Yahoo Finance The Handmaid’s Tale season four episode one review: Odyssey of trauma continues with diminishing returns
Can anyone truly say that they’ve been looking forward to a new series of The Handmaid’s Tale?
Its first season, a faithful, deeply resonant adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s novel that debuted shortly after President Trump’s inauguration (its red robes and white bonnets went on to provide a striking uniform for activists protesting the rolling back of reproductive rights) certainly had its fair share of horrors, but Elisabeth Moss was so arresting as June/Offred, it was impossible to look away. It was never something to enjoy, exactly, but somewhere in the second series, as the show’s writers moved beyond the boundaries of Atwood’s book, it became something to endure. The violence was unwatchable, the plot repetitive (all the inventiveness seemed to be saved for new tortures for June and co).
And yet, in a textbook example of a once-great show stubbornly failing to recognise its own sell-by-date, the show has continued to trudge on for a third and now fourth season. A fifth has already been confirmed, and an adaptation of Atwood’s 2019 sequel-ish novel The Testaments is also in development at Hulu, the show’s US broadcaster. Blessed be, if you’re a total masochist.
As we return to Gilead for series four’s opening episode, there are flashes of what once made The Handmaid’s Tale so good. It’s shot with flair, the visual language (the red of the Handmaids and the deep blue of the wives punctuating the gloom) remains powerful and Moss is as compelling as ever. She is undoubtedly the show’s best asset (with Ann Dowd as the bile-spitting Aunt Lydia a close second) but the stop-start plot does her a disservice.
June has successfully rescued 86 children from Gilead, packing them off on a plane to safety across the border in Canada, but there’s no time for congratulations: she was shot in the process, leaving her with a gaping wound that needs to be cauterised with a red hot iron. She and her fellow rebels stagger on to a safe house presided over by unnerving teenage bride Esther Keyes (McKenna Grace), who has been married off to an old, senile Commander.
Elsewhere, Commander Waterford (Joseph Fiennes) and Serena (Yvonne Strahovski) are awaiting trial in Canada, and the children’s escape looks set to spark an international incident, but for now at least, that feels very much like the ‘b’ plot - the real action is down on the farm. Drifting in and out of consciousness, June manages to stave off sepsis with a course of homemade antibiotics (mould scraped off rotting fruit, yum) while the other Handmaids, who have swapped their distinctive red cloaks for the sludgy outfits worn by the Marthas, are adapting almost too well to seclusion. Janine (Madeline Brewer) has bonded with a pig nicknamed Mr Darcy, and the women seem to be losing their revolutionary fervour - until Mrs Keyes shares her own horrific backstory.
Urged on by June, who whispers “Make me proud” into Esther’s ear while handing her the knife previously used to turn Mr Darcy (RIP) into pork chops, she finally gets to enact a brutal revenge on a male abuser. With her blue dress soaked in blood after finishing him off, she staggers into her twisted mother figure’s bedroom and locks her in a fraught embrace to the strains of (You Make Me Feel Like A) Natural Woman.
It’s certainly an arresting scene, but it’s also yet another example of how the show piles horror upon horror upon horror to diminishing returns: 14-year-old Grace is a pintsized powerhouse and never looks out of her depth up against Moss, but her revenge tragedy would have been more cathartic if it had been given time and space to simmer. Perhaps she’ll be better served by future episodes - if you can bear to stick around to find out.
The Handmaid’s Tale continues Sundays at 9pm on Channel 4. Stream series one to three on All4.
Read More
This Way Up: Aisling Bea’s ode to sisters is sharp, sweet and silly
It Was What It Was: Carpe diem... Love Island’s most brutal twist yet
