S03.E12: Sacrifice

[jenn31]

3 hours ago, mamadrama said:

So much of those award shows are political and not based on actual skills, anyway. 

Just about every part of it is. Basing Moss’s talents on award shows is like saying getting voted in to run the country makes you an outstanding... well okay, I won’t go there. 

[jenn31]

4 hours ago, AnswersWanted said:

But to suddenly throw us into the deep end of moving little kids, 52 of them no less, it wouldn't matter to me if Mother Oprah herself was behind the plan, it's just not a feasible endeavor.

Oprah must have gotten wind of the absurd scheme and is laughing herself sick. That’s why we haven’t heard her on the radio recently. 

I laughed out loud when June muttered 52. 

[jenn31]

Guys, guys, stop worrying. If one of them gets out of hand, June will just smother her with a pillow. To save the rest of the children. I wonder how many pillows pillows she can hide under that cape?

[goldilocks]

6 minutes ago, jenn31 said:

Guys, guys, stop worrying. If one of them gets out of hand, June will just smother her with a pillow. To save the rest of the children. I wonder how many pillows pillows she can hide under that cape?

She can tell them about her scuffle with Commander Winslow. One wave of her pen would put a stop to any misbehavior. 

[Anela]

17 hours ago, kieyra said:

Quite a few of us here stopped watching some time ago. You don’t really need to watch the show when the same three dumb things happen every week.

Yep, I've only been checking in here since episode three, and I almost didn't watch the first three episodes.

9 hours ago, kieyra said:

I remember back when I actually viewed this as a legit show and tried to analyze the characters. I used to think Luke's meh-ness and very mild sexism were meant to convey the inherent danger of complacence among men towards these huge threats to women and their freedom.

Now I realize I way overthought that.

I had the same thoughts, because it's something I know that I've dealt with, from men who are well-meaning, including my dad here and there. I'm in touch with a man from my past, who lives in a different country, and he told me on Monday, that I need to stop paying attention to the news, and politics. That it can drive you crazy.  I told him that I can't afford to stop paying attention to all of it. 

5 hours ago, ferjy said:

Not to pontificate the point, but this is it exactly. I used to eyeroll her acting in Gilmore Girls, even though she was pretty. I was floored at her acting in this. She's come a long way.

I didn't eye-roll her until the college years, when she was supposed to be partying, upbeat Rory, a certain crying scene, etc. I thought she was okay when it first started. I was also shocked by her acting here, because I've seen her in other things, and her acting hadn't improved when I saw them. 

Edited August 10, 2019 by Anela

[jenn31]

10 minutes ago, goldilocks said:

She can tell them about her scuffle with Commander Winslow. One wave of her pen would put a stop to any misbehavior. 

Or glare at them with her ugly scowl face. No, no, that would bring on nightmares and shrieking. Scratch that. 

Edited August 10, 2019 by jenn31

[mamadrama]

1 hour ago, jenn31 said:

Just about every part of it is. Basing Moss’s talents on award shows is like saying getting voted in to run the country makes you an outstanding... well okay, I won’t go there. 

Ha ha ha! Nice. 

In my previous life I worked in the country music industry in Nashville. The CMA awards were totally political and had little to nothing to do with talent. Award shows are fun to watch, but I don't put much stock in them. 

[alexvillage]

14 hours ago, Umbelina said:

So, a white woman who is well placed with a discontented Commander isn't allowed to come up with a plan?  Why?  Because she is white?  Or because she isn't pretty enough to be the lead?

It's logical that eventually smuggling out more than one or two at a time would come up, and frankly, be done.  It's equally logical that in TV, it's usually the main character of the show that is the one to come up with plans.

If this were Moira's plan would the reaction be different?  Or Emily's because she's prettier?

My comment was in reference to claims that things are based on the book when the premise of the book is lost. If they want to mention the UR, if they initially attempt to make if a thing in the show, they didn't have to turn the leadership of the resistance to Super Renegade June Wick. Because that June is not even a distant reminder of the June in the book.

I don't really care about looks. Because of people I meet in my life and people who have become my friends, I have been going through a process of unlearning society's imposing values of beauty and desirability. I try to apply this to TV watching too, despite the silly standards. 

I think that what Alexis has captured the essence of the handmaid in the book even though her actions in the sow were written in a defiant way. I can see the fear and trauma I pictured when reading the book. 

[alexvillage]

10 hours ago, ferjy said:

I highly disagree. Just because people are watching does not mean the show is doing anything right. People watch crap shows all the time then lament when they're taken off the air. As for people here, if we didn't have this thread, a lot of us would have given up by now. And still might after seeing this season out. Beyond all that, I'm sure they've lost a lot of viewers already. We're not the only forum complaining about the mess.

I will add: the fact that people watch crap shows all the time is one reason why crap shows keep running for more than 5 seasons. Some of the best shows get cancelled because a lot of people do't really care, just watch for distraction, some don't have a sense of history and quality, some don't care about the theme, but most do care about silly plots. Or beaus the sponsors don't care about the theme and stop sponsoring, even though the audience is there (hello Speechless).That's a cultural/money thing, it has nothing to do with quality.

