“Andor” creator Tony Gilroy dropped a bombshell throughout a latest Q&A on the ATX Tv Competition (through IndieWire): The entire price range for the 24-episode “Star Wars” collection was $650 million, he claimed. Launched over two seasons in 2022 and 2025, “Andor” ended its run final month to crucial acclaim. The collection was a prequel to the 2016 movie “Rogue One” (which Gilroy co-wrote) and centered on Diego Luna’s Cassian Andor, a thief turned insurgent spy.

“I imply, [for] Disney that is $650 million,” Gilroy mentioned. “For twenty-four episodes, I by no means took a be aware. We mentioned ‘Fuck the Empire’ within the first season, they usually mentioned, ‘Are you able to please not do this?’ … In Season 2, they mentioned, ‘Streaming is lifeless, we don’t have the cash we had earlier than,’ so we fought onerous about cash, however they by no means cleaned something up. That [freedom] comes with duties.”

The studio had no touch upon Gilroy’s price range reveal when requested by Selection. Manufacturing on “Andor” Season 2 was notably paused amid the Hollywood strikes. A supply accustomed to the manufacturing mentioned the guild strikes added roughly $20 million in shutdown prices to “Andor’s” price range and that episodes price an estimated $20 million after tax incentives, much like the reported episode budgets of “Home of the Dragon” and “Severance.”

Gilroy pushed Disney and the “Star Wars” franchise’s boundaries with “Andor.” Whereas he pulled again on having a personality say “fuck the empire” within the first season finale, he ended up getting subjects similar to genocide and assault into the present’s second season with out studio interference. Gilroy mentioned at ATX that he purposefully began “Andor” with a scene set in a brothel as a litmus take a look at for Disney.

“I labored on ‘Rogue [One]’ so I knew what the [permissible] ranges of violence had been, and really the foundations loosened up significantly,” Gilroy mentioned. “Yeah, we are able to’t have pores and skin, however I very consciously began the primary scene in a brothel simply to see what would occur and the way far we might go. There’s intercourse. … It’s one thing that most likely appeared in some unspecified time in the future prefer it was going to be a giant nervousness, and it actually turned out to be a nothing-burger all through.”

Gilroy beforehand instructed Selection that he “wrote a authorized transient” to Disney when he was making an attempt to get the studio to permit him to say “fuck the empire” within the present, explaining: “I wrote a memo on it and mentioned, ‘Right here’s why I believe it’s economically prudent, and right here’s why I believe it’s good.’”

“Disney wouldn’t allow us to use it,” director Benjamin Caron added to Selection. “So we modified it to ‘battle the empire.’ I bear in mind having a name with Tony Gilroy saying, ‘Are we gonna get away with this?’”

The “Andor” staff couldn’t get Disney to allow them to say “fuck the empire,” however they did get away with discussing genocide in Season 2 (Gilroy mentioned at ATX that having the ability to take action was “fairly flawless”). The second season additionally featured Adria Arjona’s Binx brazenly calling out an tried sexual assault. Bix bluntly shouts at an officer: “He tried to rape me!”

“I bear in mind studying that, and inside the fact of that second of the abuse of energy, being actually scared to enter that scene,” Arjona instructed Selection. “However there was additionally one thing — I’m going to curse — actually fucking highly effective about the truth that I get to showcase this in a galaxy far, distant. The truth that Tony gave it to Bix was a giant honor — and it was proper. She’s in probably the most susceptible state she will probably be in, and somebody tries to make the most of her. We’ve heard that story many occasions.”

Each seasons of “Andor” at the moment are streaming on Disney+.