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And in traditional radicalizing fashion, it’s only once Cassian experiences the prison system first hand that he converts to “destroy the system” mode.

Kino's "redemption" is so great. Because Kino was never "wrong", per se, he was trying to do his best, to make sure everyone around him would too, for the best outcome for them all. But when he learned he was participating in a structure which only sought his and the deaths of others? He is a part of the revolution, the information that once made him a prized gear, now makes him its undoing.

So astute of the showrunners to have a character named “kino” in a show that is pure kino

The room in which Andor's trial takes place resembles an attic, exactly like the one Josef K. has his initial hearing in. You can see the beams on the ceiling that resemble roofing joists.

This is the first Star Wars narrative that actually took a deep dive into the human condition.

Andor is the single best piece of Star Wars media since the ot.

I need season 2 immediately.

Great video! One thing you kind of hinted at the end is that Andor and Kino and the other inmates succeed where Joseph K. failed is because Joseph was on his own. Thus not only power and authority can be exposed and communicated, but facing them and dismantling them requires collective action or it will be bound to fail. No single human is greater than the Big Other.

Everyday that a video about Andor is released is a good day. Also really good coincidence. I'm currently reading realism capitalism.

I hope we get to see Andor Season 2 where Bail Organa will be the mediator between Mon Mothma the Idealist, Saw Guerrera the Radicalist and Luthen Rael the Pragmatist in the Rebel Alliance even if they have conflicts of interest.

Andor was so REAL. It had me crying every episode, especially the prison arc, because it feels like life today, and Andor the show and Cassian himself are saying it dpeant have to be. Matter of fact, it shouldnt be, and we can fix it

I’m a simple cockroach. I see Kafka, I click.

I think you may be cutting the Emperor too much slack when it comes to getting Cassian and others like him arrested. The whole point of that order was to get slave labor for the building of the Death Star. The Emperor was 100% behind that, though of course I'm sure he left the handling of the specifics of acquiring that slave labor force to his underlings. Unlike Kafka's accusers, who genuinely had no reason at all to be making K miserable, Cassian's arrest and imprisonment was very much intentional and the intention wasn't just random bullying -- it was purposeful and effective.

I have to say, I had a very different take on Andor’s arrest. But I think your explanation is more important. My interpretation of why Andor was arrested was simply that the Empire needed workers. Those imperial officers all had a quota to fill, so they detained anyone they felt like, for any reason they wanted. Maybe Andor reminded that “police officer” of a guy who turned him down for a date in high school. Or he didn’t like his accent. Or it was just the press of numbers; he needed X but had only found N so far, and any able-bodied human male would do. So taking Andor was only arbitrary in that sense, but there was, overall, a clear purpose at the top. And the call went out: we need workers, and we don’t care how you get them. This is not all that far away from the current reality in the US. The biggest differences are that, for the most part, 1. only one caste has been the target of that effort to find people to take, and 2. not as workers per se, but “engines of profit” for our current privatized prison system, which needs bodies to make money, and the more people are injected into the system, the more money the owners of private prisons get. The lower economic caste is, of course, the target of this unmitigated evil greed, and the simplest way to quickly identify who most likely belongs to that caste is skin color. But your explanation - though perhaps capable of existing alongside mine - is more important. Looking at two of our real world’s leading democracies, the U.S. and Israel, we can see exactly what you describe being attempted right before our eyes. Our U.S. Supreme Court is now dominated by people dedicated to their own agenda, not the word of law. They just make shit up now. There’s no fidelity to the law as written, judicial precedent, or even their ultra-reactionary conservative ideology. We can’t be certain what they will rule about anything. And now we have Ben Netanyahu in Israel dispensing with judicial oversight altogether, subjecting his people to arbitrary government, dismissing the rule of law. So what you describe, rule of whim and deflection of responsibility, radiates from the top, and vital parts of the highest levels of both U.S. and Israeli governments are devolving into engines of precisely that kind of chaos. When people stop adhering to law, we get authoritarianism and autocracy. Excellent video. Essential viewing.

It's cool seeing Anthony Perkins in something other than Psycho.