Then you have the powers of the producers, the actors, the famous names that keep sponsors coming back. Seriously, have heard of Dick Wolf? His shows are super popular, run for 15, 20 seasons, and the quality is buried in the basement. And my unpopular opinion is that Shonda Rhymes is very close to the same crap - with some rare exceptions. But powers. They can do magic with bad writing. They don't make the writing better though.

[Ashforth]

This was another good episode! I have done my duty and read through the posts here, and I was going to quote a number of them but it got to be too much, so please forgive me if I mention your thoughts without attribution.

First: Eleanor. Sweet, lovely, ill, victim, dangerous Eleanor. Someone gave her the pills. Who? I believe it was her husband, Commander Lawrence. We know that he has things stashed away - he gave June birth control pills. We know that he wants out of Gilead and has decided that getting children out will save his sorry ass. We know that she was going to reveal the plan. We know that the Martha network wasn't able to get the meds needed to stabilize Eleanor's mental illness.

June's decision to not call for help was, to me, a tragic but ultimately understandable one. BTW, June did not smother Eleanor with a pillow. I thought she might, but she didn't. So I guess the references to June smothering kids with pillows come from posters who aren't watching the show.

I didn't watch Breaking Bad, so I don't give a shit about whether the scene with June and dying Eleanor was similar to something that happened on that show. I also still watch this show, the show this forum is about, so my opinions are based on what I see on this show, The Handmaids Tale.

I can forgive the OTT praise of June for being a boss - she did, after all, kill Winslow. 

But who was Rita shopping for since the Waterfords are gone? Has she already been re-assigned? If so, why didn't she tell June who her new family is?

Love the Gilead leaders freaking out over Fred and Serena being captured and Winslow missing, and Lawrence using that to his advantage.

LOVE LOVE LOVE Fred realizing that Serena sold him out. Ridiculous that Luke would be brought in to visit him.

Love Truello bringing newspapers to Serena and telling her he wants to hear her opinions after she reads them. He is playing her in such a smart way, which yes, includes letting her see baby Nicole.

I thought it was totally unrealistic (yes, I know) but also satisfying that Moira got to confront Serena. Loved the child protective services guardian telling Serena not to tell Nicole "I'm your mama."

There's more, but I found a lot to like in this episode.

Edited August 10, 2019 by Ashforth

[ferjy]

On 8/9/2019 at 11:48 AM, AllyB said:

Just been watching Glow, so knowing THT’s fondness for ‘borrowing’ from better shows, my money is on The Warrior.

lol “Shooting at the walls of heartache, bang bang...” God, they’d probably even smear her face with war paint. Might douse those hideous scowls at least.

♪ “Jabbing at the ribs of Winslow, stab stab...” ♫

[AllyB]

12 minutes ago, ferjy said:

lol “Shooting at the walls of heartache, bang bang...” God, they’d probably even smear her face with war paint. Might douse those hideous scowls at least.

♪ “Jabbing at the ribs of Winslow, stab stab...” ♫

I’ve just been substituting heartache with Gilead. Except we get June VO stating that she is the warrior right before the song starts.

[ferjy]

18 hours ago, jenn31 said:

Guys, guys, stop worrying. If one of them gets out of hand, June will just smother her with a pillow. To save the rest of the children. I wonder how many pillows pillows she can hide under that cape?

Ha! Love the irreverent humor. They'll end up saving one child in the end with June heading the grand plan.

18 hours ago, goldilocks said:

She can tell them about her scuffle with Commander Winslow. One wave of her pen would put a stop to any misbehavior. 

You lot are hilarious. June's magic pen. We'll have to give it a name.

Edited August 10, 2019 by ferjy

[Pachengala]

On 8/9/2019 at 3:42 AM, Ariam said:

I've quit watching. 

I stopped at the penultimate episode of Season 2; I couldn’t even bother to watch the finale. I checked in one other time to see Emily reunited with her family. I do read here though!

23 hours ago, AnswersWanted said:

They're the ones treating her like Captain Marvel with super powers to spare. They didn't have to write her like this, Offred never behaved like June has the past 2 seasons. 

I’ll go further and say that this show derailed in Season 1, Episode 4, when they decided that June was gonna girl-power it up with her ‘army.’ That, to me, is when the show and the book parted ways. Those first three episodes were the stuff of nightmares; they were so chilling that I couldn’t sleep after watching them. Since then though, the show’s been on a shit-slide to Craptown. 

Back to this episode though. The logistics of getting out all those Marthas make the idea implausible, but leaving them behind means torture and death for them. There’s no way 52 kids go missing and the Marthas aren’t implicated. It just beggars belief. But I don’t want to give this show more energy and thought than its showrunners apparently do, so...

[goldilocks]

1 hour ago, AllyB said:

I’ve just been substituting heartache with Gilead. Except we get June VO stating that she is the warrior right before the song starts.

Those damn voiceovers. 

June can make her own video! I’m sure she can manage one just as cheesy. I can see her beating her chest just like the singer “I am the warrior!” just add the infamous smirk. 

I’m really scared for those children with June at the helm.

