SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for Season 2, Episodes 11 and 12 of “Andor,” now streaming on Disney+.
Alan Tudyk got used to having a little fun with improv when playing the quippy droid K-2SO in 2016’s “Rogue One.” But because all of his scenes on the “Rogue One” prequel series “Andor” were shot during the writers strike, he didn’t get the chance to ad lib this time around.
Right before the strike was called, however, Tudyk did get “Andor” creator Tony Gilroy to add an exchange between K-2SO and Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) in Episode 11, as Cassian is planning to leave the rebel base on Yavin for an unauthorized rescue mission.
“I’ve been counting the orders we’re disobeyed so far. Would you like to know how many?” K-2SO says. After Cassian gets K-2SO to reluctantly agree to help him comandeer a ship, the droid adds: “Eighteen.”
“It’s my favorite line,” Tudyk says. “So egotistical.”
While K-2SO didn’t make an appearance in this season of “Andor” until the end of Episode 9, Tudyk is not new to the world of “Star Wars” in the slightest. As fans have waited to see when the show’s creator Tony Gilroy would incorporate K-2SO, Cassian’s droid sidekick that he reprograms to work with the Rebel Alliance, Tudyk felt immediately welcomed back on set by his familiar castmates — and his iconic stilts.
“They just pulled open the box and there they were, just like I left them when I walked away from ‘Rogue One,’” Tudyk says. “They even had stickers on them and scuffs.”
Following the conclusion to “Andor” Season 2, Tudyk reflects on getting to play K-2SO as more than just a comedic sidekick this time around, filming the “gruesome” action scene at the beginning of the finale and why Cassian and K-2SO are really a father-son duo.
Now that the finale is out in the world, how are you feeling?
It’s bittersweet. When we were making “Rogue One,” Diego Luna and I would always talk about prequels. And they were ridiculous prequel ideas. I was always pitching old TV detective shows with just the two of us but in a “Star Wars” setting — like the ’80s version of procedural “Simon & Simon.” It was always fun to imagine all these different possibilities and now it’s nailed down. One of the things I’m anxious for people to do now is, after they watch “Andor,” watch “Rogue One” again. You can’t look at those characters without seeing their history.
Even before the finale, “Star Wars” fans have been re-evaluating “Rogue One” as “Andor” has re-contextualized its importance. What do you think of the way fans have been revisiting “Rogue One”?
I’m obviously biased, but I like that story a lot. It’s a different tone with a different pace and it tells the story in two hours. The humor is different. It has a big blockbuster movie shine to it, whereas “Andor” has a thoughtful, violent and realistic analyzation of that whole world. Of all the “Star Wars” films, “Rogue One” has that in-the-trenches feel that “Andor” borrowed from.
It’s been great to see K-2SO back in action over the past few episodes. What was it like filming the opening sequence in the finale when you save Cassian?
That was wild! In the film, K-2SO was a bit more of a funny sidekick. A good droid partner. He didn’t really get into the marauding aspect of his design. These enforcer droids were supposed to be these vicious things and in “Andor” I got to live it. When I had the guy in my hand, it’s just so gruesome — just this little rag doll going back and forth, absorbing all the shots and just killing person after person. Racking up his body count. It’s a different aspect of the character. That’s what these droids did. It was fun to kick that guy on my stilts!
I liken the changes to comic books, where you’ll have an “Amazing Spider-Man” and then you’ll have an “Spectacular Spider-Man.” And they’re both “Spider-Man,” but they have different flavors and complexions of character.
Diego Luna on the set of Season 2 of “Andor.”
Lucasfilm
Did you know that how Cassian and K-2SO meet was changed from the original 2017 comic book for the show?
There’s going to be some inconsistencies that they’re unable to respect in every iteration. Even between “Rogue One” and “Andor,” there are things that fit together but have slight variations. But that’s just part of the way that movie was made with two different directors. It was a conglomeration of a lot of different things, so they honored as much as they could.
Tony Gilroy has also gone on the record about how there was originally going to be a standalone episode dedicated to K-2SO’s backstory. Did you know about that or have you read the script?
