker 2: So that's such a fantastic moment for me and that was like a big like wow.
Speaker 2: I can't believe they pulled that off.
Speaker 2: So there's a couple things happening all at once.
Speaker 2: You know it's the climax of several plots within this 4 BBY setting.
Speaker 2: So it's like a year, a little over a year, since the first season took place.
Speaker 2: And you know, andor, bix, brassoso and wilmon are on the on the run.
Speaker 2: They're living on this agricultural world being mechanics and they're basically just hiding away from the empire while also doing luthens bidding.
Speaker 2: Andor is often like a side side job for a bit of this first three episode arc and it all comes to a head.
Speaker 2: You know where the, the empire catches up to them.
Speaker 2: They rasso ends up dying and they leave that planet.
Speaker 2: All the while, there's a whole bunch of stuff happening with mon mothma at the exact same time, or we assume it's the exact same time.
Speaker 2: It could.
Speaker 2: It could be different time periods, but whatever and what?
Speaker 2: What's fantastic about the way that they did that was they used the music of the dance.
Speaker 2: So there's a bunch of stuff happening with Mon Mothma.
Speaker 2: She doesn't want her daughter to get married to this thug's son, basically.
Speaker 2: But she's young, she's dumb and she thinks that she's in love and she know she's gonna go full steam ahead with this marriage and on top of that, the integrity of, or the secret of, their rebellion and her you know, funds that go towards it are about to potentially be dried out in the open, as her friends is now ready to.
Speaker 2: He's not getting that end of the deal anymore and he's starting to wonder when he's going to get his cut and it's starting to get agitated.
Speaker 2: You could see he's like sweating for most of this, like wedding arc and luthen basically tells mon that like we got to kill this guy.
Speaker 2: You know, like no amount of money is going to fix this problem.
Speaker 2: This is going to keep coming back to bite us and to drown out her sorrow in.
Speaker 2: You know, like this childhood friend who has to be killed to pacify this issue, she literally just drinks and starts dancing and it's such a fantastic scene because you can see there's no joy on her face.
Speaker 2: But, like when you watch the trailers for this, you're like, wow, mom's really like getting down at this party.
Speaker 2: But when you see the context of what's happening, it's so fantastic.
Speaker 2: And that music that they play, like with the, with the droid the droid, that's like DJing the party is also used diegetically.
Speaker 2: So diegetic music is like in world music that you hear but also works as the score for the episode.
Speaker 2: They use that diegetically at the end with cassian as well.
Speaker 2: So like the intense upbeat music while you know they're on the run, his friend's just been killed, been murdered, and the look on his face, you know, mixed with mon dancing super chaotically and drinking heavily.
Speaker 2: It's's just such a fantastic buildup to that last episode.
Speaker 1: Right, it's almost like the emotion is kind of matched there.
Speaker 1: You know, I mean sure, you know you have Cassian that is mourning the loss of his friends, but then you also have Mon Mothma that's kind of mourning the loss of, you know, her daughter in daughter.
Speaker 1: In a sense, you know that she's being married to somebody that you know she didn't want her to get married to.
Speaker 1: But, dude, you know, that moment was so strong and it left me like like wow, this is intense, like it's crazy.
Speaker 1: I'm actually a little side note and I I don't know and I hadn't really realized this in the first season, but then when I looked at the cast, so I don't know if you realize, but the actress that portrays Mon Mothma actually does the voice for Moira in Overwatch.
Speaker 2: I did find that out online recently.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I thought that was pretty.
Speaker 1: I was crazy and then, like, when I thought about it, I was like I see the similarities in a way, you know, like the look, but you know, I thought that that was like a little neat aside thing.
Speaker 2: But man, it's such a it's actually, like you know, leaning into that a little bit, it's such a weird contrast because this is such a fantastic visual actor.
Speaker 2: You know, like her presence on screen is crazy and that usually doesn't always translate to voice actors, so it's cool that she has that ability to do both.
Speaker 2: You know, like there there are actors who do both.
Speaker 1: Mark hamill is a actor who's very famously both on screen and, you know, just vocal, but it's cool that there's others in star wars that do that too yeah, yeah, in the first three episodes you get something that you just don't see in star wars and you have like an imperial officer, that is, you know, he proceeds to try to assault bix, you know, yes and you don't see that in star wars ever, really, you know we haven't, yeah, and there's been, there's been, like certainly they've kind of teased the idea of it.
Speaker 1: You know it's been skirted but it hasn't been shown in this capacity and I thought it was crazy because you know I could very much so see the Imperials you know pretty much abusing their power for stuff like that and it's insane, like I was, like man.
Speaker 1: You know this show is powerful in more ways than one.
Speaker 1: It shows a part of Star Wars that some people you get caught up in the mysticism of the larger part with the Jedi and stuff, but you don't get the common man and this is what you get.
Speaker 2: You don't get the nitty gritty as often as and for me when it comes to Star Wars it doesn't get any more nitty gritty than Andor and Rogue One.
Speaker 1: It really this season, you know, at least in this first part, it really just blew my mind.
Speaker 1: Something else that I really got that kind of blew my mind was Gorman, and Gorman drew like such a heavy parallel to World War II Europe, like I mean you could place Gorman, it could be a European country and like think of the way that they dress and like think about the way that it was intense for them.
Speaker 1: You know that they're trying to build up this like rebellion.
