SourK

I have a lot of empathy for Andie. In real life, I love to watch hidden role games, but I don't like to play them because I find it upsetting to think that my friends are manipulating me, even if i know it's just for a game. If Andie wasn't used to playing those kinds of games, or being on reality shows, I 100% understand how they could make the mistake of being too vulnerable or trusting too much and then get hurt by that. It's just that I think the lesson to learn is, "I went too deep with people in a setting that wasn't appropriate for that, and I ended up getting hurt" vs "Cirie hurt me on purpose." Cirie was actually in a really awkward position, because she seemed like she was genuinely trying to be nice to people who were being vulnerable with her, and whom she liked, but also she was trying to play a game where she was secretly on the opposing team and couldn't reveal it. She was clearly the best Traitor, but I would argue that shanking Arie in the finals was a mistake. He could easily have tried to expose her and take her down with him, and she just got lucky when he didn't.

Just binged this all at once. It's basically Werewolf with gameshow elements, and I like Werewolf and gameshow elements, so I had fun. The two things I found most interesting were: The way that everybody knew that any one of them could have been chosen as Traitor, and that the Traitors weren't chosen until the first episode, but then many of them started to talk about the Traitors as if they were bad people who were betraying the group because of a character flaw and not because Alan touched their shoulders. The way that many people got fixated on somebody they didn't like, and wanted to believe that that person was bad and therefore a Traitor -- and how they were so confident about that, based on nothing but vibes. In the end, I was most excited to see Cirie play, so I was happy she was a Traitor, and I think she played well -- but I have mixed feelings about how personal and nasty it got sometimes when they all ganged up on somebody for banishment. I agree that there wasn't any way for him to get suspicion off himself at that point, but he could have tried to take her down with him out of spite, which is honestly what I would have done. IMO, he was being extremely polite by just taking himself out of it and letting the game play out as it would. I agree that the challenges didn't add anything. Some were fun to watch, but they had nothing to do with the main task, which was figuring out who's a Traitor. At least on The Mole, the Mole is motivated to sabotage the group, and you're gathering intel during the challenge. On this show, no one had a motivation to do anything differently during the challenge, and the challenge didn't show you anything about who they were. I 100% agree. They need a Traitor in the game until the end, and I get that, but Cirie would have made it without throwing Arie in the mix. I think doing that just confused things. That reaction, and the reaction some people had when they were getting bullied off the show made me feel like maybe it's not awesome that we psychologically torture people for entertainment, you know? It's easy to say that people should keep perspective and remember it's a gameshow, but I also know that, once you're in it, and you're not sleeping, and it's all you think about, and the other contestants are the only people you see, it starts to feel like a really big deal. I don't think it's Cirie's fault for playing the game as designed, and I also don't think she was unnecessarily mean about it from what we saw. But, production is choosing these people and creating these situations -- so they're taking people who are emotionally vulnerable and open, and being like, "What if everyone betrayed you?! What if we let you think you won and then you didn't?!" Like, some people are more seasoned, and they get that it's a game that involves lying and good for them -- but other people probably shouldn't be playing, and it's not 100% on them when they get hurt. People behind the scenes are making choices about how much to twist the knife. I found that confusing/annoying, too. And I noticed that, in the second episode, Alan verbally clarified for everyone that no one has a motivation to sabotage on purpose & everyone wants to succeed at the challenge. But then that goes back to the issue where there's no point to the challenges. I was confused about this too and, as ever on this type of show, I wish we had more knowledge about what the contestants were told and what they understood the rules to be. Because I'm not sure whether they knew they'd started with three Traitors or not.

"Why didn't they drive to Alaska?" is probably the best question anyone's asked. Why didn't they drive to Alaska? Like, I can't imagine that it's more dangerous than Hawaii. It has a country between it and Gilead. WTF. It felt to me like they introduced a clumsy plot development to split June off from Luke, and then an even clumsier one to split Nick off from the wife he loves so much so that June and Nick can reunite and the love triangle I hate can just keep spinning. 9/10 they get back together but Nick sacrifices himself to atone for his sins and save June. Then Luke shows up and he's like, "What did I miss?" And June's like, "OMG we found each other again." Can confirm.

