Take a look at The Handmaid's Tale Series Graph (episodes ranked by fan rating), and you'll see a near-impossible feat: back-to-back 9.0 and 5.7 ratings for the final two episodes of season 6. Translated, that's a Game of Thrones scale of reaction to the show's final-ever episode.
Given that the season 6 finale was an outright setup for new Hulu and Disney+ sequel series The Testaments, things didn't look too rosy. Thankfully, the reality is completely different — and I genuinely think The Testaments is as good as season 1 of The Handmaid's Tale.
For starters, the spinoff has nailed the art of reintroducing us to somewhere we already know (the totalitarian regime that is Gilead) and making it feel fresh. There are still secrets buried beneath the surface that we're none the wiser about, and a simple anti-regime stunt from Mayday isn't going to get any answers this time.
Then there's the casting. We already knew that Ann Dowd is absolutely blistering as the impenetrable Aunt Lydia, but newbies Chase Infiniti and Lucy Halliday mould the show into their own creation. We're looking at a major star on the rise after One Battle After Another with Infiniti, people.
If that's not enough to win you over to The Testaments, its main downside (feeling like it's just getting going) gives way to its biggest positive... surprises galore.
The Testaments is the journey to revolution that The Handmaid's Tale season 6 wanted to be
Some 15 years after the events of The Handmaid's Tale, a lot has changed in the Republic of Gilead. Aunt Lydia has rescued herself from imprisonment by being handpicked to oversee the laws and uniforms governing Gilead's women in the form of a new school.
Here, students are separated into four colors: Pinks for elementary age, Plums for young tweens who haven't come of age, Greens for those who have and are eligible for marriage, and the so-called 'Pearl Girls,' who have recently transferred in from the outside.
Where Margaret Atwood's book follows Aunt Lydia's perspective, Hulu's version homes in on devout Plum Agnes (Infiniti), who completely believes in the regime and what it's trying to achieve. She hates her stepmother, however, with her Commander father also constantly absent from the home.
One day, Aunt Lydia assigns her a Pearl Girl called Daisy (Halliday), prompting Agnes' friends to think she's done something wrong. Neither trusts the other, and while Daisy arrives with Gilead with secrets, Agnes begins to see the light.
It stands to reason that a school inside a totalitarian regime creates instant intrigue, but it's the ensemble performances that elevate it. Main cast aside, our Aunts and Plums have been picked to perfection, straddling the line between deranged and oblivious as, for the first time, men begin to feel the bulk of capital punishment.
Aunt Lydia could make or break what happens in The Testaments season 2 — which I'm convinced is coming
Ann Dowd remains the class act that we've known she is for years, and I'm overjoyed that Aunt Lydia is the character that both Atwood and Hulu chose to continue. Season 6 saw her allegiance to Gilead finally falter, but this time around, I don't trust her.
Why? When we meet her again in The Testaments, her faith in Gilead appears to be completely restored. However, she clearly knows more than she's letting on, and that makes her completely opaque when it comes to potentially betraying the regime further down the line.
It's a slippery business, and Aunt Lydia could either help or hugely hinder Agnes and Daisy on their upcoming journey. Obviously, there are no spoilers here, but the entire season of The Testaments feels like a starter for the main course still to come, and I'm convinced season 2 already has to be being developed.
Wishing for more of a fictitious dictatorship while living through politically perilous times feels bizarre at best, but I'm hoping for as many instalments of The Testaments as I can handle.
In the meantime, what we already have is a heady and moreish binge dressed up in a coloured uniform. The soundtrack is bonkers yet effective, and you can never let your guard down — particularly when it comes to plot details fans have been theorizing might come true. Frankly, I'd stream it over The Handmaid's Tale itself any day of the week.
It's obvious that we're getting them for more reasons than I've listed, and if The Handmaid's Tale spinoff continues to live up to the level of brilliance we see across these 10 episodes, totalitarian TV will never have been better.