[meatball77]

This show is so frustrating because the direction is amazing.  The visuals and acting are wonderful.  The overall writing and continuity, however, is worse than a bad CW show.  It's like the writers don't talk to each other or read each other's scripts to tell a cohesive story.  Instead, they just try to write individual episodes that they think can win awards.  They love their actors more than the story (really, half of the main characters should be dead).

So we get lip ring handmaids in DC, forgotten characters and locations.  Everything that came from Atwood in the first season was great.  Now it's just disjointed and sometimes boring (I was bored out of my mind in this episode).

Atwood has a sequel to her first novel coming out in September.  I'm interested to read it and to see if it has any impact on the show.

[kieyra]

2 hours ago, meatball77 said:

The overall writing and continuity, however, is worse than a bad CW show. 

The showrunner and several of the writers come from The CW in terms of their prior work. (The 100, to be specific, so maybe that’s why the show is obsessed with giving the “bad guys” their redemption arcs.)

(And it sounds like Elisabeth Moss is wielding a fair amount of creative control, which probably isn’t helping.)

Edited August 11, 2019 by kieyra

[mamadrama]

2 hours ago, meatball77 said:

This show is so frustrating because the direction is amazing.  The visuals and acting are wonderful.  The overall writing and continuity, however, is worse than a bad CW show.  It's like the writers don't talk to each other or read each other's scripts to tell a cohesive story.  Instead, they just try to write individual episodes that they think can win awards.  They love their actors more than the story (really, half of the main characters should be dead).

So we get lip ring handmaids in DC, forgotten characters and locations.  Everything that came from Atwood in the first season was great.  Now it's just disjointed and sometimes boring (I was bored out of my mind in this episode).

Atwood has a sequel to her first novel coming out in September.  I'm interested to read it and to see if it has any impact on the show.

And the bad thing is that the CW shows don't really take themselves that seriously. I mean, they ACT like they're in great dramas, but at the end of the day there's a bit of tongue in cheek from the actors and showrunners. It's like a bad Lifetime movie.The topic is serious but WE know it's overly dramatic and the actors know it's overly dramatic, but it's like we're all in on it together. They know they're not making any big statements with those movies, but everyone has a good time watching them and making them and they don't hurt anyone. In this case, however, the writing is really cringe worthy and the storylines take crazy turns with little logic behind them, yet the people involved with the show are acting like it's the most important thing on television (or streaming) and that they're sending out this amazing message. They don't know that it's bad. 

As much as I bitch about it, I don't actually hate the show. It makes me mad, but I still like watching it. I've changed the way I watch it, though. In the beginning I watched it because it was so on the mark with a lot of political things going on that I felt like I was watching some CNN special. Lots of topics for conversation. Now, however, I watch it the way I watch a C-level horror movie: it holds my attention for 45 minutes, and I'm fairly entertained while I watch it, but the minute it goes off I promptly forget all about it. (Well, until I come on  here,which has pretty much become my second job.) My expectations have been drastically lowered and that's too bad. It started out so well. 

[Guest]

I could not stop laughing at the high-end-designer-inspired "prison" where Fred and Serena were locked up. Generally speaking, people in prison want to get out of prison but I'd be all, "Let me tell you all about MORE crimes!" ensuring my long-term life in a home that would probably costs tens of millions of dollars anywhere else.

Big old laugh, too, at the hand waving over Winslow's disappearance. "Oh, yeah...he probably got kidnapped. Let's bomb some rebels. Case closed. Congratulations, June!" Their investigative skills at Gilead are real top notch there.

What did work for me was June Walter White-ing the Commander's wife. She was a liability to the mission, June knew it, and let her go. Congratulations, again, June—you got away with another (sort of) murder!

[Baltimore Betty]

1 hour ago, Giant Misfit said:

What did work for me was June Walter White-ing the Commander's wife. She was a liability to the mission,

June Bankhole, the Renegade Handmaid! Coming to a theater near you!

[chaifan]

9 hours ago, Giant Misfit said:

I could not stop laughing at the high-end-designer-inspired "prison" where Fred and Serena were locked up. Generally speaking, people in prison want to get out of prison but I'd be all, "Let me tell you all about MORE crimes!" ensuring my long-term life in a home that would probably costs tens of millions of dollars anywhere else.

Obviously they aren't in a prison.  They're in some sort of temporary holding facility, which most likely has only a few of those rooms.  They're behind locked doors, there are guards, but this is probably some sort of administrative building belonging to border patrol or whatever agency Truello works with in Canada. 

[Umbelina]

22 minutes ago, chaifan said:

Obviously they aren't in a prison.  They're in some sort of temporary holding facility, which most likely has only a few of those rooms.  They're behind locked doors, there are guards, but this is probably some sort of administrative building belonging to border patrol or whatever agency Truello works with in Canada. 

Exactly.  If they only wanted to punish them they would be in a jail cell.  They want much more than punishment for Fred.  They want information.  This is a first step.

Although it seems Serena "cut a deal" so, if anything, she is under protective custody, probably masquerading as a ploy to get her to speak/write/denounce/expose Gilead.

[Guest]

26 minutes ago, chaifan said:

Obviously they aren't in a prison. 