No, I wish I had. I know that “Andor” was meant to be five seasons when he originally conceived it, which says a lot about Tony’s brain that he pitched five seasons. Evidently, none of those were the “Simon & Simon” detective story, but he knew where this was going from the beginning. Since it was taking so long to make because of the production value that, at a certain point, the idea of a prequel was becoming harder and harder to swallow because everybody’s going to be 60!
I believe he described the episode as “a monster movie.”
Yeah, it’s interesting. There was a lot of stuff written about K-2SO at one point. My audition piece for him was something written in “Rogue One” that never ended up being there. They were landing on a planet that had a very strong magnetic quality that scrambled his circuits. He’s coming into the planet, things start not making sense, then he starts thrashing around and knocking it out to try to subdue him. And that was the audition piece.
He’s a fun character to write for, I imagine. And his relationship with Cassian is so beautiful. You know, there’s so much about fathers in “Rogue One” and I always saw Cassian as K-2SO’s dad. I saw it as a rewiring that he’s the one who created him. He put fire and lit him up, freed him from his servitude to the Empire and let his personality come forward.
You and Diego Luna came in to “Andor” having built that relationship in “Rogue One.” What was it like getting to develop that further here?
There’s a moment after that big death scene where everybody’s in the hallway and he comes in and kills those people and frees Cassian — he comes around the corner and says: “I’ve cleared a path.” That definitely would’ve been a moment where K-2SO would give some kind of quip. But we weren’t able to.
Diego and I can fall into camaraderie pretty fast and that’s a lot to do with him because he is an easy guy to get along with. He’s very jovial, much more so than Cassian. You don’t even really get to see who Diego is in Cassian. I realized a lot of K-2SO’s humor comes from me, but also comes from playing off Diego Luna. It was immediately as if no time had gone by since “Rogue One.”
Of course, you have a lot of experience doing motion capture performances in your career. From your time working on ‘Rogue One’ to now on ‘Andor,’ what have been some of the most exciting developments with that technology? And did that allow you to play more with K-2SO as a character here?
It used to take a lot more time. I always felt a lot of freedom doing motion capture work and I think that’s partly because of working with ILM — they are state-of-the-art on all that. The suit that I wear became the industry standard, the one that you’ve maybe seen with all the spots and the square dots. Getting to wear that is very comfortable and easy, and there’s a little hat you wear. They can work with you.
In the past, when you finished a scene with somebody who was motion capturing and doing a virtual character, they had to move the camera and lighting sources around the room. There was just a whole post scene hullabaloo that took up a lot of time that no longer does. It’s pretty fast, which is important for making a series where you have less time than you do on a film — although “Andor” was an exception because they were taking the time they needed to make it. Which is why it looks so good!
Diego Luna, Alan Tudyk and Muhannad Bhaier on the set of Season 2 of “Andor.”
Lucasfilm
Even though you were only in this season for a few episodes, do you feel satisfied with where you were able to take the character? Knowing that there’s more of a backstory Tony Gilroy has in his head, are there places you’d like to see K-2SO expanded upon in future shows/movies?
Who knows? I’d play that character doing anything. Even a comic book of the stories that Tony already thought of. I think truncating these seasons is great for the show that we were able to put out and see it in full production, but if Tony’s got those stories, tell them in a comic book. Tell them in a graphic novel. I’d love to see that.
Finally, you’re also in James Gunn’s “Superman” this summer, playing one of the robots in the Man of Steel’s Fortress of Solitude. What was your experience like working on that film?
I’ve known James for a long time and the script is fantastic. I really like his kind of storytelling as well, though it’s very different from Tony. It’s a different kind of sci-fi, of course. The way James blends humor with these violent stories and a sense of realism with the fantastic right next to it — he’s very good at exploiting that juxtaposition of things. It’s people living their regular lives around extraordinary beings and extraordinary happenings.
I get to be another droid. This is my third robot! Everybody’s talking about robots taking our jobs and I’m doing my best to take jobs away from them. Will that make me a target? Maybe it will. But I’m willing to do that.
I also do “Creature Commandos” with James and play Doctor Phosphorus. He wrote that whole thing while he was writing “Peacemaker” and had already written “Superman.” Does he have time for anything else? But he seems to. He has time to run the whole studio! It’s mad. I don’t have that kind of focus but that’s why I do what I do with robots instead.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
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