Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

The Handmaid’s Tale is a chilling expansion on Margaret Atwood’s novel
The Verge ^ | April 13, 2017 | Adi Robertson

Posted on 04/14/2017 9:53:47 AM PDT by EveningStar

In recent months, The Handmaid’s Tale — Margaret Atwood’s 1985 dystopian novel about a patriarchal future where fertile women are a tightly controlled commodity — has become more of a symbol than a piece of fiction. From a “Make Margaret Atwood Fiction Again” sign at a protest to women protesting a restrictive abortion law in costume, it offers a form of protest that cuts straight to the misogynist thread in American populism. Hulu, which will premiere an adaptation of The Handmaid’s Tale on April 26th, couldn’t have asked for better publicity.

But The Handmaid’s Tale is more than a political jab. In the first three episodes provided to reviewers, it’s a dystopia that manages to stand out in a television landscape already full of apocalypses and oppressive imaginary societies. It’s a colorful TV series about a woman negotiating domestic drama, and judging from its initial installments — all three of which will be released simultaneously on April 26th — it might be one of the darkest shows on television this year.

In both book and series, The Handmaid’s Tale takes place in the near future — in the book, the 1980s, and on the show, in the late 2010s. A fertility crisis has paved the way for Christian fundamentalists to seize power in the United States, founding a rigidly patriarchal theocracy called Gilead. Under Gilead’s police state, households are composed of high-status Wives; domestic Marthas; and the titular Handmaids, fertile women who are forced to bear children through ritualized sexual encounters with the household’s male “Commander.” One of those women is Offred (Mad Men’s Elisabeth Moss), an ordinary 21st century working woman who’s now living in a surreal nightmare.

(Excerpt) Read more at theverge.com ...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat; Religion; Society; TV/Movies
KEYWORDS: elisabethmoss; handmaidstale; hulu; josephfiennes; margaretatwood; thehandmaidstale
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-30 next last
Wikipedia

IMDb

Official site

Facebook

Teaser

Trailer

1 posted on 04/14/2017 9:53:47 AM PDT by EveningStar
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Borges; DollyCali; Perdogg

ping


2 posted on 04/14/2017 9:54:38 AM PDT by EveningStar
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar

Has to be the most overrated dystopian novel ever. Nothing in the book has become anywhere close to reality. The Left luvs to being back Atwood anytime a Republican is in the White House.


3 posted on 04/14/2017 9:56:47 AM PDT by C19fan
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar
Under Gilead’s police state, households are composed of high-status Wives; domestic Marthas; and the titular Handmaids, fertile women who are forced to bear children through ritualized sexual encounters with the household’s male “Commander.”

Sounds like life under Islam.

4 posted on 04/14/2017 9:56:58 AM PDT by PapaBear3625 (Big government is attractive to those who think that THEY will be in control of it.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar

A stupid, stupid book. Poorly written too.

Could have been a better concept if it had aimed at exposing backward, barbaric Islamic society, but as an attack on Christianity, the author showed herself to be an ignorant polemicist.


5 posted on 04/14/2017 9:57:26 AM PDT by ClearCase_guy (Abortion is what slavery was: immoral but not illegal. Not yet.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar

The series looks like crap. This review is crap. The “rolling back women’s rights” canard and the typical let’s-sneak-in-a-slam-against-Trump is getting really, really tiresome.


6 posted on 04/14/2017 9:58:29 AM PDT by Ciaphas Cain (The choice to be stupid is not a conviction I am obligated to respect.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar

I just canceled HULU. Trash.


7 posted on 04/14/2017 10:01:45 AM PDT by Mercat
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar

“Make Margaret Sanger Dead Again” ......................


8 posted on 04/14/2017 10:05:47 AM PDT by Red Badger (Ending a sentence with a preposition is nothing to be afraid of........)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

Feminist propaganda?


9 posted on 04/14/2017 10:06:44 AM PDT by EveningStar
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar

It is the Left’s fantasy that, somehow, fundamentalist Christians will seize control and reshape society. Meanwhile, they feign complete ignorance to the dangers posed by Muslim fundamentalists.


10 posted on 04/14/2017 10:10:19 AM PDT by rbg81 (Truth is stranger than fiction)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar

Of course it is feminist propaganda, like almost everything else in the media. There is no more murderous, vile, deranged, or totalitarian ideology than feminism. Cuck men allowed it to happen, and now civilization is disintegrating and murder on an industrial scale flourishes.


11 posted on 04/14/2017 10:14:16 AM PDT by achilles2000 ("I'll agree to save the whales as long as we can deport the liberals")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar

Pushing Handmaid’s Tale and 1984 to bolster the Official Reality that we are entering a police state.

It’s not like the government is using the IRS to suppress opposition organization, or is conducting mass surveillance of its citizens.


12 posted on 04/14/2017 10:22:16 AM PDT by DBrow
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: C19fan

The novel actually is sort of close to the practice of Islam.

It is very far off from any Christian sect.


13 posted on 04/14/2017 10:23:25 AM PDT by marktwain (President Trump and hisHe's won supporters are the Resistance. His opponents are the Reactionaries.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: marktwain
The novel actually is sort of close to the practice of Islam. It is very far off from any Christian sect.

You think the rubes will understand that?

14 posted on 04/14/2017 10:24:44 AM PDT by dfwgator
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies]

To: marktwain

[ The novel actually is sort of close to the practice of Islam.

It is very far off from any Christian sect. ]

The left believes in overbearing government and loves to defend sharia...

They then accuse US as being overbearing and wanting a theocracy...

If there was an Olympic event for projection, the libs would be winning the gold for the rest of eternity.


15 posted on 04/14/2017 10:38:24 AM PDT by GraceG ("It's better to have all the Right Enemies, that it is to have all the Wrong Friends.")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies]

To: C19fan; PapaBear3625

Has to be the most overrated dystopian novel ever. Nothing in the book has become anywhere close to reality.


Actually, as PapaBear3625 points out, it is a clear description of life in muzzieland, and has been that way since the mid 600s.


16 posted on 04/14/2017 10:44:18 AM PDT by samtheman (Trump++)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: C19fan

Agreed.


17 posted on 04/14/2017 10:50:32 AM PDT by Secret Agent Man ( Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: achilles2000

Feminist man hating religion hating porn.


18 posted on 04/14/2017 10:51:21 AM PDT by Secret Agent Man ( Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar
the misogynist thread in American populism.

Stopped reading right there.

19 posted on 04/14/2017 10:58:36 AM PDT by NobleFree ("law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: EveningStar

In other words, a progressive wet dream.


20 posted on 04/14/2017 10:58:45 AM PDT by D_Idaho ("For we wrestle not against flesh and blood...".)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-30 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson