There are a lot of sarcastic, sassy droids in Star Wars, more so today than ever before. The best of the best are faithful servants of their masters who do their best to maintain their own witty personalities despite their otherwise rigid programming. At the end of the day, they'll do anything to protect the ones close to them. Even if it's the last thing they'll ever do.
The former imperial droid K-2SO immediately won the hearts of Star Wars fans when he first appeared in 2016's Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. He made a brief but welcome return earlier in 2025 in the second season of Star Wars: Andor. It turns out there's a big reason this droid is so beloved. It isn't just the fans who adore him; the actor who brings him to life does, too.
Alan Tudyk portrayed K-2SO in both Rogue One and Andor, and was even nominated for an Emmy following the TV series' conclusion for Outstanding Character Voice-Over Performance.
Speaking with Playlist recently, Tudyk -- who has had a prolific and successful career as an actor outside of Star Wars -- commented on how much freedom he had when delivering K-2SO's lines. Rogue One's film director, he recounted, gave Tudyk plenty of opportunities to take K-2's pre-planned sarcasm and kick it up a few notches.
"[Director] Gareth Edwards’s directing style was much looser," he said. "I’d do the lines as scripted the first couple of takes, and then I was free to do whatever I wanted, because they didn’t see my face. So, I’d do funnier versions or pushed K-2SO’s sarcasm even more."
And that plays a lot into K-2's charm, so to speak. Sometimes the best one-liners are made up on the spot, and that combined with line delivery and how a scene is shot and edited can easily create some of the funniest moments in a movie. Rogue One is a Star Wars movie with a much damper tone than many of the others, but K-2's comic relief is more than welcome.
There's also the fact that any line an actor delivers as a droid is automatically going to be funnier because many droids, like K-2, can only shift their intonation so much. Tudyk's lines often come off as straight-faced deadpans because we're hearing them through the voice of a droid. All that together makes for great viewing.
When an actor is having fun playing a role, it's often much more enjoyable for their audience. Actors are professionals; they're pretty good at making you think they're enjoying themselves even when they aren't. But Tudyk didn't have to try very hard to let his enjoyment come through. It makes sense that he was not only willing to reprise the role for Andor, but would, as he told Playlist, be willing to do so again if such an opportunity ever came up.