This is easily the best Star Wars since Rogue One. Also easily the dramatic TV series I have seen in many years. The sequel trilogy was mostly not good, but I will say it had some good emotional moments. That does not make for a cohesive story, which unlike the OT and PT, the ST just did not seem interested in having.
Andor is better than Mandalorian, at least for me, since I'm more interested in the Rebellion and in something that I'd always wondered about and that this show is delivering on in spades - what was life truly like under Imperial rule? One of the reasons that I've always held The Phantom Menace in relatively high regard is for its build-up of what would become the rise of a dictator, and how it looked similar in some respects to the rise of Adolf Hitler. Andor is giving a good glimpse into daily life under an oppressive government much like life in Germany post-1933. This is a government under which people go about their business but do so always looking over their shoulders, hunched down a bit so as to not stand out, and where citizens just disappear in the dead of night, or broad daylight, because they did something the Empire deems unacceptable. What this show is doing is not at all what much of Star Wars has done - the Empire is BAD, they are the VILLAIN, take our word for it - this show is depicting just how bad and villainous the Empire truly is.
Then we're getting a good look at the birth of the Rebellion, with Luthien and Mon Mothma's covert activities toward obtaining funding and the like. I could watch hours of a show just about these two. Very well written and acted characters (when Mon Mothma was just some chick who showed up seemingly out of nowhere way back in Return of the Jedi, yet was compelling even then).
Serkis' character was fantastic. Took me a couple of episodes to realize that he was Serkis, I was that much just into this world. And for the record, I don't give a **** what they were building in that prison. The characters are just so well realized that it really doesn't matter what they were doing. Back to Serkis, I agree that he should be much more featured in live action movies. I did enjoy his work in the MCU (arms dealer who showed up in Avengers Age of Ultron and then again in Black Panther).