In this week's installment of your dystopian dose of terror, we picked things up with Offred still doing her best Stepford Handmaid after last week's shock revelation that the family she had briefly hidden with during her escape had been severely punished. Even Nick manages to put more than a few syllables together to voice his concerns about her to Mrs Waterford, a move he later pays for.
We seem to have lost June altogether in an episode that gave us no inner monologue or flashbacks, forcing us too to feel the distance the others felt from her. It's testimony to Elizabeth Moss that we still fully understand what she is going though despite the lack of communication with her. June's reaction to what looks like a miscarriage (how was that NOT a miscarriage by the way?) emphasises her numbness to the world around her but also her realisation that without this baby, she faces certain execution.
Meanwhile, over in the colonies, Janine maintains her bright-eyed-and-bushy-tailed-demeanour despite being in hell, much to Emily's frustration. You can't help feel that she is right about one thing though - there must be a reason Janine has escaped death twice on this show and we can only hope that some heroic moment is on the cards for her down the line.
They may be living in a wasteland, but that can't stop the course of true love and The Handmaid's Tale gave us a rare moment of brief happiness, although tinged with poignancy, with the marriage of Kit and Fiona. It stood in stark contrast to the mass Moonie-like wedding ceremony that happened back in Gilead's HQ as we watched a parade of barely pubescent teenagers tie the knot with a load of unsuspecting Guardians, Nick included.
Watch out for that new wife of Nick's by the way. Apparently Eden could bring a whole load of trouble to that gaff with the actress who plays her, Sydney Sweeney, telling Harper's Bazaar UK: "Eden is a child of Gilead and has grown up with this new, closeted world, and all she knows is to be a commander's wife, and have a child for Gilead and God.
"Her blind faith is very dangerous. Eden has never seen another world, so she doesn't know what's wrong or right in the eyes of Offred or Rita."
The addition of Eden to the house and what looked to be the death of her unborn baby was enough to send Offred to the brink, but somehow our hero, and her baby, have lived to fight another day.
This episode of vows ended with June making a solemn promise of her own. A promise to get the hell out of Gilead once and for all.
Praise be, our girl is back.
Read our review of episode four of The Handmaid's Tale.
Read our review of episode 3 of The Handmaid's Tale.
Read our review of the opening double episodes of The Handmaid's Tale.
