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“The Handmaid’s Tale” S1.E4: ‘Girlpower’

The thing about living in a society that has done an unexpected 180 on minority rights is that as a targeted minority, you have to make a choice: when do you leave? What is the tipping point that finally compels you to abandon your home? Fear of uprooting with little more than the clothes on your back, and to a lesser extent optimism, are strong deterrents to leaving, but by staying too long you could be trapped with no way out. In Nazi Germany, for example, most of the Jews who waited too long ended up dead. Every day, you must reassess your situation. Now? Tomorrow? When?

In “The Handmaid’s Tale,” Offred, Moira, and Ofglen waited too long. Offred’s boiling bathwater analogy in episode three has some resonance to the current state of US society. We’re nowhere near Gilead, but what would tell us that the temperature is rising? An Executive Order like the one initially circulated in February that would have legalized discrimination against gays, or one that erases the separation of Church and political activism? A healthcare bill that makes rape a pre-existing condition but not erectile dysfunction? The firing of the nation’s highest law enforcement official conducting an investigation of the Chief Executive? “The Handmaid’s Tale” often is unsubtle in its political statements, but here the timing is apt: where is the line you draw in the sand past which you will not go? If episode three was about missing the escape window, episode four is about finding how to survive mentally in the new reality.

Episode four starts in a flashback to the past, where Offred, Luke, and Hannah are at a carnival. It’s a happy time full of positive memories, but back in the present Offred is reminding herself not to go too far back into memories like this or she’ll never come out (sane, or perhaps alive). She’s been kept in her room for thirteen days, always with the door open just as a reminder that she has no control over anything in her life. She looks haggard, with a bandage on her finger and her long hair unkempt. She sits at the window, with the light, so cinematically perfect, streaming in. Bored and depressed, she lies down in the closet and runs her hand along the doorframe. Written just above the floor on the wall is the title of the episode, “Nolite te bastardes carborundorum.” She wonders if it was written by the previous Offred, and concludes it is, in its own way, a message for her.

She flashes back to the Red Center, where she and Moira communicate through a hole in the bathroom, little more than two eyes staring at each other. Offred has heard they’ll be posted soon, and it’s clear that neither understands at all what that means. The word “surrogate” is thrown out, but Moira envisions a turkey baster approach (side note: to be a Handmaid, Moira must have had a child already. Maybe that will be a theme in season 2?). She’s in for a surprise. Right now, she’s writing “Aunt Lydia sucks” on the bathroom wall like a rebellious teenager. To her, it’s worth losing a hand if she’s caught, that old Biblical punishment, because it will give hope to future girls in their situation. Go, Moira, go!

Back in the present, Offred recognizes the bravery it took to carve those words into the closet and thanks the nameless woman. Downstairs in a dining room with far too busy, dark blue wallpaper, Serena Joy is trying to make conversation with the Commander. The UN has embargoed Gilead, but she thinks it will have to be lifted or else the Euro will collapse, an interesting economic situation that I’m not sure makes actual economic sense, but we’ll roll with it. The Commander is disturbed: an Aunt escaped from a Red Center.

Serena Joy responds optimistically that the Eyes will catch her, but the Commander informs her the Aunt made it into Canada and already gave an interview with the Toronto Star full of “lies, hyperbole, and everything in the worst possible light.” Slash it’s actually the truth and like any repressive totalitarian society, those in power don’t want the truth to get out. Tomato, tomahtoe. Serena Joy tries to act as the Commander’s councilor, suggesting that the Aunt be discredited without addressing her story (in the book, Serena Joy was a televangelist’s wife. Perhaps she was a corporate career woman in this version), but the Commander shuts her out coldly. Serena Joy is deflated.

Rita brings Offred breakfast but freaks out when she sees Offred’s body sticking out of the closet. When Rita goes back downstairs, Serena Joy demands what Offred “has done this time.” Rita reports Offred thinks she fainted. The Commander, not looking up from his work, repeats the word fainted as a question, and Serena Joy quips that it’s only what Offred said (implying it’s not necessarily the truth).

Rita asks if she should make an appointment with the doctor. Serena Joy says no, until Rita reminds her that the Ceremony is tonight, at which point she agrees. The Commander, who has paid no attention to the conversation, leaves, and Serena Joy is left without even a single word of endearment. Love her he does not, and she knows it.

Upstairs, Offred is outside of herself with excitement. The doctor’s office is across town, which means she’ll have an hour to enjoy the air and the flowers and the sun as she makes the walk. But then Serena Joy, who doesn’t believe and doesn’t care if Offred is sick, arrives to tell her that the car is ready. There will be no walking. Offred opens the door to the outside and relishes the rain that is pouring down (it rains a lot in Gilead during sunny and cloudless days), but once inside Serena Joy puts up the divider between Offred and Nick. Offred is to have no mercies, and that includes conversation with another human being.