Speaker 1: You know I can imagine this being europe before the war was in full swing, you know, before the invasion.
Speaker 1: This is what europe in that time period was in the 30s.
Speaker 1: You know, and yeah, man it.
Speaker 1: It really it blew my mind how they were able to do that, because with Star Wars a lot of times we get the Western side or we get the samurai side, but we never get that side.
Speaker 1: I mean, you get parts of it but you don't get it as strong as you do in this show, like the World War II influence that Star Wars has, you know, and you know it's very much so.
Speaker 1: You know that's a huge part of Star Wars, that influence and you get it a lot in this show man.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I totally agree.
Speaker 2: I think you know to tag along with what you're saying.
Speaker 2: It's funny because we've seen so many things that are Star Wars related.
Speaker 2: We've read Star Wars, we've seen comic books and so on and so forth.
Speaker 2: There's a whole bunch of Star Wars out there, but it's amazing that we're continually getting new vantage points and looks at the Star Wars galaxy that we probably didn't think that we needed or wanted, but just expanded not only the lore but the reality of what's at stake.
Speaker 2: And as that comes into the four with gorman, yeah, there's a lot of parallels you can make with gorman and basically it's not just like world war ii and all that.
Speaker 2: It's pretty much every oppressive government, every authoritarian regime trying to put another party down, and that that has been the case like throughout history.
Speaker 2: And I think that they nailed that down with how the propaganda is being spread, how easy it is to, you know, make the population dislike those people.
Speaker 2: Like with Mon Mothma in the Senate building.
Speaker 2: She was trying to curry favor with a bunch of different people whom she probably agreed on with certain bills in the past, but there was one senator who's even like.
Speaker 2: I don't think Gorman is a good thing to be vying for right now I forget the correct wording, but basically saying like I don't want anything to do with Gorman right now, that's a bad look for me.
Speaker 2: And you just see everyone turning a blind eye to what's happening and ultimately we don't know what's happening with Gorman.
Speaker 2: At this point.
Speaker 2: We don't really fully get it.
Speaker 2: I mean, we as the audience get it, but the people inside the show, outside of a few, have no idea that they're going to be mining for Kalkite in the near future.
Speaker 2: So they have no idea what's coming for them.
Speaker 2: They have no idea why the Imperial Destroying the planet pretty much, yeah, which is what's going to happen, yeah yeah they have no idea why the empire have decided to make gorman their enemy, but it's apparent that that's what's happening and it is.
Speaker 2: It is a really scary thing.
Speaker 2: But I want to take like a brief moment to like just talk.
Speaker 2: Sorry, rich, you haven't.
Speaker 2: You haven't actually chimed in on on these two topics.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm so, as I was listening to you guys talk about this, it just kind of made me think about a couple of things.
Speaker 3: So I don't think andor works until now and I, like I was thinking, like I think part of the reason we're enjoying it is because it's a star wars property.
Speaker 3: But it's not a star wars property, right, it's like star wars property that exists in this universe that we know very well, right?
Speaker 3: And if, let's say, you just started watching andor and you hadn't seen anything else for some random reason, or even if you, you know, you start watching andor and you just go through rogue one, right, you've got this universe that is, you know, a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.
Speaker 3: But it doesn't.
Speaker 3: I don't think it would jump out at anybody.
Speaker 3: It's well done, right.
Speaker 3: But I think that why it's being so well received is because we feel a lot of you know, I'll just like kind of our star wars nerds over here.
Speaker 3: We feel like we've explored so much of the galaxy in one direction that we want to see it in another.
Speaker 3: You know, that's a good way to put it right, because I I don't like this doesn't come out in 1977 and people are like, oh man, this is the franchise.
Speaker 2: I'm getting into.
Speaker 2: That's an OK yeah, yeah, I like, I like that idea that because, yeah, I see what you're saying, that like what, what may have appealed to audiences back then is different than what appeals to audiences now.
Speaker 3: So it's not necessarily playing to the times, but it is, in a way I don't want to say encyclopedic, because you don't really, but I think the type of person who's going to like andor is very well educated about the star wars universe right from my experience online, a lot of people who had never seen star wars are watching andor and they're considering it.
Speaker 2: They're considering it like some of the best tv they've ever seen.
Speaker 1: Well, well, I think.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 1: What I think about Andor is that, yes, I agree that right now is the time for Andor to exist, but you couldn't have had Andor be the first thing to come out, because Andor is not a foundational series in the way that, like the mainline Star Wars movies are.
Speaker 1: That's the foundation.
Speaker 1: Everything else is built upon that.
Speaker 1: You cannot, you know and or would be telling a story about something that just doesn't exist.
Speaker 1: Now we know exactly what happens, because what's happening in this show you know.
Speaker 1: So this is just something that is being built on the foundation of the greater storyline you know in star wars, the skywalker saga, if you will.
Speaker 1: But I also do agree that most people have some sort of idea about star wars.
Speaker 1: Even if they haven't watched it, they know it exists.
Speaker 1: They've probably heard of luke skywalker.
Speaker 1: They've probably heard of lightsabers definitely heard of stormtroopers.
Speaker 1: You know like it's hard to escape, even if you don't watch it.
Speaker 1: I could imagine you watching, and or without watching, the mainline series and enjoying it, just in the same way that you can watch the mandalorian without having watched the mainline series.
Speaker 1: You know, and there's especially like mandalorian season two, there's stuff from other series that you.
Speaker 1: It wouldn't mean much to you had you not seen it, but you know it's definitely something that's really good.
Speaker 1: It's something that's different.
Speaker 1: I don't know what would you call it.
Speaker 1: Is it espionage, the spy series that exists within the star wars universe?
Speaker 1: Like you know, it's not a star wars show, it's something else that that exists within the star wars universe I see what you're.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's hard to really pinpoint why it works.
Speaker 2: I think that you're both kind of right, in the sense that it does build on everything that came before, and for it to even exist requires these other properties to have existed for ages.
Speaker 2: You know, this is a prequel to a prequel, which in and of itself, is a sequel to the prequels.
Speaker 3: It's a sell for my 10-year-old right.
Speaker 3: He has enjoyed everything Star Wars with me.
Speaker 3: We have our lightsabers.
Speaker 3: He's definitely knowledgeable about Star Wars in the way that most kids his age aren't.
Speaker 3: You know, we played the lego games to their just maximum, so he knows the most random of characters and I don't think that I haven't had him watch it yet.
Speaker 3: But I don't think he would enjoy and or right like I just yeah, it's not like it's not the star wars he's looking for.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I love it, I love this show, but when I look I walk around, work and I have.
Speaker 3: I used to have an over-the-shoulder bag but my chiropractor told me I needed to wear a backpack to balance the weight.
Speaker 3: So I have these Chewbacca like the bandolier right but with hair, and it's really you can use it in your car, but I use it as like.
Speaker 3: So I have these two chewbacca straps, bandolier straps, with the fur on my backpack at all times at work.
Speaker 3: You know, like I've got star wars stuff in my room.
Speaker 3: I teach revenge of the sith, like I'm known as the star wars guy, and I guess, when I think of like Star Wars in that way, from the outside, looking in from the person who's not a big fan, you know it's just what's odd, what makes Andor great, is that almost it doesn't scream Star Wars in the slightest.
Speaker 3: You know there's.
Speaker 3: There's no Wookiees, there's no Jar Jar Binks, there's no Ewoks.
Speaker 3: You know there's very and I honestly got to the point where rewatching it with the Bix store when Bix was assaulted, I felt uncomfortable in a way that I don't want to feel when I'm watching Star Wars, which sounds like a child you know.
Speaker 3: And then as I'm rewatching the Gorman plot, because I just think that these episodes are so packed with stuff that if you're not hyper focused you're going to kind of miss something.
Speaker 3: So that's why I also enjoy the rewatches and to know what is going to unfold and see it now, see the seeds happening.
Speaker 3: Let's just look around for a second right and then you look back to the show and it's a bit startling, like anthony was saying, it is like so much of you guys were saying earlier, the authoritarian playbook and how easily it's working.
Speaker 3: You know how you said the senators were so quick to oh, I don't want to get the stink of Gorman on me too, you know, instead of them all banding together and how, just the little things you know.
Speaker 3: Well, you know the crime on gorman has increased to 36 percent and just all these rumors and the spin doctor stuff, it honestly scared me.
Speaker 3: I was kind of like, oh, it's scary stuff.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and it's such a different feeling than I'm used to watching star wars.
Speaker 3: I mean, I know like when han died I lost my mind in the movie theater.
Speaker 3: I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 3: But you know, I got over it, I was okay.
Speaker 3: You know, I I felt a little shaky after watching these episodes again because it's so real, right, like, like anthony said, it could be vania or estonia.
Speaker 3: I'm just trying to think of other countries I've never been to or can't really point to on a map, that are nowhere in europe, you know right, I mean it's different.
Speaker 1: I was was thinking Poland or something you know.
Speaker 3: Oh well, yeah, that's a good one.
Speaker 1: You know the thing is, is that the reason why I think that Andor is so important for the Star Wars universe is that you know?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I understand like you know, yeah, there is a you know a discomfort when you witness these things on screen.
Speaker 1: There is a you know a discomfort when you witness these things on screen.
Speaker 1: But you know, we've always been told that the empire is bad, the empire is bad.
Speaker 1: The empire is bad, but we're being shown how bad they are in this show this is why they're doing what they're doing.
Speaker 1: We've only ever been told that they're bad.
Speaker 1: You know it's always been black and white.
Speaker 1: But why, okay?
Speaker 1: What?
Speaker 1: Okay?
Speaker 1: Why is it what you know?
Speaker 1: Show me some color.
Speaker 1: Show me why and this is why the show is showing why and that these people are willing to put their lives on the line to do what they're doing.
Speaker 1: You don't have that whole rebellion that destroys the death star twice without these moments.
Speaker 1: There has to be a build-up.
Speaker 2: It's.
Speaker 2: That's such a really that's a great point, because little things that have led to the original trilogy stack up like dominoes.
Speaker 2: You know, like they, like, you can't have all of this that happens in rogue one without all of this that happens in andor.
Speaker 2: You need the, you need the gorman I'm not going to say the m word because that's a spoiler for next week.
Speaker 2: We need what happens on gorman to happen because that's what catalyzes the rebel alliance to finally form a united front.