Wasn’t obvious to me.

And whatever is is, I want in. Off to commit some war crimes...😀

[Trillian]

15 minutes ago, chaifan said:

Obviously they aren't in a prison.  They're in some sort of temporary holding facility, which most likely has only a few of those rooms.  They're behind locked doors, there are guards, but this is probably some sort of administrative building belonging to border patrol or whatever agency Truello works with in Canada. 

I still giggled when Luke yelled “ I hope you rot in jail”, which I heard as “I hope you rot in this luxury hotel. “

It was silly. I can suspend disbelief only so far, and it doesn’t help that, in my case, I work in the Canadian justice system, so I zero in on things others might not notice. Like the fact that, if Fred’s detention is actually lawful in any way (and I’ve expressed my doubts elsewhere on this board) he’s entitled, not only to a lawyer, but a court appearance within 24 hours of his arrest. Minor points- annoyances, in fact - but they detract from my ability to “buy” the plot. 

[Ashforth]

The impression I have is that the Canadian government gave the U.S. permission to arrest Fred and take in Serena on Canadian soil, but the arrests were made by the U.S. government, not by Canada. I figure that they are being held in the U.S. Embassy.

Serena is an asset who voluntarily surrendered and is being cultivated, it would serve no purpose for the U.S. to put her into an orange jumpsuit in a cell.

Fred? Yeah, they want info from him as well, but it's a messier situation. If the show was being more realistic (hahahahaha) he would probably have been put on a plane to Alaska almost immediately.

Edited August 12, 2019 by Ashforth

[Umbelina]

58 minutes ago, Ashforth said:

The impression I have is that the Canadian government gave the U.S. permission to arrest Fred and take in Serena on Canadian soil, but the arrests were made by the U.S. government, not by Canada. I figure that they are being held in the U.S. Embassy.

Serena is an asset who voluntarily surrendered and is being cultivated, it would serve no purpose for the U.S. to put her into an orange jumpsuit in a cell.

Fred? Yeah, they want info from him as well, but it's a messier situation. If the show was being more realistic (hahahahaha) he would probably have been put on a plane to Alaska almost immediately.

I was wondering if they were in the embassy as well.  It would make sense, because Spy Guy seems to be running things with them, and not Canadians.

[jenn31]

4 hours ago, chaifan said:

Obviously they aren't in a prison.  They're in some sort of temporary holding facility, which most likely has only a few of those rooms.  They're behind locked doors, there are guards, but this is probably some sort of administrative building belonging to border patrol or whatever agency Truello works with in Canada. 

Semantics. He was arrested. By prison we mean whatever holding facility they have him in. Obviously the point we're making is you don't hole up a criminal in a 5-star hotel awaiting trial.

2 hours ago, Ashforth said:

The impression I have is that the Canadian government gave the U.S. permission to arrest Fred and take in Serena on Canadian soil, but the arrests were made by the U.S. government, not by Canada. I figure that they are being held in the U.S. Embassy

That would make the most sense. Good catch. Still though, would they have such a ritzy room there for criminals? With a fully stocked bar no less!

[Callaphera]

Can someone explain to me why Luke and Moira had face-to-face meetings with the Waterfords? 

Insofar as I know, Luke is Nicholly's temporary guardian, not Moira. If Luke and Moira were in a romantic relationship (HA! Even if she swung that way, she would destroy him) I could see it. As satisfying as it was to see her verbally take down Serena... Moira never should have been in that room. The hand-off with baby Nicholly should have been with the social services woman while Moira remained in the lobby if Luke wasn't going to do it himself.

And I think Luke works for a refugee program or Immigration Services (somehow?) but why was he allowed in a room with his wife's oppressor and rapist? Because he had a Five Star zippered binder full of his school-work fliers for Pizza Pizza (oh, you know Pizza Pizza is still kickin' and doing business) "papers"? Even if Luke was there on some official Refugee/Immigration Services business - it's his wife's oppressor and rapist and there's no way any government, whether Canadian or American would let him into the room. 

But okay, sure. We'll pretend that it could be that way even in a fucking fantasy land. Now I want some Pizza Pizza and it's midnight, damn it. 

[SourK]

TKTK

On 8/7/2019 at 11:50 AM, Lemons said:

That turned my stomach when june didn’t get help for the commanders wife, his whole reason for living.  She was so good to June. June’s  stupid looking face twitchily calculating what would be best for her.

During that long, long moment, I thought "Then, she got an idea. An awful idea. The Grinch got a wonderful, awful idea!"

I don't particularly like this thing where June's a dark, gritty antihero or whatever, but, more importantly, I don't understand the logic of this decision. They just had to keep her from talking to anyone for a few more days. And June told JANINE their plan. Which is just as bad as letting Ms. Lawrence know, plus the part where she can't monitor Janine.

On 8/7/2019 at 1:10 PM, Empress1 said:

I didn't understand that either. They're not obligated to be there and Moira obviously didn't want to, so why did she? "Will you bring Holly to see Serena?" "No." See how easy that is?

I agree with previous posters who said it seems like the Americans are honoring their agreement with Serena, which is the smart thing to do, and the ethical thing to do.

