How do you make storylines come collectively when the characters are worlds aside?
That was the problem dealing with the primary arc of “Andor” Season 2 — particularly the final quarter-hour of Episode 3, “Harvest,” the place Cassian (Diego Luna) swoops onto the Mina-Rau grassland in a stolen tie-fighter to rescue Bix (Adria Arjona), Wilmon (Muhannad Bhaier), and Brasso (Joplin Sibtain) whereas Mon Mothma (Genevieve O’Reilly) loses herself on the dance flooring of her daughter Leida’s (Bronte Carmichael) marriage ceremony social gathering, realizing that spymaster Luthen Rael (Stellan Skarsgård) is about kill her childhood good friend Tay Kolma (Ben Miles) earlier than he reveals their rebellious actions. The 2 storylines couldn’t look extra completely different, however the despair that the characters really feel on this second is precisely the identical.
As has been the case all through his profession, showrunner Tony Gilroy relied on his editor and brother John Gilroy to deliver the tip items of Episode 3 collectively as one thing that seems like one ending, although they’re unfold all through the Star Wars galaxy. “We constructed a whole lot of these, I don’t even know what you name it — these rondelle, a number of character motion sequences through the years,” stated Tony, when he was a visitor on an upcoming episode of the Filmmaker Toolkit podcast. Once they work, they’re wonderful. However in the event you don’t execute them appropriately, you lose individuals.
“If individuals really feel like we went away from this dialog for too lengthy, and we come again, you’re feeling like the identical period of time hasn’t handed. And in the event you cheat, that doesn’t work. When you don’t have a superb sense of geometry, if the viewers isn’t oriented spatially — [these scenes] are actually, actually difficult and really technical to place collectively,” Tony Gilroy stated.
The Gilroy brothers have additionally discovered that it’s vital for the conclusions of “Andor” arcs to “take attendance” and guarantee that nobody will get left behind (so long as they’re nonetheless alive, RIP Brasso) — as a result of an ungainly reappearance of characters might be jarring for viewers. The ending of “Harvest” is pretty gentle on the variety of characters that the present must test in with, however it has a unique problem: Music.
“The track is ‘Niamos!’ that Nic Britell wrote,” stated editor and govt producer John Gilroy. “It has to do with the planet Niamos the place Cassian goes to calm down earlier than he’s arrested. And so our conceit is that it’s like a Prime 40 track within the galaxy. And one thing you at all times play at a marriage, like ‘Macarena.’ All of the younger ladies bounce on the dance flooring as quickly as they hear it.”
Added Tony, “There was a whole lot of doubt about whether or not it could work out, and that piece of music would carry. The funeral march was a gimme, we knew that was going to work, however this time I’m including music that’s not simply indicated by the opposite sequences [in the episode] and saying, ’Okay, we want this EDM dance combine we’re going use that as our mattress for quarter-hour on the finish of this factor.”
John Gilroy, although, believed the dance combine would work as a technique to knit collectively the episode’s ending. The editor, showrunner, and the remainder of the “Andor” filmmaking group put within the work to create a proof of idea for the music because the sequence’s connective tissue. They constructed completely different variations, mocked them up with iPhone video, and storyboarded till the sequence discovered its ft. The social gathering dance combine sharpens an already pointed sense of dramatic irony each Mon and the viewer have on this second, and John Gilroy got here to set with the intention to see the frivolity and happiness of the marriage [turn] in opposition to her.
“I’m not on the set fairly often,” John stated, “however I got here up for the dance, and I bought to see [O’Reilly] actually throw herself into it. She’s appearing all of the issues out. She is aware of that she’s in all probability killed her pricey childhood good friend. And he or she channels that into her dancing. It was simply improbable.”
Mon’s need within the second to neglect the ache and sacrifice of the rise up contrasts sharply with the thousand-yard stares of Cassian, Bix, and Wilmon as they flee off planet, into an unknown future. The contrasting emotional depth of Mon’s desperation with Bix and Wilmon’s numb, haunted grief, makes John Gilroy’s considered cuts forwards and backwards between them hit all of the tougher. The distinction between the stillness of figures within the tie cockpit and the frenzy of Mon’s motion on the dance flooring additionally emphasizes the emotional toll of the rise up. Irrespective of the circumstances, the rebels are surrounded by loss of life.
John Gilroy informed IndieWire that he can’t consider an episode of the collection that channels as a lot as “Harvest” does, emotionally. “That’s one I actually needed to put collectively earlier than I knew it could work. It was actually thought out, it’s critical stuff,” Gilroy stated. “The conditions you see, I believe individuals can relate to them,” he added in regards to the collection general. “All of us typically compromise, we might have to choose that’s not at all times black-and-white. Even the villains are human in our present. Everybody’s below strain.”