Speaker 2: You know, right now they're the rebels are a disparate, leader, almost leaderless group of random bands of rebels throughout the galaxy and and we actually see in the the first couple episodes of, you know, I think, episodes one and two we have cassian going to yavin four to meet up with a friend and he comes into contact with 15 rebels that don't seem to have a leader right, there's huge leadership, huge huge leadership issues that you know everyone's fighting for leadership and that's the problem with these rebels at this point, there's no organization, and that's that needs to change if they're ever going to defeat the empire and cassie.
Speaker 1: This is like cassian's like wake up, like, oh wow, maybe these guys need some help and yeah, yeah, that was crazy, like when when you you get that realization that he was on yavin that whole time that that was insane.
Speaker 1: I was like dude, what you know like we're there's about to be a battle there soon, uh, but a couple years.
Speaker 1: That was insane.
Speaker 1: This season brings back a character that we haven't seen since rogue one in orson krennic and oh yeah, dude, I mean he's such a good bad guy man.
Speaker 1: I really do.
Speaker 1: I'm glad that they brought him back, like I am so happy that they brought him back because I definitely wanted to see that character again.
Speaker 1: He just he kills that character man and I I loved his.
Speaker 1: I loved his, like cal kite ramble that he just goes oh yeah, um cal kites, cal kites.
Speaker 1: Alternatives like synthetic yeah like yeah, dude, that was just so that scene that when luthan and what's his, name again when they were at that party and she's trying to get rid of that listening device dude it was so intense what a great and then they had lonnie there, like it's like, oh, poor lonnie's, just in the middle of all this mess man, this guy's just trying to survive at this point I know poor lonnie, I wonder if he'll make it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, ben mendelsohn returning to to replay orson krennic a couple years prior to the events of Rogue One.
Speaker 2: Fantastic stuff, him being the catalyst.
Speaker 2: I keep saying the word catalyst and I think it's because the prequel novel to Rogue One is called Catalyst, so that's just in the back of my head whenever I'm thinking of these characters.
Speaker 2: So anyway, he is the catalyst to why the whole Gorman front is happening.
Speaker 2: He knows that the Empire needs the calcite, the synthetic calcite, the calcite alternatives.
Speaker 2: He needs all that.
Speaker 2: But it can only be mined via basically destabilizing Gorman.
Speaker 2: And I love that scene where he brings in certain ISB members and other people within the Empire to just have a little brunch you know, have some cakes while talking about how they're going to potentially kill millions.
Speaker 3: It's just a really great scene, really fascinating um, in that scene that's the one of the I think one of the guys that's to me was one of the most chilling things when they were.
Speaker 3: Somebody asked one of the isb guys essentially like can't we just tell them that you know there's like a disaster coming or something and get them off planet?
Speaker 3: And his response is something to the effect of we've seen that not work before and generally it's just better to do away with the whole thing.
Speaker 3: And that means that they've done it on multiple planets, right oh?
Speaker 1: yeah, you know and that's.
Speaker 3: That's what that was like.
Speaker 3: Oh my goodness, you've done this so much that you have freaking data on it right.
Speaker 3: Like you can't do something twice and have data on it right.
Speaker 3: You have to do something like five times, I'd minimum, I would assume.
Speaker 3: I don't know what the number is, but then it's just like how many more planets have they done this to?
Speaker 2: oh, they've done it to a bunch and I I did do a little bit of research on like other planets that they've done that too.
Speaker 2: So in response to someone online who thought it was like a dumb thing, like there's a bunch of like haters online for everything, this one I I don't I want to bring attention to because it was pretty astronomically stupid.
Speaker 2: There was absolutely no reason to militarily occupy Gorman.
Speaker 2: It was one of the dumbest things Palpatine could have done.
Speaker 2: The Gormans were perfectly happy with their planet and its industry.
Speaker 2: The Emperor could have simply mined the material needed and left the Gormans alone.
Speaker 2: Why would he bring this kind of negative attention?
Speaker 2: For no reason.
Speaker 2: Blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 2: And I'm like it's perfectly clear the empire needed the calcite found in gorman's core.
Speaker 2: The empire makes it very clear that the mining of said resource was to destabilize the core and lead to ecological collapse.
Speaker 2: But poverty needed it more than he believed.
Speaker 2: The empire needed good pr and I explained that it's not the first time this has happened.
Speaker 2: In the book a new dawn, the, the Empire mined Thorolite on Cinda, causing the core to nearly collapse.
Speaker 2: In Rebels we learn that Geonosis was completely sterilized to cover the construction of their Death Star project.
Speaker 2: In Rogue One we learn that the Empire destroyed Jedha City, partly to cover their extraction of kyber from beneath the city.
Speaker 2: And there's also Ilum, which is where the Padawans used to get their kyber crystals.
Speaker 2: Also ilum, which was where the that's where the padawans used to get their kyber crystals.
Speaker 2: They used that planet, they mined it out and basically a big fissure erupted on the planet's surface, causing the planet to start splitting in half and they had to, like, hold it in place.
Speaker 2: And that planet, ilum, later became star killer base in the sequels.
Speaker 2: Um, so it's something that the Empire is well known for doing.
Speaker 2: So the idea that like and they kind of do explain why one of the ISB guys basically says Partagas, partagas.
Speaker 2: He says they have a strong Senate presence.
Speaker 2: You know, like this is a strong planet, they're not going to go down lightly.
Speaker 2: So they need to create this false image of gorman to the rest of the galaxy to make it okay for them to do what need, what they believe needs to be done.