Also, because there were stills last week that made it seem like Luke was there for the arrest, and then we didn't see him, I think it's possible we're missing a scene where someone got Luke to agree to this arrangement so that they could get Fred. But it's an interesting point -- I'm not sure Luke could be compelled to bring the baby there against his will.

On 8/8/2019 at 11:01 PM, mamadrama said:

I can't help but thinking that rather than getting 52 children out of Gilead, they ought to focus on getting their mothers (or fathers) out. Rescue the adults who can then go apeshit  to the press and the rest of the world and demand the release of their children. Have them throw a shitshow.

I think it's possible to argue that one of the levers Gilead has to control the Handmaids is that it's holding their children hostage. That's something that's been used against June more than once, and the reason she ultimately didn't leave last season. So, you could say that, if the Handmaids knew their kids were safe, they might be more willing to resist, and also that they might not be willing to leave while their kids are still hostages.

On 8/9/2019 at 1:54 PM, libsl said:

After the looks Lawrence and June shared over Eleanor's grave, is anyone else expecting that somehow June will become the new Mrs. Lawrence for next season? Through a marriage of convenience they could work together to bring down Gilead.

Based on the angry, sad way they were looking at each other, they'd be good candidates for marriage on this show, but I think the laws of Gilead say that June can't be anyone's wife because she's a sinner or whatever.

However, I think it's a good point that, with his wife dead. Lawrence has a lot less reason to leave the country, even if he still goes through with the plan to send the kids. He might end up staying behind with some kind of other agenda.

On 8/10/2019 at 9:35 AM, Ashforth said:

First: Eleanor. Sweet, lovely, ill, victim, dangerous Eleanor. Someone gave her the pills. Who? I believe it was her husband, Commander Lawrence. We know that he has things stashed away - he gave June birth control pills. We know that he wants out of Gilead and has decided that getting children out will save his sorry ass. We know that she was going to reveal the plan. We know that the Martha network wasn't able to get the meds needed to stabilize Eleanor's mental illness.

I didn't think of that, but if Lawrence purposely helped her OD, that would explain a lot about the way he was looking at June, and the dialogue where they both said they should have looked in on her -- we know June's lying; maybe he is, too. I'm not sure he'd do that to his wife, though. We keep getting told that he really, really loves her.

10 hours ago, Ashforth said:

The impression I have is that the Canadian government gave the U.S. permission to arrest Fred and take in Serena on Canadian soil, but the arrests were made by the U.S. government, not by Canada. I figure that they are being held in the U.S. Embassy.

That's also what I thought, but there was that one line of dialogue where Serena was worried that Fred would be extradited to somewhere where he could be executed, which suggests to me that he might not be in US custody. I think they said something last episode about him being tried by the international criminal court, or a war crimes tribunal or something, and I have no idea how that works.

[Ashforth]

5 hours ago, Callaphera said:

Can someone explain to me why Luke and Moira had face-to-face meetings with the Waterfords? 

For the drama, dahling. To give Moira and Luke some screen time. To keep the writers from having to come up with a scenario for confrontations that made a fucking lick of sense.

Edited August 12, 2019 by Ashforth

[Trillian]

14 hours ago, Ashforth said:

The impression I have is that the Canadian government gave the U.S. permission to arrest Fred and take in Serena on Canadian soil, but the arrests were made by the U.S. government, not by Canada. I figure that they are being held in the U.S. Embassy.

Nope.  There is no legal mechanism for Canada to give a foreign government permission essentially to kidnap someone and hold that person without due process of law.  

4 hours ago, SourK said:

That's also what I thought, but there was that one line of dialogue where Serena was worried that Fred would be extradited to somewhere where he could be executed, which suggests to me that he might not be in US custody. I think they said something last episode about him being tried by the international criminal court, or a war crimes tribunal or something, and I have no idea how that works.

Well, if he's in Canadian custody (contrary to all appearances), he's lucky because Canada doesn't extradite where someone would face the death penalty.

This is the problem with plopping a dystopian society into a "normal" world.  Atwood didn't deal with anything outside Gilead, except in brief vague references, in keeping with Offred's (when referring to the book, it is not correct to call her June) POV. The writers have presented a perfectly normal Canada, where there is no reason to believe that the concepts of territorial sovereignty and civil/constitutional rights don't apply.  And it doesn't work once you start thinking about it, at least not without a lot of mental gymnastics that are not explained  or warranted by the script.

[Umbelina]

1 hour ago, Trillian said:

There is no legal mechanism for Canada to give a foreign government permission essentially to kidnap someone and hold that person without due process of law.  

I mentioned this earlier, speculating that the USA or Canada might send Fred back to Gilead, after they drain him of any information they can.  Then expose him, even just a little bit, and Gilead will kill Fred for them.  For Canada, technically they are just returning him home where he wants to be.

1 hour ago, Trillian said:

This is the problem with plopping a dystopian society into a "normal" world.  Atwood didn't deal with anything outside Gilead, except in brief vague references, in keeping with Offred's (when referring to the book, it is not correct to call her June) POV.

