Handmaid’s Tale Season 4
Wow, so The Handmaid’s Tale has been a wild ride so far. For an avid viewer who’s been keeping up with the show for the last few years, we are now in the midst of main character June Osborne (played by Elisabeth Moss) entering a phase of retaliation and retribution— her character’s arc of righteous anger against her nation, Gilead’s totalitarian, hyper-religious, exceedingly discriminatory government.
From Season 4 of Hulu’s The Handmaid’s Tale
The Handmaid’s Tale is a Hulu original series based on Margaret Atwood’s book of the same name, a speculative fiction originally published in 1985. Atwood is one of the most widely critically acclaimed living authors, and she often creates dystopian worlds in her books that push the boundaries of vices that we endure in our contemporary societies, dramatizing the potential consequences of our current trends. The Handmaid’s Tale captures themes of feminism, power structures, and deals with women’s autonomy (or lack of it) over their own bodies. It also dives into themes of occupation, religious fundamentalism, and interestingly, Canadian Identity. It’s heavy stuff, but it actually makes for engrossing drama with a lot of tension and sometimes, moments of glorious victory.
Season 4 of the show, adapted from the novel and its sequel, The Testaments, moves off-script from Atwood’s original fiction piece. The creators of Hulu’s TV adaptation originally envisioned a show that would continue for ten seasons, but amidst the pandemic, executive directors have made the decision to wrap the show sooner rather than later. This current season deals with trauma, and what to do with trauma after it lingers behind. There is a powerful scene from Episode 8, in which June and her best friend Moira discuss the traumatic events they’ve gone through. Moira says, “Anger is a valid emotion. It’s necessary, important even to heal, but we can’t live there.” “Why not?” June questions, “Why does healing have to be the only goal? Why can’t we be as furious as we feel, don’t we have that right?” The show depicts women who are angry, rightfully so, at the ways they have been repeatedly disrespected. This specific conversation touches on the complicated and conflicting emotions we can feel while coming out of traumatic events. The characters are trying to deal with events beyond their control, just like how it feels like sometimes (in the present day) certain decisions are made by our legislatures that don’t necessarily benefit us. It can seem like anger can be used positively as a force that might heal as well as change things, but the nature of healing is elusive as we try to navigate the ever-changing political landscape. The core of this show is dedicated to feminism and to women’s issues, with incredible performances by its cast including Elisabeth Moss, Ann Dowd, Yvonne Strahovski, Madeline Brewer, and Samira Wiley.
Elisabeth Moss, who plays the lead of the show and has won a Primetime Emmy Award for her role, has been heavily involved in the creation of the show as an executive producer. She wanted to try her hand at directing a few episodes, originally in the third season but called it off in order to take more time to envision and plan out the scenes to be shot. This season, she’s making her official directorial debut and stepped behind the camera for three episodes. She started by observing directors she knew more closely and reached out to directors she had worked with previously for advice, including Wes Anderson and Martin Scorsese. She also solicited advice from frequent directors of The Handmaid’s Tale like Daina Reid and Mike Barker. Something she learned: “Directing is done in prep. By the time you get to set, you should have it almost shot in your head. You should be in a place where you’re just having fun with it exploring it with the actor... I’m paraphrasing Martin Scorsese here, but have a plan. Even if you change the plan—if you get a better idea for the actors’ blocking, or whatever—you’ve done the work: What is this thing about? What is the story I’m telling? What are the characters doing in the scene? Whose point of view is the scene from? Even if you get to set and have to change your plan, you’ve laid all that groundwork.” (Elisabeth Moss, New York Times). As she takes these next exciting steps in her career, moving from lead actor to director, she is becoming more involved with the creation of a work rather than just acting as an on-screen face. She especially loves directing the actors she regularly has scenes with and feels immense gratitude that she was given the opportunity and the privilege to direct. “I’m the luckiest person in the world,” she says. Both on-screen and behind the scenes, women’s stories are being given the platform to be heard.