Speaker 2: And it's it's just crazy, it's just it's so sick and twisted, but you could totally picture the empire doing that, because they need what they got, you know, and there ain't no more Kalkite alternatives elsewhere.
Speaker 1: Nope, something else.
Speaker 1: So two characters that we also get back from the first season is Cyril and Deidre, and in this one they're kind of like you know, there's some romance there, you know.
Speaker 1: So what?
Speaker 1: What did you all think about that dynamic it?
Speaker 2: it was definitely kind of awkward yeah, they have a very healthy relationship.
Speaker 2: It seemed.
Speaker 2: You know they both respected each other's boundaries very clearly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, it was very good.
Speaker 2: I'm happy for cyril, very happy for deidre.
Speaker 2: They both look and feel very happy in their new roles.
Speaker 2: No, it's the weirdest relationship I've seen in star wars period.
Speaker 2: This is weirder than when those frog people, like that frog lady with all her eggs, like met up with her husband and just like touched heads at the end of that mandorian episode.
Speaker 2: This was bizarre and it's so clear that Daedra is not a psychopath but a Sociopath.
Speaker 2: Sociopath, yes, she's sociopathic.
Speaker 2: She has no emotions, she has no feeling.
Speaker 2: Everything she does is to get ahead, to move up a ladder, and Cyril just happens to be present and isn't moving out of her way and is willing to help her out right.
Speaker 1: So she's, she's cool with it and she's even like holding a secret, like from him, and he's helping them out.
Speaker 2: Like you know, locate these rebels on gorman I actually really do feel bad for cyril I do too like, honestly, he, he's someone who clearly needs a lot of structure in his life and he's gone about it the entire wrong way.
Speaker 2: And he wasn't wrong in that, you know, in the first season he wasn't wrong for wanting to do his job correctly, to go apprehend and or and all that.
Speaker 2: He just was barking up the wrong tree with the wrong people.
Speaker 2: And then he got involved with the Empire and the Empire feeds you all these lies about.
Speaker 2: You know this and that, and it's so easy, you know, as it's explained.
Speaker 2: You know, just by watching the hollow news, like it's so easy for you to be brainwashed by all the propaganda.
Speaker 2: And Cyril is conscious that there is propaganda being perpetrated about Gorman in this season.
Speaker 2: He knows that what's being presented on the news isn't what's actually happening on the planet.
Speaker 2: You know, and it's such a fascinating concept because he's undercover for these people, which does make him complicit.
Speaker 2: He knows that the Empire is doing something and they're trying to incite a rebellion on this planet for some reason, but he doesn't know why or how it's going to play out.
Speaker 2: You know, and I feel bad for him because he thinks he's doing the right thing for the right cause.
Speaker 2: He still truly believes that the Empire is what's good in the galaxy and that the rebels are terrorists.
Speaker 2: And with that mindset it's hard not to fault the guy.
Speaker 1: But right, right he is an antagonist.
Speaker 2: You know like it's hard to it's.
Speaker 2: It's hard to make that balance, so I I feel bad for the guy.
Speaker 1: He's an antagonist.
Speaker 1: He is an antagonist but he's also a bit of a patsy.
Speaker 1: You know like he is definitely the type of guy that would be set up to be a fall guy.
Speaker 1: You know that the empire would leave him out to dry and what we'll find out.
Speaker 2: You know I don't want to get ahead of myself, but it's so easy in the empire for there to be fall guys.
Speaker 2: You think of, like all of these big players, like we saw in rogue one, that orson krennic, the guy who basically designed the entirety of the death star.
Speaker 2: He ran the project, he was the fall guy for tarkin.
Speaker 1: Tarkin stepped in, yeah, and there is a hierarchy in the empire but there's no loyalty yeah, there's a lot of like stepping on backs in the empire, a lot, a lot of stepping on backs in the empire, a lot of stepping on, backs, backsteppers.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a lot.
Speaker 2: There's a lot that this season, even these first six episodes, you can like read into, and what's amazing is the timeliness about, like, some of the the stuff in the first couple episodes.
Speaker 2: You know like we have within america right now a big issue of like being for or against illegal immigration, people being deported back to their countries or detained whatever.
Speaker 2: Say what you will about that.
Speaker 2: This show was filmed several years before any of that was mainstream news.
Speaker 2: You know, like we've had deportations for illegal immigration for years in America, but right now it's coming to a head because whatever, but within Andor, it's so fascinating because these are the characters that we love, these are the characters that we're rooting for and they are the illegal immigrants on this planet and the empire is technically the lawful government that has the right to deport them because they don't have their papers and it's.
Speaker 2: It's such a timely contrast to the our real world discussion, you know, and like the political, political landscape, because they didn't know that this was going to be an issue when when the show was coming out, but it kind of just fits perfectly in the narrative and I think that's part of why this show is so timeless.
Speaker 2: You know you guys were saying that it needed to be released at this point in history, at least in terms of Star Wars, for it to like really resonate itself.
Speaker 2: Even if it didn't like focus on andor and wasn't a prequel to rogue one directly and all that it would.
Speaker 2: Using these themes, it's kind of timeless, you know, like it's always going to be relevant to some, some degree and I I think that that's what's really cool about it yeah, it's definitely a great show.
Speaker 1: You know, it's sad that we lost your boy, brasso Brasso.
Speaker 1: I love Brasso dude.
