Series The Handmaid's Tale: Seasonal Summary, Analysis and Cast

The Handmaid's Tale (The handmaid's tale) is an American series released in 2017 and based on the eponymous book published by writer Margaret Atwood in 1985.

What would happen if, from one moment to the next, a democratic system is overthrown by a repressive, dictatorial and ultrareligious one? What if women were also divided into roles according to their ability or not to conceive?

The series, like the novel, poses a dystopian future in which people have lost all their individual rights, especially fertile women (maids) who are subjected to a system of slavery.

The Handmaid's Tale synopsis

After a civil war in the United States, a new totalitarian and fundamentalist system is implanted that obeys the orders of the biblical verse under the name of the Republic of Gilead.

Thus, a new society is formed that groups citizens and divides them by classes.

Due to the low birth rate, fertile women are considered as servants and are sent to the homes of commanders, high-ranking government officials. There they are subjected to rapes until they become pregnant, since their mission is to father children.

Among the maids is June, the protagonist of this story, an ordinary woman who has been she stripped of her identity and that she tries to survive in a new world in which women have lost all their Rights.

Summary by season

The tale of the maid It has four seasons divided into a total of 46 episodes, 10 make up the first season, 13 chapters complete the second and third season and 10 episodes constitute the fourth season.

Throughout the four installments, the series has presented an enormous evolution, especially of its protagonist. How has this transformation been? What are the most important events of each of the seasons?

Attention, from now on there may be spoilers!

Season One: The Gilead Implementation

Before the introduction of this new system, June was the mother of a girl and had a husband. Also a best friend named Moira. With the imposition of the Republic of Gilead, the young woman loses her name and is renamed Offred.

On the other hand, she has to train as a maid in the Red Center, a place where women are trained and tortured. One day, Offred and Moira try to escape from there, but the protagonist does not succeed.

Afterward, Offred is sent to the home of Major Waterford and his wife Serena Joy, who is unable to father children. Soon the commander begins inviting Offred to his office to spend time alone and play scrabble.

After some ceremonies, Offred is unable to get pregnant with the commander and Serena proposes that she have relationships with Nick in order to conceive. Soon, these encounters become frequent and Offred begins to suspect that Nick is a government spy.

Deglen, Offred's walking companion, is discovered having a relationship with another woman. Later, she is subjected to a punishment of genital mutilation.

One day the commander asks the protagonist to accompany him to a brothel for the night. She agrees and there she meets Moira again, who has been forced into prostitution.

Dewarren, another maid, manages to have a child and tries to escape with him. Her aunts try to punish her by forcing the other maids to stone her. However, they refuse to do so and disobey.

At the end of the season, Offred discovers that her husband is alive and that he resides in Canada. On the other hand, she also finds out that she is pregnant.

On her side, Moira manages to successfully escape to Toronto. She there she meets the husband of her friend and they plan to rescue her from her. Meanwhile, a black van comes to take the maids, among them is Offred.

Season Two: The Escape

The maids think they are going to be hanged for disobeying. They are taken to a place where they are tortured and made to fear for their lives. Although, finally nothing happens to them.

Offred goes to a review for his pregnancy and there receives a visit from the commander and his wife. She later manages to flee from there hiding in a delivery truck and arrives at a house where she later reunites with Nick. For his part, the commander organizes the search for Offred.

Deglen and Dewarren appear for a time in the colonies. There they work with radioactive substances and many die from the diseases they cause.

One of the maids causes an explosion that costs the lives of 30 maids and some commanders. Waterford is seriously injured. This event causes Deglen and Dewarren to return from the colonies due to a shortage of servants.

Later, the Waterfords visit Canada. There Nick meets with Luke and informs him about where June is, he also talks about her pregnancy and gives him some letters written by her.

Offred asks Fred to see his daughter Hannah. After Fred's refusal he finally manages to meet her in an abandoned house. Later, she gives birth to a girl while she is alone whom she names Holly, although after her Serena will call her Nichole.

Aunt Lydia visits Emily, at the end of the meeting the maid violently stabs Aunt Lydia.

At the end of this season a fire breaks out and Rita suggests that June escape Gilead with her daughter. The commander tries to stop him but Nick stops him when he threatens him with a gun.

Serena discovers June as she runs away, however, far from preventing her from escaping, she says goodbye to her baby and allows him to go ahead with her plan. Finally, June decides to stay at Gilead and hands her baby over to Emily.

Season 3: Stuck in Gilead

Emily flees with June's daughter to Canada and, after overcoming various adversities along the way, she almost cost the little girl her life, she manages to give the girl to Luke and Moira so that they can become responsible.

Then the protagonist manages to see her daughter Hannah hers again. Meanwhile, Serena is concerned about Nichole's whereabouts and tries to commit suicide.

Offred is reassigned to a new house, Commander Lawrence's, under the name Dejoseph. During the stay in the new house, June joins a resistance group formed by some marthas.

Serena and the commander learn of Nichole's whereabouts and ask June to call Luke to arrange a meeting with them. She at first refuses, but eventually Serena gets to see the girl. From then on, the Waterfords will do their best to bring the baby back home.

