Some thoughts on The Handmaid’s Tale 2x09 - what an episode
The trip to Canada, oh boy I’ve been waiting for this ever since it was first mentioned. We’ve seen what’s happening within Gilead (obv) and we’ve seen what’s going on in Canada but this is the first time we’ve seen the Gilead establishment interacting with the wider world. They’ve been living in their own bubble ever since the new republic was established. They may have been able to justify they’ve fucked up actions within their own little society, but that shit still doesn’t fly elsewhere.
I just wanna point out I love Serena’s lil hat, it’s so 1950s. Plus I actually love the whole costume, I love the silhouette and the way everything drapes. If only it didn’t represent something so awful.
Serena flinches when Fred touches her. That’s really hard to watch. I don’t have sympathy for Serena in any other way, but no one deserves to be beaten the way she was.
The car ride through the streets of Toronto. Serena looks so... enchanted by what she sees, even though this is the type of society that she helped to destroy in the US, the society that she abhorred, that she felt deserved to be razed to the ground in a flurry of violence, blood and death. Now she looks so wistful as she watches people freely go about their day. And I’m struck by the noisiness of the streets, such a contrast to the constricted silence of Gilead. It doesn’t escape my notice that Fred is totally unmoved by the sights. He still has freedom at home in Gilead, so he has no interest.
The schedule made out in pictures, what a moment for Serena. She’s so disappointed by it. The Canadians have obviously done their research and are trying to be culturally sensitive. This is what you wanted, Serena. Maybe she thought that the Canadians would treat her as she used to be treated in the pre-Gilead days.
“I would never betray my country.” “I thought you already did.” God, I fucking love this show.
The confrontation between Luke and Fred has to be my favourite scene of the entire series. The catharsis of seeing someone call out Fred, in a place where he has no power and he has to be courteous, oh my god it was a glorious feeling. At long last, someone who doesn’t have to bow and scrape and can call him a fucking piece of shit to his face.
I am so so so glad it wasn’t just a case of Luke lunging at Fred and then being dragged away. He actually got to tell them all that he is June’s husband, her family. This is the first time Serena and Fred have been forced to acknowledge, albeit internally, that June is still a person – she had a life, she had a family, she had an identity and she still has people who care about her and are fighting for her. They can take her name, her freedom, her body, they can do whatever possible to strip her of her humanity, but they can never fully do it, they can’t erase her past or her connections to others. They can’t reduce her to a blank canvass. No matter what they do to reduce her to a piece of property, they’ll never truly accomplish it.
The look on Serena’s and Nick’s face when they see the picture of Luke, June and Hannah. They both look horrified, though presumably for different reasons. A major theme of this episode and the previous episode has been Serena being forced to come face to face with the reality of what she has done in helping to create Gilead. Episode 8 was Serena coming face to face with what she has done to herself in creating Gilead, i.e. stripping herself of autonomy, freedom, both intellectual and physical, as well as placing herself at the mercy of her husband. This episode was (in part) about Serena having to come face to face with what she has done to other women in helping to create Gilead, and this was done in her experience with Luke.
“Are you thinking about the husband? It was unpleasant, but we soldier on.” To quote Luke, Waterford, you fucking piece of shit.
The scene when the Waterfords are told they are no longer welcome in Canada had me cheering. Erin was right, the letters certainly went boom.
“We believe the women.” “Yesterday you believe me.” God, what a perfect line. I think it sums up not just the mentality of the powerful men of Gilead, but of powerful men in general. It can be perfectly applied to the Me Too movement. Yesterday, sexual assault was as men defined it, so many have responded with anger at the thought that all of their actions have been abusive to women. They feel they should be able to define it, but then we have women who are saying it was/is wrong, they don’t like it and it’s not a respectful way to approach or treat women. Today, it is shifted so that women are the ones that define what is and isn’t okay in their interactions with men.
Fred called the Canadian diplomat a coward. I puzzled over this line, wondering exactly what he meant. I’ve come to the conclusion that Fred called him a coward because he listened to the women and to the citizens of Canada, rather than asserting (masculine) power over them. Wow.
A last tidbit of that scene, when that female Canadian representative tells Serena “I don’t know how you live with yourself. It’s sad what they’ve done to you.” Thing is, Serena did it to herself and Serena damn well knows it. She’s not a victim, she was not stripped of anything, she willingly gave it away and threw her fellow women under the bus. She herself did it. How can she live with that indeed.
A word on Eden: she is a child, and a meek, unempowered girl to boot. She deserves sympathy from the audience, and she certainly has mine. However, at the same time I do find her annoying, and no I don’t think they cancel each other out. She’s not annoying or frustrating for her personality or anything she does, but simply because she is entirely indoctrinated and loyal to the regime that it makes her a liability when it comes to herself as well as Nick. We’ve watched Nick for an entire season, so of course many people have developed a connection with the character so I’m not surprised some have really turned against her. Her loyalty to the regime could get the both of them killed. Though I myself find her frustrating at times, we have to remember that she is a child and she knows no better, she has never lived independently of her family and their views, she had never been able to develop away from that. And Nick is caught between a rock and a hard place in this marriage because she is a child. How could any sane person just erase the fact this is so terribly wrong, and would have been considered a crime had it happened pre-Gilead. It’s an absolute nightmare of a situation.
Does Serena deserve sympathy? When it comes to the physical abuse, yes. When it comes to everything else? No. She’s a very interesting, complex character and she makes me feel a lot of emotions, but the reality of Gilead is self-inflicted, she’s only now coming to realise that and perhaps regret it. We’ll see what happens with June’s baby.