Speaker 1: Yeah, man, he was definitely that homie.
Speaker 2: He was the homiest of all homies.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that guy that you could rely on.
Speaker 1: He watched out.
Speaker 1: I miss B.
Speaker 2: Oh man, B2Emo.
Speaker 2: I love that droid so much and I feel so bad that they just leave B2Emo on that planet.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I love that droid Like it's my own pet, like it's my own child.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: Seeing them leave so unceremoniously, oh, it kills me every time.
Speaker 1: And you feel so bad because, like you know, you do like hear that depression, like he just he wants to be with cassian, you know, and it's not that cassian doesn't want him around, he just he knows that he's going to be doing dangerous things and in a way he's kind of like the last bit of of memory of his mother, you know, and if you lost marva yeah, if you lost him, that that would be.
Speaker 1: you know, it was definitely a good call on that front.
Speaker 1: Something that we didn't really talk about was your boy Right on him.
Speaker 2: Wait, wait, wait.
Speaker 2: What were you going to say, Rich, about B?
Speaker 3: Well, I love B and I was so sad that he had to be left behind.
Speaker 3: I know this is Star Wars and it happens all the time, but man, just like he had to arrive at that exact second for them to get off of there.
Speaker 3: You know, like talk about fortuitous, I mean, you know it's, it's a big galaxy, and he, he pulls up just right at say, you know, without really kind of knowing about it, which is kind of all that more right, he just hears like blockade or whatever from clay, and then he immediately goes there, right, but well it's.
Speaker 2: It's interesting like it's going to be a major plot thread in the the next couple episodes.
Speaker 2: But you know the idea of cassian as a messenger.
Speaker 2: You know he wants to send a message to bix on this planet.
Speaker 2: He finds out, oh he can't send message, so he's going to go there directly.
Speaker 2: And he is the messenger, you know, for all of these little adventures.
Speaker 2: He's the one relaying all the information to all these parties.
Speaker 2: That eventually culminates in a new hope and it's so.
Speaker 2: It's so good the way that they wove that idea into the show and we're going to talk more about specifically him as a messenger next week because I think that that is a really fascinating discussion.
Speaker 2: But yeah, going back to B2Emo, I feel so bad for that guy.
Speaker 3: He just B's two emos and that's he's just so sad, and you know you guys were talking about Saw.
Speaker 3: You know this guy.
Speaker 3: I mean, can I ask a question?
Speaker 3: So do we believe that the mechanic in training was working with the Empire?
Speaker 3: Is that a real, or did he just make that up and then his friend agreed?
Speaker 2: What's his friend's name?
Speaker 2: I think it's Two Tubes or something like that.
Speaker 2: I think that's actually like his name in the character encyclopedia.
Speaker 2: I don't think that this guy was.
Speaker 2: It came out of nowhere.
Speaker 2: And I don't think Saul would have humored this guy making Rhydonium for as long as he did if he was going to kill him anyway.
Speaker 2: And I don't think that he planned on killing him.
Speaker 2: I just think that he saw that there was a need for ridonium and that wilmon couldn't leave, because clearly wilmon didn't think like there was some apprehension when wilmon said he thinks he's ready for, you know, this production yeah, essentially he's like, he's good enough, you know like there, but with, with, with ridonium, there's, there's there's no margin of error.
Speaker 2: There's no margin of error, yeah you're gonna blow up the whole party.
Speaker 2: So yeah, it's really I.
Speaker 1: I don't personally think that he was a empire spy right, like maybe he just needed a reason to kind of kill him in that moment.
Speaker 1: But yeah, no, I I agree.
Speaker 1: I think that, like he realized, okay, this guy's not, he's obviously can't, he can't do the job, and it's like we kind of put ourselves in a hard spot because we can't let this guy leave, because he knows too much and he's the best bet for this job.
Speaker 1: So I guess he's going to be coming anyway.
Speaker 1: I find that process of extracting Rhydonium so fascinating Like that.
Speaker 1: Just it's a eight step process, dude, and it looks so cool, like you know, just like kind of like you know the rotating of like the machine, and to me it just it looked awesome, like it looked so complicated and it was a really cool like scene to have.
Speaker 1: And man, your boy I know your boy is just cracked out for ridonium.
Speaker 2: No wonder why he's insane, saw so in uh rogue one, we all thought that he was like huffing off oxygen, you know like.
Speaker 2: We thought that he was just like ill and he needed the, you know the inhaler.
Speaker 2: Turns out he's just been huffing rhodonium good boy.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a drug to this man.
Speaker 1: He's just how does.
Speaker 1: Oh, it's a drug cracked out on him, man how is he now?
Speaker 3: how is he so like I?
Speaker 3: How does he weather it, I mean, and then like, will I, don't under.
Speaker 3: Did he just like get peer pressured, like it sounds like?
Speaker 3: It's the worst thing in the world you would ever do to yourself and like it's not like hey take a hit of this joint Right.
Speaker 3: It's like I don't know.
Speaker 3: Hey, here's some ether.
Speaker 3: I don't.
Speaker 3: It seems insane, right.
Speaker 2: It's a very extreme high.
Speaker 2: Yeah, give's some ether, it seems insane.
Speaker 2: Right, it's a very extreme high.
Speaker 2: Give me some spice.
Speaker 2: He just tells.
Speaker 1: Wilmon like just accept it.