The protagonist plans a new escape with her daughter Hannah, but she is betrayed by one of the marthas.

At the end of the season, June plans to take 52 children out of Gilead and tries to flee with them and a good number of maids through the woods.

Finally, the children manage to get to Canada by plane, but June's fate is uncertain as she has been badly injured in Gilead.

Season Four: The Revolution

June is injured and has to be operated urgently by her companions.

In Canada, Serena and Major Waterford discover that June has managed to free many children from Gilead. Aunt Lydia appears before Gilead's men, who blame June for the revolution.

Meanwhile, the maids hide in Major Keyes's house, where they meet his young wife Esther.

Later, June is discovered in her plan to poison some commanders. For this reason, she is kidnapped and held in a sinister place. There, the commanders and Aunt Lydia blackmail her and threaten the life of her daughter. Then, June decides to confess the whereabouts of her companions.

After being released, June sets out on a dangerous journey with Janine and they soon make it to Chicago.

In Canada, Rita finally breaks free from the Waterfords and Serena discovers that she is expecting a child. Meanwhile, at Gilead, Commander Lawrence proposes a "ceasefire" to help June.

Soon, June and Janine are involved in a bombing. Amid the chaos, June and Moira meet again, while nothing is known of Janine's whereabouts.

After that, June leaves Gilead and arrives in Canada thanks to the help of Moira. There she can be reunited with Luke and his daughter Nichole. She also finds out that Serena is pregnant and decides to wish her the worst.

Later, June appears in court, there are the Waterfords, and she reviews all that she has suffered in Gilead. Also, the protagonist discovers that Janine is still alive and that she is in Gilead with Aunt Lydia.

At the end of the fourth season, June and Waterford face off. June is determined to get revenge on the commander. In a forest, June and some maids beat the commander, whose body ends up hanging on the wall. After that, the protagonist returns home with Luke and Nichole.

Analysis: The Handmaid's Tale or a permanent reflection

Why has this series managed to be so relevant today?

The truth is that the production created by Bruce Miller has been as revered as it is criticized. But what cannot be denied is that it awakens different issues in the viewer that they might even have overlooked before viewing. But how do you manage to awaken this series of questions?

On the one hand, it does so through a argument which already supposes a reflection in itself, since it makes visible issues such as individual rights, feminism wave sexual freedom.

On the other hand, thanks to audiovisual elements, as the illumination, the Colour, the decorated wave music, that allow to recreate an almost repulsive atmosphere, that the spectator would never want to know in their own flesh.

What is our place in society

Gilead's new status has been proclaimed, in part, because of the birth deficit. To solve this problem, far from solving it with democratic policies or laws, the leaders of the Republic of Gilead have opted to impose a system based on religious beliefs that dynamite individual rights, especially the rights of the woman.

With these measures they believe they are implementing the best for the future of society, but where is the right to decide individually here? What is our place in society? Where is the boundary between decision and imposition?

An awakening of consciences

This series, like the homonymous novel on which it is based, has meant an awakening of consciences. This “violent” division into roles that is made on women according to her reproductive capacities and that restricts her from the right to decide on her own body brings us back to current issues.

With fictions like The Handmaid's Tale it is clear that there is still much to do in a world in which it is still believed that the antonym of “feminism” is “machismo”.

In the series, the role played by Holly, June's mother, is important. She raised her daughter trying to instill feminist values, however June did not understand the importance of these values ​​until their rights were not violated with the implementation of the new regime. Does something like Gilead need to be produced to raise awareness?

It may not be essential to go to that extreme, however The Handmaid's Tale she has become a kind of "alarm clock" that has revealed to many viewers that permanent dream in which it seemed that "nothing was happening".

Sexual freedom

Homosexuality is not allowed at Gilead. We see how Degled's character suffers torture for being a lesbian.

Today, there are still many countries that condemn homosexuality with prison terms or even the death penalty. In others, although not condemned, same-sex marriage is not allowed. Which reiterates that this dystopia brings us again shades of reality.

Oppression through enlightenment

In Gilead women are repressed, like birds in a cage. It is very interesting how that feeling is transmitted to the viewer thanks to a good use of lighting.

Generally, when the maids are inside the houses of the commanders, a harsh lighting is used, in which the shade prevails. Almost always a point of natural light that falls through a window.

Thanks to the technique in the direction of photography, it is possible to convey to the viewer the oppression suffered by women in Gilead.

A retrograde environment in the near future

Although the series is set in the near future, its aesthetic often takes us back to bygone eras. How is this achieved? What is the intention?

On the one hand, the series' chromatic palette is full of neutral colors in contrast to red, the most representative of the series, and blue.

Red represents the maids and normally appears in the color of their wardrobe. In contrast to the more sober blue that appears on the suits worn by the wives.

On the other hand, to this color scheme we must add the decorations and furniture that surrounds the characters, which seem inspired by the beginning of the last century.

If we add these two elements, color and decorations, the result becomes different frames more typical of a period series than "futuristic".

What if the line between the past and the future is thinner than we imagine? The color and staging of the series convey that idea to us.

