'Andor' returns to Disney

"Andor" returns for its second season on Disney+ with a three-episode premiere and the weight of the "Star Wars" galaxy seemingly on its shoulders.

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But creator Tony Gilroy says he and his collaborators felt little pressure from Disney and Lucasfilm as they sought to tell the story of a growing revolutionary resentment against the Galactic Empire and the birth of the Rebel Alliance leading up to the events of the 2016 film he scripted, “Rogue One.”

“We took no creative notes on this show,” Gilroy, whose deep screen-writing resume also includes four films in the “Bourne” franchise and 2007 Oscar nominee “Michael Clayton,” which he also directed.

He told The Associated Press that “I've never had this much freedom before, even in final-cut films that I worked on. The latitude was astonishing.”

The forthcoming season, whose production was delayed by Hollywood’s 2023 strikes, are coming with high expectations from fans who have been disappointed in other recent “Star Wars” TV offerings, with no new movies released in the franchise in six years.

The new episodes trace how the spark lit in Diego Luna’s Cassian Andor in the 2022 first season spreads through the galaxy. And they do it with characters and arcs rarely found in this realm before.