Handmaid's Tale. EPISODE 11 (season 3). Channel 4, 18/08/19. UK pace. NO SPOILERS!

[OriginofSpecies]

We're heading for the final countdown, only three more episodes to go, folks...

This is the thread for Episode 11 (season 3) of The Handmaid's Tale.

We are watching on Channel 4, UK pace and have only seen episodes 1 - 10 so far.

Please, NO SPOILERS.

Lawrence couldn't get through because he's been blacklisted. And I'm not convinced Serena has "gone good" she's a very complicated character and I don't think she'd do anything to help June.

Serena just needs to phone June - using the handy phone that was discovered- and tell her the route to take.

Serena has no reason to believe June has any access to a/the phone or that CL is on June’s side now. She doesn’t know what has been happening in the Lawrence house so that June pretty much rules the roost there now. As far as Serena knows June is restricted in the same ways as she was in the Waterford house.

I found it really vomit inducing when Fred and Serena were flying up the road in their gas guzzler and smugly congratulating themselves on returning the countryside to its “natural state” by removing the factories and houses. You forgot to remove the smooth tarmac strips that allow you your luxury vehicle and freedom to travel.

I had subtitles on, it was definitely more trucks not drugs that June asked for.

Lawrence tried to pass checkpoints he doesn't have authority for. That will be reported up the food chain

Ahhh right. I just imagine he pootled up to the border, found out he needed another security doc, went home and nobody thought anything of it in particular!

What I took from CLs situation was that they (higher ups) have removed all his authorisations (Which would have been quite a high level as he was one of the higher ups himself) and he knows the checkpoint will have reported his attempt to leave so he knows they’re coming for him. They’ve made it impossible for him to escape. He’s stuck in his house basically. Exactly where they want him. I found it odd though that they didn’t immediately take him into custody at the checkpoint as presumably if they’ve removed his authorisation they know he’s defecting so why not just take him now?

But why have they removed all his authorisations? He's gone through the ceremony, he's high up and in the end CW has had far more of a chequered past, one handmaiden took her life didn't she?, regular at Jezabels, 'losing' a baby, house caught fire - CL's misdemeanours are positively tame in comparison!

Wasn't a lot of it down to Fred's hints because he wanted to get June back assigned to him in DC, presumably so he could get revenge? All the stuff about none of CL's four handmaids getting pregnant, etc. Aunt Lydia didn't seem to approve of the house, either.

Waterford is a networker, Lawrence is an oddball. I reckon Gilead is just like many other organisations - if you stay in with the right people you can get away with anything, if the in crowd doesn't like you they will look for anything to bring you down.

I wonder if Lawrence's handy hot line phone still connects to Gilead HQ? From what we have seen of Gilead they don't hang around if they think someone has overstepped the mark, and I think Gilead HQ will be joining up the dots between June, the Lawrence's, Fred and Serena pretty soon, throw in the mysterious disappearance of another high up commander who also has recent links to them all and the proverbial is about to hit the fan.

I think it is time for Nick to mount his white charger and ride to the rescue.

And incidentally, I don't think Aunt Lydia is coming up smelling of roses either. She has known for a long time that June is a disrupting influence and that the Lawrence's do things their own way, but still put the two together. I think her day of reckoning is nigh too.

When June lifted the receiver of the phone it went straight through to an operator who greeted commander Lawrence and asked who to connect him to so definitely still connected to HQ. I doubt anyone other than commanders have a phone line so it would only be connected to Gilead HQ surely?

With Big Cheese dead, Fred arrested and Lawrence potentially on the wall I reckon Commander Nick has got a promotion coming up.

With Big Cheese dead, Fred arrested and Lawrence potentially on the wall I reckon Commander Nick has got a promotion coming up.

I hope so. Nobody knows Big Cheese is dead yet, though. As far as they're all concerned he's just disappeared.

Will Canada/free America inform Gilead straight away that they have arrested Fred? Or do they not have to?

I was thinking ahead to future series really.
The Jezebels death is interesting because it could go either way - either nobody even pins his disappearance down to Jezebels and they get off scot free, or someone figures it out and there's a massive investigation which blows apart all kinds of shenanigans.

I actually hope Nick doesn't come back. When Nick's around there's too much emphasis on longing glances and touching hands. June's hopefully too busy for that!

I’m just wondering if they don’t have to inform Gilead and CL gets away with the kids (not sure how possible that is) with Fred’s being arrested then that would be 3 commanders all suddenly “missing” without explanation. That would certainly put the frighteners up Gilead HQ. It could look to them as though the (not officially acknowledged) resistance has had a resurgence and essentially initiated a war. I wish we saw more of the discussions between commanders other than just Waterford/Lawrence/Winslow etc the discussions we saw in season one were great and we could see how the Gilead top set operates and thinks etc. This season we’ve had none of that.

either nobody even pins his disappearance down to Jezebels and they get off scot free, or someone figures it out and there's a massive investigation which blows apart all kinds of shenanigans.

I have a feeling they won’t even show us any of that.

I hope Nick doesn't come back either. I got fed up with his moody floating around not saying much acting.

I wonder what would happen if Commander Nick decided that he wanted to redeem a handmaid - give her a chance to repent of all her past sins & live a Godly, holy life as his wife... He's probably too junior to get away with that quite yet but he could definitely spin some Bible verses about forgiveness/redemption to make a persuasive argument.

I'd quite like him to be promoted to Fred's position & set up in Fred's old house with Rita as his Martha. June's so focused on her plan to get the children out that I really doubt she'd be up for much romance. She could always use another commander as an ally though...

Does anyone know, if a handmaid fails to produce offspring for 2 commanders but does with a 3rd, does the three strikes rule reset or is it a cumulative thing so she'd give shipped off if she didn't get pregnant at the fourth posting? June's on her 3rd commander now, isn't she? Pretty sure Fred wasn't the first. Just wondering how much longer she's got. She's been with Lawrence for a while now & not pregnant... Maybe they'll be moving her on soon now that they know the ceremony has been performed but she's not pregnant.

Presumably Fred will be tried quite publicly for the war crimes, so Gilead will know where he and Serena are. I wonder if he will be a suspect for Winslow's disappearance, as it happened at about the same time, and Gilead will assume that's why he was trying to cross the border.

Ooh good theory! Fred has fucked up enough already that I imagine Gilead would be quite happy to pin Winslow’s disappearance on him.

I'd quite like him to be promoted to Fred's position & set up in Fred's old house

They'd have to rebuild it first, after burning it to the ground.

AGnu, she produced a healthy full term baby for the Waterfords so is on the fertile list as far as Handmaids HQ is concerned. The wonder is that they assigned a fertile (and troublesome) Handmaid to the Lawrence's in the first place given their poor record of making babies with any of their other Handmaids, the presumably public knowledge about Eleanor's poor mental state and not to mention their last Handmaid pushing Aunt Lydia down the stairs. I can't see the other wives being happy about allowing a possible precious baby being born into such a disruptive house.

Does anyone know, if a handmaid fails to produce offspring for 2 commanders but does with a 3rd, does the three strikes rule reset or is it a cumulative thing so she'd give shipped off if she didn't get pregnant at the fourth posting?

But she was pregnant and gave birth to a healthy baby at the Waterfords.

It covers this in the book. I think it's 3 postings with no pregnancy and off to the Colonies. I can't remember how many months at a posting before they move them on, though. Someone who has read the book more recently could confirm?