It's just easier to call her June, especially since the Of-names keep changing.  She dealt with a few things, including escapes to Canada, a tiny bit about Europe, and resistance...she just didn't flesh anything out.

1 hour ago, Trillian said:

The writers have presented a perfectly normal Canada, where there is no reason to believe that the concepts of territorial sovereignty and civil/constitutional rights don't apply. 

True, but now Canada is bordering an insane, and insanely armed, country for 5,525 miles.  (ahem) I can easily believe that they, not just the Swiss and others, would like to know what Gilead has planned, how they are operating, if they will use nukes, is an invasion of Canada a long term plan, are the boycotts working, is another country helping them, who exactly are the decision makers, etc.

ETA

That's probably another reason for the nice digs instead of a jail cell.  "Serena expressed interest in defecting" (true) "and brought her husband along" (true) "they were put up in nice apartments" (true) "when Fred eventually decided he'd prefer to return to Gilead, we sent him on his way."  (hard to prove either way)

Edited August 12, 2019 by Umbelina
the ETA

[AngelaHunter]

6 hours ago, SourK said:

I'm not sure he'd do that to his wife, though (OD her). We keep getting told that he really, really loves her.

If he did do it, could it have been out mercy? If it had become known that Eleanor was colluding with June and knew all about the children - which probably would have happened and already did nearly happen-  she may have suffered a terrible fate and Joseph wanted to spare her that?

[Lemons]

6 hours ago, SourK said:

During that long, long moment, I thought "Then, she got an idea. An awful idea. The Grinch got a wonderful, awful idea!"

You almost expected them to show wheels turning slowly in her head

[Umbelina]

35 minutes ago, AngelaHunter said:

If he did do it, could it have been out mercy? If it had become known that Eleanor was colluding with June and knew all about the children - which probably would have happened and already did nearly happen-  she may have suffered a terrible fate and Joseph wanted to spare her that?

I don't think there is ANY way he would do that.  She was a week away from freedom and to a place where she would/could be treated.

I'm pretty sure those looks that he gave June were meant to convey that he had suspicions that June did it though, or at the very least, failed to act to save her.

I also don't think it would have been that easy to keep Eleanor contained.  People are now dropping by Lawrence's house all the damn time, and two Commanders have just disappeared as well, they are toying with the idea of nuking Canada, I'm pretty sure Lawrence will be involved with a great deal of scurrying around with other Commanders, since he already was stopping a full out war on the show.

It was going to be 7 long, and busy days, preparing for all of this.  In one day she nearly gave away the whole plan three times.  First with Winslow's widow, then with running out the door to tell two other families.

I feel like, on some level, she knew she would blow it, and that 52 kids would not get out, and many others would be hung.  She wanted her life to mean something, and saving those children was one thing she could finally do to fight Gilead effectively.  Oddly enough, it was may have been one of her most sane moments to take those pills.

[AngelaHunter]

13 minutes ago, Umbelina said:

I don't think there is ANY way he would do that.  She was a week away from freedom and to a place where she would/could be treated.

Chances are he didn't do it, but a week can be a very long time when you have guard someone 24/7 to keep them from spilling the beans, and that's assuming the plan would go without a hitch on the day it's supposed to. Yes, she could have taken the pills herself and since I see this show 5 days behind most people here, I don't know if we do find out what happened. 

7 hours ago, Ashforth said:

For the drama, dahling. To give Moira and Luke some screen time. To keep the writers from having to come up with a scenario for confrontations that made a fucking lick of sense.

I did like someone (Moira) finally mentioning the rapes and how Serena colluded in them, but Luke annoyed me as he always does in his every scene, with his total lack of impulse control in punching Fred. Understandable that he would want to do that - and much worse - to the uber-slimeball but nothing was accomplished by this in any way. And Fred could have mentioned how Luke skedaddled away and left his wife and daughter alone to their fates.

[Umbelina]

On 8/7/2019 at 12:02 AM, mamadrama said:

I just read that Elisabeth Moss now even has input on camera angles and scene setting, making her basically a cinematographer/director. Color me shocked.

Fascinating.  I've been reading a lot of reviews and watching interviews and I've never heard this.  I remember actors on the show talking about Moss handling call sheets and being up at dawn in meetings, etc. but I've never read she has anything at all to do with Directing or Cinematography.

Do you have a link to that article?  I'd like to read it.

[mamadrama]

1 hour ago, Umbelina said:

Fascinating.  I've been reading a lot of reviews and watching interviews and I've never heard this.  I remember actors on the show talking about Moss handling call sheets and being up at dawn in meetings, etc. but I've never read she has anything at all to do with Directing or Cinematography.

Do you have a link to that article?  I'd like to read it.

Yes, but I'll have to find it. It was an interview with Christopher Meloni. 

[jenn31]

2 hours ago, Umbelina said:

Fascinating.  I've been reading a lot of reviews and watching interviews and I've never heard this.  I remember actors on the show talking about Moss handling call sheets and being up at dawn in meetings, etc. but I've never read she has anything at all to do with Directing or Cinematography.

Do you have a link to that article?  I'd like to read it.

