The Handmaid's Tale: Ballet (5x02)

Okie dokie, let's dive right in!

Cons:

I'd never accuse this show of being subtle with its imagery, but every once in a while they go a step beyond bold and into downright trite/insulting. Most of the parallels with June and Serena avoided this fate, but the part where June dressed all in white, and Serena all in black, as they each got ready in mirrors... that was a little much, I gotta say.

And another moment I was taken out of it a little, what exactly was the resonance of intercutting Serena at Fred's big funeral, with June watching someone dance at the ballet? Who is the metaphorical ballerina here? Why are we cutting between these two things? It just felt too heavy-handed and also muddled to me.

Pros:

We see that Aunt Lydia is getting a group of Handmaids ready for selection, including Esther, the former Wife. Janine gets to go along to her former Commander's house in order to show Esther off, and thus gets to see her daughter. But Esther has bigger plans for the rebellion; she steals some chocolates from the Commanders' house, and somehow poisons them... the episode ends with her and Janine both collapsing and coughing up blood. Gasp!

Esther is great, I love how ruthless she is, and how chilling it is to see such a young girl forced into this position. It's grotesque, and the show plays on that, especially the scene of Esther being force-fed the chocolate truffles by the man who plans to own her and rape her repeatedly for his own purposes. Esther's lack of understanding of Janine's trauma also shines through: she thinks of Janine as a coward and a traitor for accepting her lot in life instead of continuing to rebel, but we know that Janine has been through more than any person is meant to survive, and is merely coping as much as she's able. We also get Aunt Lydia, one of the show's most complicated characters; we see here again that she genuinely cares about the girls in her care, albeit in an extremely disturbing way. I can't imagine they'd kill our girl Janine off in this manner, so what's going to happen next episode???

Back in Toronto, we get to see Rita visiting June, Luke, and Moira's home, and June just can't let it go, talking to Rita about the abuse she suffered at Serena's hands, triggering her and causing Moira to chastise June for it. I think June was awful to Rita, of course, but she's got PTSD. I think Moira's protective instincts towards Rita are understandable, but also she's not registering June's trauma for what it is. So many different dynamics at play here, between this complicated little family.

June confesses to Luke that Serena knows she killed Fred, which leads Luke to implore her to be present, here, and stop obsessing over Serena. This seems to work in the short term, as the two of them go on a date to the ballet together, but the episode ends with June seeing Fred's internationally televised funeral, complete with a now young-teenaged Hannah, standing at Serena's side during the ceremony.

I mean... this was such a twisted way for Serena to try and get some revenge. To show June that she still has access to Hannah, that she has power over someone June loves, in the same way that June got access to Serena's husband. I love that Luke managed to get June out of her head for an evening, and then even from all the way back in Gilead, Serena was able to pull her back in. Those final shots, where Serena and June appears to be staring at each other through the screen, were absolutely breathtaking.

In Gilead, Tuello offers Nick the chance for freedom from Gilead, and access to seeing Nichole, if he spies for the American government. He's turning it down for now, but I love what this is setting up. Everything about Tuello in Gilead was great, this fish out of water awkwardly answering everything with "blessed day", trying to speak the lingo. And probably my favorite dark comedy beat of the episode was Aunt Lydia's baffled offense that Tuello didn't know her name.

It's interesting that Nick and Commander Lawrence go to bat for Serena, in helping her to get Fred's funeral televised. Not sure what their long game is here. They were taking a risk in suggesting it, and the funeral itself is very evocative of fascist ceremonies, and Serena is using it to get one over on June but does she really think it will help Gilead's international reputation? It's unclear! That's one of the things that's pretty great about this show, is that people's motivations are always very tangled, and multiple people can be united around a goal while feeling quite differently about its import, and I trust the show to track that, to track Commander Lawrence vs. Nick vs. Tuello vs. Serena when it comes to the optics of Fred's funeral.

There's more I could say, as always, but suffice to say this was good tv, and I can't wait for more!

9.5/10