Andor Star Kyle Soller Says Syril Karn Has The Energy Of A Man 'Chewing On A Wasp'

How well do you know your "Andor" cast? The latest "Star Wars" streaming series has drawn comparisons to the work of more than one 19th-century novelist, with /Film's own Lyvie Scott likening it to "Les Miserables" in space, and "Andor" showrunner Tony Gilroy describing the show's cast as "a huge, orchestral, Dickensian ensemble." The first three episodes of "Andor," which dropped last Wednesday, introduce us to new "Star Wars" planets like Ferrix and plenty of new faces as well.

One of those faces is Deputy Inspector Syril Karn, played by Olivier Award-winning stage, film, and television actor Kyle Soller. When we first meet Syril, he's standing at parade rest in his boss's office at the corporate security headquarters of the Pre-Mor (Preox-Morlana) Authority on Morlana One. Syril's got a bee in his bonnet about the two men our resident antihero, Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), killed in a street encounter — and that's just the beginning of the comparisons to flying insects with stingers that you might make about this guy. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Soller recently said:

"I had an interesting chat with one of the ['Andor'] directors, Toby Haynes. And they were looking for a reference photograph for something to do with my hair and everything. And he found something online, where, unfortunately, I do look like I'm a little bit tightly wound and kind of angry. And he's like, 'I think like this, like this. It looks like you're chewing on a wasp.' And I was like, 'Oh, that's so brilliant.' Syril at every moment is just chewing on this wasp of pain and anguish and determination to transcend his station, and is unbelievably disappointed with everything around him because he's looking for his satisfaction and his validation from the outside and from this horrible structure of the Empire."

This section contains spoilers for the first three episodes of "Andor."

Syril Karn's introduction scene immediately establishes him as a company man who takes himself and his custom-tailored space uniform way too seriously. As the first three-episode act of "Andor" progresses, his boss leaves him in charge and he proceeds to buddy up with Sergeant Linus Mosk (Alex Ferns), another Pre-Mor security officer who shares mutual ideas about dereliction of duty, making a show of force, and bringing Cassian Andor to justice.

When Soller talks about Syril "looking for satisfaction" outside of himself — in the Empire — you can see that in the way that he clings to rigid notions about what should and shouldn't be allowed under the Pre-Mor Authority, which acts as an administrative affiliate of the Empire. In the second episode of "Andor," "That Would Be Me," we begin to realize just how out of his depth Syril truly is as he attempts to give his and Mosk's strike team a rallying speech, which is rather weak sauce. Then, in the action-packed third episode, "Reckoning," they lead the team down to Ferrix, and Andor eventually gets the drop on Syril, holding him at gunpoint (or blaster point) and leaving him bound and gagged.

No sooner does Syril get free than he's falling for the old landspeeder switcheroo, allowing Andor and Luthen Rael (Stellan Skarsgård) to escape. The moral of the story is: If you're seeking validation from the Empire, kids, don't do it. That way lies damnation (or perhaps just Disney-fication and abject humiliation).

"Andor" is now streaming on Disney+, with the fourth episode set to drop this coming Wednesday, September 28, 2022.