The Handmaid's Tale: The Wilderness (4x10)

Oh boy. I don't even know what else to say. Just. Lots of stuff happening here.

Cons:

So, obviously I'm going to talk about the Fred situation, but I actually want to start by saying there was a logistical weirdness with the end of the episode that kind of troubled me. For one thing, and this is just a script decision I don't understand, why does the mailman open the mail and see the severed finger and wedding ring? Why not have Serena opening it so we get the full impact of the horror? That just felt odd to me.

And then... the ending. June comes back to say goodbye to Nichole, and says she's leaving in five minutes. My initial read on this was that she was going to go and face the consequences/get locked up for what she did to Fred. But then I realized that made no sense, and maybe she's instead going back to Gilead to get Hannah? See, the problem here is that a) I'm bored of Gilead and want to keep the story in Canada. And b) June's connections with Lawrence and Nick seem to be able to get her a lot of things... it feels like it would be a relatively simple matter to snatch Hannah and run at this point, wouldn't it? The narrative stakes feel uneven, after what we saw June was capable of orchestrating in this installment.

Also just going to go ahead and say that as this was a finale, I was a little bummed not to have more time with certain characters. No Janine update, and only sparse screen time for Moira, with no mention of her love life at all.

Pros:

Okay, let's start with a smaller detail: Mark Tuello has been more of a narrative device than a character for most of the show, so much so that I kept forgetting his name. I don't think this is necessarily a mark against the writing or acting. He's meant to be representative of the slow-moving arc of justice, of a neutered American government trying to do its best. But here he came to life for me, in two moments. One when he asked Serena to explain her decision to stay with Fred. And another when June shows up outside his house and he has an outburst about how she's crossed a line, and then apologizes for it.

He's a person. He's dealing with a lot of fucked up people, and traumatized people, and he's trying to prioritize the greater good while seeing the very real personal consequences of Gilead's atrocities up close. I just really liked how he was utilized in this episode; it almost felt like a culmination, happening quietly in the background.

And then there's Fred Waterford. It's hard to really put my finger on why Fred is such an unsettling villain, but I think it has something to do with the fact that he buys his own bullshit so easily. He's really incredibly gullible. When he and June have that chilling scene where they both say they "miss" Offred, Fred is 100% buying what June is selling. June is... not even that good of an actor except when she has to be, but Fred genuinely, actually, believes that they had something approaching a relationship of mutual understanding back when June was his literal sex slave in Gilead. And June plays him like a fiddle. He's utterly shocked by June showing up at the end and kissing Nick. It never occurred to him that June, a person he repeatedly reminds everyone is duplicitous and sneaky, might be involved in some greater scheme.

And why? Because he really is that full of himself. He has every reason to believe that the world will keep catering to his needs, that he will, again and again, be able to dodge the consequences of his actions. It's always been true in the past, hasn't it?

That's the genius of Fred as a villain. He's not playing three-dimensional chess, he's not someone you can just "outsmart" and be done with. It's his worldview, this absolutely unshakable belief that he is a good person. He even apologizes to June in this episode, but it's not in a way that holds himself accountable for his behavior. It's more in a "I'm sorry you suffered, I do regret that aspect of it" kind of way.

There's something so twisted about a zealot whose zealotry is tied up so intensely with his misogyny that he looks like a caricature of a sexist man when you see him talk, and yet he's not playing it up. That's really how he thinks! Just imagine it.

But also... holy shit, that scene at the end was brutal. Can't really blame June for it, I guess, but it was tough to watch. Not because I felt sympathy for Fred, but because I felt sorrow in my heart for what he'd driven these women to. I hope they get some measure of peace from his death.

I think (and kind of hope) that Season Five of The Handmaid's Tale is the end. Not because there's not a lot here to enjoy, but because it seems like we're reaching a culminating moment for June. Getting back to Hannah has been the driving force of the show, and now June is right on the edge of achieving that.

There's a lot more I could say, but I'm keeping this one nice and zippy for the moment. See you next season!

9/10