Evil takes many forms in Gilead. We’ve seen that in The Handmaid’s Tale and it plays out now in The Testaments as this cruel fascist regime continues to punish those trapped inside.
But there’s perhaps nothing worse than when such evil comes from a trusted place, which is exactly what happened in the episode where Agnes MacKenzie (Chase Infiniti) visited the dentist earlier this season.
After she was anaesthetised by Dr Grove, Agnes woke up feeling like something wasn’t right. And then, later that evening, she realised that the buttons of her shirt had been opened by him while she slept.
When Agnes later plucked up the courage to speak about the assault, it didn’t seem like Aunt Lydia (Ann Dowd) was going to help. That’s when Daisy (Lucy Halliday), who Agnes also confided in, decided to take matters into her own hands.
But if you’ve already read Margaret Atwood’s book and think you know how this was going to play out, you are mistaken.
At the start of this week’s episode, Daisy says “Gilead has a real hard-on for vengeance,” but it’s not only Gilead that’s feeling vengeful these days.
When it’s Daisy’s turn to visit the dentist, she’s surprised that everything goes smoothly. Dr. Grove doesn’t do anything out of the ordinary, not like he did with Agnes. But this monster needs to be put down regardless, so Daisy suddenly starts panicking out of nowhere, running out of the office screaming with her shirt ripped open.
“Help, he tried to touch me!” Daisy screams. “Please protect me!”
Unable to ignore this very public outburst, the Aunts question Daisy over what happened in the dentist’s office. “I know sin when I see it,” claims Pearl, and so does Lydia, it seems, because she chooses “not to think on it deeply,” despite knowing that this one particular assault was likely fabricated.
Either way, she is “deeply grateful to the Lord for shining light on [Grove’s] evil.”
Lydia plans to punish Dr Grove after his daughter’s wedding so it won’t ruin Becka’s (Mattea Conforti) chances at matrimony. Such ties are everything in this world, after all. But that’s not what ends up happening.
In the source material, Dr Grove is executed when Lydia frames him for the attempted rape of Aunt Elizabeth (in scenes that are deliberately echoed by Daisy at the dentist office in this week’s episode). Deemed guilty, the book version of Dr Grove is publicly executed by 70 Handmaids during a “Particicution” where they tear him apart with their bare hands.
A fitting end for a monster like Grove, that much is true. Yet even so, Hulu’s adaptation of The Testaments decides to speed up this timeline and punish him much sooner. But it’s not Lydia who arranges this or Daisy for that matter either.
No, the person responsible for Grove’s death is none other than his own daughter, Becka, who finds out about her father’s crimes after Daisy’s accusation goes public.
It seems that Grove never hurt his own daughter, not like he did in the book, but Becka is heartbroken anyway when she discovers what he did to Agnes.
Later, Becka asks her father for the truth at dinner. His reply? “I didn’t lay a finger on that Pearl girl,” referring, of course, to Daisy. And he’s right. He didn’t. But Becka knows her father and she can read between the lines about what really happened between him and Agnes.
After dinner, Dr. Grove takes a bath, and it turns out to be his last one when Becka suddenly appears and stabs her father to death. Upon doing the deed, Becka shows up covered in blood at Agnes’s house.
“He can’t hurt you anymore,” says Becka, who wreaked “divine justice” for her best friend. But not just her best friend, no. Because the love Becka holds for Agnes cuts so much deeper than just friendship. Becka is in love with Agnes, which is the real reason why she did what she did.
This twist is nowhere to be seen in the source material, but neither is Becka’s love for Agnes. By making Grove’s own daughter the perpetrator, it cements this new queer element as integral to the show, even if Becka herself probably doesn’t have the words to describe these feelings beyond abstract notions of love.
All Becka wants to do is protect the girl she’s in love with, which makes what comes next even harder to stomach.
With the help of a silent Martha, Agnes cleans Becka up and together, they plan to run away to somewhere safe, somewhere away from Gilead.
“I would do anything for you,” says Becka, but it turns out the same is not true for Agnes.
When the pair walk downstairs, ready to leave, both of Agnes’s parents are there waiting in the foyer.
“You need help, Becka,” says Agnes. “I’m sorry. I had to tell them.”
Agnes thinks she is helping Becka, but she doesn’t fully understand what’s about to come next.
Garth (Brad Alexander) arrives then to take Becka to go see a doctor. It’s not a calm visit, not by any means, because the Eyes suddenly appear and grab Becka outside, throwing her into the back of a van.
“Please don’t let them take me!” screams Becka as Agnes watches on in horror.
“I really thought they were taking her to the doctors…” she trails off, devastated as the full extent of her betrayal becomes apparent.
Knowing Becka is in love with Agnes, it’s hard not to read this scene as a stand-in for conversion therapy, the horrific practice where young queer people are whisked away to be “cured” of their sexuality.
Although Gilead isn’t aware of the exact reason why Becka killed her father, the state will seek to “correct” her regardless. And in doing so, viewers will be made privy to yet another form of evil this cruel patriarchy takes.
Never mind that Becka was doing what Gilead should have done all along. Yet again, it’s the young girls who are punished for the sins of their fathers, quite literally in this case. And therein lies the strength of this adaptation, which seeks to expand the source material through increasingly interesting, often harrowing means.
The Testaments continues to air on Disney+ every Wednesday.
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