While The Handmaid’s Tale saw the fall of Gilead in Boston, it didn’t see the end of the regime. That’s not surprising when you consider The Testaments is happening, and it’s a sequel to the original series. The Handmaid’s Tale ended with June continuing her mission to take down Gilead and find Hannah, and it means she needs to be in the sequel series.
Caution: There will be some book spoilers for The Testaments in this post.
However, she can’t be in it right away. The Testaments isn’t June’s story, and there’s a lot that needs to be covered first.
The Testaments is the story of three women in Gilead
If you’ve read Margaret Atwood’s 2019 novel of the same name, you’ll know that the story follows the lives of three women in Gilead. Well, one is outside of Gilead at first, but she ends up going in on a mission of her own. While there, she comes across Aunt Lydia and Agnes, who we know is supposed to be Hannah. In fact, in The Testaments series, we know that Agnes is definitely Hannah.
We get to see how Aunt Lydia works on bringing down the Gilead regime, working from the inside to protect the young girls who are training to be Wives (and some Aunts). We get to see Agnes figure out what she wants from her life in Gilead, and we get to see Nicole/Holly, but with a new name, Daisy, as she learns what Gilead is really like.
The TV series needs to keep the focus on that. This is no longer June’s fight, but that doesn’t mean she can’t show up in the end.
There needs to be an end point with The Testaments
Any good series will have an ending in mind, and The Testaments needs that. This is a story that needs to end in hope. After all, we know from the novel The Handmaid’s Tale that Gilead does eventually fall. The Testaments can be the way to set up that fall, even if it’s still just one more state and not the full regime.
June and Luke are both still fighting in Gilead. They are both figuring out where Hannah is and how to save her, and we need to see them reunite with their daughter to offer some sense of hope when all of this is done. It would even be great to hear about what they’re doing, which is possible through Aunt Lydia and maybe Naomi, who seemed to start a redemption arc at the end of The Handmaid’s Tale.
June doesn’t even need to be a big part of the ending to the series, either. In The Testaments, we see Daisy and Hannah smuggled out of Gilead and reunited with June, although Luke and Nick aren’t there or mentioned. Elisabeth Moss is sure to be a busy woman by the time The Testaments TV show wraps up, but just this cameo will be everything to make it clear that June did as she planned — and I would love to see Luke there as well.
The Handmaid’s Tale is available to stream on Hulu. The Testaments will air on Hulu, but there’s no date known yet.