In the 3rd episode of Andor Season 2, Syril formally introduced the love of his life, Dedra, to his mother, Eedy. Things started off on an ugly note, and Dedra realized that it was high time that Eedy’s influence on Syril came to an end, or else he’d always be a nervous wreck. And although Eedy loved to antagonize Syril, she accepted Dedra’s terms, thereby allowing her to maintain minimal contact with him instead of spending her twilight years without listening to her son’s voice ever again. Meanwhile, the situation on Mina-Rau came to a boil. As the Imperial forces tried to apprehend Brasso, Wilmon, and Bix, Cassian had no choice but to use the TIE fighter he had stolen to unleash hell on the representatives of the Galactic Empire. He did manage to save Wilmon and Bix, but Brasso died in combat. On Chandrila, Tay made some veiled threats to Mon about telling Davo how his money was being used to fund the Rebel Alliance. Mon was of the opinion that they could buy Tay’s silence, but Luthen knew that the only way to solve this issue was by eliminating Tay; they went for the second option. What were the repercussions of these actions? Let’s find out.
Spoiler Alert
Syril Is On Ghorman
One year has passed since the events of the opening 3 episodes of Andor Season 2, thereby putting us and the characters in BBY 3. In episode 4 of Andor Season 2, we see that Syril has moved to Ghorman and is in charge of the Bureau of Standards field office. He gets to talk to Eedy on a weekly basis, who is under the impression that Syril’s move to Ghorman has led to his break-up with Dedra. But it’s very obvious that Syril is there on Dedra’s orders. He is pretending to be an innocent member of the Galactic Empire, vulnerable to being turned by the Ghorman Front to help them find out why an armory has been built so close to the city plaza and what’s being transported into that place every night.
Rylanz, the leader of the Ghorman Front, has been listening to Syril’s conversations with Eedy, and he is finally convinced that they should rope in Syril before he is replaced by an officer who has gobbled up the anti-Ghorman propaganda. As soon as one of the rebels approaches Syril and invites him to a secret meeting, he giddily contacts Dedra to tell her about everything that has happened so far, thinking that she is going to convey the info to Partagaz. However, Dedra downplays Syril’s work and tells him to keep looking. Syril attends the meeting he has been invited to and meets Samm, Enza (Rylanz’s daughter), and Dilan. Rylanz straight-up asks Syril’s advice on how to keep the city of Palmo peaceful when the Empire is building an armory near the very plaza where Grand Moff Tarkin dropped a ship on a bunch of innocent people, and Syril agrees to help Rylanz as best he can.
Syril Wins Over The Ghorman Front
In episode 5 of Andor Season 2, in order to prove to the rebels that he is unlike the rest of the Imperial forces, Syril “stands up to” Attendant Grymish from ISB tech when he asks the employees of the Bureau of Standards field office to empty the premises so that the place can be screened for bugs. The rebels who have been listening to Syril cut off the connection to the listening device they have in Syril’s office. And when the bug is eventually found, Syril expresses disappointment that the Ghors are doubting someone who is willing to side with their cause. While all this is taking place, Rylanz and the Ghorman Front learn of Syril’s past as a cop on Morlana One, where they see that he was fired for not following orders. Now, they only see that Syril was fired by the ISB; combine that with Syril’s very loud display of insubordination, and come to the conclusion that he can be of use to the Ghorman cause.
What they don’t see is that after being fired from his post on Morlana One, he has been working closely with the ISB. Hence, Rylanz and Enza naively approach Syril and request that he help them learn what’s being transported to the armory every night. Syril delivers whatever blueprints he has at his disposal to Samm and makes it seem like he is defecting from the Empire. His ruse works because the Ghorman Front laps up the information that’s being fed to them, and they decide to make their move on one of the transport vehicles. Meanwhile, Syril returns to Coruscant to get freaky with Dedra. Yes, he also meets his mother where he eats cereal because Syril eating cereal is a running joke. After dealing with all this personal stuff, Dedra and Syril have a meeting with Partagaz, where they share all the information Syril has gathered from his visit to Ghorman. When asked about what Syril needs the Empire to do, what he says is diabolical: he wants the Imperial forces in Palmo to continue transporting weapons to the “armory” so that the information that he has fed to the Front seems legit. In fact, he wants the Empire to not raise any flags regarding the Front’s activities until Syril is sure that they have gone past the point of no return and are vulnerable enough to be trampled by Imperial forces. Upon returning to Ghorman, Syril finds out exactly how the Front is planning to steal Imperial weaponry—not to stop them, but to encourage them to go ahead with their plan.
Luthen Learns About Ghorman
During an ISB briefing in episode 4 of Andor Season 2, Dedra learns from Supervisor Heert that Partagaz has given him the duty of looking into Axis, which is something that Dedra was on previously. And when she requests of Heert that he involve her in his search for Andor, he puts Dedra in her place and indirectly tells her to focus on Ghorman. Supervisor Jung secretly meets Luthen and conveys Dedra’s interest in Ghorman. While that certainly gives Luthen an idea of what he should look into in order to defeat the Empire, since Jung doesn’t know about the Kalkite, Luthen doesn’t understand the urgency of saving that planet. So, he calls up Cassian and tells him to go to Ghorman and check if that part of the galaxy is worth saving.
