One aspect that’s really striking when you see Andor is how little the Jedi and the Force have to do with it; which highlights how central they are to the original trilogy. (Rogue One does a pretty deft job of bridging those worlds, eg with Donnie Yen’s character.)
And the Force was a big part of the charm of the original movies, right? All the scenes with Luke and Yoda are wonderful, for example. I wouldn’t want to take that away, any more than I’d want to shoehorn the Jedi into Andor.
I think the real problem with the original movies starts with the prequels, which doubled down on all the Jedi business but managed to make it feel very pedestrian, rather than mystical.
The sequel movies could have been great if they had really tried to explore the collapse of the Empire and what the reconstruction would look like, rather than shamelessly retreading everything beat-for-beat. The Last Jedi did at least try to be different, but its ideas were completely scattershot and (I think) not very fruitful.
The less Force, the better in my opinion. Save super-powers for comic-book movies.
In the recent Disney movies (Andor being the exception) it’s like they gave everyone the force, everyone is a super hero, it’s bombastic and annoying.
Let me run around with a rock and a stick for the first hour. Then give me a sword that looks cheap but I will cherish it. Then take it away. Let me earn it when I am awesome in the end.
To many games treat you like a toddler that wants shiny things. Yeah I want shiny things, but I want them when I deserved them. Similarily, yeah, I want powerful heros, but they have to earn it as well.
Sure, you'll be a badass at the end, but you're going to earn it. :)
If your standard for what science fiction is us The Expanse then almost all of what's considered science fiction is fantasy.
Star Wars doesn't even claim to attempt this. It is a world of entirely made up rules and places for the sake of the story. There is nothing wrong with that. But it completely misses this key feature of sci fi.
There isn't a very clear delineation between the two genres. Star Trek also crosses this line into pure fantasy pretty consistently (an anomaly that compells everybody to sing and eventually produces a Klingon boy band performance? Or one that gives everybody amnesia and turns them into actors in Shakespeare drama - costumes and all?).
I'm not saying the distinction doesn't exist - The Hobbit isn't SF and Ringworld isn't high fantasy, but I am saying that between the extremes, it's mostly just vibes. There is no objective reason not to consider Star Wars science fiction, some people just find the space wizards too silly (while having a bookshelf full of "The author's barely disguised fetish or hyperfixation but In Spaaaaace.")
I wasn't in both cases, communists considered it a capitalist propaganda about US might and banned it (maybe just heard about Star wars being US space program, took just first result on soviet gugel so to speak, but fight for freedom at all costs is generally not something you want to encourage in dictatorship).
They are an interesting flick (original trilogy), but nothing really magical for me in them. As mentioned by others they feel like 80s pop sci fi movie, nothing more, characters and acting are... mediocre and it all feels aimed at kids/teens. A lot of creativity with sets, but that's not primary reason for me to watch a movie.
Since I refuse (can't even) to be swayed emotionally of some good ol' memories from growing up, prequels felt even more childish (maybe apart from ep3), and this trend continued with last 3 movies. Rogue one was by far the best experience in whole SW universe, so if this goes even further happy to experience it.
That is to say, a sci-fi setting. Andor would not be correctly put in the sci-fi genre, rather in the political thriller genre.
I guess in short, I'm saying that you really don't have to be open to the sci fi genre to enjoy Andor.
And once you have relatable psychology you also get politics and weaponization of information (what the show was mostly about) - political thriller. Agree, those elements were damn good ones. And I loved the utilization of WW 2 analogues - French resistance, Spanish civil war, Wansee conference etc etc
I would say the show was very _grounded_ in that the high stakes were about humans doing human things.
What sets Andor apart is _excellence_ and (partly budget driven) restraint.
Not only was the acting superb, the script was intelligent.
But then the attention to visual detail was next level as well. The sets and costumes were mind blowingly good. For example I was convinced they had to had found some real life location for the Ghorman plaza (nope, built set + CGI). I would love to have a plaza like that. Not many shows have so good fictional architecture you would love to see the real thing.
So I was totally impressed with the show. But in my books it’s still sci-fi. It’s probably the best recent serialized sci-fi show in the last decade along with the Expanse.
If I’m reading between the lines what you are saying is that ”Andor is actually intelligent and high quality art … sci-fi can’t be high quality art”? I’m exaggerating to make a point.
Nope not at all, for example I personally would put the Expanse firmly in the genre of sci-fi. The major themes it explores centre around its setting; it doesn't happen to exist in a futuristic space setting; the entire show would cease to function as a concept without it. Major plot lines exist specifically to explore the "what-ifs" of that fictional future. And honestly, while I acknowledge it's intelligent and extremely well loved by its fans, it's one that I'd have trouble recommending to people that aren't big into sci fi, for that reason.
But compare that to something like Firefly, where's it's basically a heist/western that happens to be set in outer space.
Personally I have very hard time predicting why someone would enjoy _some_ fictional elements but not others. If someone does not like ”made-up” fiction then Andor still has many ”fantasy” elements to potentially put them off.
IMHO the idea that humans will colonize the solar system one dat is much more mainstream nowadays - so the setting in Expanse is in many ways much more grounded than in Star Wars where the latter is pure cinematic fantasy.
But maybe viewers don’t care about the milieu and just want relatable plot lines? There Andor is more familiar for sure.