For those who read The Handmaid’s Tale before there was ever an acclaimed TV adaptation could not have ever imagined this: Not only has Margaret Atwood’s chilling dystopia continued over four seasons — with a fifth already announced — but it looks like its hero, Offred, might actually take down the evil empire of Gilead. That’s what it appears could happen in the trailer for its fourth round of episodes, due late April.
The ad finds Elisabeth Moss’ Offred — formerly known as June Osborne, though Atwood never revealed her name in her novel — way away from the patriarchal hellscape that imprisoned her for so long. Now she’s a resistance fighter — a scary name to the likes of Ann Dowd’s Aunt Lydia, who once lorded over her with an iron first, and now worries that she’s “out there planning who knows what kind of atrocities to visit upon our righteous nation.”
You’ll have to wait another few months to see what those atrocities are, as Hulu, The Handmaid’s Tale’s home, doesn’t do season dumps à la Netflix. (And keep in mind there’s another season after this one, and presumably it won’t just be Susan and team sitting around, relaxing after a long and stressful fight.) In the meantime, reflect on this: The first season of The Handmaid’s Tale kicked off soon after You Know Who took office, back in 2017. That means a staunchly feminist novel, warning of the grim future someone like Trump (or, more likely, Pence) could enact — which ends ambiguously, at least for Offred — has outlived Trump. We did it.