It's the best Star War thing I've ever seen

I want a video edit where Cassian actually does take it up with the Emperor. And Palpatine is all apologetic and understanding and sees him compensated for the inconvenience.

“Where our protagonist is mistakenly arrested in Blackpool” pahahaaaa nice one

The plot plus some of the performances (Luna himself plus of course Skarsgard and Serkis) were truly fantastic, surprisingly good show and honestly one of the best things Disney have done with Star Wars.

On a rainy day last year I was detained walking back and forth on a covered strip mall right of way sidewalk after a dentist visit while waiting for my wife. I live in the USA. No one had asked me to leave or even spoken to me. I wasn't singing or talking. I was listening to an audio book called White Too Long The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity By Robert P. Jones. I saw the Andor episode right after that. For the record I'm coded as white.

Honestly as good as Andor is, it's held back a little bit by the IP. I think it feels perfect as a deeper look at the Star Wars universe, but it's a shame that a ton of people will probably never watch Andor, just because of the total IP burnout people have with Disney anymore. The show stands toe-to-toe with with the classics of the Sci Fi genre in my opinion. But nobody saw a modern classic when it released. They saw yet another piecemeal drop of Star Wars media in the overflowing, dirty bucket of modern Disney.

Andor? I hardly know'er!

This show single handedly justifies the Disney buyout imo. It’s legit the best piece of Star Wars media in actual decades

I've been binging Andor video essays because I'm desparate for more Andor content. The structure here is maybe more "traditional" than other video essays, which is by no means a criticism. The content of this essay, however, is thoroughly more interesting than other essays I've sat through. Andor is the first Disney Star Wars show that can really be compared to proper, good art. Well done man, great essay.

Shear fact that analysis like this are possible and being made is a proof of Andor's series quality level. Absolutely loved it. Well done Pillar!

Andor is probably the best Star wars storytelling. The show does so much with the dialogue is so dense than even the design of sets and things I think are contribute to the story. Such as the prison. It resembles the panopticon that has been discussed his philosophy as a sort of totalitarian prison.

I agree, it is really a great show.

Speaking of Kafka, I highly recommend playing The Franz Kafka Video Game. It's one of the best point and click adventure games ever made.

I really loved Andor, it is my favorite Star Wars media, if not of all time, certainly of the Star Wars released this century. Thanks for the analysis.

The Trial is the basically the first thing I thought of when I saw the arrest and sentencing sequence. The whole situation is somehow hilarious and terrifying at the same time. 😂😱

like what you did with the audio for the Kafka quotes that was cool.

"A man once said: Hell is the impossibility of reason". It took me many years before I realized how true that statement is. if reason can't get you anywhere, there's nothing else left than to go insane

Also kafka had first hand insight into th terrors of bureaucratic labyriths and geting lost in them, he wa either a secritary at courts or a lawyer. He knew of the criminal justice systems and , that. probably what ,akes him sadly timeless.He hated that job. Not that all courts have tobe that, but eay can be used and just grind their wheel once catching anyone, at last smallr guys usually.

I don’t usually comment on videos, but this video essay was absolutely fantastic. Your writing and textual analysis is amazing. You deserve so much more attention! I love the almost Foucauldian edge to your analysis of the prison section.

Brilliant video. One of the best analyses of the show I’ve seen

Very well articulated

Thanks for tricking me into watching a half hour video about the trial by baiting me in with StarWars, great video!

I'm not terribly well read (when it comes to classics), so I wasn't aware of the Kafka connection. However, I've also been binge-watching DS9 recently, and this vid also reminded me that they effectively did this to Chief O'Brien twice (once by the Cardassians, and once for the mind-prison episode)

Amazing video! Loved this arc in Andor

Yay! More Pillar stuff to watch!!

beautifully written and presented essay. thank you.

you are based for making this.

