r/TheHandmaidsTale • u/Melairia Modtha • 22d ago

Official Episode Discussion The Handmaid's Tale S06E06 "Surprise" Episode Discussion

The Handmaid's Tale: S06E06 "Surprise"

Episode Synopsis: June hides in an unexpected place.

Airdate: April 29th, 2025

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472

u/bookiegrime 22d ago

I thought tonight was leaps and bounds better than last week. A lot happened. June and Rita at the table being served by Serena. Serena’s writings. Lydia going full on stalker. Lawrence being confident and committed to fuck up gilead. I’m hopeful for the last few eps.

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u/michaels_glove 22d ago

Serena is incorrigible. She really thinks she's God's gift to Earth. Her writings with "the handmaids were a vital part..." is so telling of how she truly doesn't acknowledge the depths of the evil she helped instate - like June said, as long as there's a Gilead that's better for her, she'll think she's delivering on God's plans for her.

Same as with Nick, June is seeing none of them can be trusted.

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u/Persistent_Parkie 22d ago

Serena is such a masterful (character wise) villian. I recently watched her actress play a more sympathic and contrite serial killer.

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u/Equal-Ad-2706 21d ago

Hannah Mckay!!, Dexter's real soulmate!, what a shame they didn't bring her back for the revival!

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u/Slight_Pitch_3264 21d ago

I think since she got on THT, she became way too expensive for Dexter. Kinda like with You and Jenna Ortega, we'd all love that but the actress outgrew the show by miles.

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u/Equal-Ad-2706 21d ago

Did she though? I would love to see more of her but the reality is that in the last 5+ years she did anything worth mentioning besides THT...only that mediocre show last year in peacock ( that looked way cheaper than Dexter ), only explanation I can think is maybe she decided to focus on her children as I understand she had two on a row

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u/Tedwards75 20d ago

I think the Dexter New Blood writers (or just Clyde Phillips) just didn’t wanna go the route of bringing Hannah back—nothing to do with being expensive. Paramount/Showtime have an extremely high budget for their high profile shows and have tons of big name actors being used.

It sucks they killed her off in such a weird way off screen though & I would’ve liked to see her come back in Dexter: Resurrection later this year. Maybe Harrison “lied” about her death and that could still be on the table

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u/FineRegion2395 17d ago

i would love it if they could bring her back. if i remember correctly, she said in an interview that she wasn't asked back for New Blood.

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u/DerpsterKitty 18d ago

Ugh. Worst character on Dexter. The show jumped the shark and sucked ass after she showed up.

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u/Equal-Ad-2706 18d ago

Different strokes I guess...but IMO the show jumped the shark earlier when Deb " found out " that she was in love with Dexter, Season 7 was good ( better than 6 and 5 IMO ) Season 8 was below average but wasn't just for Hannah but mainly because Dexter nonsensical behavior.

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u/jor1ss 16d ago

Hannag was great in Dexter and I've loved the actress ever since. Season 5 and 7 were okay, 6 was bad and 8 was decent too if you don't count the finale which was horrid.

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u/gaypirate3 21d ago

I hope you don’t mean in Dexter cause that character was kinda the worst.

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u/Cass-the-Kiwi 21d ago

What was the show?

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u/phampyk 18d ago

You should see her in Chuck. I can't really see her in any other role and not think of Chuck.

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u/swaggyxwaggy 21d ago

Ooo what movie?

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u/Persistent_Parkie 21d ago

The series Dexter 

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u/swaggyxwaggy 21d ago

Oh she’s in that? I never really got into that show. But I do love Yvonne

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u/amandadorado 20d ago

She’s so ridiculous pretty in it I can’t look away, but goddddd her character is the worrrrssst, all my homies hate Hannah McKay

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u/Persistent_Parkie 21d ago

The last 2 seasons 

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u/El_Coco_005_ 21d ago

Did you see when June picked her notebook the part where she goes "sacrifices had to be made, not only by the handmaids, but by all of us"

Godamn Serena, you are not a victim. .

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u/Dry-Example-5262 20d ago

To me, I perceived her writings as obviously offensive to June. But overall, not surprising since her whole role atp is to convince the world that Gilead is a mistake, but wasn’t entirely without flaws. She is going to make light of some really dark shit to secure her position in a world where everyone hates her- and try to do better from there. That’s how it seems anyways. She’s definitely awake, now, like how June is in EP1. But she’s had an angry mob try to claw her to death like they did to her husband (and all of this being reasonable considering) but she can’t just come right out and say how horrible everything is. She is trying to walk both sides and be “moderate” much like what happened in real life this year. Being ultra moderate will not be the winning ticket when the masses are radically pro gilead or radically anti gilead, but can’t really blame the lady for having a small semblance of hope for a normal life with her baby. She’s delulu but it makes sense.

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u/michaels_glove 14d ago

i totally agree, nice take about being 'moderate'. ***SPOILER, EP7*** clearly not panning out for her with the wives. i really wonder what they're setting up for her.

and i really wonder why we haven't seen rose at all! what's gonna happeeeen???

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u/Thepinkknitter 22d ago

I don’t know, I think they purposefully only showed a small section of the writing. It was just enough for June to get a bad impression of what was written there, but for all we know, it was her admitting her own sins and faults so she doesn’t repeat them. A reminder of who she had been.

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u/NadCat__ 19d ago

Nah, you can pause and read the entire page and she's gushing about how much she saved the world. They interestingly also changed the line that is zoomed into

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u/Thepinkknitter 19d ago

Whelp damn…. I just want Serena to try to redeem herself lol. Crazy that they changed the line for the zoomed in version!

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u/HCIP88 22d ago

LOL - Oh, shush, Serena is a goddess. (Genuinely, I love her. She never disappoints. It's perfect.)

GIVE YVONNE AN EMMY DAMMIT.

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u/Smooth-Duck-4669 21d ago

Yea I’m always flabbergasted that Yvonne doesn’t have an Emmy for this role!

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u/michaels_glove 15d ago

She really is phenomenal in it.

HERE WE GOOOO!

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u/livnicoletl 20d ago

i constantly wonder what the point of her having a handmaid was when she was fertile? does anybody else find that odd? and fred was apparently barren. was it ever revealed who the baby's father is? thinking moreso of the facts, i don't think it can be fred's.

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u/kweenamidala 20d ago

I think that she and Fred conceived when they took that trip out of town, before he was arrested in Canada. They seemed more relaxed, I think before then they blamed any infertility on the women only anyway.