‘Andor’ Has a Heartbreaking ‘Rogue One’ Easter Egg You Probably Missed (2024)

If you’re behind on Andor, the latest in Disney+’s line of Star Wars TV shows, then you need to catch up ASAP. You need to be caught up in order to read this spoiler-y article, sure, but you also need to get caught up because oh my god. Andor isn’t just the best Star Wars show right now. It’s quite possibly the best show right now, period. It’s a stunning, immaculately-executed political thriller with undeniable relevance to today. And after watching Episode 6, “The Eye,” it’s clear that Andor isn’t just changing what Star Wars will be moving forward — it’s also retroactively changing how we view all the Star Wars that came before.

Again, SPOILERS, people!

Andor is, of course, most closely tied to Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. The TV series is set five years prior to the events of Rogue One, a film that runs up to the minutes before the start of 1977’s Star Wars: A New Hope. But Andor is set way before Rogue One and Cassian Andor’s (Diego Luna) mission to steal the Death Star’s plans on behalf of the Rebellion. This Cassian, five years younger, is only out for himself and looks for smaller ways to hurt the Empire. There is no capital R Rebellion yet and he’s definitely not fighting on their behalf.

And then comes Aldhani and, as we learn in “The Eye,” the mission that completely changes his entire outlook… forever. It also retroactively makes a heartbreaking moment in Rogue One — a movie that came out in 2016 — even more heartbreaking.

Let’s talk about Karis Nemik

Played by Alex Lawther, Nemik was without a doubt the heart of the ragtag band of rebels that Cassian found himself amongst for this storyarc. Nemik was young but he was a true believer in the cause. Not only that, he was brilliant and was somehow both incredibly articulate and complex in his speech while also having a head that cried out for nonstop noogies. He was as sincere and sweet as he was a radical and a revolutionary — and he got through to Cassian, just a little bit. Granted, Cassian initially seemed to relate to Nemik on more of the “ugh, kid, you’ve got so much to learn” level for these three episodes, including the start of “The Eye.” Nemik was worried that he wasn’t sleeping before the big heist and that he’d be tired. Andor had to reassure him, from his own personal experience, that no, he would not be tired while infiltrating an Imperial garrison on a mission to steal the Empire’s quarterly payroll for an entire sector.

Fast-forward to the climax of the mission. Lieutenant Gorn and Taramyn Barcona were gunned down in an unexpected firefight, Cinta Kaz was left stranded on Aldhani (although maybe that was part of the mission), they made it out with a sizable chunk of the payroll and not all of it, and Karis Nemik was crushed under the considerable weight of that sizable chunk of payroll when the rebels blasted off in their getaway ship. During the getaway, Vel Sartha gives a paralyzed and panicking Nemik a boost of space adrenaline so that he can do his job and chart a course for their escape. His job is even more important now because their getaway ship is being chased by a squad of TIE fighters. He tells Cassian, who’s piloting the ship, to climb — even though to Cassian that means pulling the ship up into the hurtling, sparkling meteors of the celestial event that they’re using to cover their escape. Nemik insists that they climb, however, and climb they do. Nemik ultimately doesn’t make it, and essentially the last thing he says to Cassian is “climb.”

So, remember Rogue One: A Star Wars Story? The last thing that K-2SO, Cassian’s sidekick, says to him? “Climb.”

Wow, right?

We already knew that Nemik’s death means a lot to Cassian’s story arc, but this sealed the deal. After Nemik dies on the operating table, Vel forces Cassian to take Nemik’s manifesto — the one he’s been working on for the past two episodes (and presumably the past few months of his life). Cassian doesn’t want it. He wants to move on. He’s a mercenary. That’s what he does. But he gets Nemik’s manifesto, ensuring that he won’t forget this mission. Not only that, he has to deal with the fact that he chose to take the ship to a doctor to save Nemik’s life, and that he killed his “teammate” Skeen when he revealed himself to be a liar willing to leave Vel and Nemik behind just to steal the money that they just stole. For a guy who doesn’t care about much else, he sure does care a lot.

Because of all that, we know that Nemik’s death means something to Cassian. And on top of all that, the last words that screenwriter Dan Gilroy had Nemik say to Cassian are the same final words that K-2SO says to him before they complete their mission and get the Death Star plans to the Rebellion.

Now when you rewatch Rogue One and get to K-2 telling Andor to “climb,” you’ll hear Nemik’s voice too, and you can now infer that Cassian is hearing Nemik in his head as well — Nemik, the kid whose unwavering belief in the cause ultimately led him to that very point. Now, because of the incredible storytelling on Andor, the climax of Rogue One and Star Wars: A New Hope itself has as much to do with Karis Nemik and the fulfillment of his battle as it does anything else. That right there is why prequels can be so damn impactful.

Karis Nemik may have been a bit naive and he may have died on what was presumably his first mission against the Empire, but he set off a chain of events that directly led to the destruction of the Death Star. Nemik’s manifesto manifested.