The Testaments: when does the series take place after the end of The Handmaid’s Tale?
“Boston fell and inevitably the war had repercussions in Gilead…” The producers explain to us where the new series which begins on Disney+ is located.
Boston has fallen. June is a free woman. But Gilead is still there. A year after the broadcast of the grand finale of The Handmaid’s Tale, the saga resumes with a vengeance this week on Disney+, with the sequel: The Testaments.
We follow Agnes, aka Hannah, the girl that June never found. Now a young woman of marriageable age, she learns to be a good wife at a new school run by Aunt Lydia. But where and when exactly does it happen?
“The story takes place three or four years after the end of The Handmaid’s Tale,” tell us producers Warren Littlefield and Bruce Miller, met during the Séries Mania festival. “Boston fell and obviously the war had repercussions in Gilead. But Gilead is not over. There are still strongholds of Gilead and our story takes place in a completely different place, much more stable.”
The Testaments will be an adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s new book (published in 2019). An adaptation which will take liberties ordered by the changes made during The Handmaid’s Tale. Indeed, “we had to change things compared to the book because it didn’t fit in terms of ages so we made adjustments, particularly on Daisy…” reveal the producers.
But The Testaments is indeed a direct sequel to the previous series. A sequel “which changes the point of view: instead of telling the story through the eyes of June (Elisabeth Moss), we tell it through the eyes of these young girls raised in Gilead and who only know that”.
Lydia is also no longer the same. His view of things has changed. Ann Dowd admits to us that she is “delighted with the changes that Lydia has made in her life. It’s really a continuation of Lydia’s developments that we saw during the 6 seasons of The Handmaid’s Tale. Her way of seeing the world has changed but she retains a deep and sincere love for the girls in her care.”
This is how The Testaments will begin this Wednesday, April 8 on Disney+ in France.
