How Janine Will Shape The Future of Gilead In 'The Handmaid's Tale'
Blessed be the fruit!Warning: This article contains the ultimate spoiler. If you haven't read The Testaments, don't read it. I promise you, you will regret it.Consider Janine.She's Innocent, beautiful, brave, and in many ways more powerful than any other character in the show, even Aunt Lydia, who the showrunners described as the immortal spirit of Gilead. Out of all of the characters in The Handmaid's Tale, there's no one more loved or cherished by the fandom. At the beginning of season 4, there was a ripple throughout the community. It cropped up in every blank space where fans were allowed to comment. They did not want anyone touching a hair on Janine's head. This is the kind of thing studios take notice of. There are certain mistakes that the show cannot make without alienating their base, so they do everything they can to find out what those mistakes are--and they go to unimaginable lengths of find out. That's the only way to make a successful series. We made our voices heard. Nobody touches Janine. She is to be protected. That doesn't mean that they won't kill her off, but it does mean that her death would have to mean something. It also means that we will not tolerate a world without her for long--probably no longer than a few episodes.In that way, and in many others, Janine is as immortal as Aunt Lydia. It's because she has something that nobody else has: an unlimited capacity to believe. We can call it psychosis, and she does hallucinate, but it's more than that. It's the magic of a child, the ability to play and pretend, and the faith to believe in fantasies. She can see past the flesh rotting off of unwomen's bones, past the brutalities in the Red Center, and the horrors of the Putnam house, and she can dream about a world where Gilead is no more. She believes that that world is coming, not just because June told her so, or because nothing lasts forever, but because she has to believe. She can never be fully present when women are passed around like cattle, or when talking back in a propaganda session can get your eye gouged out. That's not the world she wants to live in, so she won't live there.In a sense, there's power in that. Psychosis and dissociation are defense mechanisms that keep us from experiencing moments of torment and pain. This protects Janine. Gilead can't hurt her the way it hurts everyone else, because she can disconnect. Then there's her faith, which may or may not be an acting force in the universe of Handmaid's Tale. But it is a plot device. She's no longer in the colonies. She sees Angela. She brought her baby back from the brink of death.I would argue that faith is a force in the show. Luke buried a persimmon in his backyard (an old folk magick practice), then June escaped from Gilead. He had faith that God was watching over her, and things worked out just the way he needed them to. After Janine's moment of faith, she was set free from the colonies. Emily found her way to Toronto. God had a plan, just like Janine said. They've put too much work into illustrating the power of faith for us to discount it.I think we'll see Janine work more miracles in the coming episodes, especially this season, and I'll explain why below.
