Offred

This show is very well written and the actors are amazing. Great way to begin a series! I like the flashbacks that help build the characters. I highly recommend this show!

I have just finished episode 4 of Handmaid's Tale, so I thought I would take a moment to reflect on the first four episodes of the show. I will specifically focus on this first episode in this review.

This show is straight up terrible. If you want to save an hour of your day, do not watch this show. The main actress is very painful to watch and she has a personality blander than a piece of white bread. The "sexual tension" that this show is famous for is nothing more than awkward silence with practically no purpose. I constantly found myself looking towards my phone for salvation from the boredom. The journey that Offred goes on is one of suffering and inefficient decision making. If you want adventure, drama, espionage, and "sexual tension" done right, go watch Game of Thrones. This show will disappoint and leave you wondering why you ever started it in the first place.

This show has gotten such rave reviews, I had to check it out. Now that I've seen the pilot, and only the pilot, I have to wait and see how things progress, but for now I can focus on what I see as the biggest pro and the biggest con, thus far.

The pro: visually stunning. That depth of field is enrapturing. The color tones, too. Just perfect.

The con, and it's a common one: beautiful visuals often happen at the expense of story. And, story-wise, I expected the pilot would have more going for it. We didn't see anything new or innovative. And perhaps the pilot steering away from the pressure to out-dramatize other shows' pilots will turn into a strength, if the rest of the show ends up being compelling, but for now it feels flat and caricaturized, relying on the works of other people to imbue the concepts and visuals with dramatic purport.

I will say, the moment where the two handmaidens realize they both saw each other as fakely pious was eye-opening. This gives me hope that the continuing episodes will attempt some originality, without relying on borrowing tension from other skilled writers and filmmakers. (And yes, I'm taking into account that this show is based on a book.)

There was a decent film adaptation of The Handmaid's Tale in 1990.

This television adaptation would expand on Margaret Atwood's novel and allow it too breath. Atwood makes a brief appearance in the first episode.

However this being US television you just know the series would go on and on getting further away from the kernel of the original story.

The first episode carries on the Dystopian themes of the book. A critique of those who hypocritically advocate traditional values and fundamentalism not only in America but in places in the Middle East.

In a society where the fertility rate has fallen. Offred (Elisabeth Moss) who in a previous society was called June is effectively a slave to the Waterford family.

The Handmaid is assigned to be impregnated by Fred Waterford (Joseph Fiennes) as his wife Serena Joy watches on. She is both repulsed and envious of Offred.

The first episode had a good setting of a theocratic based feudal society, you are always being watched, you could always be reported by someone close to you.

Rebellion is not tolerated. Public hangings are common.

Moss gives a good performance of someone caught in a trap, she wants to rebel but she is also regarded as being pious. She had a life before all this, a husband and daughter, as well as her own name and identity.

The idea for this series is very original, but I founded 'christianphobic'. Seriously in this 'modern' society there are people who think Christians see women in that way and that will be a perfect world for a Christian? It is an exaggeration. Direction and acting is okay.