Speaker 1: Wilmon just looks like he's in excruciating pain.
Speaker 1: Dude.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting.
Speaker 2: And Wilmon's so surprised.
Speaker 2: After he starts releasing the Rhydonium, saw just kind of goes up to him like oh, how I've missed you.
Speaker 2: And Wilma's like what on earth, how are you doing this?
Speaker 2: Because Saw just went on this tangent about how your skin starts to itch and you start feeling your skin crawl like it's alive.
Speaker 2: And as a kid he like hooked on this stuff.
Speaker 2: You're asking how he weathered it.
Speaker 2: I think it's just tolerance.
Speaker 2: You know, like you give you, give a kid a taste of bourbon, they're gonna hate it, they're gonna spit it out.
Speaker 2: It tastes gross to them.
Speaker 2: There's no way that they're gonna enjoy that because it just tastes like spicy and bitter and all of that.
Speaker 2: But as an adult you grow tolerances to certain things.
Speaker 2: Now bourbon tastes fantastic to me.
Speaker 2: It feels really good going down, burning.
Speaker 2: The burning sensation is part of the fun of it and I think that is what we're experiencing with the Rido.
Speaker 1: Yeah, man, you know it's like at this point, are you going to use this for sarsaparilla?
Speaker 2: fuel fuel, or are you gonna like just huff it all?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't got an answer for you.
Speaker 1: I, everybody else will use it for starship fuel, but saul's just gonna use it for his own weird reasons yeah, no, it's, it's bad.
Speaker 2: I want to look this up actually, right don't?
Speaker 2: I know?
Speaker 2: I've heard that like so many times before, like in random things I mean, like this guy could just be using regular spice.
Speaker 1: You know whatever would happen a good old spice it's probably not strong enough, man, not that it doesn't have that rhododium strength, you know, because like rhododium because when you say rhododium strong like, I mean it sounds strong, but when you think of spice, I'm thinking of like maybe pepper right, some, you know pepper salt, you know oregano, whatever but you know you think of rhodonium.
Speaker 1: That honestly, doesn't even rhodonium sounds like, it sounds like an ore, it doesn't even sound like a liquid.
Speaker 1: You know yeah, but but yeah, no, it's crazy.
Speaker 1: I'm not too sure.
Speaker 1: Is there anything else that you, that you guys want to talk about?
Speaker 2: I really liked luthen and kleia in this arc.
Speaker 2: I feel like we've talked a little bit about them and I appreciate that their dynamic is growing.
Speaker 2: We didn't really know what their dynamic was in the first season and we still don't know at this point in the show, like, what their dynamic is.
Speaker 2: Are they related?
Speaker 2: Are they friends?
Speaker 2: Are they just partners for a long time?
Speaker 2: Could be in any number of things, but I think it's really cool that they have such a professional relationship, even on their downtime.
Speaker 2: You know, like there is technically, there is no downtime for them.
Speaker 2: They're on 24 7, because that's what it takes to run a rebellion and they're running it from the center of civilization.
Speaker 2: They're in the hornet's nest while they're doing what they're doing and it's it's so cool the way the show uses them as accesses.
Speaker 2: They're literally an axis.
Speaker 2: It's such a like fascinating word because you think of an axis, it's what the rest of, it's what turns in the center of things.
Speaker 2: It's what turns in the center is the one who's running all the shots and they're partially right, he's one cog of the greater rebellion, but he is like a mastermind of what's going on in the galaxy rebel-wise, and you think of another term that's used in machinery that's been applied to characters like fulcrum.
Speaker 2: Fulcrum was given to characters like Ahsoka, later it will be given to Cassian, and it makes sense that there's multiple fulcrums but there's only one true axis, so a fulcrum is a pivot point on the spinning mechanism of the axis and these characters Ahs, ahsoka, cassian and others are fulcrums, basically like they're pivots in this moving cog and it's.
Speaker 2: It's so cool the way that this is all being explored subtextually but also like in real time on the show and I think that it's just brilliant writing.
Speaker 2: It's so cool.
Speaker 1: I agree.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and we also lose Senta, which she was kind of not around too much, Right, she was kind of here and there, but she ends up getting killed during that heist.
Speaker 2: That heist on Gorman.
Speaker 1: Yes on.
Speaker 1: Gorman.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I felt bad.
Speaker 2: Val clearly was in love with this person and the moment she gets since a back since is like literally killed by mistake by some kid who, you know, thought he could do his own thing on the like as part of the rebellion, and that's why leadership is so necessary.
Speaker 2: You know and talking about gorman really quickly the culture of this world was so fantastically realized.
Speaker 2: I am amazed every time it's on screen because it feels legit, it feels like a real world and it what?
Speaker 2: What helps it is that all the actors are French.
Speaker 2: They're not speaking French, but they're speaking an alien language based off of French linguistics, which is why it sounds like French, but you can't actually pick up any of the words.
Speaker 2: It's so well done.
Speaker 2: It's the cultural world building of Gorman, making it centered around these spiders who create weaves and silk that the galaxy needs, and then bringing in Cassian to kind of play onto that, because you know, this whole world's ecosystem runs on these spiders, basically, and he's playing a designer so that he can blend into this world's ecosystem and it's dude.
Speaker 2: The writing on this show is next level and it just blows me away.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and also something that I kind of wanted to just kind of cap this conversation on is PTSD.
