Andor season 2: everything we know so far about the hit Star Wars show’s return

Andor season 2 is up there with the most eagerly anticipated of the new Star Wars movies and TV shows – and, as we're sure you'll agree, with good reason.

When the Rogue One: A Star Wars Story prequel debuted in August 2022, it revelled in showing us the gritty underbelly of George Lucas’s famous galaxy, so much so we called it a "blood-pumping spy thriller that might be the best Star Wars show yet in our Andor season 1 review.

Showrunner Tony Gilroy – the writer widely credited with saving Rogue One – is back to continue Cassian Andor's (Diego Luna) Emmy-nominated story, and he's already confirmed that the 12 episode season will be the show’s last, with its final episode will run directly into the opening of Rogue One. "If you know your ending, it really helps," Gilroy said at Star Wars Celebration 2023 (via Variety). "We know exactly where we’re going. You know what you have to deliver emotionally and what the story has to do. It’s good for us creatively."

Indeed, this is one Star Wars story where the journey is going to be considerably more important than the final destination. So, ahead of Andor's return, here’s everything we know so far about season 2, including release date speculation, plot predictions, and its known cast details. Andor season 1 spoilers ahead!

Andor season 2 release date: what we know so far

Lucasfilm is yet to confirm an official Andor season 2 release date, but showrunner Tony Gilroy told Star Wars Celebration 2023 attendees he was targeting a mid-2024 launch.

"We started shooting in November [2022]," he confirmed via Deadline. "We’re halfway. We will finish shooting in August, [then] a year on post, and we’ll come out in the following August."

Since then, production has been hit by external factors that could push its launch back – namely, the now resolved writers strike and ongoing actors strike. At the time, The Hollywood Reporter revealed Gilroy (a member of the Writers Guild of America) had to step away from showrunning duties, although he finished season 2's final script days before the industrial action (per Deadline).

At the time of writing, principal photography remains incomplete as negotiations continue between the major studios and SAG-AFTRA members, so production is unlikely to resume any time soon. When it does, it’ll be massively behind schedule, meaning we might not lay eyes on Andor season 2 in August 2024.

"The only place you can accelerate the processes is in post and the only way you can accelerate in post is with money, and money is tight," Gilroy told Collider in November 2022, long before the strikes became a reality. "Someone would have to say, ‘Wow, we really need this, and we’re willing to pay X.’ Rogue One proved, if you throw money at it, you can do post really, really fast. It’s just very, very, very expensive". In short: season 2 of Andor is on the way, but it won't be on Disney Plus for a while.

Andor season 2 cast: confirmed and rumored

Here's who we expect to return in Andor season 2: 

• Diego Luna as Cassian Andor
• Genevieve O’Reilly as Mon Mothma
• Stellan Skarsgård as Luthen Rael
• Denise Gough as Dedra Meero
• Kyle Soller as Syril Karn
• Adria Arjona as Bix Caleen
• Faye Marsay as Vel Sartha
• Varada Sethu as Cinta Kaz
• Elizabeth Dulau as Kleya Marki
• Anton Lesser as Major Partagaz
• Duncan Pow as Ruescott Melshi

In an interview with Empire, Andy Serkis also hinted – or, more accurately, didn't deny – that his season 1 character, Kino Loy, will live to fight another day. Chatting to SlashFilm, Gilroy also teased: "We didn't see him die", so he may still be alive.

There were close to 200 speaking parts (and thousands of extras) in Andor's first season, so we’ll likely see plenty of newcomers on the Andor season 2 cast list. Lucasfilm is yet to announce any new stars, though Spanish site Levante (thanks to StarWarsNewsNet for the find) did spot Benjamin Bratt (Poker Face) when filming took place in València. This has led fans to assume he’s bagged himself a role in outer space.

Andor hasn’t gone particularly big on cameos from legacy Star Wars characters, either, but its first outing contained appearances from characters we've seen in other projects.

For one, we already know Rogue One soldier Ruescott Melshi is back, with Gilroy confirming as much to Deadline. Imperial bigwig Wullf Yularen (Malcolm Sinclair), who dates all the way back to Episode IV: A New Hope, and extremist Rebel Saw Gerrera (played by Oscar-winner Forest Whitaker) also featured in season 1, and we expect this duo to return.