Tuello was so proud of himself for helping that I knew something would go wrong. The actor keeps playing his scenes with more and more sorrow and gravity, and I like to think it's because the character's confronting his own uselessness and failure. Imagine if this were a better show, and June and Serena had been apart for a couple of seasons, having different journeys that made sense, and then they suddenly saw each other on the train in the last minute of the season. Imagine how suspenseful and intense that would be. Imagine that the last line wasn't "Do you have a diaper?" It feels normal to me that he would get arrested if he killed someone. But I do agree that it seemed alarmist for June to conclude that everyone would hate them and try to kill their kid if/when it was revealed that he killed a Canadian. There's an interesting angle here where maybe she's having an extreme reaction because of the trauma she suffered earlier -- eg, immediately concluding that they have to flee the country before it all happens again. But the show seems to think she's correct, so. I knew it too and I smiled like the Grinch because I love the idea that, no matter where June goes, there's Serena, just casually standing there. I also love that June just abandoned her stroller in the middle of the train. I had the same thought, though I don't know why it would benefit Tuello to put his own people on a train to New Bethlehem. So far, Nick's whole characterization is that he keeps getting asked to be a spy even though he's bad at it. It doesn't really surprise me that he'd agree to spy for Tuello and then, five minutes later, blow his cover and punch Lawrence in the face.

Maybe the pro-Gilead Canadians will move to New Bethlahem. Someone's got to -- they've built it up too much for no one to go there.

LMAO the blue-haired girl is my favourite character. The way she just stares at Serena and her insane, no-context request and then she's like, "You know what? I'm in!" Otherwise, I really didn't enjoy this. I think I actually hate June now? I decided while she was on the phone with Lawrence and she cycled through, like, five different motivations, from randomly being Walter White at him to begging him to save her daughter to telling him to fuck himself to trashing the landscaping... and then every emotion she expressed was conveyed by shaking her head. Also, I think it's unkind for people to picket while the Americans are trying to hold a memorial service (why they did it there instead of at the embassy or something IDK), but a scene where a little girl learns to say the pledge of allegiance while looking at a photo of a brave soldier who died... kind of made me want the Americans to go home? That was the most tense moment I can remember in a long time. I didn't care about 99% of what was happening, but I was still like, "Go, Serena. OMG, go now! You don't get another chance!" Honestly, my main thought when Mrs. Wheeler slapped her was, "Okay, there's an unambiguous assault." I'd say I don't know how they think they can get away with this, but apparently in the universe of this show, they can? She already has a child, so I think that's probably enough to satisfy Gilead, at least for a while.

This was, by far, my favourite episode of the season. Lots of interesting ideas and interesting dilemmas for the first time in a long time, all framed around the idea of how you live in a world where you accept that Gilead gets to exist and your hopes of dismantling it aren't going to happen. Disagree. I hate Nick, and part of the reason is because I think he never wanted June to be free -- he just wanted her free to be with him. I think bringing her back to Gilead in a way where he's allowed to be with her is exactly the outcome he wants. After years of going "What's his deal? What's his deal?" I feel like I understand Lawrence's deal, now. And I think Bradley Whitford is really good in this role. You want to like him. Even if this is similar to what he does most of the time, he does it really well. Even when she was pregnant, I didn't get why she wasn't trying harder to report the Wheelers to the authorities. They're not actually in Gilead -- you're not allowed to just take someone hostage and hold them against their will. Also count me as another person who doesn't see why the foster system would ever give this kid to the Wheelers as opposed to normal foster parents. Also, if she's released from detention, now, there would be a process for her to get her kid back. The Wheelers couldn't just unilaterally decide to keep him. I think it's been implied that America still holds part of real-world American territory and they're actively at war with Gilead, still. They're just losing. I had the same thought. And I had never considered babies while that was happening, but wow. It would be so terrible if your kids couldn't even sleep because people kept honking all night.

