In 'Andor,' minor 'Star Wars' villains play major roles

In the galaxy of “Andor,” “Star Wars” super villains are relegated to the shadows.

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The Disney+ series is more interested in what might be called supervisor villains: the bureaucrats, planners, schemers and petty functionaries who make tyranny possible. Instead of Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine, we get Dedra Meero and Syril Karn, a pair of ambitious middle-managers who become an unlikely couple in their pursuit of Diego Luna’s Cassian Andor. “It's so nuanced, these villains are operating in a real grey zone, and they're representing a side of the empire that we have never seen before,” said Kyle Soller, who plays Karn. “You're getting a real like cogs and nuts and bolts view of how the empire machine works, from the very bottom to the upper echelons.”

In a joint interview with Soller for The Associated Press, Denise Gough, who plays Meero, added, “It can’t just be brute force. An empire can't survive on brute force, it takes all these Machiavellian, tiny movements here, tiny movements there, ripple effects everywhere.” Gough is a 45-year-old Irish actor who is also currently starring in the thriller “The Stolen Girl” on Hulu.