Andor creator Tony Gilroy urges Star Wars ambition

Tony Gilroy used Andor’s latest awards stop to make a case for the kind of Star Wars he wants to see next. The writer and showrunner said on June 3 that he hopes the franchise will “stay ambitious” while accepting a Peabody Award tied to Andor’s second season, according to an Associated Press video report. (peabodyawards.com) The comment arrived days after the 86th Peabody Awards ceremony in Beverly Hills and during a stretch in which Andor has been framed as one of the franchise’s most acclaimed recent projects. (peabodyawards.com) Peabody announced the 2026 winners on April 23 and said the honorees were celebrated on May 31 at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel. Peabody’s citation for Andor described the Disney+ series as a “complex and urgent portrait” of the human cost of rebellion under authoritarian rule. (apnews.com) The awards body listed Tony Gilroy as creator and showrunner and named Lucasfilm Ltd. and Disney+ in the project’s production credits. ### What exactly did Gilroy say at the Peabody stop? Tony Gilroy said he wants Star Wars to “stay ambitious,” according to the AP report from June 3. The remark came while he was accepting a Peabody Award connected to Andor’s second season. (peabodyawards.com) The AP report said Gilroy made the appeal as Andor’s awards run continued after the show’s second-season finale. AP’s framing tied the comment directly to the future of Star Wars storytelling rather than to a new project announcement. (peabodyawards.com) ### Why was Andor at the Peabodys in the first place? The Peabody Awards named Andor among the 86th annual winners announced on April 23. Peabody said the year’s winners represented storytelling released in the last year across television, podcasts, radio and the web. (apnews.com) Peabody’s award profile for the series said season two depicts protests crushed by riot police, workplace raids and resistance factions confronting an empire consolidating power “with violence and impunity.” The organization said the show expanded Star Wars into a story about the cost of rebellion. (apnews.com) ### How did Peabody describe the show’s achievement? Peabody said Andor won for “further expanding” one of Hollywood’s biggest franchises into a story that created “a complex and urgent portrait of the human cost of what it means to rebel.” The citation also noted that the show’s first season had already won a Peabody in 2023. (peabodyawards.com) Jeffrey P. Jones, Peabody’s executive director, said the 2026 winners reflected the organization’s mission to honor storytelling with the potential to change culture. (peabodyawards.com) In the same winners announcement, Peabody grouped Andor with other entertainment and documentary titles that led this year’s awards. ### Where does this leave Andor inside the wider franchise? Disney+ carries Andor as part of Lucasfilm’s Star Wars television slate, and Peabody’s credits list Diego Luna among the series’ executive producers and cast. (peabodyawards.com) The award profile also names Stellan Skarsgård, Genevieve O’Reilly, Denise Gough, Adria Arjona and Forest Whitaker among the featured performers. The AP report presented Gilroy’s “stay ambitious” line as a statement about future Star Wars projects after Andor’s second-season finale. (peabodyawards.com) AP did not describe the appearance as the launch of a separate film or series. ### When was the award presented, and what comes next? The 86th Peabody Awards were celebrated on May 31, 2026, at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, according to the organization. (peabodyawards.com) Peabody said the winners had been announced earlier, on April 23. As of June 3, the most immediate next marker is the continuing public life of Andor as a 2025 Peabody winner on Disney+ and in Peabody’s winners archive, where the organization has posted the show’s award profile and credits. (apnews.com) (peabodyawards.com 1) (peabodyawards.com 2)