The Handmaid’s Tale season 2: Teaser analysis

Without any dialogue and with less than 20 seconds, The Handmaid’s Tale played around with some fascinating symbolism in its season 2 teaser.

There are about five months between now and the release of The Handmaid’s Tale‘s second season, according to the teaser the show’s official account put out earlier today. Five and a half, if you want to get a bit more specific, since we’re only midway through November, and the show will be back … sometime in April. It’s not really specific at this point.

But the teaser also comes with a few little tidbits that could indicate where exactly the second season is going … and since this comes with the confirmation that “season 2 — now in production,” it’s a little easier to start prognosticating.

Before we go any further, here’s the teaser in question:

“No turning back,” huh? Even before you take it in conjunction with the image, which shows a handmaid holding her bonnet in one hand and a flashlight in the other, walking away with her back to the camera, it’s a sign that as we requested in our season 1 finale recap, June’s time with the Waterfords as we know it may be coming to an end. Wherever that van is taking her, it’s presumably going to be a turning point in the series. There will be pre-van, and there will be post-van. (What interests us is the teasing of more June and Serena Joy scenes in season 2.)

But as that same recap pointed out, things will continue to probably be dark in the series. That’s promised here by the dim lighting, which only just reveals our walking handmaid. And still, she has that flashlight, illuminating her path forward despite everything pressing in on her. She keeps moving forward. We don’t see her face, because she doesn’t look at us.

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Though it’s easy to read this as being June, it could be any of the handmaids in Gilead, and that’s presumably the point. Although one singular handmaid may be our main character, she’s just one of many — and one of many who has started to rebel against what’s happening in Gilead or at least try and get her story out there.

Will you be tuning in to The Handmaid’s Tale‘s second season in April next year?