LordOfLotion

With the mouths wired shut, this is just getting into stupid territory. The muzzles would be enough. People have to eat. They're just trying to shock the viewers now. In case you didn't get the message, they're putting on the reich really hard with all the banners and flags hanging everywhere. I keep expecting a good seig heil. Yeah, the Swiss would never be negotiating this, but most of the stuff on this show would never happen, so I'll keep going... What would have been better with the Lincoln statue, would have been if they showed another one off to the side, with a giant tarp draped over it. Like they were getting ready to replace it, but you didn't get to see what with. Instead we just get Lincoln with a severed head. Hey Fred got his white rope back! That's the story progression we've been waiting for!!

I don't understand why Luke was buying baby stuff at all. If it's really a crisis I don't know why there isn't some king of program supplying the baby's needs, like someone else already mentioned. I think that they're writing this by the seat of their pants with no clear plan or map. They have no idea where they're going with this so they're not laying any groundwork for anything in the future-- in spite of saying they want to go ten years. I can tell because things like the handmaid letters have never been mentioned again. That locket will be forgotten after this season. They're not really setting anything up for a true long haul. Unfortunately I think the result of this is going to be that when something does finally change, or a character finally does something, it's going to feel like an ass pull or a deux ex machina. Because they're going to mash it up with one of their flashback episodes to make it seem like "see, the thing was there all along," when it really wasn't. And speaking of the media that ought to be shown, has anyone else wondered why Oprah was only doing late night radio? Even if she only made it out of the country with just the clothes on her back, at that point she would have had another TV talk show, and she would have had fans watching her on a world stage. She would have done it based on her media connections alone. That was one of the worst wastes of a guest star I've ever seen. I'm sure that might have been based on her availability, but come on. I should not have to fill in this many blanks two and a half seasons in, with as much time as they've wasted on other things. It is the show's job, not mine, to imagine things, and then show me. That's why it's a show. Otherwise, I don't know why I'm paying Hulu and watching these commercials.

Israeli trailer for 05x06:

Nobody told Serena she couldn't have children as a result of the shooting.

Yeah, about that locket. I would smash that thing with a hammer and dump it in the trash in another province. Too often gifts like that from totalitarian regimes come with bonus gifts like trackers and listening devices. Come to think of it I would burn anything Serena got close to.

I wonder how many of those people at the big commander meeting were missing body parts. I regret looking forward to Bradley Whitford having an expanded role. Clearly he is just a glorified guest star and we're never going to get beyond the Waterfords pissing on June. These close-ups on June's face with the dumb rage-ey expressions are completely meaningless now. And the way they did it during the propaganda video like that is kind of breaking the fourth wall and what little immersion I had left was totally gone. I would like to see a plot thread about Canada Man and what he does, but I'm not going to get it. I need to go binge a season of Burn Notice.

I just want to say that I love this show. It is a light, easily digested distraction from my life that sparks joy. I also enjoy your comments. And that's all I have to say about that.

There is book talk in the thread below. The last post mentioned the sequel but it was back in November. Maybe if you post there people who have read the first book and keep up with Margaret Atwood can answer your questions.

Promo photos for 03X05: https://images.spoilertv.com/The Handmaid's Tale/Season 3/Promotional Episode Photos/Episode 3.05 - Unknown Caller/THT_305_ED-_0224RT_f.jpg.php?fbclid=IwAR3Q9RKxzXKvtsPNrSTDWrsZiJNvLjXy-UMF38wM7HWQFGpPP4apFZo3ZGQ

When I look at quotes from Bruce Miller from back in 2017 when this show was getting started, he's kind of putting it off on the audience saying that we can't handle seeing only white people on TV. “That was a very big discussion with Margaret [Atwood] about what the difference was between reading the words ‘There are no people of colour in this world’ and seeing an all-white world on your television,” he told Time magazine. “What’s the difference between making a TV show about racists and making a racist TV show where you don’t hire any actors of colour? So that was part of it.” So they couldn't possibly have shown minorities who had fled to Canada and Alaska, or showing what actually happened in the book. The only way to do this was to pretend racism doesn't exist. The problem is that the way it worked out, I still hardly ever see these minorities, especially in positions of power. If you blink, you'll miss them. I have to slow it down and freeze frame it in a show where they are constantly doing close-ups and slow motion shots.

Aunt Lydia has power that the wives don't have. She can read and write, inspect their homes, live in their homes when a baby is on the way, regulate their diets, tell them not to smoke, and who knows what else. She probably writes everything they do in her little brown book. When the wives saw her beating Janine, that was an escalation of Lydia's behavior. They all probably wondered if they were next. The commanders probably had another helping of deviled eggs.

