The Answer to When Andor Is Actually Set in the Star Wars Timeline Is Complicated—But We Broke It Down So You Can Follow Along
Every time there’s a new Star Wars project, one of the biggest questions that pops up is: When does this take place? That’s one of the most normal things for a story that was always told in reverse. Star Wars did, after all, start in the middle, go backwards, then forward, and then started filling in the blanks—not always in order. So, it makes sense for fans to always be confused about every new project that takes place long ago, in a galaxy far, far away.
Andor is one of those stories that started in reverse, too. The story is, after all, technically a prequel to Rogue One, which is in itself a prequel to Star Wars: A New Hope. In Rogue One, we learn the story of the group of people who stole the plans to the Death Star that would later get to Princess Leia in A New Hope, the plans that would later be instrumental in the destruction of the Death Star in that same movie. Andor goes back and tells us the story of Cassian Andor before he was a rebel Captain. Before he met Jyn Erso. Before Scariff.
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The story, however, jumps around from different points in the timeline to get to where it ends up. So, when does Andor take place in the Star Wars universe? And is it the answer different from Season 1 to Season 2?
When does Andor take place in the Star Wars universe?
Andor Season 1 takes place approximately five years before Rogue One, or what the Star Wars timeline refers to as 5BBY (5 years Before the Battle of Yavin). The Battle of Yavin is the timeframe the Star Wars universe uses to set time, and it is the battle in Star Wars: A New Hope in which the Death Star is destroyed. Ironically, the information Cassian Andor and the group of rebels in Rogue One gather is the information that is then sent to Princess Leia Organa, the same information that makes it possible for Luke Skywalker to deliver the shot that destroys the Death Star. So, it all ties together in a way.
The first three episodes of Andor Season 2 pick up a year after Andor Season 1, or 4BBY. In Andor Season 1, we met Cassian Andor as someone looking out for himself and himself alone. The season ended with him deciding to join Luthen Rael and the fledgling rebellion against the Empire after realizing that there is no escaping the Empire, and that if he is going to die anyway, it is better to die fighting.
Season 2 finds Cassian a full-fledged Rebel on a mission for the Rebellion. But the season does not stay on 4BBY. Instead, it spends only the first 3 episodes there, jumping ahead to 3BBY for the following three episodes, and then 2BBY for the next three and ending the series in 1BBY, which is exactly when Rogue One is set.
This is always what the series was meant to do, lead into the events of Rogue One, and tell the story of how Cassian Andor and the group of rebels he is part of got to information that would lead them into Rogue One and the plans for the Death Star and how all of that leads the new Rebel Alliance into the big win that would be the Battle of Yavin. Andor was always meant to be the story of the heroes behind the heroes in Han, Luke, and Leia. And Andor Season 2 has very effectively told it. It just jumped along in the timeline a lot to do so.
