LaChavalina

Danny does act out of character... but I'd bet money that Bob Saget agreed to do this show only on the condition that he did not have to go back to being full-on, uptight Danny Tanner. 100% with you on the point about DJ, though, she's come off like a total airhead in this season.

I understand the functional reason for it, I'm just saying that the way they've written it kind of makes Steve look like a jerk--i.e., he's engaged to this woman but just hangs around his ex-girlfriend's house and makes life decisions without consulting her. Even a throwaway line where he's on the phone with CJ and something comes up at the last minute and oh, darn, she can't make the cake tasting... That would be a perfectly reasonable solution, IMO.

I thought the whole thing was sort of tasteless and painful to watch. It would be incredibly hurtful to know that your fiance's ex-girlfriend is helping dress him for your wedding and parading around him in wedding dresses and posing for pictures (reluctantly, but not too reluctantly). Even if DJ didn't necessarily know it was CJ's dress until later, there were red lines all over the place. And wasn't CJ also not involved in tasting cakes or picking Kimmy as the wedding planner? I agree that the show will eventually find a way to put Steve and DJ together and make it seem like no one's feelings are hurt, but it's a little ugly to watch and it makes me like these characters less.

I'm pretty disappointed that Max still just yells so many of his lines, but the adult male actors are really not much better. I know the actresses have had decades of experience with their characters, but even Steve comes across so... hammy.

But if Lucious is mentally incompetent right now, someone is in charge of making his medical decisions. That's what bugs me about this story. I know he's not married to Cookie, but Andre or one of the other sons should have the authority to send her packing. She's not, though, and she's clearly in violation of the codes of conduct of whatever group she works for (unless making out with your patient has become a standard practice)... Also, I presume she's his nurse and not his doctor, so why is she the one making decisions about his overall treatment plan? Too many plot holes and one of the weakest episodes in the series, IMO.

Penny setting Raj up with someone is not the same as an arranged marriage, which is what the previous poster suggested. There was a storyline that lasted about one episode a few seasons ago where Raj's parents (I think) tried to push him into an arranged marriage, then he met one girl and found out she was a lesbian, and then he decided not to marry her and that was it. The whole thing was kind of poorly written. People in the Indian-American community that I know of who have done this have had a very different experience, with parents actively involved in choosing several potential matches and then the son/daughter going on a series of first dates until they find someone they're willing to live with. (In my friend's case, his father picked his mother out of a group of potential brides because they had good conversation and she was "tall enough.") I think it would be interesting if the show re-visited the arranged marriage issue and handled it in a culturally appropriate way. I can't really think of another series (at least not in the U.S.) that has presented the issue in a positive light, and yet it's quite common in some immigrant communities. But, it is a weighty topic in its own way so maybe the writers are afraid to engage with it further.

Seriously. No matter what you think of Pedro's family, that is totally boorish behavior. And I can't imagine they'd try that if Pedro's family were poor people living in, say, the deep South rather than foreigners. They are treating his family like they're subhuman. Common courtesy, yo. ETA: Pedro's abuela's digs are also way nicer than many I've seen in Central America.

I have the giggles reminiscing about Tom's "Thor's hammer" in bread week and his "snakes" in batter week.

From the NY Times. A tease that we may get Aunt Lydia's backstory next season.

I honestly felt like they went with "Ontario" because if she showed up in Quebec and people were speaking French, too many Americans would have been confused. Just to be clear, the "pond" she would have had to cross into Ontario is the St. Lawrence River... or one of the Great Lakes, or Niagara Falls. It's a maritime border.

I guess I'm going to be "that person" who points out that, for Moira to get from Boston area to Ontario, she must have taken a pretty roundabout route. There's also not really anywhere that one could "run" across the border into Ontario because, you know, bodies of water... It's a shame because that took me out of what I thought was otherwise a well-written, well-acted scene at the refugee agency. I liked parts of this. I assumed everyone in Gilead would have known that June was pregnant, since Serena was out getting baby things. I also assumed that's why they didn't beat her on the spot, as they did with OfGlenn. The amputation scene was too much for me, though.

It's not as clear to me that they're dragging someone in a red dress, but if they are I'd be surprised if it's Janine. The clear implication from the last episode was that she's in a coma or vegetative state, and she's being kept alive artificially because of her ability to reproduce. (I suspect that was also intended as an irony--i.e., Gilead doesn't believe in fertility treatments because they're unnatural, but if you are fertile they're happy to keep you unnaturally alive.) The particicution victim may well be the Mayday Handmaid, in which case it would make sense that June opens the package because there's no one left to accept it.

Agreed on both counts. The book was powerful in part because of what it left unsaid. If they're true to the book

YAAAAAAAS, Moira! Praise be for that ending. A part of me was hoping that Serena would bust in and find the Commander and Offred playing Scrabble. IMO, Waterford agreed to going back to Jezebel's a little too quickly/easily, but I guess the message they're trying to send is that these guys are all total horndogs. For that reason, I'm sure the powers that be in Gilead do believe what Janine said about Warren. It sort of parallels Stalinist times--everyone informs on everyone, everyone is presumed guilty. Ann Dowd also deserves some kind of award for her work in this series. She is acting the hell out of her role.