It’s so awesome to see your channel growing

This video is really well done, thanks for making it

Great vid man 👍

Great essay. Fantastic stuff

I'd like it if you did breakdowns on some of the Spectacular Spider-Man villains like you've done for the EMH characters. It feels like you're the only channel out there (except HiTop films) who's really broken down individual parts of the show, and that show meant a lot to my childhood. It seems like you like the show as well, and I really enjoyed your videos on Midsummer Night's Dream (which I watched shortly before my own school's production of the play). Some of the villains in that show have very dynamic arcs; Sandman, Norman Osborn, Eddy Brock, and Colonel Jupiter come to mind.

I don't know why but the first citation just got me fascinated from the beginning to end of the video.

This story arc was easily the best part of the entire show.

When you talk about the level of overreach on Niamos, it suddenly puts the desolate look of the planet come episode 11 in a whole new light. Is it the off-season, or is it that even in this (slightly) less war-crime-of-the-week mode, people know that Niamos _is no longer safe?_

Oh cool, will watch this later after a meeting. Loved Andor though

I really wish that a video like this could bring an "awakening" to populations on this pale blue dot... People need to realize they are stronger then they believe, and that strength is their power.

I really gotta finish this show. It was so good.

It feels like Atlanta has become a microcosm of all the contemporary issues Andor has touched upon the past few months. Starting with the fact that the facility is being built with in a an indigenous forest that would result in considerable ecological and environmental damage much like what the Imperials did to Aldhani. Likewise with police agencies responding to hundreds of black-bloc militants chasing out the cops with fireworks before torching the construction site by detaining festival goers who had nothing to do with said attack and charged as 'domestic terrorists' as a form of collective punishment thanks to a statute ironically enough created after a white supremacists shot up a black church. None of those charged with 'domestic terrorism' have actually been accused of actual acts that would've constituted as such under the statute. And of course before that there was the considerable unrest that erupted in downtown Atlanta after the execution of an unarmed activist in which a police cruiser was destroyed and several corporations supporting Cop City were vandalized.

This video essay deserves more love, its fantastic.

I feel most of Kafka's work was inspired by his own depression. So him writing a book where he's arrested for no reason fits the paranoid worldview of a depressed man, who thinks everyone is against him.

Brilliant!

Nemik’s Manifesto- though nothing of it’s sort is referenced in The Trial it can be said that it was/is a key difference in how Cassian’s views on the Individual’s place in an encroaching fascist society. Perhaps an “Andor Essay” is in the works in this regard? Good stuff, btw!

Hey… This video is super cool and goated.

Its so fascinating looking at the conflicts between art and Authoritarianism. There is a long tradition in fascism branches of the disavowment of more esoteric art, characterized well by Hitler's famous quote about blue hills and green skies. In more recent times there have been attacks on pieces of modern art like "Who's afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue" by fascist leaning individuals. Another massive 20th century authoritarian body, The USSR also had an absolutely fascinating relationship with art in society, though more prominently and I would say crucially with music. Music in the Union had two streams, officially sanctioned, and underground/illegal, both of which heavily influenced society. Of course the most obvious means of artistic control was censorship but there were other softer controls too such as the words used to describe music which carried a derogatory connotation for non-Russian non-classical music. The underground music scene was far more influential in the long term and there is no coincidence that nearly every democratic revolution by Post-Soviet countries involved music and the Baltic states gained independence through the "Singing Revolution". In the Union western music was extremely popular in spite of the massive risks one took in owning such records and it was usually the authorities themselves who were responsible for their smuggling particularly the further from Moscow you got. In places like Mongolia there were songs like The Ringing of the Bell which were sung in chorus by enormous groups of protesters; In Russia itself the sole legal rock music location became a hotbed for artists pushing the limits of what censorship allowed for under the loosening restrictions of Glasnost and so you get groups like Kino, Mashina Vremeni, and DDT who become amongst the best known Russian bands following the collapse of the USSR. I guess this just turned into a long way of saying hey Disney where are all the artists in your universe.

Great video! Seriously!

Reminds me way too much of how asylum seeking is handled in Europe (at least). Well, the whole of immigration really, but soncalled "economic migrants" get a prettier face that looks less like a trial (though it generally is, in practice) and the nicer more lenient side of the bureaucratic grinder, so people usually don't see much of an issue. Sometimes, I hate this planet.