I rewatched some the earlier episodes, focusing on the finalists and, if your attention is only on them, then she starts to look more suspect. In the prison task, I actually think she did a really good job -- Joi was placed in a cell that had a worse view of Kesi's door than the other contestants had (and I was curious about whether that was on purpose -- exactly the kind of thing I wish they had explained or recapped during the finale) -- and the Kesi's strategy was to keep yelling instructions to Joi that took her away from the door and got her to focus on the key she couldn't reach instead. It sounded like she was trying to help, but it really dragged out how long it took them to do the task, while also making it look like Joi's fault. There's always been a tension on this show, though, where it's more fun for the players than the viewers, partly because we don't have the same opportunity to gather information on the mole.

I'm actually kind of confused about how Joi lasted this long if she's been voting for Will since the beginning, but maybe almost nobody picked Kesi, and it was a game of who spread their votes out the best? I was also kind of hoping for more after material where they showed how Will figured out it was Kesi, or discussions people had about their suspicions behind the scene. For me, the apex of this was season two of the original series, where the finale revealed how the two finalists had known who the mole was for several episodes and traded info -- how one of them had figured it out before the other and accidentally let it slip, because they assumed the other finalist already knew. And then it was a contest to see who did the best on the quiz. In this case, though, it seems like everyone was kind of bad? I still enjoyed watching it, and I like Kesi, so I'm glad she got to be the mole -- the ending just wasn't as suspenseful and revealing as I hoped it would be.

I'm honestly not sure if it's Kesi or Joi, and I love that. Even though I wrote Joi off because of the $25k, I rewatched some of the early episodes in preparation for this, and she does act super suspicious. I ultimately still think Kesi is the mole, but we'll see! I thought Avori would make it to the finals, and I was rooting for her, so I'm sad to see her go. If Will and Joi are really the last two contestants, then the two people with the biggest chips on their shoulders made it to the end, which is kind of a bummer. I like Kesi a lot, though, so I'm still happy if she's the mole.

Serena: "June, you're like an angel. 🙏 One of those fucked-up Old Testament angels that smites everyone and drinks blood." Here's my thing: people changing their minds about what their motivations are over and over again doesn't create conflict an tension. There was a time in the past when the June/Serena alliance was interesting, but that story reached its climax when Serena gave Nichole to June and let her escape so they could have a better life. Everything after that has just been needlessly rehashing the same points in their relationship -- like backing your car out of a ditch just so you can drive into the ditch again. This season has been the worst, IMO, in that it feels like someone just decided they need to be mortal enemies again so that they could build to this unearned moment where they (again) learn to be friends. To me, it didn't feel dramatic or authentic -- it just felt like, "Okay, cool. When Serena makes that face and pretends to be helpless, it works on women, too." Honestly, that's a pretty good summary of how Lydia's affection works. She plucks out your eye and then gives you an eye patch because you are her favourite. (Also, I had totally forgotten that they used to do that makeup on the actor every episode back in the day).

I guess that's true, if we assume that the Mole will grab the exemption even if they're the last person -- then the best possible outcome is that you don't get the money but none of the players gets an exemption and no one sleeps on the floor. I think it depends how much you value not making people sleep on the floor.

I had forgotten about this, but it's one of my favourite moments. Where Obvious Greg is like "Oh, you want to talk to EVERYONE, each of us INDIVIDUALLY, of course you can do that. Let's start with Pranav..." and what they all took from that was, "Cool, let's tell the other team our plan and wander down the hall." At the same time, I thought his self-serving thing of "I'm not going to LIE; I'm just going to mislead them" made him sound way less convincing than if he'd just lied.

