The Handmaid’s Tale, final season (Hulu) prods the viewer to rethink easy answers. Can we love more than one person? What will we allow in the name of our needs, and as the only gender that can bring life into the world, who has ownership of our bodies? When you carry life, whose right is greater: the unborn or the vessel already alive?
When the series began in 2017, these ideas were philosophical discussions debated over dinner and a glass of wine without too much impact in the western world. Today, with a conservative tilt in America and world politics, the discussions provoked by the series have a feeling of urgency for many. Roe v Wade was overturned in 2022; 18 states do not allow abortion and have implemented the restriction of easy access to contraception for women.
The Handmaid’s Tale follows a woman, June, who's kidnapped and subjugated as a handmaid in a totalitarian society called Gilead, where sterile couples condone rape of fertile women to create a child which they take as their own after the handmaid has given birth. The forced rape is committed by the husband while the wife holds the handmaid down. All pretty brutal and not the stuff you'd think would make for an entertaining series, but it's proved to be a gripping show with fierce fans.
Based on the best-selling book by Margaret Atwood of the same name, the final season is one of its best, with false leads, unexpected betrayals and tension ratcheted in an arcing escalation that builds with each episode.
The fundamentalist regime that treats women as property also has enough overlaps with today’s geopolitics that it sparks fascination. Despite escaping with the child she bore during captivity, June's desperate to reunite and rescue her first daughter captured alongside her and raised and indoctrinated in female subservience. Season Six finds June, played with a visceral intensity by Elisabeth Moss (Mad Men), coming to terms with her own fragility, testing her relationship with her archenemy Serena (Yvonne Strahovski), her best friend Moira (Samira Wiley) and her unexpected love interest and spy, Nick (Max Minghella). Bradley Whitford plays the duplicitous Commander Joseph, who may or may not be the ultimate player in Gilead, a world where trust and virtue are concepts that are collateral in the chessboard of power, survival and life. A surprising addition is Josh Charles (The Good Wife) who portrays High Commander Wharton, the head of Gilead whose character is complex — simultaneously benign and potentially sinister.
Co-showrunner and executive producer Yahlin Chang said, “We wanted the final season to be rewarding and satisfying.” At the LA premiere women dressed as handmaids in scarlet cloaks and white hats circled the upper levels of the reception at the renowned Roosevelt Hotel, making the lush after-party feel eerie whenever you looked up and saw their silent observation.
“The final season will surprise audiences,” said Minghella, son of the Oscar-winning late director Anthony Minghella (The English Patient). Minghella, who directed Teen Spirit starring Elle Fanning in 2018, is already focused on his next project, Shell, a film he directed featuring Kate Hudson, Elisabeth Moss and Kia Gerber, releasing later this year. Unwilling to be drawn on the specifics of the conclusion of the series, he noted that some characters will continue in the sequel The Testaments.
Wiley, who brought her mother to the LA premiere, was relieved the show was finally coming to a close. “We’re ending on a high note. It's better than lingering and letting the show weaken. Moira taught me to be unafraid, to speak up about things I might not have addressed before playing the character. I’m inspired by her fight, fire and activism.”
Moss also spoke of her character’s impact. “I hope she gives courage to people who needs it.” Heavily pregnant, Moss took to the stage before the screening of the first episode of Season Six held at the illustrious TCL Chinese Theatre, to caution audiences to choose love over hate. “We live in a time where the message of this season is needed now more than ever,” she told the packed theatre. “It's easy to go towards darkness and to turn your back on people you may not understand. This season invites you to go towards the light. It invites you to see beyond our differences. It asks you to have hope. This season is about love, about never giving up fighting for the freedom of those you love. The revolution is not hate. The revolution is you.”
Season six is also full of subterfuge, of achieving desires, wish fulfilment and reality checks we can't ignore. Serena tries to reform Gilead, and Joseph and Aunt Lydia are put to the test. Nick faces truth and lies, as does June. The very core of courage, resilience and solidarity are put to the test as each character comes to terms with their own vision of justice and freedom.
In addition to its relevance, this is entertainment at its finest that will have you holding your breath, aghast at the choices made and their consequences.
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