The Handmaid’s Tale Season 2: 6 Things to Know

Blessed be the fruit—and hints about what’s coming next on The Handmaid’s Tale.

A month before the Emmy-winning Hulu series returns for its second season, the stars of the series took Los Angeles by storm. Samira Wiley, Yvonne Strahovski, Max Minghella, Madeline Brewer, O-T Fagbenle, and Amanda Brugel all joined creator-slash-show-runner Bruce Miller and executive producer Warren Littlefield at Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre on Sunday to screen three clips from the upcoming season and participate in a panel discussion for this year’s annual PaleyFest L.A. TV Festival. (Emmy winner and titular Handmaid Elisabeth Moss was not able to make it to the Q&A, but greeted fans via a taped message: “We have been hard at work since September to bring fans Season 2,” she said, “and I hope you love it as much as we do.”)

Those present promised a second season filled with even more gut-wrenching moments as the series moves beyond the events of Margaret Atwood’s seminal 1985 novel. Expect new settings, new characters, and new twists—as well as a promise that this year (perhaps unlike in Season 1), no one is safe. The six major takeaways to keep in mind ahead of the show’s April 25 release:

1. This year, The Handmaid’s Tale is about motherhood—and how the horrific ideals of Gilead live even beyond its walls.

“The idea of ‘Gilead is within us’ is one of the dominant themes this year,” Littlefield explained on the red carpet. “We know Luke and Moira escaped Gilead to Canada, but does that mean they got away? No. They may have left Gilead, but it still stays in them. How do they recover? There’s trauma, and they will deal with the repercussions of that in year two.”

Littlefield added that motherhood is another driving force in the new season. “When we start the season, it is confirmed that Offred is pregnant, and the people around [her] find out. But now she is thinking about how to protect her child, Hannah, and also thinking about the future of her unborn child. It’s like a volatile chess game; all her moves are about that unborn child, and what the future will be for that child and her daughter.”

2. Expect the characters that you love—and hate—to reveal more about their pasts as they take on an uncertain future.

“Lizzie’s character is a lot more of a rebel, and feistier. She’s having a lot more of trouble as Offred hiding June”—her actual name, said Miller. “She’s also getting to know and building a relationship with Serena that, even though they wouldn’t like it to turn out that way, is getting more honest.” At the same time, Serena and her husband, Commander Fred Waterford (Joseph Fiennes), will be more united as a couple and share a “common front against Offred, so she has even more to battle against,” said Miller.

Strahovski, who plays the barren Serena Waterford—Offred’s formidable mistress—said that while her character begins the season “pissed off,” the one thing that will make her life more tolerable is the birth of Offred’s child.

“She has moments of humanity, and there’s still going to be moments where you hate her,” Strahovski told Vanity Fair. “It’s a season where she’s challenged where she’s never been challenged before.” During the panel, Strahovski revealed that the show will also “keep exploring another significant part of Serena’s past.” She then looked guiltily at Miller: “Am I allowed to say that? I just did.”

As for the formidable Aunt Lydia (Ann Dowd, another Emmy winner): the thrill she feels upon learning of Offred’s pregnancy quickly curdles when she loses her grip on the rebellious handmaid. “She expresses her anger in very interesting ways,” teased Miller. “The biggest thing with her character this year is her sense of duty. She’s going to make Offred’s baby healthy and come into a loving house—even if it kills her.”

Meanwhile, one-eyed Janine (Brewer) is “happy to be alive after a few brushes with death,” even though she has been banished to the Colonies for a life of hard labor. “The first season was a lot about Janine taking herself out of reality and out of her present situation, and in the second season she’s just grateful to be on Earth,” explained Brewer. “There’s a little bit more of her finding her own personality within the guidelines of Gilead. There’s so much more to her than meets the eye!”

Moira (Wiley) is living in Canada as a refugee, where she has reconnected with June’s husband, Luke (Fagbenle). “Moira is trying to figure out who she is now that she’s escaped Gilead,” Wiley told Vanity Fair on the red carpet. “She now has all these wonderful things; she’s no longer getting raped every day, has access to health care. But on the other side, she’s in a foreign land and nothing is familiar. So she’s trying to figure out how to live as this different person.”

Another twist awaiting concerns Rita, one of the two Marthas (i.e., housekeepers) serving the Waterfords. “In Season 1, we left off not knowing what side she was on,” Amanda Brugel, who plays Rita, told V.F. “Was she in an allegiance with Gilead? Was she someone who would fight for humanity, [or] just trying to get by? In Season 2, we truly find out the answer to that question, and it’s shocking to me what the answer is. I felt like I knew where she was going, and then it took a hard left.”

3. The #MeToo and Time’s Up movements have added an extra resonance to the show.

“With Time’s Up and #MeToo, I felt empowered through Janine to read more stories about sexual assault survivors,” Brewer said at the panel. “She encouraged me to talk about my own #MeToo experience. I think this show has that power.”

Wiley agreed: “I was bolstered by Moira, and found some courage to be able to be a little more vocal about my own beliefs and try to understand where activism [fits] into my own life,” she said. “We’re in the make-believe business, but at the end of the day, what we’re doing can elicit real change.”

4. Get ready to take a trip to the Colonies—a toxic wasteland that’s even more cruel to women than Gilead.

Janine and Ofglen, Alexis Bledel’s now series-regular character, have both been exiled to the Colonies, a barren wasteland the show will depict for the first time this year. The set, said Brewer, feels “so aligned with what I read in the book and what I pictured. It’s aesthetically really beautiful, has rolling hills and cornfields—and then you put a magnifying glass on it, and it’s incredibly sinister and gut-wrenchingly terrible.”

Despite the circumstances, “Alexis was astonishing, and continues to bear up under incredible brutality all the way through,” added Miller. “But eventually, they both find ways to live a life there, the same way people did in concentration camps and work camps in China.”

Miller also noted that “the Colonies is really the ultimate place of misogyny and the discarding of women. But even in the most hateful and cruel environment, you see women find ways to support each other. That’s powerful. So much of the show is about the incredible resilience and strength of all the women.”

5. And be prepared to meet a few key new characters.

Littlefield and Miller spoke briefly about additions to the cast this year: West Wing alum Bradley Whitford is joining the show as a Gilead commander. Clea DuVall, who most recently was seen on HBO’s Veep, portrays Ofglen’s wife, and will be seen in a flashback. Tony winner Cherry Jones has been cast as June’s mother, and Oscar winner Marisa Tomei will also appear in the new season, though details on her character are scarce.

6. The main takeaway: this year, no one is safe.

Littefield bluntly told the audience that this year, “anyone could die”—and gave no further explanation for what he meant. For his part, Miller added this: “The terrible thing about Gilead is that sometimes the worst-case scenario is that they don’t die!”

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