She certainly seems to imply it in interviews. “We try to tell stories about badass women...” Unless she’s assuming way too much power. Not unlike June. 😁

Edited August 12, 2019 by jenn31

[alexvillage]

This is from 2018 and it is an insight into the downturn of the show. Apparently EM bears some responsibility for the shitshow. 

I do agree that women (in Hollywood in this case) are expected to “be” a certain way but boy, did she miss a chance to lift the rest of the female cast.

From the article:

”The moments where she talks about things that don’t work for her have increased from Season 1 to Season 2,” Miller told IndieWire. “And it’s not always ‘This doesn’t work.’ It’s, ‘Is there a way to make this better? This is bumping me for some reason.'”

so, she thinks that June post season 1 is better? JFC

And

“The conversations between Moss and Miller extended beyond her own role on the show, Moss said, because besides her official producing duties, she felt she was, in a sense, “the head of the acting department.””

Now we know why better actors than herself got reduced parts or disappeared for half of the season. EM is June. Super June Wick is Super Lizzie. The BOSS idea was not a creative moment. It was an art imitates life thing. 

https://www.indiewire.com/2018/04/handmaids-tale-season-2-elisabeth-moss-interview-1201956995/

Edited August 12, 2019 by alexvillage
Add link to full article

[Umbelina]

Those are both pretty positive links really.  "Moving things around" could be anything from scheduling issues to an oddly placed chair.  

Thanks.

I've never heard a cast member do anything but praise Moss' work as both producer and actress on the show.  I tend to think they are not all liars.

[alexvillage]

5 minutes ago, Umbelina said:

Those are both pretty positive links really.  "Moving things around" could be anything from scheduling issues to an oddly placed chair.  

Thanks.

I've never heard a cast member do anything but praise Moss' work as both producer and actress on the show.  I tend to think they are not all liars.

Between the lines...

the 2018 interview is really telling as her involvement grew and the quality diminished. And ED can actually fire people so actors might truly like her or truly say whatever to keep a job. 

But she said she felt in charge of the cast. That worked really well for her, not so much for the others. The close ups abound...

[Ashforth]

5 hours ago, AngelaHunter said:

If he did do it, could it have been out mercy? If it had become known that Eleanor was colluding with June and knew all about the children - which probably would have happened and already did nearly happen-  she may have suffered a terrible fate and Joseph wanted to spare her that?

I think he did it to save himself, and maybe to save Eleanor from being sent to the Colonies or hanged. He seems to have decided that bringing a bunch of kidnapped children with him will buy him mercy from the rest of the world. Mercy he didn't show when he helped create Gilead, and has only sporadically showed since we met him.

[Caia]

Quote

But to suddenly throw us into the deep end of moving little kids, 52 of them no less, it wouldn't matter to me if Mother Oprah herself was behind the plan, it's just not a feasible endeavor.

It just occurred to me.  They're trying to do The Great Escape.

[Ashforth]

9 hours ago, Trillian said:

Nope.  There is no legal mechanism for Canada to give a foreign government permission essentially to kidnap someone and hold that person without due process of law.  

Well, if he's in Canadian custody (contrary to all appearances), he's lucky because Canada doesn't extradite where someone would face the death penalty.

This is the problem with plopping a dystopian society into a "normal" world.  Atwood didn't deal with anything outside Gilead, except in brief vague references, in keeping with Offred's (when referring to the book, it is not correct to call her June) POV. The writers have presented a perfectly normal Canada, where there is no reason to believe that the concepts of territorial sovereignty and civil/constitutional rights don't apply.  And it doesn't work once you start thinking about it, at least not without a lot of mental gymnastics that are not explained  or warranted by the script.

I bow to your knowledge of Canada's legal system and totally agree with your summary (which I bolded).

I work in the legal field in the US (civil, not criminal, but I have some familiarity with the US criminal legal system). There are many fictional "legal drama" shows that I just can't suspend my disbelief enough to enjoy, no matter how entertaining they might otherwise be.

I guess I have suspended disbelief for THT to the point that I truly don't expect any realism in the depiction of the legal process in regard to Canada, the US, and Gilead. For me, it isn't interfering in my ability to enjoy the show, especially now that it has moved on from the malaise that derailed the middle episodes of this season.

I'm seriously curious about what they will do with Fred. 

Taking a comment about this to small talk!

Edited August 13, 2019 by Ashforth

[mamadrama]

1 hour ago, Ashforth said:

I bow to your knowledge of Canada's legal system and totally agree with your summary (which I bolded).

I work in the legal field in the US (civil, not criminal, but I have some familiarity with the US criminal legal system). There are many fictional "legal drama" shows that I just can't suspend my disbelief enough to enjoy, no matter how entertaining they might otherwise be.

I guess I have suspended disbelief for THT to the point that I truly don't expect any realism in the depiction of the legal process in regard to Canada, the US, and Gilead. For me, it isn't interfering in my ability to enjoy the show, especially now that it has moved on from the malaise that derailed the middle episodes of this season.

I'm seriously curious about what they will do with Fred. 

Taking a comment about this to small talk!