I'm so torn. Kesi's behaviour seems the most suspicious lately, but Jacob's talking heads sometimes make me think it could be him, because he words things strangely -- like when he was like, "Down to four players, except five players, the fifth one being the mole" or when he said "The mole is trying to trick the players" (or something similar) instead of "The mole is trying to trick us." Avori also made it sound like she split her votes between Jacob and Joi -- but that could be the show misdirecting us. Finally, I know they don't want the players to talk to each other after the elimination because they don't want them to share information about who they voted for and whatnot, but it's so awkward and sad that they have to just leave silently.

Joi calling out Jacob makes me a little more suspicious of Joi, but I think maybe she's just hard to get along with? I liked Will's pearl necklace. I don't know if he just started wearing it or if I never noticed it before, but it looked really cool. LOL at Greg saying that, when he leads a focus group, be plays good cop and bad cop by himself. That's not something it would ever occur to me to do with a focus group, but I can see it being his strategy. I feel like Kesi and Jacob are still the most suspicious people from the guessing game, though I think I suspect Kesi more.

Ha ha ha -- this is what I love. Challenges where you have to double-guess everything, and someone being selfish. Good cliffhangers this season. If I were the mole, I think I would put the money in my own bag. If I get left behind, we lose $10k and it's not my fault. If I get to go to the end, I won $10k for the team and you can't suspect me. Meanwhile I'd try to get the other two people left behind somewhere. However, I don't think any of the people with money in their bags were playing that angle, so... I liked the Parnav/Avori alliance a lot -- and Avori is one of my favs because she seems to have such a level-headed attitude about the game. I was sad to see them split up, especially if it's because she made him think she's the mole. Jacob and Kesi are the two that stand out to me, and I'm undecided about Casey. I think, this episode, they could have just been showing random footage of her taking appropriate breaks and talking to people, to make it seem like she was stalling on purpose. There's a lot of waiting around on shows like this while the cameras get moved, etc. I don't think it's Joi, Avori, or Will. Greg, I'm also not sure about.

I felt zero suspense about what Serena would do -- from the moment she said she had to "be there" when June died, I was like, "Okay, so you and June are starting up your odd couple comedy again. I guess that's a better way to escape the house than going to see that weird doctor." Also, that was the moment I realized Serena might be smarter than me. I had been saying, "I don't understand why she isn't more confrontational about them holding her prisoner," but the reason was exactly for this: so that she could manipulate them by making them think she was cooperating, just like June used to do. Otherwise, LOL at Lydia 2.0 with more compassion. She deserves to get screamed at by a teenager. Naomi didn't do anything wrong, though, so they would probably just marry her off to a different Commander, wouldn't they? Maybe she'll be the one to marry Lawrence, since they all keep bringing it up. I actually expected Janine to ask what would happen to Putnam's kids; I was surprised she didn't. As soft as I am on Serena, I doubt it. I think that, in her mind, the distinction isn't suffering vs not suffering, it's deserved suffering vs undeserved suffering. She thinks she's a good and important person, so she doesn't deserve to suffer, and her suffering is wrong. She thinks the handmaids were bad, unimportant people, so their suffering was deserved, and that made it right. Totally different things. Oh, yes. Now that you've said it, I'm sure this will happen. Well... we've learned that no man's land is a magical place where you can commit murder and Canada doesn't care, so maybe they don't care about whatever this guy's doing either? It seems kind of fantastical to me that everyone's allowed to just step across the border into this other territory and do whatever, but it's internally consistent so far, I guess. I also thought it was dumb for her to say her own name. Like, why not even try to lie and say you're someone else? But I bet the thing where she asked for Lawrence and Nick will get ignored.

Jacob is at the top of my suspect list, partly because he was happy that Joi was his navigator. It also makes me laugh to think that maybe the mole's strategy this season is to just let the contestants play to their weaknesses and mess up the tasks on their own. If Joi isn't the mole, I think it's hilarious that she's doing more than the mole to sabotage their pot. She definitely seems like she'd be okay with winning a $0 pot just to get there. But she also seems to think her best chance to win is to continually skip the quiz, which makes me doubt how well she'd do in the final. (FWIW, I understand wanting to skip the early quizzes because you're just guessing at that point, but the farther you go in the game the more you should hope to do well). I'll really, really laugh if Joi gets to the end with another contestant, that person wins, and then there's like $15.50 in the pot because of Joi.

