'The Handmaid's Tale 3' episode 9 teaser shows June getting increasingly desperate and selfish; is Gilead's treatment of women rubbing off on her?
This article contains spoilers for 'The Handmaid's Tale' season 3 episode 8
In 'The Handmaid's Tale' season 3 episode 8, we saw how Ofjoseph aka June Osborne (Elisabeth Moss) influenced Ofmatthew's (Ashleigh Thorpe) mental breakdown causing her to attack Janine and grab a gun, which she pointed at Aunt Lydia (Ann Dowd). Before Ofmatthew could fire the weapon, however, she is taken down by the guards.
Her limp body with a gunshot wound is taken away and June, who was expected to fight injustice against handmaids, has now become instrumental in injuring one. She doesn't regret her actions because Ofmatthew was the reason June's daughter Hannah and her Gilead family - the McKenzies - relocated and Martha Frances is punished by being hung. She was seeking vengeance, but does it justify bringing down Ofmatthew so brutally? Or is she being influenced by Gilead's ruthless and callous handling of women in society?
This is not the first mistake June commits. In an attempt to rescue Hannah, she puts Frances in danger by planning a meet-up with her daughter. She manipulates Mrs. Eleanor Lawrence into accompanying her to Hannah's school at Brookline.
She does confess it to Eleanor, but is that acceptable? Especially considering how she abandons Mrs. Lawrence in the hopes of even hearing her daughter. After everything she has gone through to survive Gilead, one wouldn't expect such carelessness from her.
When she learns Ofmatthew was the one who informed Aunt Lydia about June's rendezvous with Frances, she is angry to the extent of strangling her. All of this progresses into her vicious act of seeking retribution by affecting Ofmatthew's mental state. On July 15, Hulu dropped a teaser-trailer of episode 9, in which June's desperation may lead to something even more horrid. A murder.
She is in a hospital room with Aunt Lydia and Ofmatthew who is unconscious and probably brain dead. She is on life support only to save the baby and June cannot leave the room until the baby is born. She is desperate, trying to find anything possible to salvage the situation and escape from that room but her only option is to attack Serena Joy, who visits the handmaid.
She has a blade in her hand, but it has to be seen if she will attack or just use it as a way to get away from her current situation. Janine, who is a timid handmaid otherwise, raises an objection to having June act out in this manner. She is now not a figure of resistance, but a selfish woman who only wants to get a look at her daughter at the cost of anything and anyone.
Episode 9 of 'The Handmaid's Tale' will air Wednesday, July 17, on Hulu.
