If you think we're being clever with that headline, we're not even mentioning the final moments of this week's episode - but rather the ticking timebomb that is the Waterford household and Serena and Offred / June's relationship.

After last week saw her lying in a pool of blood and subsequently waking up in a hospital, reasonably unscathed, Offred / June seems to have snapped out of her tailspin and is now trying to keep herself on a forward momentum whilst dealing with the fact that Nick is now married to a teenager. There's more than a few scenes where his wife's youth is laid bare and Max Minghella's performance in the role really drives home just how uncomfortable he is around her.

One of the most interesting aspects of the series as a whole is the incredible cinematography and the colour palettes - all bright reds for the handmaids, teal for the wives and jet-black for the husbands - but also in the world surrounding them. It's all desaturated and lifeless, and that contrast is made all the more stark when the episode flicks back to Serena and Fred before Gilead. We see Serena trying to speak at a college like so many real-world, far-right nutjobs attempting to push their thinking onto a screaming crowd of angry, intransigent students - which, in the episode, ultimately ends up turning violent.

What's fascinating about this flashback is that we see how Fred and Serena's dynamic was before Gilead, that they were equals and he was as much a supporter of her as she was supplicant to him afterwards. As a whole, the series has always intimated that Fred's a weakling, but it's made obvious her in a pivotal scene where Serena, her eyes ablaze, calls him out for what he is - and the next scene draws the line from that to the present in the series.

There's also more of the dynamic between Serena and Offred / June, and just when it feels like they might just finally be coming towards some kind of slight peace, we see Serena break Offred / June again for even hoping to try to reach her - to where she states what everyone's known along; that these people won't break and they won't ever become reasonable. All of this is leading up to the final scenes of the episode, which shows Gilead's infrastructure becoming more formalised with the opening of a new Rachel and Leah centre that Fred has personally overseen.

The Handmaid's Tale has never been subtle about its metaphors and there's more than a few times - particularly in the third episode with the whole Salem thing - that it's felt belaboured and obvious. Still, seeing that single handmaid break ranks and calmly and quietly walk into the middle of the assembled room of men - after she's been told to stand outside by Fred, like she's wandered out before the cue - is one of the most riveting and compelling moments of the whole series.

One of the complaints levelled against this season is that it's almost revelling in the torture it's putting the women through, but seeing the final seconds of this episode finally gives that sweet, sweet comeback we've all been waiting for. Next week's episode will ultimately detail who lives and who dies, but given how close Ofglen 2 - not the one out in the colonies, the one who replaced her who had her tongue cut out - was to Fred Waterford when the explosion hit, it seems likely that he's a goner.

The song, by the way, is Oh Bondage! Up Yours! from X-Ray Spex.

Episode 1 & 2 review

Episode 3 review

Episode 4 review

Episode 5 review