The Handmaid's tale

Good, but a bit too gruesome for me !

Just started watching series 1. After the first episode I wasn't sure but now on episode 4 and hooked!! Very creepy and thought provoking.

It feels as though the whole book is being re-written in flashback.

I've just watched the first episode of series 2. Very tense and gruesome but very moorish. My daughter texted me and said she felt anxious all the way through it. I read the book after watching the first series and thought the production team did the book justice. Looking forward to the rest of the series.

I'm not sure I'm enjoying this new series. Introducing new characters via flashback then plunging them into the darkness of the colonies where you can't see who's who is confusing. Who was the woman who was poisoned by one of the 'inmates' at the end? (sorry about all the whos)

Where exactly is Offred and was that sex scene necessary to the plot??

I think I'm losing the plot.

I started episode one and the first half hour was just torturing women, I don’t mind gruesome but it just seemed one after the other, the pretend hanging, then the kneeling in the rain, followed by the hand in the burning flame all seemed like voyarism wasn’t comfortable so gave up

Merlot. The woman who was poisoned was one of the upper classes who had been caught having an affair. So she had been one of those who had held down a handmaiden every month while husband tried to impregnate her. Not sure where Offred is now. Looks like disused office block.

Episode 2 all a bit confusing, dark and rather boring for me.

I will watch again, see if it improves. I hate seeing the torture, I fast forwarded through the hand part last week.

Pensionpat she is in a disused newspaper office, now that newspapers have been banned and it looks like the news reporters have been killed.

The only bit of this programme I have seen, was a snippet from Gogglebox, and I couldn't watch all of that. It looks horrid and upsetting for the sake of it. Nasty.

I loved the book and series 1 but this new series is too gruesome. I had to change the channel with the torture last week. This week was so dark, grim and confusing I'm not sure if I will carry on.

Same here Auntieflo - I was struggling with even that small clip. Not for me I’m afraid

Series 2 not good in my opinion but I loved series 1.

Thanks, pensionpat. I guessed she might be one of the wives because of her religious fervour. Bit of a dim-wit if she didn't realise they'd be out to get her.

I wonder what will happen to Janine?

I have made a point of not watching this - real life is gruesome enough thank you.

I think the 2nd series is just as dark as the first and equally as gripping especially as they didn't base this series on a book as a second book wasn't written. The scary bit is - could something like this ever happen? Having recently seen a documentary about 'Hate Preachers' in the USA who hate gay people, divorcees, people in single sex relationships, people living together etc. etc. They pray for such a Utopian society and would violent methods to try achieve it.

I agree with Luckygirl that real life is gruesome enough and find this kind of dark fantasy too difficult to watch. It can't be viewed as entertainment, surely? There are so many parts of the world where oppression of women is a reality that it seems more effort should go into tackling the existing horrors of FGM, subjugation and kidnap/slavery if programme makers are determined to make audiences anxious or fearful. And I don't mean that we need to have these things shown in graphic detail, of course. Just that there are real life issues to challenge and change.

Series one was true to the book and kept the uncertain, troubling, what has happened? feeling. Series 2 is too explicit and not mystifying enough. Also a lot of time filling shots. It's interesting but never as good as Margaret Atwood's original. Elisabeth Moss does her best but the writing is too thin and the plot is tenuous relying on scarey images and too obvious violence,

Wow! What a cliffhanger!!

Glad something really dramatic has happened because Offred's pregnancy was becoming a bit tedious.

It's certainly not a drama to dip in and out of I've found. There appears to be lots of silences and because I've missed a bit I couldn't fathom what was going on. Not for me. Neither is Poldark. Perhaps I've changed and now need something livelier.

I read the book and saw the (Vanessa Redgrave) film. Having done so, I have no desire to watch the tv series. A truly awful concept.

I thought the first series was a good adaptation of the book, but I think that the second series is disappointing and seems as if it is being spun out just to fill more screen time. Am fed up with it.

Watched first series but find the second just unwatchable.

First series was based on Margaret Atwood's novel which I read and enjoyed (if that's the right word - I found both book and TV adaptation gripping but chilling.) I can't see any point in watching series 2 as it is no longer based on the book.