I've started lowering my expectations for the show so that I can just watch it as entertainment. I still get really frustrated, but by setting the bar a little lower it's kind of made the viewing more enjoyable. Still, I've seen my region portrayed in a crazy manner over and over in Hollywood so I get the frustration. I have some suspension of disbelief, but it definitely gets tested. 

[CouchPotatoNoLife]

I just want to complain as a Canadian, that we only get to see these episodes days after the premier in other countries. 

with that out of the way, something occurred to me, and i don't know if other people have mentioned it, but if the american agent managed to lead fred across the border to Canada, that means some portions of the border are undefended. Which makes sense given how long the border is, but this creates the problem of how easy the agent managed to slip into and out of Gilead. Eg. why doesnt everyone leave?

second point, is Gilead has been describe as extremely militarily powerful. All of a sudden commanders can just be arrested? If we are being honest in the real world international laws are really only applied to weak nations. Powerful nations commit war crimes/crimes against humanity all the time and their officials are never arrested. Is gilead weak or strong? 

[SuzieSioux]

1 hour ago, CouchPotatoNoLife said:

with that out of the way, something occurred to me, and i don't know if other people have mentioned it, but if the american agent managed to lead fred across the border to Canada, that means some portions of the border are undefended. Which makes sense given how long the border is, but this creates the problem of how easy the agent managed to slip into and out of Gilead. Eg. why doesnt everyone leave?

This is a great question and I hope some people in the know can give some answers/ideas on this. I'm not American or Canadian, so I have no familiarity with the border, beyond looking at Google Maps, but I have been wondering recently how easy it would be for people from Gilead to cross into Canada. I enjoy thinking about the real world possibilities of shows like this. Gilead could have checkpoints at the roads that cross the borders obviously (though seems they didn't in this particular case), but there's a lot of space in between roads. I'm very curious as to how they would be defending the border in its entirety if this were real.

[Ceindreadh]

1 hour ago, CouchPotatoNoLife said:

I just want to complain as a Canadian, that we only get to see these episodes days after the premier in other countries. 

with that out of the way, something occurred to me, and i don't know if other people have mentioned it, but if the american agent managed to lead fred across the border to Canada, that means some portions of the border are undefended. Which makes sense given how long the border is, but this creates the problem of how easy the agent managed to slip into and out of Gilead. Eg. why doesnt everyone leave?

second point, is Gilead has been describe as extremely militarily powerful. All of a sudden commanders can just be arrested? If we are being honest in the real world international laws are really only applied to weak nations. Powerful nations commit war crimes/crimes against humanity all the time and their officials are never arrested. Is gilead weak or strong? 

Why doesn’t everybody leave? The border may be quite porous as many long borders are, but people still have to get to it. The Waterfords seemed to have travelled a long way just to get to the meeting point and it didn’t look like a densely populated area. I can’t see an Econofamily or Martha having the resources to get within walking distance of a border.

June’s decision to not help Mrs Lawrence.  I think she was in a difficult situation.  Her first instinct seemed to be to get help, but if she’d done that and Eleanor was brought to a hospital, then even if they’d managed to save her, it would have brought unwelcome attention to the Lawrence household.  There’s no guarantee that Eleanor would have been fit to travel within the week - even assuming that she would have been allowed leave and not charged with attempted suicide.

And if they did manage to explain it away as an accident, they still have the risk that Eleanor will tell about the plan.

On the other hand, there’s the risk that Joseph won’t want to leave without her by his side, but as long as he doesn’t stop the others going, that’s not as big a problem.  

Like I said, I don’t think it was an easy decision for June, but I can see why she let Eleanor go.  Now if she’d helped her on her way, that would have been a different matter.

[Trillian]

9 hours ago, Ashforth said:

I bow to your knowledge of Canada's legal system and totally agree with your summary (which I bolded).

I work in the legal field in the US (civil, not criminal, but I have some familiarity with the US criminal legal system). There are many fictional "legal drama" shows that I just can't suspend my disbelief enough to enjoy, no matter how entertaining they might otherwise be.

I guess I have suspended disbelief for THT to the point that I truly don't expect any realism in the depiction of the legal process in regard to Canada, the US, and Gilead. For me, it isn't interfering in my ability to enjoy the show, especially now that it has moved on from the malaise that derailed the middle episodes of this season.

I'm seriously curious about what they will do with Fred. 

Taking a comment about this to small talk!

You’re very kind, thank you. I was expecting simply to be told I was wrong. I’m happy to debate the issue, but would prefer that the debate be based either in reality or the script.

I think, if the situation were reversed, if a Canadian cop arrested someone in the US and held that person without a lawyer or bail while American authorities stood passively by, more viewers would’ve noticed the dissonance. In other words, my national pride was engaged and I don’t like how they present my country as bumbling idiots on the world stage. 

It was so unnecessary. Tuello could’ve said “you’re now in Canada and you’re under arrest you son of a bitch” and the Canadians stepped forward and made the arrest. Certainly, A Few Good Men didn’t suffer for doing it that way.  I guess it’s heresy to compare the screen-writing brilliance of Aaron Sorkin to this hot mess. I’ll go cut off a finger now and sit in the corner.