We wouldn’t be surprised if they’re joined by a few more familiar faces from Rogue One, too. Bodhi Rook (Riz Ahmed), an Empire pilot who defects to the Rebellion and Tivik (Daniel Mays), the Rebel spy Cassian kills early on in Rogue One, could both cross paths with the nascent Rebel Alliance. Orson Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn) is presumably hard at work on the Death Star – the legendary battle station Andor and his fellow inmates unwittingly helped to build during their imprisonment on Narkina 5.

We'd be amazed if K-2SO, the Imperial security droid who's Cassian’s mechanical BFF in Rogue One, doesn't finally show up as well. Speaking to Collider, Gilroy seemingly confirmed K-2SO would make his TV debut in season 2, with the showrunner calling the android's first meeting with Cassian "one of the responsibilities of part 2".

As for other potential actor appearances, Gilroy told SlashFilm: "We have some things we have to do and some people we have to meet". Expect a few more familiar faces to pop up before the show ends.

Star Wars: Andor season 2 plot: rumors and speculation

While season 1 mapped out 12 months in Cassian Andor’s life, Andor season 2's plot is spread across the four years leading up to Rogue One. The forthcoming 12-episode season will be split into four installments, comprising three episodes apiece, that each depict a 12-month period covering a pivotal few days of the Star Wars timeline (check out our guide to how to watch the Star Wars movies in order for more on where it'll be set). Oh, and Gilroy revealed to Collider that "a great deal has happened in the interim [between season 1's finale and the start of season 2]", so expect some plot exposition to be laid out in season 2's opening episode.

"When we come back, it’ll be literally like a Friday, Saturday, and Sunday," Gilroy told Deadline. "And then, we’ll jump a year, and then it’ll be, like, four or five days, and then we’ll jump a year, and then there’ll be another four or five days, and then we jump a year, and be another four or five days. Our last block is the last three days before Rogue One. So, the last shot will be walking into Rogue One. So, you can imagine that we have to do a lot of interlacing at the end, with the [Star Wars] calendar."

We know, then, the beginning and end of Andor season 2 – but everything in between remains something of a mystery.

"The beauty of this show is that even though sometimes you know what's going to happen, it hits you as though you’re learning it for the first time," star Diego Luna told Entertainment Weekly (EW). "You are witnessing this from the inside, from the personal perspective. You get to live it with the characters, or through the characters. Therefore, it hits you differently. It’s not about the events, necessarily, but about the choices made and the risks these characters are taking. It’s because you know them that you care like you didn’t care before."

So, what did the season 1 finale set up for its successor? (Full spoilers follow for Andor season 1 after the tweet below!).

At the end of season 1, Cassian Andor briefly returned to his home planet Ferrix for the funeral of his adoptive mother, Maarva. After she posthumously incited an anti-Imperial riot, he managed to rescue ex-girlfriend Bix Caleen from Imperial torture and convince morally flexible Rebel Alliance kingpin Luthen Rael not to kill him. Now that the previously ambivalent Cassian has a reason to take the fight to the Empire, it looks like he’ll be a fully fledged member of the Alliance next time we see him.

"Cassian’s commitment to the cause is not in doubt," Gilroy explained to Polygon. "If it was about him becoming a revolutionary, then the second half is about him becoming a leader."

Although her name isn’t in the title, Andor was as much about Mon Mothma as its eponymous antihero. Over the course of season 2, the character has to evolve from a respected senator helping fund the Rebels on the sly, to the leader we see making pivotal decisions on Yavin IV in Rogue One. 

Speaking of Yavin IV, Gilroy let slip to Collider that season 2 will be paying a visit to the Rebel base's headquarters. Oh, and successfully taking the fight to the Empire will also require Mothma turning a blind eye to the activities of operatives (like the aforementioned Rael) who aren’t afraid to get their hands dirty.

"If your business is based on paranoia and secrecy and death, how do you expand your business?" Gilroy asked in EW. "How do you go public? How do you go wide? What happens to all the original gangsters and the hardcore people who built that road? What happens to them, and how do they integrate with [a legitimate Rebel Alliance]?"

Cassian will also be doing his best to stay one step ahead of Dedra Meero, the ambitious Imperial Security Bureau (ISB) agent who became obsessed with catching him. Matters may be a bit more complicated, however, now that she owes a debt to disgraced police officer Syril Karn, who saved her from rioters on Ferrix in the season 1 finale. 

After their surprisingly close encounter in a broom cupboard, Karn – the most intriguing, multi-layered character in the show – surely has a big part to play in the pursuit of Andor, the man who effectively ruined his career.