Offred flashes back to the Red Center, where they’re about to learn what the Ceremony is. Surprise! Like dogs in a pound, Aunt Lydia tells them that they’re going to “new homes, to new families.” There, they won’t be judged on their looks or their “ability to sound clever” (throwback to the good feminine qualities of the upper class women of the 1800s!). Instead, they’ll be “loved” for the blessing they provide: children.

One of the new Handmaids doesn’t understand. She thinks they’re about to practice labor. Why else would they be lying in some other woman’s lap? Answer: the Ceremony. Once a month, they’re going to become one flower with the Wife, waiting to be seeded. Worst. Metaphor. Ever. All the Handmaids look horrified but Janine, who’s like, “Yasssss we’re all beautiful flowers OMG guys.” Moira asks for clarification like, “Sex. With dudes. Ummm…” Aunt Lydia replies with the Rachel-Bilhah-Jacob Biblical story again and all the Handmaids continue to grapple with the horror of what’s happening and what they’re expected to do.

At the doctor’s office in the present, Offred sits across from a pregnant and happy Handmaid. Behind the Handmaid is a fish tank, above which are pictures of Wives, their husbands, and their babies (and one picture of a Wife with no husband. What happened there?). A security guard calls Offred to the spotlessly white doctor’s room. A curtain is drawn over her hips so that when the doctor comes in and makes small talk about his gardening, then asks about her symptoms, we never see him fully. We only hear his voice. Apparently fainting isn’t uncommon on Ceremony night for Handmaids. He asks how the Waterfords are treating her in his nice, light voice, and Offred says they treat her very well. He tells her she can be honest with him. He can’t change her situation, but he’s a good listener. It could be a trap, or he could be a genuinely nice guy just as stuck in the system as she is. She stays silent.

She’s physically fine, the doctor concludes, but he adds that the Commander himself is probably the sterile one; most of the Commanders are. Offred thinks how the word “sterile” is forbidden now. There is no such thing as a sterile man in Gilead. Men are fruitful; it is the women who are barren. This is the false narrative (alternative facts) that is being preached in Gilead.

The doctor whispers, “I can help you,” and places himself between her legs. If Waterford can’t impregnate her, she will be blamed, not him. He looks around the curtain and says, “It will only take a few minutes, honey.” Suddenly all those babies in the pictures above the fish tank make sense. This isn’t his first offer. Offred tells him that she can’t, that it’s too dangerous, but thanks him. Still, it’s easy to see why other Handmaids probably took him up on the offer.

Offred flashes back to the carnival again, such a staple of American life, in the car on the ride home. It makes her happy momentarily, but then she is overpowered by sadness and rage. This is what was stolen from her. She starts to beat on the divider between her and Nick, swearing. When they park at home, Nick offers, “I’m sorry this is happening to you.” His verbiage shows the problem: not, “I’m sorry I’m helping do this to you” or even “this is being done to you.” Instead, he uses a passive construction with no actor. Who is doing this to her, and why is he doing nothing to stop it? He starts to say, “I wish,” then stops. Offred challenges him to finish. What does he wish? He doesn’t answer.

“So, are you dying?” Serena Joy, who is knitting, snarls when Offred comes in. Offred says she was just dehydrated, which is a lie, but a white lie that is better than saying she didn’t faint at all but was just lying in the closet feeling the words carved by a ghost. Serena Joy doesn’t care, she only cares that Offred can participate in the Ceremony that night. Offred tries a new tactic to avoid being trapped in the room again: she apologizes to Mrs. Waterford for disappointing her, for failing her. But Serena Joy’s face is hard and cold. There will be no mercy. Offred returns upstairs to lie in the closet to touch the carved words of courage. She wants to know how the former Offred survived.

In a flashback to the Red Center, Offred tells an Aunt that a toilet has overflowed. Actually, Moira is waiting there for her with the same piece of metal she was formerly using to carve an insult against Aunt Lydia into the wood. She’s sharpened it down to a shiv, and they use it to force the Aunt into the basement. Threatening her with her own cattle prod, they force her to disrobe because Moira is going to escape by pretending to be an Aunt. They tie the Aunt to a pipe, and Moira threatens to use the cattle prod on her. “Just remember I didn’t, if it ever comes to that,” she says, putting the prod away. Moira and Offred leave the Red Center together, an anonymous Aunt and Handmaid.

Clearly, however, the attempt was ultimately unsuccessful, because we’re back in the present with Offred kneeling on the pillow in the living room waiting for the opening part of the Ceremony. But the next person into the room isn’t the household staff, but the Commander (who previously had always been perpetually tardy). Offred is freaking out because he’s not supposed to be there. He’s supposed to be the last in.

He knocks and Serena Joy lets him in and this is all wrong. The Commander tells her that he just wanted to say hello. He’s being friendly again. He wants a Scrabble rematch after the Ceremony, but he puts it to her as a question. She has a choice in the matter. Before she can answer, the door opens and Rita, Nick, and Serena Joy come in. Serena Joy is confused and she tries to figure out what is happening, but all she can conclude is that somehow Offred is at fault.

