The ensemble was Imperial today.
Although I didn’t get any compliments on my outfit, Atticus the AT-AT ALWAYS does.
The first panel of the day was the much-anticipated Andor panel, and in the time leading up the the panel’s start, our beloved pre-show/hype guy DJ Elliott invited some guests up to the stage.
I may have previously mentioned a Star Wars Celebration tradition called the Running of the Hoods, in which, each convention, a literal legion of 501st members dress up as a minor background character from Empire Strikes Back. After Lando announces the evacuation of Cloud City due to the Imperial takeover, this character, Willrow Hood, is seen fleeing Cloud City carrying a canister of what is ostensibly rebel secrets but in reality looked a whole lot like a Hamilton Beach ice cream maker. Now, every Celebration, the Willrow Hoods run through the hall chanting “ICE CREAM!” (This year it was yesterday. I missed it!)
Anyway, after Season 1 of Andor, a second run debuted at Celebration Europe in 2023: the Running of the Narkina-5 Prisoners. On the appointed day, a contingent of 501st members wear their prisoner uniforms, some accessorizing with pool floaties, life preservers, or beach balls, run through the hall chanting “ONE WAY OUT!”
And DJ Elliott, in his infinite folly, invited them to join him onstage. He had no idea there were this many.
Bravely, he volunteered to lead the run. Snaking through the hall single-file, there were almost enough of them that DJ Elliot caught up to the last person in the conga line.
It was glorious.
Anyway, the panel finally started, and basically the whole cast of Andor came out on stage.
I freaking love Diego Luna. To me, he epitomizes the idea that Star Wars is for everyone. There are so many stories floating around the internet about how seeing a Rebel Alliance leader with a Mexican accent onscreen brought Star Wars to new people and reaffirmed a slice of the fandom that had never really seen anyone like themselves in this universe before. But the reason I love Diego Luna is that he seems really conscious of his position as a sort of ambassador for Star Wars. He made a point this morning to acknowledge the Japanese fandom, as well as the fans that had come from far away, noting with awe that the members of the audience before him comprised 125 different countries.
Speaking of numbers, Andor Season 2 is gonna be a big’un. The statistic that really stuck out to me is when one of the producers said that the main cast–JUST the main cast, not the supporting cast or extras–had over 700 costumes.
The cast each got a moment to hint about what’s coming for their characters in the next season. We were promised that we’d get to see ALL our favorites continue their stories.
Denise Gough had a cryptic warning about her character Dedra: “Less girl boss, more fascist.” Overall, everyone hinted that this season is gonna go some dark places.
You guys, everyone was so excited when they mentioned Alan Tudyk that the room erupted in cheers that went on for quite a while. Alan seemed kind of stunned by the outpouring of fan love.
He and Diego confirmed that K2-S0 is in for Season 2–in fact, we will get to witness his ‘birth’, whatever that means.
At this point we were only about 25 minutes into the panel, and they really hadn’t said much yet, but we were abruptly told to put our phones away…because we were going to SEE THE FIRST EPISODE.
Guys, it was REALLY GOOD.
After lunch, I headed back into the Celebration Stage for the Ahsoka panel.
Mostly, it was Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau chatting with Rosario Dawson about the previous season.
Dave confirmed that the anime Princess Mononoke was a major inspiration for the Clone Wars and Ahsoka’s appearance (like her face markings).
They talked about giving in to the fan suggestion of casting Rosario as the live action Ahsoka, and how each one of them secretly really wanted it to happen so when they finally got the chance they were all privately freaking out. But none of them knew whether a character designed like Ahsoka would work in live-action, or whether the fans would even like it enough to make it a recurring thing. When Rosario made her appearance in Season 2 of The Mandalorian, she was mentally preparing herself for this to be a one-and-only-chance kind of thing.
It was a huge surprise for Hayden Christensen to come out and talk about reprising Anakin/Vader and getting to wear Anakin’s Clone Wars outfit from the cartoons. He and Dave Filoni talked about how both of them were personally schooled in Star Wars storytelling by George Lucas himself.
Both Dave and Rosario agreed that ‘nobody can swing a saber like Hayden.’
Dave talked about how wild it was having Ariana Greenblatt play his Clone Wars-era younger Ahsoka in real life. Everyone agreed that she seemed to just perfectly embody the character, whether she was mimicking Rosario on set or holding court over a gaggle of clone troopers between takes.
Dave genuinely got choked up talking about the late Ray Stevenson, who played Baylan Skoll. In real life, he was apparently the nicest, coolest, most genuine dude. Dave had wanted to find a fallen Jedi character for him to play for years.
They had done a lot of soul-searching in deciding what to do about Ray’s character, and recast the part with Rory McCann, whom they knew would pay fitting respect to the role Ray had originated.
Since Ahsoka Season 2 starts filming next week, there really wasn’t a whole lot of footage they could show us, apart from some model mockups
…That revealed a role for Admiral Ackbar in Season 2, where he would apparently, and fittingly, ‘go head to head with Thrawn’.
Also, LOTH KITTENS.
Since there was no actual footage to show us, Dave Filoni did something appropriate and hilarious: harkening back to how Lucas put a trailer for Empire Strikes Back at the end of Episode IV before he’d shot any footage for it, Dave went full 1970s and created a vintage trailer for Season 2 using stills from Season 1 and some concept art footage, complete with one of those nostalgic voiceover narrations.
From there, I went to Doug Chiang’s master class, which was mostly a lecture about what to do if you want to become a production designer. If I’d known that’s what it was gonna be I probably would have skipped it, but there was some good advice in there for other creative types too about how to push yourself and develop new skills. My favorite piece of advice he gave: “Your first or second idea is probably going to be your best one.”
My last panel of the day was Bit Reactor, the folks who make games like Elder Scrolls Online and Civilization (iterations of which I’ve been playing since the 1990s). They’re making the first-ever turn-based strategy game for Star Wars, called Zero Company.
Set during the Clone Wars, you play a customizable (yay!) hero who runs a squad of misfits that remind me of the A-Team, each with their own set of skills. There’s a Mando, a disgraced Clone Trooper, a Jedi Padawan whose master died, and a sniper with a grudge–but you’ll also have the ability to create custom ‘operatives’ to add to your company as well.
You pick your team and run missions on what looks like it will be a truly staggering variety of planets.
Here’s the interesting part: the whole thing is woven together by a storyline, so it isn’t just mindless grinding. And when your squad comes together, they each have their own motivations and don’t necessarily like each other. But as they go out on missions together, their relationships will develop in different ways through a bonding mechanic that will fundamental change the way they work together as the game goes on. The developer says this mechanic means the game will be different every time. Another factor in that respect is that your choices mean something in this game–not just in opening or closing off opportunities, but sometimes resulting in permadeath for a squad member and changing the outcome of chunks of the war.
And honestly, the way their abilities interact sounds almost Baldur’s Gate 3-level complex–an example given was that the Jedi could Force-push a bad guy out of cover for the sniper to shoot at.
So today was a LOT of panels, but they were all very cool. I can’t believe tomorrow is the last day of Celebration already!
Laura Writes 