Andor‘s third block of episodes, which aired two days after Star Wars Day, might be the most connected to the larger franchise. Not only did Episode 8 showcase the Ghorman massacre, which has deep ties to Star Wars lore, but the ninth episode is both a great standalone piece of political commentary and a prologue to an episode from a popular Star Wars animated series, Star Wars: Rebels.
Star Wars: Rebels premiered on Oct. 3, 2014, and was the first piece of new material added to the Star Wars canon following Disney’s purchase of the franchise in 2012. Running for four seasons, the series followed a group of Rebels known as the Phoenix Squadron during the early years of the Rebellion before the events of Star Wars. Rebels featured Genevieve O’Reilly reprising her role as Mon Mothma in a story that saw her fleeing the Empire after speaking out against the Ghorman Massacre, which now makes it a sequel to this Andor storyline. Here is how Andor and Rebels connect within the larger Star Wars franchise. Andor also retcons what came before, but the result might be one of the best hours of Star Wars storytelling ever.
Is There Any Overlap Between ‘Rebels’ and ‘Andor’ in the ‘Star Wars’ Timeline?
Star Wars: Rebels and Andor take place in the period that Star Wars canon storytelling often refers to as The Age of Rebellion. Both series tackle the formation of the Rebel Alliance and its early years before Luke Skywalker joins the cause and the beginning of Star Wars happens. Andor and Rebels could be seen as companion Star Wars stories, as each has episodes set within specific years of the timeline leading up to the Battle of Yavin and the destruction of the Death Star — the standard Lucasfilm uses to track Star Wars events (though this system doesn’t exist in-universe).
Here is a breakdown of how Andor Seasons 1 and 2 fit into the Star Wars timeline and which seasons of Rebels match that timeframe.
5BBY – Andor Season 1 / Star Wars Rebels Season 1 Episodes 1 through 7
4BBY – Andor Season 2 Episodes 1 through 3/ Rebels Season 1, Episode 8 through Season 2, Episode 9
3BBY – Andor Season 3 Episodes 3 through 6/ Rebels Season 2, Episode 10 through Season 2, Episode 22
2BBY – Andor Season 3 Episodes 7 through 9/ Rebels Season 3
1BBY – Andor Season 3 Episodes 10 through 12/ Rebels Season 4
Related
20 Years Later, ‘Revenge of the Sith’ Remains a Masterclass in Movie Marketing
‘Revenge of the Sith’ was more than just the seeming end of the ‘Star Wars’ saga, but a celebration that could not be missed.
Rebels‘ “Secret Cargo” episode takes place after the events of Andor Season 2’s ninth episode. This means the Rebels’ first 17 episodes before “Secret Cargo” occur before Andor‘s seventh episode begins. There is no real overlap between the previous episodes of Andor and Rebels. Given that Andor Season 2 episodes occur over a few days, it’s possible they could run parallel to the Rebels episodes or take place during unexplored periods in the animated series. The only real case that can be made is that Andor Season 1 likely takes place before the events of Rebels Season 1.
The biggest character connection between Andor and Rebels is Saw Gerrera, who originated in Star Wars: The Clone Wars before being brought into Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, where Forrest Whitaker played him. Whittaker reprised his role as Saw Gerrera in Rebels and Andor, while a younger version of Saw Gerrera also appeared in The Bad Batch.
Through both Andor and Rebels, Star Wars shows the birth of the Rebellion from two different points of view. Andor explores the dark underbelly of the Rebellion, while Rebels shows the more heroic adventures of the organization, showing the various sides that came together to bring down the Empire. Andor showcases a more politically inclined version of the conflict, akin to the prequel trilogy. At the same time, Rebels features more of the swashbuckling adventures of a rag-tag team commonly associated with the original trilogy. This is why Rebels and Andor‘s Mon Mothma episodes blend so well, making great complementary pieces of a larger Star Wars story, showcasing the vast scope of the Rebel Alliance’s origins and the various operatives that made it possible.
‘Andor’ Leads Directly Into “Secret Cargo”
In Andor, Cassian successfully gets Mon Mothma off Coruscant to the Rebel Alliance, but does not seem to bring her to Yavin 4. He is informed that Gold Squadron (Y-Wing fighters) will escort and transport Mon Mothma to Yavin 4 after she is set to deliver a new message, a call for action that will unite various rebels around the galaxy following her speaking out. This is where Cassian leaves Mon Mothma in this story, but the aftermath, Gold Squadron’s escort, and her message transmission are shown in the Rebels episode “Secret Cargo,” which aired on Disney XD on Mar. 4, 2017.
