The Handmaid’s Tale Season 6 Finally Gives The Show What It Needs: An Ending
After eight years of fascist dystopia, June Osborne finally gets to rest.
I remember the exact moment that The Handmaid’s Tale lost me.
In the Season 2 finale, June Osborne (Elisabeth Moss), otherwise known as Offred, had been suffering for years in the dystopian religious oligarchy known as Gilead. She had lost her husband, her daughter, her mother, and her best friend. She had successfully given birth to her daughter Holly, but as a Handmaid had to give up the child to Commander Waterford (Joseph Fiennes) and his wife Serena Joy (Yvonne Strahovski).
But finally, it looked like things were picking up. With the help of the kind-hearted Commander Lawrence (Bradley Whitford) and the begrudging permission of Serena Joy, June managed to get safe passage to Canada for herself, her daughter, and her friend Emily (Alexis Bledel). But at the last moment, June has a change of heart: she hands the baby over to Emily, realizing she needs to stay in Gilead and rescue her other daughter, Hannah.
It was in that moment that I realized the longer this series went on, the more frustrating it would become. If June became happy, there would be no more story, so as long as there was another season ahead, she had to suffer more.
Thankfully, Season 6 is the final chapter in June’s story, and it provides something every other season has been clamoring for: satisfying closure.
Season 6 of The Handmaid’s Tale follows June and Serena Joy as they try to navigate a changing world.
The Handmaid’s Tale began as an adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s classic dystopian novel, but as the series crawled on, it became a self-flagellating meditation on the Trump era, putting June in more and more miserable situations so that she could have a moment of feminine rage that often turned murderous.
In Season 4, June finally made it to Canada, but that didn’t stop her from constantly speaking out against Gilead and navigating an ever-tumultuous relationship with Serena Joy, who also found her way to Canada under the guise of a “global ambassador” for Gilead.
The last time we saw the two, they were on a train out of Canada and into America. At least what’s left of it: Alaska and Hawaii. Both of them seem to find happiness there, but this is The Handmaid’s Tale, so naturally that doesn’t last long.
Serena is recruited to New Bethlehem, the experimental community where Gilead refugees can live among their loved ones while free of the nation’s restrictive rules. June is forced to return to Canada — and Gilead — with the promise of a rebellion that could take down Gilead for good.
For fleeting moments throughout Season 6, June finds room to be happy.
Once both women are back in the thick of Gilead, they both try to find their own slice of happiness. For Serena, that’s securing a path for Handmaids who are no longer fit for service. For June, it’s tearing the whole business down. But both missions are bogged down by this season’s constant theme of “disappointing men.”
Some men are outrightly evil, like the Commander played by Timothy Simons who may as well be Jonah Ryan from Veep. Others just hitched their wagons to the wrong star, like Commander Lawrence. Still other, like June’s husband Luke (O-T Fagbenle), are just full of righteous envy.
The result is admittedly meandering and often hamfisted, veering more into “rah rah girl power” than the actual cutting satire it should be. But there’s a comforting air of finality over everything. None of June’s plans is doomed to fail. This time, she’s allowed to be happy, even if it takes unprecedented heartache to get there.
We may be living in a time where The Handmaid’s Tale is unfortunately relevant again (and where a spinoff series is already in the works), but this time, we get to see June overcome, not just endure. That’s the hope we need now.
