I’ve got an appreciation of Andor that goes hard on greebles (the small, irregular pieces of plastic that give Star Wars ships their detailed texture).
It’s the greebles that gave the Empire’s ships their sense of enormity, even though they were really miniatures. A smooth-textured ship has trouble communicating its scale, especially against a field of distant stars. The greebles, stuck on all over, create a sense of expansiveness and activity. A few greebles may have a clear function in the plot (this protuberance is an anti-aircraft gun, that dimple a shield generator), but the overall effect is one of possibility. The ship (and the world) has riches that our story will not plumb.
For Gilroy, it’s the trust that every individual is infinitely interesting that both allows an actor to do his job and guarantees that the Empire cannot prevail. The Empire is less fascinated by the stubborn set of Dedra Meero’s jaw than is actress Denise Gough, who plays the Imperial Security Bureau agent on the rise. The Empire sees Syril Karn’s faith in regularity and order as a currency to spend, but only actor Kyle Soller understands the depth of Karn’s love of fair play.
The Empire asks its people to be less than they are, to sand off their greebles and become featureless and frictionless. In so doing, it makes every eruption of individuality an act of
destabilizing rebellion.