When we meet the rebel leader Luthen Rael (Stellan Skarsgård) in “Star Wars: Andor”, he helps Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) to escape the Ferrix police and recruit him for turning work. SO We see that Luthen is living a double life, working as luxury antiques merchant on Coruscant, the capital of the Empire that he fights. Kleya Marki (Elizabeth Dulau) is Luthen’s assistant in the two halves of her life.

So from the start, Luthen has had an air of mystery; We see very early on that he has a mask (well, a wig) so there are others? In “Andor” season 1 episode 8, “Narkina 5″, ” Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker), a radical anti-imperialistAsk Luthen what is his ideology. Luthen replies that he is a “coward” who is afraid of letting the Empire become unbeatable. Ok, but it’s not Really answer the question. What was so scary in the first place?

Besides, how Luthen and Kleya forged such a unbreakable trust, where they are both So willing to sink into extremes to destroy the much bigger evil? “Andor” revealed The even darker than expected background of Luthen in his last episode“Make It Stop” of season 2. He was once an imperial soldier named Lear. He participated in at least one massacre (and perhaps more) and discovered a young girl (April Woods) hiding for his life in his ship. His already trembling faith in the Empire broke and he deserted, taking the girl with him. A guess what was his name.

In an exclusive interview with / film, “Andor” Creator Tony Gilroy said that Skarsgård did not want Luthen’s motivation as a rebel revenge. So, as Skarsgård himself explained in the featurette behind the scenes “Andor Season 2 Declassified: Farewell,” Gilroy had an epiphany: “It’s [Kleya’s] revenge.”

In other flashbacks during “make it stop”, we see how Luthen taught Kleya to be a rebel. Kleya swore to destroy the Empire and Luthen helps him because he owes him more that he cannot reimburse. But even if Luthen raised Kleya, Dulau said in a coherent way through interviews that she doesn’t See their bond as father and daughter.

Talk to The Hollywood ReporterDulau recognized the comparisons between Luthen and the Flashback scenario of Kleya and “The Last of Us”. However, she also finds the story “Andor” “much darker”. The relationship of Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey), for all her complexities, is ultimately a love. With Luthen and Kleya, it’s not that simple. In “Andor Season 2 Declassified”, Dulau has developed:

“It is not a father-daughter relationship. To make it become that, it would mean that Kleya forgives [Luthen] for [helped kill her family]. There are parts of Kleya who really hate this man. “”

Notice Dulau says parts From Kleya hates Luthen. There are also parts of her who love her, but this love could never be pure as a parent and that of the child should be. Luthen, too, could probably never look at Kleya without feeling guilt. Their last scene together underlines the contradictions. Kleya kills a Luthen imprisoned to silence him, showing loyalty to his revenge above all, but she does it with a broken heart and a last kiss on her forehead.

According to Dulau (via the Hollywood Reporter), a film that Gilroy fired for for The Flashbacks of Luthen & Young Kleya were “Paper Moon” by Peter Bogdanovich in 1973. The con artist Moze begs and his daughter (perhaps) Addie Loggins (the real father and the daughter Ryan and Tatum O’Neal) cross the Kansas together and draw scams along the way. As with the comparison “The Last of Us”, Dulau thinks that the link of Luthen and Kleya is much darker than that of Moze and Addie.

A comparison it could find closer The Anime of horror thriller “Monster” (based on a manga of Naoki Urasawa). In episode 9 of “Monster”, our hero, Dr. Kenzo Tenma, takes lessons from Hugo Bernhardt, a retired mercenary. Bernhardt has a silent young girl living with him – but she is not his daughter. During an operation in Myanmar, he killed the daughter’s mother, then brought her home so that she would have someone To raise it. Although Bernhardt admits that the girl will probably hate him for the rest of her life, at the end of the episode, they are at least able to enjoy a hot meal together.

Another manga / anime that makes such a relationship not a parallel intrigue, but the whole story is “Vinland Saga”, a historic epic of the Viking era of Makoto Yukimura. The advance of “Vinland Saga” is Thorfinn, a warrior teenager fighting in a Viking group led by the sneaky Distous. Thorfinn’s own father, Thors, was murdered by Askeladd. Thorfinn serves Askeladd not because of loyalty, but hatred; He wants to win an appropriate duel with his father’s murderer. Blinded by his rage, Thorfunn did not realize until much later than during all the years of childhood that he spent trying to avenge his father, Askeladd was His father. But that does not mean that Thorfinn could completely forgive and forget, in the same way that Kleya could not for Luthen.

“Star Wars” concerns a plot Things, but the nine main films have at least become a family saga retroactively, starting with the revelation of Dark Vader that he is Luke Skywalker’s father in “The Empire Strikes Back”. In “Return of the Jedi”, Luke’s arc is all about the conflict between the father he idolized Also Be someone who injured and terrified him so much – and if he can reconcile this by bringing Vader back to light.

“Andor” can shake a lot of “Star Wars” shots (including the clear fracture between light and darkness), but its exploration of a complex parental relationship is more than faithful to the traditions of the series.

“Andor” is in trouble on Disney +.