Misadventures in Blissville

“Night”

After the “before-time,” after the long-long-ago, June and her class of handmaids-in-training are being led to orientation as Aunt Lydia calls them, a “a parade of sluts.” Really? She wants the handmaids to “humble themselves” in the eyes of the Lord, which requires lowering their heads in front of Aunt Lydia, which would suggest Lydia is “the Lord.” Is that the inference here? Later, June is put in a dark room where she is given an identification tag punctured into her ear; a very painful process, Lydia promises her. In the present, June returns from shopping with the package the butcher gave her. She secrets the package under her bathtub. She exits her room and is immediately struck by Serena. The hit is so hard she slams into the doorway and falls down. This is Serena. This is what she is. When you have no compunction or hesitation with regard to striking a fellow human because of your personal anger, you become a threat to everyone around you, especially the children you so desperately want to have. In my estimation, this woman should never know a moment’s happiness in her life. Love and joy should become silent, staring strangers. Serena is livid over the discovery that Fred took June to Jezebels. Rather than take it out on Fred, she beats a woman half her size. Serena makes June take a pregnancy test. It is positive. Maybe Serena won’t strike her so hard the next time. Serena and Fred argue in his office. Fred tries to assert his “God-given” dominion over Serena. Serena tells him June is pregnant, and that the child is not his. Why should we care? Why does the writer want us to care about their petty squabbles? Monsters being monstrous to each other elicits no sympathy from me.

Rita is positively giddy over June’s pregnancy, serves her a breakfast of eggs and oatmeal. Serena tells Nick she’s pregnant. Nick wants to be all daddy-daddy with her, but she, wisely, think it’s inappropriate given the circumstances. Serena watches over them and fumes. This is her baby, damnit! Serena orders her to the car. Meanwhile, Moira, after having ditched the car from the previous episode, flees on foot, discovers she has made it to Ontario. What the … ? Well, that was easy! After a short drive, Serena and June arrive at what looks like a school. Serena exits, goes inside the building and brings out Hannah, June’s daughter. Serena does not permit a family reunion. She instead sits with Hannah on the steps and talks with her. June goes ape-shit inside the car. She can’t get out because the doors are locked. Hannah goes back inside. Serena gets into the car, in the front seat this time. Serena suggests that no harm will come to Hannah if no harm comes to the baby growing inside June, which causes her to unleash all manner of insult. This show is sick. Janine’s former Commander from the previous episode confesses to his sexual impropriety with his handmaid. Interesting that her words would be more powerful than his, him being a man and all. He could’ve called her a liar and been done with it. She’s just the dirty slut, one-eyed batshit crazy Janine. Why would anybody in this total nightmare world believe her? As punishment, his left arm is amputated, and we see the amputation in graphic detail, but at least he’s been anesthetized.

June seeks solace with Nick in his upstairs Fonzie-style garage apartment, but he isn’t there, so she goes to visit Fred. She needs his help. She needs him to protect her daughter from Serena. Fred finds this dubious, but June tells him he doesn’t know his wife. Fred asks if the baby is his. June lies, and I do think Fred sees through the lie. Later that night, June finds the package and opens it. It could be anything. It could be bullets. It could be a bomb. It could be chemicals for a bomb. It isn’t. It’s the most stupid device this series has yet unraveled. Letters. Fucking letters! This is what was so important? These are confessional letters about what the handmaids are going through. People were already starting to get stories of the handmaids back in “The Other Side” and that was three years before! This is what Mayday is fighting for? June stays up the whole night reading the letters. Why?! In Canada, Moira is put through the refugee system. She’s given money, a phone, and an I.D. card. Samira Wiley (Moira) does a very good job here of trying to remember what it was like to be free before all of this began. She’s equal parts shell-shocked and confused. This is where the show succeeds. Fred and Serena argue some more, and they seem to reconcile, but again, I don’t care. Monsters being nice to each other elicits no sympathy from me. Early morning vespers and roll-call in the park. The handmaids are given rocks and told to stone Janine to death for her transgression of stealing her baby and jumping off the bridge. Janine, being her sweet, broken self, asks the handmaids to not hit her “too hard, okay?”

Ofglen protests. She doesn’t want to kill Janine. A Guardian strikes her and she falls to the ground, the gun trained on her. They drag her away. You have an assemblage of handmaids with rocks in their hands, and Guardians with machine guns pointing those guns at them. Aunt Lydia tries to control the situation. It’s amazing it hasn’t escalated completely out of control with Guardians mowing down these handmaids, as they are worth less than nothing. June drops her rock and smart-assedly apologizes. It becomes a Spartacus moment for the group and everybody drops their rocks and apologizes to Aunt Lydia. She sends everybody home and tells them to think about what they’ve done. Uh, mercy? Compassion? These are simple human concepts. Oh, but Lydia warns, “There will be consequences.” Such is the control Gilead has over the handmaids that they are free to walk home without supervision, without a Guardian presence. None of this makes any sense. Either that, or Gilead chooses which rules it wants to follow. As June walks home, we’re treated to a reunion between Moira and Luke. Moira is still traumatized. Now this is good acting, and it really brings home the tragedy of human atrocity and violence. June considers herself in “disgrace” because of her action, but she isn’t the center of the rebellion. The center was Ofglen and her refusal to cast that stone. She was the one brave soul. June is a pretender. Everything she does is in service of her own survival. Guardians come to take her away. She tells Rita where to find the package full of letters. Nick tells her to go along with them, and this is how the first season of The Handmaid’s Tale ends.

* I’ll be back next week with a wrap-up of the first season.