Thats why Andor is the best star wars thing ever!! Its so more complex than any movie, so rich in its meaning, I loved it so much

I loved this show

Well made video. As a German, I wanna add a tiny detail about Kafkas „Der Prozess“, as in German, the word „Prozess“ can, as a noun, mean Trial, which it was translated to as ir is topic of the book. But, as another noun, it means as „process“. Cool detail and in my opinion a comment on the idea of a system, that just keeps going without second doubt or maybe even a first.

I have been telling people to watch The Trial for decades now, and now I am telling you. It's bonkers, it's bothersome, it's beautiful, it's unnerving.

This was basically the story of a lot of African American men post Emancipation Proclamation where you then saw a lot of black men arrested for “crimes”. The movie “Life” with Martin Lawrence and Eddie Murphy does a great job of highlighting this in semi humorous manner.

Agree

There is an unwritten description of the physical environment that i found terrifying on a subliminal level, i could not continue reading this story. I need to go back and try again.

Need more explanation on how functionaries wrap themselves in the comfort of such a system as it gives them _orientation_ and _identity_ , the two things necessary for one to experience _meaning_ in life. The clerk at city hall has their job title (identity) and a narrow section of rules (orientation) that is enough to for them to feel they validated. This is actually the model for the vast majority of people and they do not see the overall concept or long-term product of their actions or acknowledge the relevance of it if pointed out. Is this mere cognitive dissonance or selfishness or stupidity? Yes, and all of us do it to some degree at all times just to maintain our sanity. We cannot know every eventual outcome of every one of our actions any more than the butterfly flapping its wings that initiates the hurricane/typhoon. But we do know that not flapping those wings (doing our job according to the rules) will endanger our job (identity).

To see the arrest of Cassian Andor as Kafkaesque is a very interesting perspective, but to me it is just a spotlight to how those kinds of regimes actually work, that stuff that happened to Andor does happen in the real world, my dad ended up in jail in a VERY similar way once.

The Trial isn’t about a lawless bureaucracy. Joseph K only comes to his proceedings once. He is late because he assumed he’d recognize the place he’d never been in, after also assuming the time of the proceedings without asking, where before the judge can even make sure who he is he jumps and declares the whole system a sham in which he refuses to participate, that can keep on going without him for as much as he cares about it. Which, to his request, it does. This condemnation of the court by K isn’t the end of the story, this is the second out of 13 chapters. If the whole of the work was about an arbitrariness of judgement, why does the book go on so long after the main thesis? Why does K not hear any accusations against himself, false or true? It is K that describes his accuser as arbitrary and thus unworthy of an effort showing his innocence. The witness Joseph K have duped many a reader which ignored contradictions in K’s claims and the events of the first and later chapters. K does not tangle with an uncaring system, he deems it so to not consider what he might be guilty of. With his own lawyer K doesn’t bother to ask what he’s even accused of. Just sits around waiting for this burden to be lifted. Andor might be what many describe as kafkaesque, but Kafka’s own works rarely are.

I'm a burocrat. I firmly believe my current work is for good but about half my decisions can't be justified other than by a vague nebulous sense of how my department interperates things. Is scairely easy to imagine how easily this system could enforce evil without any accoutability.

I really don't like the translation of the opening quote. A more accurate translation would be: "Somebody must have slandered ["verleumdet"] Josef K., for, without having done any evil ["Böses"], he was arrested one morning." It just... has a different gravity than simply saying somebody "told lies" and Josef K. didn't do "anything truly wrong" imo.

The adventures of space che .

The process is my favourite from kafka

Kino's journey

Andor is elite

It drives me nuts when people call the arrest of Cassian as pointless, trite, random, etc. Maybe as a "leftist" 🤓, I am attuned to link these narratives. Because it seemed pretty obvious his arrest is coincidental but NOT RANDOM lazy story telling.

Now I want to hear the story of an all powerful but weary emperor brought low by the need to rely on fascist bureaucracy to control a galaxy being the seed to spark the rebellion that brings it all down

I had an epiphany while watching this. Some conservatives don’t understand why people not directly effected by a cause still choose to support it. It’s because they see if they don’t stand up for this one injustice it will simply pave a way for more injustices that may eventually effect them directly.

