The Handmaid’s Tale’s Final Season Kicks Off With [Spoiler]’s Shocking Return — Read Episode 1 Recap

Editor’s note: This recap covers the first installment of The Handmaid’s Tale’s three-episode Season 6 premiere. Go here for a recap of Episode 2 and here for a recap of Episode 3.

There’s a moment at the end of The Handmaid’s Tale’s Season 6 premiere that feels like a reward for longtime viewers, and blessed be the bright spot after such a long stretch of darkness. If you’re a fan of this show, you’re aware of how disturbing it can get and how unrelenting the tragedy visited upon June Osborne and her loved ones can be. Holding out hope for Hannah’s return, or Janine’s liberation, or… anything, really, by this point in the Hulu drama’s final run can feel like a fool’s errand. Damn that excellent writing and awards-caliber acting!

But when June hears someone calling her name after arriving at a refugee center in the hour’s final moments, and we recognize that person’s voice after such a long time of not hearing it, damned if that hope didn’t pop up again like the first daffodil after a particularly harsh winter. Will it die, soon, and via violent means? Most likely. But let’s just bask in the beauty for a minute or two first, cool?

Read on for a recap of Episode 1, “The Train.” And after that, check out my post mortem chat with stars Elisabeth Moss and Yvonne Strahovski.

OFF THE RAILS | Presumably, June did have a diaper — albeit one far too big for little Noah — because she’s rocking him in the last car of the train as the premiere gets underway. Nichole is in her stroller nearby. When Serena returns from wherever she was, she takes the infant back so he can nurse and so she can attempt to make small talk. She asks about June’s arm and is shocked to hear that a truck ran her over the day before. “Always look both ways,” June deadpans. “Well, you are one exceptionally tough woman,” Serena says, which is the understatement of the year. June whispers that Gilead tried to kill her. “Seems they are unhappy with both of us,” Serena replies a little too chirpily for my taste; you two are not the same, woman! “The enemy of my enemy is my friend,” she goes on, but June isn’t having it. “On a case-by-case basis,” June says flatly.

As the conversation continues, there’s a lot of eye-rolling on June’s part, and with good reason: Serena is all “We’re safe! It’s all good! God is smiling on us! Onward and upward!” An exhausted June falls asleep and dreams of Hannah, grown now and dressed in the purple that signifies she’s being trained as a wife. When she wakes up, Nichole is nowhere to be found.

June’s instant, all-encompassing panic doesn’t last long — she finds Serena tending to both kids elsewhere in the car — but her anger does. She spits that Serena should never do that again; Serena explains that she didn’t want to wake her. “I was concerned that you might be ill-tempered if you didn’t get enough rest. Silly me,” Mrs. Waterford quips.

I should note here that June isn’t doing so well; she’s possibly feverish, on the edge of fainting, and she doesn’t have much food for her or Nichole. Though she refuses Serena’s help, she gets it anyway: Serena brings a doctor back to see June, who only agrees to let him examine her (diagnosis: ruptured sutures, a little infection) in exchange for the use of a satellite phone afterward.

‘I WISH THAT HELPED’ | June gets a call through to Moira, who lets her know Luke has been arrested and is in jail after sacrificing himself at the train station. “God’s justice will prevail,” Serena reassures her. “Your family will be together again.” But June’s like, um, remember Hannah? “She was kidnapped, and she’s still a prisoner.” At least Serena has the good grace to look chagrined; she apologizes. June has other (bad) news: Vancouver is overwhelmed, and they won’t let the train full of refugees disembark in the city. June is very sad, and Serena offering her help doesn’t make anything better, but Serena is Glinda-like in her determination to assist. “I need to, after everything,” she says, and that reasoning sits well with June, who acquiesces with a simple “OK.”

Serena, who is sorely in need of a sudoku book or something to keep her busy, in the most annoying way possible creates space in the car that’s just for women and children, and the refugees share their stories. June tells the story of how Hannah was taken in the forest, half a mile from the Canadian border. “That’s awful,” Serena says, and I wonder if it’s the first time she’s hearing this. June tears up as she remembers how the soldiers pulled her daughter from her arms. (Side note: I still maintain that the sequence where the Osbornes get captured in the series’ premiere is one of the show’s most harrowing.) “I’m sorry,” Serena says. “I know,” June answers, “I wish that helped.”