"The end of season 1 is so perfect for Syril," told Esquire. "He’s kept Cassian as this talisman that’s giving him fuel to stay alive, basically. It’s a receptacle to put his frustration and aggression. And he’s still living at home, so he doesn’t have any friends or a therapist. He doesn’t have a dog. He also knows that he’s right.

"Then, through his relationship with Dedra, being seen by her and feeling seen, that’s a massive indication. And so this is like, ‘Wow, it’s [Cassian’s] mom’s funeral, it’s all coming together again. It’s at the place where I f***ed up last time. I can put this right'. He sees this opportunity to swoop in. It’s not even that he views it as a hero moment. I think it’s just his obsession with Cassian, that starts to extend itself to Dedra, because she’s involved in the same obsession. He recognizes that the two of them are more powerful together than they are separately."

Given Andor season 2 directly leads into Rogue One (and, by proxy, Star Wars Episode IV), we'll eventually see the Rebel Alliance learn all about the Death Star and the Empire's plan to use it against worlds that resist their tyrannical rule. In the post-credits scene of season 1's final episode, we learned that Cassian, Kino, and other Narkina 5 prisoners had been building components for the Death Star's lazer array, meaning they had a hand in its creation. 

"It [the Death Star's construction] will still be the looming threat," Gilroy told The Hollywood Reporter. "Rogue One is all about discovering what it is. [Season two is] about who picks up the final breadcrumbs that lead to the beginning of Rogue One. In Rogue One, Cassian goes to the Ring of Kafrene to meet Tivik, who is from Saw’s group, and he says 'Oh my God, it’s a planet killer'. Cassian knows some shit, but he’s looking for answers. So we’ll [cover] the breadcrumbs that lead up to that, sure. But we have a situation where Cassian will never know that what he was building is actually the machine that’s going to kill him."

Amid all the intergalactic and political warfare, one seemingly forgotten plot thread continues to dangle in the background: has Cassian given up on finding his sister, which is what set Andor's events in motion in its premiere?

"I don't think so," Luna teased to Collider. "I don't think it's over in Rogue One, because I see that as one thing. It's like the feeling, it's one of those things that kind of follow every decision you make, or never letting [go] anymore, not again. That kind of thing. And I think that's behind the decision of that last mission, that suicide mission in Rogue One. That's for her. That's for Maarva, that's for his people, for his community. I love the arc that Tony has built, and the arc ends in Rogue One, not in season 2. I think it's going to be quite amazing to watch Rogue One after you see season 2."

Andor season 2 trailer: is there one?

There’s no Andor season 2 trailer yet, and we don’t expect to see one until much nearer to the show’s release. Indeed, given past Lucasfilm form, it’s extremely unlikely we’ll see something significant before early 2024.

That said, those who attended Star Wars Celebration 2023 were treated to a sneak peek at footage from the new season. Reports say it included Stormtroopers, civil unrest, Cassian Andor on a mission against time, Mon Mothma rallying the Rebellion, and plenty of Syril Karn.

Three Star Wars shows to watch while we wait for Andor season 2

With Andor season 2's release date still TBD, Star Wars fans new and old may want to pass the time with other TV shows set in Lucasfilm's iconic galaxy far, far away. If that's you, stick one of these series (two in particular are considered to be some of the best Disney Plus shows ever made) on to pass the time. Happy watching, young Padawan!

• The Mandalorian – billed as a space Western and set between Star Wars Episode VI and Episode VII, Pedro Pascal's lone gunslinger becomes a surrogate father to 'baby Yoda', a juvenile of the legendary Jedi's alien race, who is apparently vital importance to a Machiavellian scheme concocted by the Galactic Empire's remnants. All three seasons are available in full on Disney Plus.
• Star Wars: Ahsoka – running parallel to events in The Mandalorian, this live-action sequel to Star Wars: Rebels, sees the fan-favorite Togruta Force wielder reunite with her Rebels allies to thwart the return of a menacing Empire general. Stream all eight episodes now and then read our Star Wars: Ahsoka ending explainer to see how it sets up future Star Wars storylines.
• The Book of Boba Fett – the weakest of Lucasfilms' live-action shows, Boba Fett's standalone series sees the iconic bounty hunter navigate the underworld of Lucasfilm's galaxy as he attempts to replace Jabba the Hutt as Tattooine's number one crime lord. All seven episodes are available now on Disney Plus, aka one of the world's best streaming services.