In the bedroom, the Commander shows up to perform his duty but his face indicates there are some… technical difficulties. It’s not going well. He gives up almost immediately and Serena Joy looks heartbroken. Her face suggests she thinks the Commander doesn’t want a child with her. In another room, he’s still trying to get up some steam, but it’s not working. Serena Joy, who has followed him, asks to help. She moves in and touches him and the happiness and relief on her face says it’s been a very long time since this sort of intimacy has happened between them. She looks so vulnerable, desperate to please him and win his love back. When she tries another tactic, the Commander stops her and leaves. Once again, her hard mask falls across her face as she sits on her knees alone. Coldly, she orders Offred back to her room.

As she walks back to her room, Offred thinks how she’ll be blamed for this failure, but she realizes that the Commander needs to connect emotionally to perform physically. Then she thinks, “You can wet the rim of glass and run your finger along the rim and it will make a sound. This is what I feel like: the sound of glass. I feel like the word shatter.” It’s a wonderful simile. Back in her room, she goes straight into the closet. It’s her safe space now.

Again in the past, Moira and Offred are on full alert as they walk free outside. Moira believes that if they get to the city, the Collective has safe houses. The coup has evidently just happened because they are surprised to see that all the street signs have been taken down (oh hey, another Prius…) and armed men with assault rifles are everywhere (apparently acting as militiamen is now the primary economy for men in Gilead). Black Humvees with anti-aircraft weapons screech past. Along a round concrete water tower, dozens of men are hanging, dead. While groups of Handmaids go to and fro in their distinctive red cloaks, men burn paintings. In the subway, a worker is chiseling out the station name. It will be replaced with a new name soon.

Moira leaves Offred to ask two guards about the next train to Boston, but while she’s away Offred is approached by another guard, who starts asking difficult questions. When the train pulls up, Moira is faced with a decision: get on, or try to help Offred, who may be a lost cause anyway given the guard’s treatment of her. Offred nods to her and smiles: go to freedom and leave her. Moira gets on the train and watches as Offred is led away by the guards.

Back in the closet, Offred thinks of Moira’s strength and how she would have fought being locked away in a room for two weeks. She would have escaped. “Get up,” she orders herself. “Get your crazy ass up.” Or as Moira would have said, keep your fucking shit together.

Offred goes downstairs to the Commander’s study. It’s a minor act of defiance against Serena Joy and an appropriation of her sense of agency. It’s her choice to go, one of the few choices in her life she’s able to make now. As they play Scrabble, Offred mines the Commander for information. He was in Mexico coordinating a trade delegation. In response to his complaining that it was stressful, Offred teases that perhaps she’ll let him win again to make him feel better. The Commander replies he prefers a fair fight. When Offred is sent to get the dictionary, she sees a book of Latin grammar. Is this a clue?

Offred wonders if the writer of the words in the closet, too, sat where she sits now and played Scrabble with the Commander. Is this what he does with Handmaids? What happened to her? Did she say the wrong thing? Displease the “divine emperor of this house”? Assuming the answer is yes, Offred wonders what price she paid for her insolence, but she probably knows the answer. Back at the Red Center, the recaptured Offred is strapped to a gurney while Aunt Lydia lectures her about her ingratitude. Her punishment is to be lashed on the bottom of her feet.

The Commander wins again, but wants another rematch the next night after the Ceremony. Offred casually asks for a “favor” in return. “Sure, anything,” the Commander answers cheerfully, “within reason, of course.” Again, he speaks as though they’re equals even though nothing could be further from the reality. She asks, “What does ‘Nolite te bastardes carborundorum’ mean?” It doesn’t mean anything; it’s a joke. He brings her the Latin grammar book she saw earlier, and in it is written just that phrase. He wrote it there as a 12 year old boy. It kind of means “Don’t let the bastards grind you down,” he explains, and Offred’s face twitches. Whoever wrote in the closet definitely saw the book. The Commander wants to know where she heard that phrase, knowing it could only have come from that book, but Offred just replies, “From a friend.”

Offred then braves an exchange with the Commander:

Offred: What happened to her?

Commander: She’s dead.

Offred: What happened to her?

Commander: She killed herself. Hung herself from the ceiling. Suppose she found her life unbearable.

Offred: And you want my life to be bearable.

Commander: I would prefer it.

Offred sees the opening and goes for it like a child working a guilty parent. It’s been hard to be kept locked away in the room by his Wife, she tells him. She’s been starting to give up…she wouldn’t want to give up, like her friend. When we next see her, she is heading outside. Point: Offred. The piano music rises triumphantly while the birds sing and Serena Joy glares at her from the window. In a flashback to the Red Center, Handmaids walk past Offred’s bed, each putting some food for her on her bed. Supporting her for her defiant attempt to escape. Offred narrates, “There was an Offred before me. She helped me find my way out. She’s dead. She’s alive. She is me. We are Handmaids. Nolite te bastardes carborundorum, bitches.” Oooooh, snap.

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