Andy Serkis ended up delivering one of the best performances of his career as Andor's Kino Loy, and won the hearts of Star Wars fans everywhere as the surly prisoner. However, he just about broke the internet at the end of last week's episode when his character uttered the words "never more than twelve."
Serkis' delivery, combined with the buildup to that moment, resulted in what many fans have since declared one of the franchise's best lines.
Asked if he was just as pumped dropping that line as we all were to hear it, Serkis told THR (via SFFGazette.com), "Yeah, it’s the transitional moment for the character, and it was so beautifully written. It’s the arc of a man who’s become so desensitized and is only really looking after number one and just wants to get through his incarceration and his sentence."
"We sort of set up this back-history that he had a family, that he was a factory worker, a shop steward and a foreman in his life outside of prison, but he was very vocal about workers’ rights," he continued. "And then he forgot all about that as soon as he was in prison and just became a tough shell of his former self. He just wanted to get through the day."
"And in that moment that you are talking about, the scales fall from his eyes, and he re-engages with his truth and finds himself again."
In yesterday's episode of Andor, Cassian and Kino staged a breakout and managed to overcome the Imperials inside their prison on Narkina 5. However, tragedy struck when it became clear the only way to truly escape was to jump into the water below, and Loy broke all of us - and Cassian, for that matter - when he told the future Rebel, "I can't swim."
"In [episode 10], he finds that desire to act on behalf of others again, to serve others, to enable others to find their freedom, even though he knows ultimately it’s not going to happen for him," Serkis explains. "So it really was a wonderful arc. It was a wonderful journey that I was able to go on with all that."
Asked whether he thinks his character was subsequently executed, the actor smiled and responded, "That’s an interesting one. Who knows?"
Of course, Andor isn't the first time Serkis has travelled to this Galaxy Far, Far Away. He previously played Supreme Leader Snoke in the Star Wars sequels, and admits that his history with the franchise very nearly put him off coming back to play this character.
"I thought it would cause complete uproar and more confusion for the audience, thinking that there would be some sort of connection between the Supreme Leader and Kino Loy," he says. "So that was my only [hang-up]. I thought, 'Am I really going to go into this melee of uncertainty again?' but I was such a huge fan of Rogue One."
"Once I got through the Snoke-theory quagmire, it didn’t take me long to commit."
There are only two episodes left of Andor, and we're hoping we do get to see what became of poor Kino. There's a chance the series will leave his fate ambiguous, though we do hope he shows up in season 2 if that's the case. One thing we can say for sure based on Serkis' comments here is that he most definitely won't transform into Snoke down the line...or will he?