Music and its meaning

The music in this series completes this almost cinematic show. How does she do it?

In an extraordinary way, the songs included in the episodes offer clues about what happens in Gilead, serving as an added bonus to the images we see through our eyes.

Almost always, at the beginning and at the end of each chapter there is a (pre-existing) song. Throughout the three seasons, the series spans different musical genres, ranging from pop, rock, jazz or alternative music, among others.

One of the themes that appears in one of the episodes of the second season is “Piel”, a song by the Venezuelan interpreter Arca, which is the only musical theme in Spanish included in the series.

It is an intimate theme in which the voice predominates, almost a cappella, to which instruments are added little by little, to create a loud and overwhelming sound that manages to make the skin crawl. The lyrics say: "remove my skin from yesterday."

In the image, Offred's face appears, while she is fleeing in a meat truck. At that time she is not wearing maid clothes. At the same time, she hears a voice in off from the protagonist:

Is this what freedom is like? Even this pinch makes me dizzy. It is like an elevator with open sides. In the higher layers of the atmosphere you would disintegrate. You would vaporize. There would be no pressure to keep you whole. We quickly got used to the walls. It doesn't take long either.

Put on the red dress, put on the headdress, close your mouth, be good. Turn around and spread your legs (…)

What will happen when she comes out? I don't think I need to worry, because she probably won't come out.

Gilead has no borders, said Aunt Lydia, Gilead is within you (...)

The sum of image plus music in this scene, results in a shocking moment in which the her character desperately asks to get out of this situation, but at the same time she does not see possibilities.

Cast of the series

Offred / June Osborne

Elisabeth moss plays the protagonist of this series. Offred is a woman who has lost the true identity of her (June) and her family to become a maid in the new established regime. She has been assigned to the home of Major Fred Waterford in order to conceive the children that his wife Serena Joy has been unable to bear.

Fred waterford

Interpreted by Joseph Fiennes. Fred is the master of Offred and commander within the new Gilead regime. He is married to Serena Joy and, together with her, is one of those responsible for the established system.

Serena joy

The actress Yvonne Strahhovski she plays the wife of Fred Waterford. She is a woman of conservative ideas and is considered sterile. His greatest desire is to become a mother and he behaves cruelly towards Offred.

Aunt Lydia

Ann dowd She plays the maids' instructor. She often subjects women to cruel punishments if they disobey in order to re-educate them in the new conservative system.

Deglen / Emily

Alexis Bledel she orders Deglen. She is part of the maids and is Offred's shopping companion. Before the introduction of the system, she was a university professor. She is gay and has a relationship with a martha, for which she is punished. She too, she belongs to the resistance group "Mayday", which aims to end the imposed regime.

Moira Strand / Ruby

Samira wiley she plays Moira, June's best friend since they were in college. In the Red Center, she is one of the protagonist's pillars of support. She later manages to escape her life as a maid and ends up working in a brothel.

Dewarren / Janine

The actress Madeline brewer she plays this maid. During her stay at the Red Center, her eye was amputated for her misbehavior, from that moment on she has a delicate mental health and presents strange behaviors. He believes that I love her, he is in love with her.

Rita

Amanda brugel is Rita, a martha who takes care of the housework at Major Waterford's house. She is also in charge of watching Offred.

Nick

Max minghella He plays the chauffeur of Commander Fred, he is also a spy for Gilead. He soon begins a relationship with Offred while she is in the house as a maid.

Luke

O.T Fagbenle he is the husband of June in the series and manages to flee to Canada. He was married before meeting June so due to Gilead's implantation, his marriage is invalid. June is considered an adulteress and her daughter Hannah is illegitimate.

Commander Lawrence

Bradley Whitford she is Commander Joseph Lawrence. He appears in the second season and is in charge of the finances of Gilead. At first his personality is a mystery, later he helps June.

Esther keyes

Mckenna grace she plays Esther in season four. The young woman is 14 years old and was disgraced by guards at the request of her husband, Commander Keyes. When the maids are hiding in her house, June helps Esther get revenge on the guardians who hurt her.

The Handmaid's Tale book vs series

The Serie The Handmaid's Tale (The handmaid's tale) is based on the novel by Margaret Atwood published in 1985. The book was already adapted to the cinema in the early 90s under the title The tale of the maiden.

Book or series? To fully immerse yourself in the narrative and audiovisual world, which has been created from history, it is necessary to understand its origin. Reading the novel, therefore, becomes essential for those truly interested in understanding the world of Gilead. Although audiovisual fiction tries to be a faithful adaptation to the novel, it only succeeds in its first season. Although it shows differences considerable, some of these are:

• In the book the true name of the protagonist, although we can guess that her name is June.
• The point of view. If in the book we know the events through the first-person narration of the protagonist. In the series it is about zero or omniscient targeting.
• The epilogue that he appears at the end of the book is not shown in the television adaptation.
• Characters. The age of some characters varies between the book and the series, being older in the first. Luke's character is not so important in the novel, his whereabouts are unknown. Offred is even more repressed in the book than in the series, in the latter she is more courageous.

If you liked this article, you can also read Book The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood