Anybody here watched / watching A Handmaid's Tale? I searched but didn't find any discussion thread.
DW and I just finished binge watching Season 3 of the show. We get the DVDs from out local library and only have a week.
Wow. It's really good but really depressing. It's clearly speculative fiction / alternative history, but it's not far enough away from reality to leave me comfortable.
We had watched the first 2 seasons last year, a few months apart. They were excellent - unbelievably chilling; well written, well acted, and well produced. Season 1 did a great job of capturing the original book (with some changes, made for specific reasons). Season 2 went beyond the original story (which is only 300-odd pages), but in a very believable way.
Season 3 is not quite as good, but still excellent. At 13 episodes it is a slow buildup of tension that at times is a little too slow, but that's part of the claustrophobia and paranoia of the situation. The season ends on a note that is close enough to a wrapup that they don't need to continue, but open ended enough that they can. Not sure if Season 4 is in the works.
DW and I are both big Margaret Atwood fans. We both read the original in 1985/86. DW is currently reading The Testaments, which is Atwood's new sequel. I'll probably reread the original and then move on to the new book.
Thoughts?
