What I’m Watching: The Handmaid’s Tale

The Handmaid’s Tale: Season 2, Episode 3 “Baggage” (B+)

June was so close, and now she doesn’t have any hope of ever being as free as she just was. At the beginning of the episode, the choice of music showed how June was taking back her life, trying to get into shape and make the most of her isolating existence, waiting with no knowledge of what instructions would come next. Pleading with her driver not to leave her behind led her straight into what counts as the most normative life possible in this new world order. You’d think she would know not to look out the window when no one is supposed to be home, but she was bold enough to try to reclaim her life and wander outside in the subtle, conforming clothes of her unwilling host. It was miraculous that she wandered through the woods and found the aistrip, managing to prove to the pilot that she was who she said she was, and then she could have been home free. Instead, those shots prevented the plane from taking off, and there’s nothing quite as finite and frightening as an immediate execution, which took the pilot out of the equation. Let’s hope they at least know who she is and that the Waterfords are able to help her avoid the fate of that uncooperative pregnant handmaid, or something worse. Knowing that her mother, played by Cherry Jones, was an activist who chastised her daughter for not protesting enough only to be apprehended by Gilead early on gives us plenty of context for who June wants to be. Up in Canada, Moira seems to have adjusted to how life is there, and I sincerely hope that she and Luke haven’t forgotten that June is very much in need of a rescue after her latest and bravest escape attempt.