The Handmaid's Tale Season 1 - TV Series Review

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Miller, B (Executive producer). (2017-present). The Handmaid’s Tale [TV series] MGM television; Hulu. Link to Image.

“I sit and watch the curtains move in the breeze. Nothing can change. Someone is watching. It all has to look the same. Because I intend to survive. I intend to survive for her. Her name is Hannah. My husband was Luke. My name is June.”
June, “Offred”, The Handmaid’s Tale

The Handmaid’s Tale is an Emmy award-winning televised adaption of Margaret Atwood’s bestselling 1985 novel of the same name. It was created by Bruce Miller and stars Elizabeth Moss, Joseph Fiennes, Yvonne Strahovski, Alexis Bledel, Madeline Brewer, Ann Dowd, O-T Fagbenle, Max Minghella, Samira Wiley, Amanda Brugel, Bradley Whitford and Sam Jaeger. The first season premiered on 26 April 2017 to rave reviews. After five seasons and multiple awards nominations and wins, The Handmaid's Tale will conclude with its sixth and final season which is scheduled to air sometime in 2025.This article will contain spoilers for The Handmaid's Tale book and season 1 of the TV series.


Miller, B (Executive producer). (2017-present). The Handmaid’s Tale [TV series] MGM television; Hulu.
Link to YouTube.

I’ve been a huge fan of The Handmaid’s Tale TV series ever since 2017. I recently sat down to watch it again and it struck me how much more closer to reality season one feels now than it did back in 2017. The Handmaid’s Tale is set in an alternative future where a group of religious fanatics known as the Sons of Jacob have overthrown the United States government and established the totalitarian government of Gilead in its place. In Gilead fertile women who have sinned are forced to work as concubines known as Handmaids. The Handmaids are assigned to the homes of powerful men where they are expected to submit to rape and be impregnated by them for the good of the state. Maragaret Atwood has stated in multiple interviews that nothing in The Handmaid's Tale was made up it was all inspired by real-life events.


Miller, B (Executive producer). (2017-present). The Handmaid’s Tale [TV series] “Late” (Video). MGM television; Hulu.
Link to YouTube.

In the television series Elizabeth Moss stars as June Osborne a fertile woman who gets caught trying to escape Gilead with her husband Luke and their daughter Hannah. June is separated from her husband and daughter and made into a handmaid for the sin of being an adulteress. She is assigned to the house of Commander Waterford and his wife Serena Waterford. Moss really owns the role of June Osborne. In season one her trauma of being made into a handmaid is still fresh. She spends a lot of her spare time trying to hold onto fleeting memories of Luke and Hannah and what her life was like before Gilead. She also narrates a lot of the episodes because she has withdrawn into her head as a way to dissociate and escape from the trauma she is forced to endure as a handmaid.


Miller, B (Executive producer). (2017-present). The Handmaid’s Tale [TV series] “Late” (Video). MGM television; Hulu. Link to YouTube.

In the book and television series, June finds herself in a love triangle between her husband Luke Bankole (O-T Fagbenle) and Nick Blaine (Max Minghella) an undercover Eye stationed in the Waterford house. I’ve always disliked this love triangle and the pressure put on June to choose a man. It is obvious to me when re-watching season one that she loves Luke but feels like the memory of him is drifting away from her. She doesn’t know if he is still alive or if she is still the same June that he fell in love with.

I really hate how much the book and the show tries so hard to push Nick Blaine as a love interest for June. I think that it is gross. Nick is not a hero. He threw his support in with Gilead before the civil war. He is one of the bad guys. He got a job with the Sons of Jacob before the uprising because he needed money and wanted to feel like he belonged. Nick and June’s relationship was built on a foundation of trauma, loneliness, and lust. I have disliked it from the start because of the power imbalance between them and the fact that Nick was involved with bringing Gilead into power. He is one of June’s oppressors and deserves to be prosecuted for his war crimes.


Miller, B (Executive producer). (2017-present). The Handmaid’s Tale [TV series] “Offred” (Video). MGM television; Hulu. Link to YouTube.

I think that the real love story of the show is the friendship between June and Moira (Samira Wiley). So much of season one is devoted to showing their history through flashbacks and how the two of them have always been there for each other through thick and thin before and after the rise of Gilead. In the episode “Late” we see in a flashback the moment when June and all of the women in her workplace lose their jobs because Gilead has passed a new law banning women from working, owning property, and having their own bank accounts. June and Moira are horrified by what’s happening in their country but Luke is not. He is condescending and dismissive. He can’t see how bad things are getting. I really like how Moira calls him out in this scene for being patronising and not seeing how his sexist attitudes towards women are contributing to the problem.

In another flashback, June and Moira attend a protest for women’s rights. They are greeted by a group of Guardians who open fire on the protestors and start indiscriminately killing them. It is an absolutely terrifying scene that is made all the more haunting by a chilling remix of Blondie’s “Heart of Glass” playing in the background. I find it really noticeable that Luke did not attend the protest with June but Moira did. It really shows that he wasn’t paying as much attention as June and Moira were back then about how much political tension was rising in the country. My heart breaks for June and Moira when they are forced to hold hands and flee from the Guardians. They are really united by their trauma in that moment.


Miller, B (Executive producer). (2017-present). The Handmaid’s Tale [TV series] “Jezebels” (Video). MGM television; Hulu. Link to YouTube.

The bond between June and Moria deepens even more throughout the season. After the uprising, June and Moira are rounded up with other fertile women and turned into handmaids. The two of them attempt to escape from the Red Centre together. June is caught and sent back but Moira is not. In the episode “Jezebels” we learn that Moira was eventually re-captured and sent to work as a prostitute in a men’s club. It really breaks my heart when the two of them re-connect in Jezebels. They love each other so much. Seeing Moira again awakens powerful emotions inside Offred. She encourages Moira to try to escape Jezebels and join Luke in Canada.

When The Handmaid’s Tale premiered back in 2017, the world was a very different place. It was pre-pandemic and President Donald Trump had been sworn into office just a few months before. A lot of people were nervous that Donald Trump was going to go after reproductive rights. They were right to be concerned because on 23 June 2022 the US Supreme Court made the historic decision to overturn Roe v Wade which removed abortion as a constitutional right and rolled back abortion rights across the country. Ever since then multiple states have either brought in abortion bans or have passed laws that severely limit access to the procedure or threaten abortion providers or people who assist others in seeking an abortion.

On the 24 February 2024, the Alabama Supreme Court made headlines when Chief Justice Tom Parker made a ruling that frozen embryos should be defined as people . In his judgement, he declared his belief that life begins at conception and wrote that the state should recognize and protect “unborn human life” and that “All human beings bear the image of God and their lives cannot be destroyed without effacing his glory.” When I heard what he said I sat back and said out loud “What the fuck? Are we in Gilead now?”

The Handmaid’s Tale feels more closer to reality in 2024 than it ever has before. In the book and TV show one of the themes is complacency. We have to keep our eyes open to what is happening to reproductive freedoms and women’s rights around the world or else we will all pay the price. There is a Margaret Atwood quote from The Handmaid’s Tale that perfectly describes the horrors of creeping fascism “Nothing changes instantaneously: in a gradually heating bathtub you'd be boiled to death before you knew it.”

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