Ever since it was first teased that Andor‘s second season was preparing to show the tragedy that set the stage for the formal formation of the Rebel Alliance, there’s similarly been discussion of the fact that there are two Ghorman Massacres. The one we are about to learn much more about in this week’s batch of episodes, and the very different version of events that took place in Star Wars‘ old Expanded Universe. Would we be getting something new, or something inspired by the story that had come before? Andor simply responded: why not both?
Although this week’s episodes are primed to ignite the simmering tensions for what will become the Ghorman Massacre—the one that sparks Mon Mothma to publicly rail against Palpatine’s authoritarianism, flee the Senate, and call for the Alliance to Restore the Republic—last week’s act of Andor season two took us to Ghorman early to explore the planet’s resistance to the Empire. We learn pretty quickly during that exploration that while tensions between the Ghor and the Empire are at an all time high at the moment (thanks to a campaign the Empire’s enacting to fulfill its secret desire to mine the world for resources it needs to build the Death Star), disdain for the regime is not just contemporary feeling on the world.
There has already been a massacre on Ghorman once. The Tarkin one.
This Tarkin massacre matches many of the details of what was the primary Ghorman Massacre in Star Wars‘ old EU: it took place relatively early on in reign of the Empire, it involved a young Tarkin slaughtering hundreds of unarmed Ghorman protestors by landing a cruiser on them, it sparked wider public blowback to the Imperial regime. It is, for all intents and purpose, the EU’s Ghorman Massacre reconstituted into current Star Wars continuity. But crucially, it is no longer the incident that takes that name. The new story doesn’t erase the EU one, it weaves it into history, and creates thematic and narrative depth by choosing to say that it was not one or the other, but both.
Now, Ghorman’s history of resistance holds up a mirror to the cyclical conflict echoed throughout the wider Star Wars saga—and crucially, the Empire’s cruelty, the Tarkin Doctrine of fear crushing dissent, is given a fatal flaw. Ghorman didn’t break in the wake of this first Imperial atrocity, it remembered its past and fought regardless, and although we’re only on the cusp of learning the full details of this latest one, we know the planet’s resistance will inspire greater pushback against the Empire in the wake of it, laying the groundwork for open galactic civil war and the Empire’s fall in its wake. It’s a brilliant parallel to the first season’s lessons with Nemik, the idea that fascist control through power can be broken if only people try, and keep trying, to not bend in the face of it.
And most importantly, it’s texture that matters more than just checking off a known name or event. Andor doesn’t nudge and point when it makes note of the Tarkin massacre; if you weren’t already familiar that this was a known thing from the EU it might as well just have been an organic piece of background information. It’s woven into the narrative in the moment, not to disrupt the current story, but further enrich it. It’s something the series has done a surprising amount of, from offhand mentions of the Rakatans to the oodles of Easter eggs in Luthen’s antiques collections: it treats Star Wars‘ “legends” as history, something to provide color and context but not to necessarily dictate the story it’s telling in the here and now.
The point of evoking the Tarkin massacre is not simply to say “here is that thing from that other time” and call it a day, but to recognize the storytelling potential of recognizing these twinned versions of this same event, and realizing it’s more interesting to have both co-exist rather than cancel out one or the other. After all, there should always be a little truth in legends.
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