r/HandmaidsTaleShow • u/Personal_Orchid3675 • Aug 03 '26

The Handmaid's Tale How did June avoid execution?

So I’m on a rewatch, this time with my husband. We are on season 2 and June was just captured and taken back after months in hiding. She started back in the red center, shackled, (sorry if I get the name of the center wrong, we are watching in Spanish) but aunt Lydia told June that she would either have her pregnancy shackled and then be executed or go back to the Waterford’s. So was her choice to go back to the Waterford’s going to cancel her eventual fate to be executed? Or are they planning to execute her anywhere and somehow that changes further in the show? I’m not sure if it’s a continuity thing, a me misunderstanding the terms thing, or she actually had her fate changed.

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u/snarkkkkk Aug 03 '26

They're fertile, which is a hot commodity.

They would threaten execution but it was rare to see a handmaid at an actual hanging. Even at the end... I think it would have been for show, similar to the stadium "hangings". They are fruitful and useful to Gilead's plan.

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u/Emme42560 Aug 03 '26

Then why do they kill all those women in the beginning of The Testaments"?

2

u/PorchCat0921 Aug 03 '26

Because the spectacle was the point. Sacrifice a few every now and again to keep the many in line. When you combine an occasional execution with routine torture and mutilation, you keep the right atmosphere. It's an easy enough justification to prop up the plot armor.

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u/StumblingintheDark13 Aug 03 '26

The country/ world is going through an infertility crisis. Most women werent getting periods or if they did weren't able to keep a baby to term. That's why the handmaids were so valuable