This is the move that makes me think Joi can't be the mole -- firstly because it's such an obvious thing to do, and secondly because I don't think the producers wanted somebody to completely drain the pot. They immediately tried to give 10k back for no reason, and the contestants turned it down. It could be a double fake-out where her plan as the mole is to act so much like the mole that no one thinks she can be the mole -- but I doubt it. That seems too risky and complicated.

This is where I started to get interested in this season, because of the dossier dilemma. I wish that the rules around some of these challenges were explained better, or that we got to hear them exactly as they were described to the contestants, but I still had fun trying to game out whether or not it made sense to read the dossier. I also love watching everyone pat themselves on the back for being too moral to lose money from the pot by reading the dossier, and then immediately agree to lose money from the pot by betting on who read the dossier.

Oh no -- I didn't realize we only got five episodes this week. It was slow to get going, but that's kind of how I remember The Mole being. I'm fully into it now and suspicious of everyone.

The happier they were, the more afraid I was for Luke. Purely for meta reasons; not because the show built tension. June isn't going to die yet, so it felt like they were fattening him up to be more depressing in death. One thing I thought about again in this episode -- I think I get that they're trying to make June the more stereotypically masculine person in this marriage and Luke the more stereotypically feminine -- and I don't hate it -- but it's also not quite landing for me, and I don't know why.

Here's what I wish: I wish June and Luke embarked on a dangerous quest because they actually needed to get something important. It doesn't feel like anything the characters are doing follows from anything else -- it just feels like the writers are trying to stir the pot to keep the story going. I loved that moment, because it seemed like maybe they were going to try to turn it into a three-person idiot expedition, and Moira would agree to go too, but then, no -- we just cut to her handing off the backpack and saying goodbye. Smart girl. I don't want that for her or for anyone. And I personally feel like I watched enough of it in season one.

Am I crazy or did Luke say he didn't want the state to take Nichole away because she was their best chance to get Hannah back? And then we got a clunky scene where he needlessly met with Serena in person, to establish that he wanted to ask her to get Hannah back, and then she said a bunch of Gilead stuff, but looked over his shoulder to let him know they weren't alone. Is Luke going to trade Nichole to Serena for Hannah? Is that where this is going? I only sort of care. I don't think she was necessarily in the room when that decision got made, but in so far as she was involved, we've seen from the flashbacks is that Fred used to treat her a lot more deferentially before she lost her rights, and she probably assumed that that would continue. There are certain women (who are usually religious) who have an attitude like, "You just need to find a good man, and then you can trust him to protect you and put your fate in his hands, and it won't matter if you have legal rights, because he won't ever try to hurt you." I think this might have been one of those situations -- she thought Fred was a good man who would make sure she was okay, and she didn't realize what he would turn into once he thought he could get away with it. This narrative (that I'm kind of making up) also gives her a way to blame Fred instead of blaming the system that she lobbied for and created. If Fred had been a better person, and if other particular men had been better people, and done what they were supposed to do, everything would have been fine -- so she doesn't have to conclude that the system inevitably produces this outcome; she can just conclude that particular people were bad. It's also a show of dominance because it deliberately evokes memories of a time when June was helpless and Serena got to bully her and ruin her life. It's kind of like if someone had a mean nickname in high school and you put that in cursive on their invitation to the reunion. Only, like, x100.

It bothers me too. Even in the first season, the vibe was almost like the Handmaids had been kidnapped and taken to a foreign country -- but then it's like, "No, wait. Literally all of these characters were American until, like, a year or two ago." I think the aspect of it that gets me is how people in Gilead speak to other people as though they believe that those people have only ever lived in Gilead and somehow aren't familiar with the concept of anything else.