I'm surprised nobody has posted this yet. They're saying that in the finale, there is supposed to be a plane that leaves Gilead with a bunch of children on board. This has been posted on the Facebook groups as well as on Reddit. Everybody is assuming that they make it out. If I were a totalitarian dictator, I would shoot the plane down, because if I can't have the children no one can. But these are the same writers that gave us Luke and run June in circles, so I was just wondering where you all think this will go.

Right after the promo there's an "inside the episode." They explain that the "I don't hate him but I don't love him" line was from the book. They say that they don't understand it either but they wanted to put it in, so they did. We're on season three now, way past the end of the book at this point. There's no reason to be putting book material like that in, especially if it does not make sense. The time for this would have been sometime in season one, not after all that stuff in season two. As for Luke, I forgot to say it in my other post, but IT IS DUMB in a general sense to be taking a baby to a rally, or any crowded public place in this world. With the birth rate being what it is, there's a high motivation for someone to kidnap your child. But on the bell curve of intelligence, Luke is walking in the valley of the damned. He even had someone try to kidnap a child of his own once before. On top of that, he knows the "lawful" parents in Gilead are important political figures who know where he lives. So he's out there flaunting the little MacGuffin in the streets and waving at the cameras so that everyone can see them. This man has a serious brain deficit.

OK.. the nerve of Fred standing there all repulsed at Aunt Lydia beating the crap out of Janine when he beat Serena and HAD HER FINGER CUT OFF. But Lydia takes a couple of whacks at Mad-Eye Moody and and that's going too far. And this show jumped the shark with June and her super powers when she negotiated Janine handing off that baby on that bridge in season one. It was all downhill from there. June is the only one who can do that stuff, and it seems like whenever the Putnams are involved, June's people powers intensify. When June is in the Putnams' house, June is all glowing and her hair is blowing around like Dark Phoenix.

It could be Alzheimer's. It could also be that she doesn't like people seeing her look weak. You don't have to be in a dystopia for that. And in this dystopia, a weak woman often gets sent to the colonies.

I'm wondering if maybe there isn't a therapist shortage in Canada. With the influx of refugees, I'm stunned that there isn't a longer waiting period for regular medical treatment, unless they've managed to streamline care somehow. Maybe if you're a refugee and you were some kind of doctor, nurse etc in the US they put you in the express lane to get certified and working in Canada when you arrive. But answers to all of that require story expansion that the writers just won't do.

Yeah I saw that too. I don't know what they were thinking there.

Episodes 1-3: After a daring journey across the border, Emily and Nichole are greeted by a border patrol agent and are granted asylum in Canada. Now a refugee, Emily is taken to the hospital for a physical examination before being released into the care of Moira and Luke, to whom she hands over Nichole. She then reaches out to her wife, Sylvia, whom she last saw when they were separated at the airport and Emily was forced to stay in Gilead. What’s Next: Learning to navigate life as a refugee, Emily will eventually have to atone for her past life in Gilead. “What we quickly see is just because you’re free doesn’t mean you carry the scars of Gilead with you,” Littlefield says. “Physically, [she’s good]. Emotionally, that’s a journey.” But more immediately for Emily is her reunion with Sylvia and their child.

https://www.etonline.com/the-handmaids-tale-the-cast-breaks-down-whats-to-come-on-season-3-exclusive-126577 The big one is Lydia's backstory: Episode eight, Littlefield reveals, will be a big one for Lydia, who finally gets a flashback this season. “It’s pretty substantial,” he says. “It’s the beginning of an understanding of who she was before Gilead.” Audiences will see her life as a teacher and single mom and the conflict that comes out of her bond with her son. “It begins to open a door into this complex character and where she began to adopt some of the principles of Gilead," he adds.”

Lawrence is highly intelligent, and he values people who are also intelligent because he feels like he's surrounded by idiots, and that's frustrating for him. In the regular world it was irritating, and in Gilead, a moron can get you killed, especially when you're doing illegal stuff. He looks down on anyone he thinks is dumber than him. The problem is that he thinks everyone is dumber than him. Eventually, that gets you killed, because there is always someone smarter, and he's going to underestimate people-- assuming we have a logical character arc, which I know is a lot to ask considering the way the writing is. But why he is where he is and why he acts that way, and does what he does all make perfect sense to me.

I saw an interview with Warren Littlefield somewhere last year where he seemed very insistent that they were going to stick with telling "June's story" and not expand into the world or too much into other characters. I got the impression that he didn't like the idea of world building very much and that he was the one who had pushed to keep the narrow scope. I think it was posted somewhere here in the forum but I don't remember where it was.

It can't be helped with Heather. Her forehead is just this side of abnormal. When I first saw her I was convinced she had a syndrome of some sort.

I get it, too. But it's just a storyline to her. She faked a pregnancy for this show, and now she's pulling this garbage. She's playing on people's real pain to try to get more seasons of "Look at me! I'm Fat!"

Yeah, come to the forum, Whit.

OMG Todd just called it! "I feel like Whitney may have struck rock bottom not even being able to bathe."