I took the arrest as a comment on America's injustice system, which routinely prosecutes innocent people for the profit of prison owners.

I mean I appreciate you trying to bring these concepts back to our own world, but i think you're underestimating the effect of the Dark Lord of the Sith had upon how insanely totalitarianism the Empire becomes. He'd gotten his dirty claws deep even back when it was the Republic, god knows all the sorts of things he got up to as both the Supreme Chancellor AND the secret separatist leader, but he clearly takes this to a whole new level with the Empire. I think in Andor, their attack was just the excuse he needed to start up his new slave system needed to build the Death Star, but Luthen obviously knew and banked upon the Empire responding so strongly. But I'd argue it's more tied up in "evil Sith space magic" than it is with a system that doesn't know what it's doing. The Dark Side of the force seems to get stronger with the more death and suffering in the universe, so i think the influence of the Sith in all this misery cannot be understated. I wouldn't be surprised if Sidious had a direct hand in this nightmare slave-prison, or at the very least directed those directly beneath him to make it happen.

Good video. This is the world I experience. The difference with Andor is it's a fantasy in which we indulge in dreams of taking on and overcoming the system. You are right it isn't that simple or enough, it is nothing. It is hopeful and inspiring but made up. In fact it's cathartic, releasing of frustration, reinforcing the system, reducing our efforts. There's nothing we can do that will change the heavy tide.

One thing that jerked me out of my reverie was the fact that the orbital shot of Europe at 23:48 was mirror-flipped. Why?

This video make me almost want to pirate Andor. Almost.

8:32 Just curious, why is keef girgo a spectacular name?

Andor is the best of Star Wars

You don't have to have read Kafka to wonder at the absurdity of policing in America and many other places in the world. But maybe more folks will see the parallels if they read the book or see this video. Thank you.

Or... You've had the exposure to the obscure source material that was conveniently lifted for stage directions and script!?!?!

I just watched the D&D movie and had a thought about that prison related to this (spoilers, natch) I think the film really undercuts itself in the opening sequence where they escape the prison during their parole hearing. We know that prison is a brutal and unfair system: the prisoners are seen doing hard labor, chopping ice for no apparent reason. They weren’t arrested for hurting anyone, just for trying to steal something. This is an obviously and inherently unjust system, just like we see in America today. That’s why it sucks that their pardon is granted. It makes for a great joke that establishes the film’s tone of these lucky bastards taking the hard way out, but it really undercuts what we know to be the reality of prison. Edgin secures their release through eloquence and a heartfelt appeal-unlike the real world, in which far too often, innocent people serve full and brutal sentences. The movie was fun and I’m glad it was made, but there are all kinds of little notes like this that make me wish the script had been approached a bit more thoughtfully.

Looking forward to this being a critique of capitalism and the police state of the USA! Will update after I watch.

Cleveleys not Blackpool!

I would really appreciate to see these bureaucracy things with lustrations and these corrupted judges of the Empire seeing their new fate in the New Republic. I really hate that BS story in Mandalorian S3 with that scientist. It could have been much much more. Sheesh. Rogue One and Andor are really the only things that are great in the StarWars Disney era.

is this meat kafkaesque

what a view from a person who never encountered oppression You need to talk to people who encountered oppression in Africa and Arab world. Go to a refugee centre near you which include ppl who were jailed in countries like Syria by the government or Ukraine by Russia. Then and only then you will understand Kafka and see how real it is. I personally didn't fully understand Kafka until I lived with those ppl who suffered this kind of oppression. I am not being antagonistic towards you I am just stating my opinion. I enjoy your work and you're video essays.

Nice video essay, are you going to take on the way driods in Star Wars normalise slavery?

3:42 How is anything set during the galactic empire a critique of capitalism? It doesn't get much less capitalist than an emperor controlling everything

control is natural enough. without it the old and infirm would have nothing to keep them alive and comfortable. charity only takes the form of defective worn and torn hand me downs.