We all knew where Cassian Andor’s story was going to end — with a heartbreaking sacrifice on Scarif. But what remained a mystery until just recently was how Andor was going to end. Much like fans thought, we saw Cassian apprehensively take off and head off to what would be his debut in Rogue One, but that wasn’t the last scene in the episode.
Andor’s final coda tied off one last loose end — with Bix, his long-time love, who left Yavin so she wouldn’t hold Andor back. “I can't be the reason you leave here. If you ever gave this up for me, I'd... I'd never forgive myself,” she said in a letter to Cassian. “We have to win. We have to beat them.” She promised they’ll be together after everything was over, but that wasn’t meant to be. Instead, she’s left with an ending that seems hopeful at first glance, but undercuts her character arc and perpetuates a Hollywood trope in the worst possible way.
Heroic sacrifices are often found in sci-fi and fantasy stories, but they are often accompanied by some glimmer of hope in the end. If it can’t be revealed that the hero can come back, often we’ll see a character reveal the next best thing: a secret child who can carry along the hero’s legacy. It happened in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever’s mid-credits scene with Nakia, and in The Walking Dead after Glenn perishes, leaving Maggie pregnant.
In Andor, we see this trope in the final scene, which shows Bix on the farm planet Mina-Rau where she previously hid from the Empire. But she’s not alone — she’s carrying a small child, presumably Cassian’s child he’ll never get to meet.
“It’s a tough road. And we know where [Cassian’s] going and I really would be bereft if there was not a candle in the window at the end of this thing,” showrunner Tony Gilroy told Decider of the reveal. “I really wanted to have hope, so there’s that.” He also revealed Bix was probably pregnant when she left Cassian, which may lend more credence to her sudden disappearance.
But writing her off Yavin and safely on Mina-Rau throws a wrench in Bix’s story. Her entire arc this season has been about her healing and reclaiming her identity after she was assaulted by an Imperial officer. She turns to substance abuse, but slowly regains the confidence to work on Rebel missions. This ending means she gives up everything, not just to get out of Cassian’s way, but also to be a mother.
But Bix deserves much more than the simple life on a farm planet. In fact, Star Wars has shown this exact same trope in a far better way. In Rebels, Kanan sacrifices himself to save his love Hera Syndulla, and we see her raising their son, Jacen, in an epilogue. But Hera doesn’t feel the need to escape or leave the Rebellion. In fact, she even flew the Ghost in aid of Cassian himself in the Battle of Scarif.
This trope was also used in the non-canonical video game Knights of the Old Republic, where one of the endings involved Revan leaving his wife, Bastila Shan, forever when he ventures out into the Unknown Regions. But even in that case, the novel The Old Republic: Revan revealed she went on to become a Jedi Master.
Perhaps Bix does return to the Rebellion after she realizes how Cassian sacrificed himself, but as it stands, it appears like she abandoned her life’s mission so she can focus on raising Cassian’s child. There’s nothing wrong with choosing to be a mother, but she could absolutely be a mom and a Rebel if she wanted.
Maybe this last scene is teasing some future project where we’ll learn if Bix ever returned to her roots, but for now, it’s hard not to read the end of Bix’s story as her being defined by the father of her child instead of her own story.