Cassian doesn’t want to leave Bix, because things are not really great between them. She is now not only haunted by visions of Doctor Gorst but also images of all the young Imperial soldiers they’ve killed. To make things worse, since the couple is on Coruscant, the most surveilled planet in the galaxy, their paranoia is at an all-time high, and it has caused Cassian to become overprotective and Bix to depend on drugs. But when Luthen underscores the importance of the mission, he packs his bags and leaves.
Cassian Goes To Ghorman
In a pretty cool sequence in episode 5 of Andor Season 2, we see Cassian getting all the information he needs to pass himself off as Varian Skye, a budding fashion designer who is visiting Ghorman. While Cassian is away, Rael pays Bix a visit with the intention of giving her a job. However, after seeing what a mess she is, especially due to her drug problem (I think she’s using some form of rhydonium), he walks back on that decision and leaves with a warning about addiction. Cassian lands in Ghorman and is almost immediately approached by Enza, which is something that Cassian thinks is pretty immature. He does his best to underscore the fact that the Empire is looking for something to hold the Ghors accountable for so that they can subjugate them, which is why they have to be more careful about who they are putting their trust in. However, we all know that it’s too late because the Ghorman Front has unknowingly joined hands with Syril of all people, a fact that really concerns Cassian. He basically points out to Rylanz that Syril is feeding the Front white lies so that they play into the hands of the Empire by doing something drastic (like stealing weapons and getting violent), thereby leading to their downfall.
However, Rylanz and the Ghors are too desperate, which is why they don’t pay attention to Cassian’s warning, even going so far as to tell him to get the hell out of Ghorman if he can’t fight for them. So, Cassian deems the Ghors a lost cause and returns to Coruscant. By the way, while all this is going on in Cassian’s world, Kleya finds out that Davo has discovered that one or more items in his gallery are fake. So, he is planning to inspect and reject everything in there that seems suspicious. Since Kleya and Rael have bugged his gallery in order to keep tabs on what Davo is up to after he unknowingly funded the Rebel Alliance by donating to Mon’s Foundation, they are afraid that the sweep will unearth the listening device and blow their cover. There is an exhibition that’s going to happen, and the cleanup will take place after that. Hence, Kleya and Rael have to smuggle out the bug during said exhibition. If they fail, they have to cut and run. Elsewhere on Coruscant, Mon is seen asking senators to vote for a legislative bill that will protect the rights of the people of Ghorman, but to no avail. Even the Ghor representative, Senator Oran, has no hope for his planet, and he knows that, one day or the other, Ghorman will be squashed under the might of the Galactic Empire.
Wilmon Gets A Taste Of Saw’s Madness
In episode 4 of Andor Season 2, we got to D’Qar, the planet that eventually becomes the base for General Leia Organa’s Resistance forces, which is where Wilmon is apparently stationed to help Saw Gerrera with a mission that involves the poaching of a deadly substance called rhydonium. Apparently, it’s the stuff that’s used as starship fuel, but the thing is so volatile that without proper expertise in handling the material, one can die most excruciatingly. Saw wants to know if Wilmon’s credentials are legit, but since Wilmon doesn’t exactly know Saw, he doesn’t want to give him any information that can eventually be used against him. Saw, impressed by Wilmon’s confidence, doesn’t press him any further and makes a guy called Pluti his student. Wilmon is tasked with teaching Pluti the proper method to steal rhydonium. But here comes the kicker. Until Pluti is as good as Wilmon at extracting rhydonium, he isn’t allowed to leave D’Qar. Since this goes against the agreement between Luthen and Saw, Wilmon gets angry. However, since he is in Saw’s domain now, he has no option but to comply. In episode 5, Wilmon is seen training Pluti, who isn’t really a fast learner, thereby extending Wilmon’s stay. Later on, Pluti learns about something that shakes him to his core: Saw plans to kill Wilmon once he is done teaching Pluti about the unlocking variations needed for the heist.
Pluti knows that he won’t be able to pull off what’s needed of him without Wilmon. So, he admits to Saw that if he can focus on just one of the variations, he can learn it. What he’s saying is that since Saw and his platoon are planning to hit various rhydonium plants, he is facing this complication. If he can know the details of just one of them, he’ll be able to focus on that and get the job done without Wilmon’s help. Saw seemingly complies, which not only helps Pluti with his task but also delays Wilmon’s death. However, when the time comes to ship out, Saw actually shoots Pluti in the head and basically puts Wilmon in charge of the heist. It turns out that Pluti was actually an Imperial spy, and Saw intentionally gave him fake information about their mission so that he could confirm his allegiances. As soon as Saw learned that the Empire had been sent to the exact location that he had fed to Pluti, he realized that he was being played. Yeah, sometimes it’s good to be paranoid. Anyway, at the end of Andor Season 2, Episode 5, Saw and his group, which now includes Wilmon, depart from D’Qar, never to return there again, because he suspects that the planet will be swarming with Imperial forces as soon as they find out that Pluti has been killed. Upon reaching the planet where they are supposed to steal rhydonium, Saw radicalizes Wilmon in his signature style, while the lad skillfully extracts the fuel. I don’t know about you, but if I listened to Saw (who is played to perfection by Forest Whitaker) for too long, even I would be huffing rhydonium and fighting fascists till my dying breath.
