Adria Arjona’s Bix Caleen has gone through a journey during the two seasons of Andor. She started as Cassian Andor’s friend, someone with ties to the Rebellion. She ends on Mina-Rau with a baby in her arms, looking up at the sky and waiting for the love of her life, who will never return. But Bix’s journey isn’t just one of sacrifice, hers is one of strength that in many ways calls back to the sacrifices made by many immigrant women worldwide.
Season 2 shows us very specific moments of her journey. We begin with Bix in Mina-Rau alongside Brasso and Wilmon, waiting for Cassian. There, we see that though Bix has mostly recovered from the torture she suffered at the end of Season 1 of Andor, the scars remain. She’s healed physically, but the mental injuries are always so much harder to cure.
Then, Bix comes face to face with one of the realities of being a woman – sometimes men will see you as a thing they can use, not as a person with wants and needs. And yet Andor doesn’t depict Bix’s attack and attempted rape in an exploitative way or a plot device to “make her strong.” Instead, the scene is brutal and uncomfortable, even as it clearly shows that Bix is a survivor. Her strength predates this particular attack – she survived the Empire before, and this is her doing it again.
Because even when we meet Bix again, one year later, still struggling with nightmares but settled in a more domestic and happy romantic relationship with Cassian, the reality remains the same. Her oppressor isn’t Gorst or Krole, but the Empire. That’s why she tells Cassian that if they’re doing this, getting involved in the Rebellion, it can’t be half in. “I want to win,” she says, and she’s willing to sacrifice anything, even her life, for it.
Killing these men – Gorst and Krole – marks the defeat of two of Bix’s personal monsters, but her revenge doesn’t set her free. The Empire is her true enemy and it has many footsoldiers to do its bidding. As we get closer to the end of Andor, it becomes clear that Bix understands that the Empire must fall for her, those she loves, and the galaxy at large to be free in a way Cassian doesn’t. Luthen chides him for thinking like a soldier, not like a leader, and in some ways, he’s right. Cassian is fighting for the people he loves. Bix sees beyond that.
The Cassian Andor of Rogue One, the one willing to do everything to take down the Empire, the one who helps save the entire galaxy by getting the Death Star plans to Princess Leia, that man only exists because Bix Caleen put the Rebellion first. Because she took a step back. And Bix only gets there, to the place where she understands that the way for the Rebellion to “win” is by her leaving because she understands Cassian in the same way Maarva understood him.
Sure, Bix of all people would like to just have a quiet life with the man she loves. But when they hide in Mina-Rau, and the Empire still comes. The two of them try hiding in Coruscant, and that feels like half a life. Even in Yavin, it’s all about the fight. And for Bix, perhaps it should be. Because there’s no peace or happiness for her while the Empire exists.
And considering that the last shot we see of Bix is with a baby in her arms, she knows she’s a liability, one that could not just put Cassian in more danger, but prevent him from doing what he needs to do to help win. What she feels in her heart, he is meant to do.
In the second season, Andor plainly depicts the ways the Empire works on a large scale – the propaganda, the censorship, the genocide. It’s clear that Bix is right; there is no real freedom while the Empire exists. And Bix, who has been a victim of the Empire in many ways, who has also been a survivor, becomes in some ways, the ultimate hero of the Rebellion, one no one even knows about. Because she, unlike many others, is willing to put the fate of the galaxy before her happiness.
Cassian wanted to run away with her. All she had to do was say yes. What happens in Rogue One if Cassian Andor isn’t there? Are the plans for the Death Star retrieved? And, if they’re not, can the Empire ever be defeated? The answer seems obvious. Since we watched Rogue One, we’ve celebrated that team as the heroes behind the heroes. Andor Season 2 is giving us another side of the story, the woman who pushes the man to greatness and glory. That’s been the story of women throughout history and now it’s one to celebrate in a galaxy far, far away.
