okay but like… so many people in the comments of The Testaments’ social media posts are acting like it’s completely set in stone that Agnes is straight, that there’s not even a remote POSSIBILITY that she could be queer — let alone end up with Becka! and I just. take so much issue with that???
of any teenage girls we’ve seen in modern fictional media, our core ensemble in TT has to be some of the most repressed and oppressed across the board. these girls have no autonomy, they’re BARELY educated, and the trajectory of their lives depends on whether they start their periods or not. one could argue that these girls will only know romantic love by accident, if at all; that is to say, it’s not guaranteed that they’ll even experience romantic love in a genuine manner unless they happen to be matched with a Commander they actually do wind up falling for, which seems rare from what we know. they don’t even understand the physical mechanics of heterosexual sex until it’s literally forced upon them on their wedding night!! it’s a type of suffocation coming from all sides and every angle.
I don’t even think the majority of these girls know that queerness is an OPTION!! we don’t know for certain that “gender treachery” has ever explicitly been explained to them outside of the general umbrella of “forbidden acts against god” that are specific to straying from mandated gender roles. someone raised in Gilead that has no memory of any time or culture prior to its existence might not even have the language to describe queerness, let alone the wherewithal to identify with such labels!
take Becka, for example. she’s operating solely off her innate/gut instincts; ones that are telling her she vehemently doesn’t want a husband, that she doesn’t want “any” of what Gilead has in store for her future, and that she deeply, irrevocably loves and is IN love with Agnes — in the most pure, instinctual manner a person could love another. she doesn’t have the language to articulate her feelings to any degree beyond what she’s experiencing, nor does she have the ability to label herself in any way, shape, or form. she is just Becka, and Becka would literally do anything for Agnes.
so, without writing a novel here, I’d like to run through some of the takes that I’ve seen about Agnes’ and Becka’s dynamic. this will be beyond what Mattea and Chase have said about the way they acted certain scenes like the kiss — which doesn’t preclude an eventual future romance, I might add !! even if they’re expressing “different types of love” in that initial kiss scene.
- is the love they’re experiencing for each other ACTUALLY that different?? is it though??? ruining their own lives for each other, prioritizing each other over everyone else, completely ignoring Gilead’s bullshit rules to support each other no matter what???? the lines between platonic and romantic love have always been blurred in my opinion, but this is a damn SWIRL.
- Agnes being “in love” with Garth is literally…not love lol. she does not know that man!! it’s a puppy love crush at BEST. the physical sensations she described when she sees him is physical attraction, plain and simple. she’s clearly infatuated, sure, but we all know that’s not actually true, genuine romantic love. it just isn’t. there’s a lot of space to be filled between what currently is between them and what being in love is.
- what Agnes does for Becka throughout the season but ESPECIALLY in ruining her own match to Commander Weston to free Becka IS love in both platonic and romantic forms!! it’s love as an action verb, love as a series of consistent actions and behaviors, which is love at its core and in its truest form.
- even if Agnes does actually fall in love with Garth at some point in time, why couldn’t she also come to be in love with Becka as well? whatever happened to bisexuality?!?!? it doesn’t just go away because it’s “outlawed” lol.
so many audience members are acting like Agnes’ romantic fate is locked in with Garth despite the fact that we’re talking about ONE SEASON of a tv show in which Agnes KISSED BECKA, not Garth !!! ruined her life in Gilead (at least in the short term) for BECKA, not Garth !!! they are children locked in to fates they didn’t choose under an extremely oppressive regime. NOTHING is set in stone, and the book is clearly its own thing at this point.
anyone dismissing the possibility of a canon romantic relationship between Agnes and Becka is simply ignorant at best 🤷♀️
romaincrisis
turnnoffyourmind
areudirty