THROW MOMMA FROM THE TRAIN | The sister-love hour is about to come to a halt, however. The doctor who treated June pulls her aside, ostensibly to check her sutures but really to whisper her that Serena is a war criminal traveling under false papers, and an official is on the way to come get her. “Just promise me that we will keep her baby safe,” June says back evenly, but the doctor doesn’t answer. Instead, he asks Serena if he can look at Noah, and as he examines the boy, he calmly lets Mrs. Waterford know that he recognizes her from when she and Fred visited the Gilead fertility center where he worked. He eventually hands the baby back to Serena, but not before outing her to the entire car.

The women, understandably, get angry. June tries to deescalate the situation by telling everyone that police are on their way to arrest Serena, which terrifies the new mom. “If I am arrested in Canada, they will give Noah back to the Wheelers and I will never see him again. June, please help me,” she pleads.

So June does step in… which Serena sees as her cue to start spouting off about how before Gilead, “America was full of whores.” (Side note: I needed a laugh in this episode, and I got one when June immediately commands, “Serena, SHUT UP.”)  Unsurprisingly, Serena does not shut up, going on about how the refugees’ missing children weren’t taken but “saved.” Oy. Things don’t get any better when the police officer finally arrives, examines Serena’s papers… and determines that they’re legit, leaving her to the whim of the increasingly violent assembly.

June steps in once more and begs the man to arrest Serena, knowing that doing so will keep her and Noah safe. But he won’t — because his wife was sent to the Colonies, and his son died, and he wants Serena to receive every single molecule of bad stuff coming her way.

AN UNANNOUNCED STOP | I cannot stress to you how quickly things spiral from this point. The doctor helps clear the children from the car, and then the vengeance-seeking crowd descends upon Serena… who’s still got Noah strapped to her chest in a carrier. That doesn’t get in the way of their shoving her around, and when June realizes that she can’t stop what’s about to happen, she begs Serena to hand her the infant. But the stubborn commander’s widow won’t, so June does the only thing she can think of: She pulls the emergency brake, and the train screeches to a halt. She manages to pull Serena to the space between cars and barricade the door, but the angry mob immediately starts beating at the glass.

The only chance Serena and her son have at survival is to jump from the train into the dark night, but she won’t do it. (Not defending her here, but it’s pitch black out there; I understand her hesitance to cannonball into the unknown.) So June makes the hard choice like she ALWAYS HAS TO, and when the throng breaks the glass as the train starts to chug back to life, she pushes her former mistress (and Noah) off the train.

MEET NICK’S FATHER-IN-LAW | Let’s take a break from this week’s second saddest train ride to see what’s going on elsewhere. In Gilead, Nick is brought to New Bethlehem, released from his handcuffs, and left to talk with High Commander Wharton (played by The Good Wife‘s Josh Charles), who is Rose’s dad. Nick says he “wasn’t thinking straight” when he hit Commander Lawrence, and Wharton says he’ll help him smooth things over. But he also suggests that Nick leave June alone once and for all in order to make sure he has a “bright future.” We learn that the high commander is stationed in Washington, D.C., but he’s planning on sticking around for a while — especially because Rose is expecting.

Meanwhile, in Toronto, Tuello tells Moira that anti-refugee sentiment is at an all-time high, Gilead is making progress in its identity-rehab campaign (aka other countries are starting to think it’s not so bad), and that the refugee office likely will be shut down in the near future. “So that’s that. We’re done fighting back?” she wonders, offering to help him with whatever he’s planning. After all, she was held prisoner at Jezebel’s, and she escaped by killing a commander. “Well, that’s something,” he says, impressed.

‘SWEETHEART?’ | OK, now for the best part of the episode: an actual moment of light and hope for June! After the clamor dies down, June holds Nichole and falls asleep. When she wakes, she’s in Alaska. When she arrives at the refugee camp she’s met with a sobering sight: The American flag, now with just two white stars (Alaska and Hawaii, I presume). Oof. She waits in a long line to be seen by medical staff, and she’s near tears with the enormity of everything that’s happened when a woman in scrubs yells, “June Osborne? Sweetheart?” And that’s when we see that June’s mother, Holly — whom we’ve only seen in flashback and who was presumed dead at the Colonies or soon-to-be-dead at the Colonies — is alive and working at the camp! “Mom,” June breathes, and the two women embrace. BLESSED BE!

Now it’s your turn. What did you think of the premiere? Grade it via the poll below, then hit the comments with your thoughts!