Speaker 1: And Bix has that big time with what happened to her in season one With Dr Gorse.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and actually these episodes cap that like plot line off really, really neatly.
Speaker 2: We learn a couple episode, or like an episode prior to this, that dr gorse the guy who invented the torture device or the torture method that we saw used on bix in the first season.
Speaker 2: They want to embiggen this project, they want to get more people involved, they want to make a whole team involved in this interrogation process.
Speaker 2: So they give Dr Gorse this brand new wing within the Imperial Complex on Coruscant and I just love that Bix, who is so distraught about this, gets the opportunity to get her comeuppance with this guy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then Cassian just straight blows him up.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 2: What did you think of the PTSD Rich?
Speaker 2: What did you feel about this plotline with Vix?
Speaker 3: Well, I think the first time I understand that to properly short you need to do it over a little bit more time.
Speaker 3: But I I was just I was unsure where it was really going.
Speaker 3: But then the visit from luthan, I think when I saw it the second time around, made it way more interesting.
Speaker 3: And doors questioning of.
Speaker 3: Well, if luthan did that and he didn't tell me that and he came home he knew you would tell me.
Speaker 3: So he had to know that he's always doing something for like, and you could just really see andor's paranoia.
Speaker 3: But I don't want to call it paranoia because he's right.
Speaker 2: I mean he's yeah no, he's pardon, he is being paranoid, but he's also right.
Speaker 2: You know, you don't just get visits from luthan.
Speaker 3: There's a reason so I thought that again, like it's just, I appreciate it way more the second time.
Speaker 3: I think I wanted to just kind of get to some big resolutions a little earlier than I, than I should have the first watch through, right.
Speaker 3: So when I now know where everything was, watching it again, it really is paced well.
Speaker 3: I think the way they did it was excellent and without spoiling too much for next week, right Like this PTSD arc is really important.
Speaker 2: Totally yeah.
Speaker 2: So one last thing I do want to mention, because I do think that, you know, nothing is truly perfect, and if I could give it a criticism, I would say that the jumps in years for every three episodes is a little jarring and there's a lot that goes unsaid between episodes that you just kind of have to pick up the pieces on and try to figure out.
Speaker 2: And this will come into like I think, like, think, like technically, next week, the jump from 3 BBY to 2 BBY is probably like the hardest jump for me in terms of like wow, I really wish there was more to this story.
Speaker 2: I wish they told all of those things that they're talking about.
Speaker 1: You know they will eventually.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I'm excited about the books.
Speaker 2: They teed it up so nicely for publishing.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I'm excited about the books.
Speaker 2: They teed it up so nicely for publishing and their publishing is literally just finishing up the High Republic.
Speaker 2: It's five years, I think, at this point, and they're going to need new territory and I think they're going right into Andor hopefully soon, because this is such a ripe area, for I just don't know that they can write it as well.
Speaker 2: I'm genuinely like will they give us good stories in Andor?
Speaker 1: Or will they give us good stories in Andor, or will they not?
Speaker 1: I think it can be done.
Speaker 2: you know it can be done, but it's tough.
Speaker 1: You know when you're going from.
Speaker 1: You know a big huff of Rhydonium to, you know Spice.
Speaker 2: Oof, yeah, Speaking of which do next week, boys.
Speaker 1: Yes, next week we shall be doing the last half of Andor and you know that'll be capping off the series because the series rolls right into Rogue One.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I do kind of wish we, like you said earlier, I wish we hadn't done Rogue One and A New Hope so soon, because it would have been nice to go into it.
Speaker 2: Hopefully, like in some future episodes, we can go back and like revisit certain things I would like to do, like a Rogue One and A New Hope rewatch after Andor.
Speaker 2: I know, rich, you already did it, but I have I have yet to do it yet, so I really can't wait to like see how the story unfolds in a new manner and a new light after watching andor.
Speaker 2: So it could be something we we, you know do at some point.
Speaker 2: But, guys, thank you for listening to us here for our 124th episode of project geekology.
Speaker 2: We hope you enjoyed our ramblings on the star wars galaxy as a whole.
Speaker 2: Please be sure to check out next episode where we cover the final six episodes of Andor as they lead up to the events of Rogue One.
Speaker 2: We're excited to finally get to what I believe is probably the best couple hours of Star Wars ever produced.
Speaker 2: And yeah, thanks so much for listening.
Speaker 2: If you want to check us out on any of our socials, be sure to click down into the show notes.
Speaker 2: You'll find us there.
Speaker 2: And, yeah, boys, stay juicy, like that Rhydonium that you know, like that Rhydonium that Saw Gerrera is huffing and puffing.
Speaker 2: You need some of that juice in your life, and to do so, I think what you'd really need to do is Anthony, you want to explain it to them?
Speaker 2: What do we?
Speaker 1: need.
Speaker 1: You know we need that strong Rydonian.
Speaker 1: You know five star review.
Speaker 1: You know we want it to be so strong that it even knocks.
Speaker 1: You know, saw Guerrera back a few pegs and you know, just keep them coming for more yeah, yeah, speaking about pegs, we never like figure out how he lost his leg.
Speaker 2: Anyway, guys, yeah, this is.
Speaker 2: This is episode 124.
Speaker 2: We shall see you or you'll hear from us, anyway, next week bye guys.
Speaker 1: Long live the gentle lads.
Speaker 1: Love it peace.