Yes, I think there's a lot of truth to that. And I can see why the writers took the opportunity to build on the book by giving the men a more extensive backstory. However, I think there's a way to do that while remaining true to the central POV in the story, which is June or at least the woman's gaze more broadly. That is where the last episode failed, and where this one fails a bit, too. What if we discovered Nick's backstory along with June, maybe through her finding an artifact of Nick's past life. What if--instead of asking for June to write a letter to Lucas--the Mexican envoy had brought her a smuggled letter from Lucas, so that we see their escape and his subsequent rescue through her eyes. Those, for me, would have been stronger episodes than the ones we got. Also, glad that others commented on how literally dark this episode was. This was the second time in the series that I had my brightness cranked all the way up and could still barely see what was happening!

Kind of a silly and campy episode, but some fun moments. I still hate Nia Long's acting in this part. Basically every scene: Say something bitchy, flip hair, make duck lips, strike a pose. Eva Longoria was better, but I still got a good chunk of the way into this episode before I finally sorted out who her character was and why she was important. I feel like the previews (at least the ones on Hulu) give away a couple of big plot points for next week... Don't watch them unless you want to be spoiled.

You can find the preview for the next episode on Hulu. It looks to me like it's going to center on the storyline of how Luke gets "woke" to the fact that he and his family are genuinely in danger. There's a part of the clip where June berates him a bit for them not trying to escape sooner. I don't know how I feel about Luke being cast as a hero. Honestly, I didn't hate him in earlier episodes. I just thought of him as a frog in slowly boiling water who didn't understand how bad things were getting. I also like the complexity of the idea that June and Luke are both flawed people--and that's OK, because people can be regular and flawed and yet they are still deserving of basic human rights and dignity.

The entire "Mexico needs handmaids" storyline makes less sense to me the more I reflect on it. The handmaid concept is based on a fundamentalist/evangelical interpretation of the Bible. If Mexico doesn't accept that (which they don't--e.g., women ambassadors and women reading books), why bring in handmaids? Likewise, are we to believe that Gilead is now cool with Catholicism and vice-versa? Finally, Mexico is not a small country. There are tens of millions of women in Mexico. If almost all the women there are infertile as the ambassador claims, there's no way a few of Gilead's handmaids would have a meaningful effect on population decline. Someone else in another discussion pointed out that it would have made way more sense if the trade were envisioned in reverse--i.e., Gilead wants to bring in more handmaids from Mexico, and in exchange they will trade some of their food.

Honestly this was the weakest episode so far for me. Only the twist at the very end redeemed it. Discussing the terror plot in the movie theater was corny, as was the idea that Mexico evidently has no fertile women at all and would be trading for handmaids. (And, why would Gilead be trying to trade away their handmaids, since they're still having so few healthy babies?) From a technical point of view, I think they are over-using some of the tricks for dramatic effect. Long scenes where no one talks, filters, tight close-ups on someone's face having a range of emotion. I don't need to be quite so bashed over the head with the dramatic-ness of it all. The movie theater scene also annoyed me this week. I had the brightness on my screen turned up all the way and I still could barely see anything.

Yes, thank you. I didn't see this as a character referendum on the real William and Kate. To me, it was an exploration on the meaning of 21st century monarchy in Britain. Should the monarchy be an independent institution that stands for principle (Charles), a facade that inspires but which is ultimately powerless (Will & Kate), or has it run its course altogether (Harry)? And TPS did a good job with the role. I can believe there were parts of the play that were cut for the TV broadcast, because some points felt rushed. Charles seemed to go quickly from having about 50/50 public support to being burned in effigy. The Harry/Jess relationship was not well-developed, and it confused me that he was released from being a royal and yet 10 minutes later he's back to tell his father to abdicate for the good of the monarchy. And why would Harry need to sign an abdication decree for it to be official? I did enjoy this though. At least it was something a bit original and not another mystery-solving clergyman. ETA: I was just reading about the play and evidently the choice to include a press freedom bill as the focal point was inspired by the News Corp. phone hacking scandal. Which would have made a lot more sense if they gave it context in the play.

Yeah, I haven't been feeling Giuliana, either. I guess this was actually the previous episode, but the flashback scenes where she looked, um, absolutely not younger were kind of silly. And it's predictable that Luscious will throw her over in the end. Trai Byers is running away with this season, though.

Well, they cast a Hispanic girl so I'm guessing not Tiana. And I don't think there's any fantasy realm where Henry could get with Esmeralda. LOL

Yeah, and I guess we can safely conclude from this episode that Henry and Violet don't live happily ever after. *smirk*

Aww, I'm glad I watched that. I thought they did a nice job, for the most part. Rumple turning his mom to fairy dust was pretty satisfying to watch. She was getting a little... Oedipal on Rumple and Gideon for a while there.

So, I have a theory that, in this series, Gilead is a much more insular place than we've been led to believe. They tell us in Ep. 1 that the entire continental U.S. is either Gilead or nuclear wasteland, and only two stars (Alaska/Hawaii) are left on the U.S. flag. Gilead seems to extend across New England and as far south as Washington, but what we see of Gilead is really just this one New England town. Is June being a reliable narrator when she tells the audience what Gilead's leaders have told her? Is most of U.S. territory really a toxic waste dump? Has Gilead's government really consolidated power over all remaining territory? If so, why are they so desperately seeking foreign allies? This is just conjecture on my part.