‘Andor' Season 2 Composer On Scoring The Show's Poignant Conclusion: ‘Don't Mess That Up!'

Forbes

14-05-2025

Key art for Season 2 of 'Andor' on Disney+. © 2025 Lucasfilm Ltd™. All Rights Reserved.
Andor has officially come to an end and, as promised by its creators, the Season 2 finale (also the series conclusion) led directly into the events of the acclaimed Episode IV prequel, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
In the show's final moments, battle-worn Rebel spy Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and his sardonic droid buddy, K-2S0 (voiced by Alan Tudyk), set off for the Ring of Kafrene to meet with Cassian's confidential informant. That contact is Tivik (portrayed in Rogue One by Daniel Mays), who will corroborate the intel Luthen Rael (Stellan Skarsgård) died for:
The Empire has indeed built a super-weapon — the dreaded, planet-destroying battle station known as the Death Star — to crush all remnants of dissent throughout the galaxy once and for all.
But as our titular hero flies off to hear the crucial piece of information that will ultimately bring peace to that collection of stars far, far away, there's the stabbing knowledge in the back of our minds that he, K-2SO, and so many others are doomed. Dozens of courageous souls are destined to meet their ends on Scarif while stealing and transmitting the Death Star plans to their cohorts hovering above the tropical planet.
In other words, the Andor finale is the very definition of bittersweet when taken alongside the existing context Rogue One established nearly a decade ago. It's a context that grows ever more poignant by way of the series' finale scene, which returns us to the Outer Rim farming world of Mina-Rau, where Bix (Adria Arjona) has been living since she made the difficult decision to leave Cassian on Yavin 4.
Walking into the wheat fields, Bix carries a newborn child and looks up as the sun breaks through an overcast sky. While the baby's identity is not explicitly confirmed, there can be no doubt of its paternal origin. Cassian's child is, quite literally, the embodiment of a new hope; the start of a fresh generation that will know freedom and self-determination, thanks to Casssian's noble sacrifice.
Bix Caleen (Adria Arjona) and Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) in Lucasfilm's ANDOR Season 2, exclusively ... More on Disney+. Photo courtesy of Lucasfilm. ©2025 Lucasfilm Ltd. & TM. All Rights Reserved.
Scoring such an impactful bookend was no small feat for Season 2 composer Brandon Roberts, who got the chance to watch all 12 episodes before writing the music. 'That's rare,' he notes over a Zoom call. 'Normally, they're in process [while you're scoring]
When Roberts got to the last episode, there was no music — not even a temp track. 'I was very sick at the time," he remembers. "I was in bed, watching it on my laptop, and [when] I got to that scene, I openly wept. It was so beautiful and such a perfect way to end that story; such a perfect way to re-contextualize Rogue One, that I was very overwhelmed and surprised by that moment. I couldn't believe how beautiful it was. And then the second thought I had was, 'Don't mess that up! It doesn't even need music!' I did score the sequence, but even up until the end, we kept it so minimal, because the moment, and Bix's expression…it was all there onscreen.'
Andor creator, showrunner, and executive producer Tony Gilroy (also a co-screenwriter on Rogue One) was apparently very hands-on with the score, regularly flying in to Los Angeles from London or New York in order to visit Roberts' studio for days at a time.
'We would sit there, going through every cue, in every scene … fine tune it and try stuff," Roberts says. "A lot of it [was] taking music out. Sometimes, it was, 'Hey, I think we can wait longer to bring the music in.' We would fine tune it and go down to the wire. It was a really wonderful way to collaborate, and I haven't had that level of intensity for that extended period of time with a director. Tony is extremely musical, so it was a good match. I think by the time we went to the recording sessions [at the British Grove Studios in London], everyone was on the same page. There were no surprises. The whole process was very smooth."
Both seasons of Andor are now streaming exclusively on Disney+