The episodes involve members of Phoenix Squadron, Captain Hera Syndulla, Lasat warrior Zeb, and Jedi knight-in-training Ezra Bridger. They are waiting to rendezvous with a Rebel ship carrying secret cargo, Mon Mothma, who is on the run after speaking out against the Emperor in the Senate. However, the Empire intercepts and disables the original transport ship, forcing Mothma to move onto Captain Syndulla’s ship, the Ghost, with Gold Squadron escorting them to Dantooine, a former Rebel base that Leia Organa would later give to Tarkin as a fake location for the Rebel base in Star Wars. Mothma gives a rousing speech broadcast to various channels across the galaxy, and the Rebel Alliance finally starts to take form.
Andor‘s episode works rather well as a prequel to Star Wars: Rebels “Secret Cargo.” Despite different formats and target demographics, the two episodes are excellent complementary pieces that tell a greater part of the Star Wars story. The small comment at the end about Gold Squadron escorting Mothma at the end of Andor is a simple way to explain how the two series don’t seemingly contradict one another, as now it appears Cassian met up with another team that transported Mothma while he went to Yavin 4 separately. Andor makes the two stories seamlessly blend. However, Andor does retcon Rebels slightly, but does it for the betterment of both Andor as a series and Star Wars.
‘Andor’ Makes a Major Change to Mothma’s Speech, But It Is Great
While Andor and Rebels blend together into one larger story, the live-action Disney+ series changes the context of Mothma’s speech. The circumstances remain the same, as Mon Mothma is spurred to speak out following the Ghorman Massacre. In Rebels, the speech is a generalized but effective call out of the Emperor in a fashion that fits into the original Star Wars trilogy mold of framing the Empire as Nazi Germany. Also, the prequels’ critical lens of the Bush administration’s use of excessive wartime powers following 9/11. Mothma’s speech in Rebels goes:
“I name the Emperor himself for ordering the brutal attacks on the people of Ghorman. Their peaceful world is one of countless systems helpless against his oppressive rule. This massacre is proof our self-appointed Emperor is little more than a lying executioner imposing his tyranny under the pretense of security. We cannot allow this evil to stand.
In Andor, Mon Mothma’s speech is a wider commentary and reflection on the spread of misinformation, which certainly hits close to home for audiences watching Andor in 2025. The idea of those with the loudest screams being so defensive that it drowns everything could apply to many subjects in the current political climate, particularly those who willingly choose to spread misinformation for profit and personal gain.
“I stand this morning with a difficult message. I believe we are in crisis. The distance between what is said and what is known to be true has become an abyss. Of all the things at risk, the loss of an objective reality is perhaps the most dangerous. The death of truth is the ultimate victory of evil. When truth leaves us, when we let it slip away, when it is ripped from our hands, we become vulnerable to the appetite of whatever monster screams the loudest. This chamber’s hold on the truth was finally lost on the Ghorman Plaza. What took place yesterday, what happened yesterday on Ghorman was unprovoked genocide! Yes! Genocide! That truth has been exiled from this chamber! And the monster screaming the loudest? The monster we helped create? The monster who will come for us all soon enough…is Emperor Palpatine!”
Mon Mothma’s speech feels timely and relevant, reflecting the world in which it was released, as George Lucas’ Star Wars films did. Lucas compared the Rebel Alliance to the Viet Cong and the Empire to the American military-industrial complex. At the same time, the prequel trilogy has gained a newfound appreciation for how relevant the trade tariffs plotline was and how “liberty dies with thunderous applause.” Now, Andor is looking at the state of the world, specifically a post-Trump America. Worth remembering that Rogue One, the film Andor is a prequel to, was released one month after Trump won the 2016 election.
Related
Everything We Know About Ryan Gosling’s ‘Star Wars’ Movie
Ryan Gosling is set to star in a Shawn Levy-helmed ‘Star Wars’ film, and here’s everything we know about it!
While Andor Season 2 was written and filmed well before the second Trump administration, its words certainly hold a great deal of power now at a time when the United States government has been deporting children with cancer, spreading misinformation about gang members having MS-13 tattoos, and spreading a level of discourse in the country that the media is lying and only Trump, the person in power, can be trusted and everyone else is the enemy. Andor‘s third batch of episodes, and Mon Mothma’s speech, now hold even more weight following the White House’s May the 4th post, where an AI-generated image of Trump showed him wielding a red lightsaber, common with the villains in the Star Wars franchise.
The two speeches are drastically different, both in tone and context. Rebels, which was written first, was aimed more at a younger audience and was more a commentary on the Emperor’s unchecked power in the galaxy that led to the massacre. Andor didn’t try to bend itself over to make Rebels‘ speech fit into Andor; instead, it reinterpreted the scene differently, focusing more on the current tangible rise in fascism and fearmongering that is spreading in the 21st century, which hits close to home for the viewer. The two speeches’ wording might differ, but the message remains the same.
The final result of Mon Mothma’s speech is easily some of the best writing in all of Star Wars, and cements Tony Gilroy as one of the best creatives to join the franchise and Genevieve O’Reilly’s Mon Mothma as one of the best characters in Star Wars. Andor is streaming on Disney+.