June accompanies the Waterfords on a trip to Washington DC where the Commanders are formulating plans to recover Baby Nichole. While there, she witnesses more horrors of life in Gilead, and is forced to participate in a prayer circle supposedly to get Nichole back. Fred meets Commander Winslow, who has plans for Canada in the event that they are unwilling to return Nichole and Emily.
Tropes:
- Actor Allusion: Casting the former Det. Elliot Stabler from Law & Order: Special Victims Unit as a Serial Rapist couldn't have been an accident. As the detective, he's catching the sexual predators and putting them behind bars. On Handmaid's Tale, he plays one. To make it even more obvious his character's wife is named Olivia. Olivia Benson was his partner on the SVU.
- Although, considering he DID play a sexual predator and psychopathic serial killer on Oz it may not have been too much of a stretch for his acting repertoire.
- And I Must Scream: The Washington Handmaids have their mouths wired shut. Extra nightmare fuel when you consider they probably still are during childbirth, when they would uncontrollably cry out...
- Continuity Nod: Serena wears a veil while in Washington, which is what the Commanders’ Wives wore outside (and during the Ceremony) in Margaret Atwood’s original novel.
- Depraved Bisexual: Downplayed but hinted at with Commander Winslow with his gestures towards Fred. "Depraved" by virtue of the culture of Gilead.
- Shown Their Work: It is off-handedly mentioned that DC's historic Union Station building was demolished and replaced by Gilead because its creator was an "apostate". While the primary goal was to justify the series' use of Television Geography, the Union Station's chief architect Daniel Burnham
indeed was a Swedenborgian. - Did You Actually Believe...?: When June finds out about Nick's past and his involvement in the downfall of the United States, she asks Serena about what he did. Serena smirks that June never bothered to ask Nick about his past in the first place.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Aunt Lydia admits to June that she does not approve the policy of having Washington Handmaids' mouths being wired shut.
- I Should Have Done This Years Ago: At the end of the episode Serena tells the ever defiant June that she should have wired shut her mouth like the Washington Handmaids when they first met.
- Monumental Damage: The Washington Monument, one of the symbols of the city, has been remodeled into a giant cross.
- Obliviously Evil: When asked who the five multiracial children living in their house belong to, Mrs. Winslow smiles brightly and says "Who else’s would they be?"
- Put on a Bus: Or, in Nick’s case, a heavily armored train to Chicago to fight the resistance.
- Putting on the Reich: The epic Handmaid prayer video June is forced to participate in at end of the episode is straight out of a Leni Riefenstahl propaganda film.
- The Reveal: The fact that Nick aided the rise of Gilead and fought in the war is played as a serious thing, previously unknown to June. Considering that in wars, all able men are drafted and forced to fight even for countries and regimes they might not approve of, this was very, very obvious.
- Smash the Symbol: At the Lincoln Memorial. Judging from the damage behind and above, it looks like someone played John Wilkes Booth with a bazooka.
- "Spread Wings" Frame Shot: June Osborne and other handmaids (who are all oppressed, tortured and treated like sex slaves and baby factories) are gathered around a huge statue of an angel. Long-suffering June is walking from the statue and it looks like she has white feathery wings◊.
- Wham Shot: Meta and in-universe when Ofgeorge takes off her muffler to reveal the clamps keeping her mouth shut.
