Emily (Ofglen), The Handmaid’s Tale

Plot Overview

The Handmaid’s Tale is based on the novel with the same name by Margaret Atwood, and is a story set in a near-future totalitarian theocracy, where population is facing dangerously low reproduction rates, and in which women’s rights were taken away and society was reorganized along a hierarchical regime inspired by religious fanaticism.

Handmaids are fertile women assigned to men of the ruling class (Commanders) to bear children. They have no freedom, are routinely raped by their Commanders as part of the “Ceremony” and are forbidden to read. Marthas are older, infertile women who are used as servants.

Homosexuality is punishable by death and referred to as “gender treachery”, although if women are also fertile, they are “sentenced to redemption” because “God has seen fit to make you fruitful, and by that we are bound”, and (re-)assigned as handmaids.

Ofglen/Emily (Alexis Bledel)

(Season 1, Episodes 1-5)

Ofglen was the handmaid Offred/June first went shopping with. They met daily outside the house, and June initially referred to her as a “pious little shit” before, at the end of the pilot, Ofglen told June she was sorry about her friend (Moira) and they talked for the first time.

Ofglen was a lesbian, used to be a college professor of cellular biology and had been married with a 5 year old son, Oliver. Her wife and son had Canadian passports, but she didn’t, and was caught at the airport. She also told June she was a part of a resistance network and encouraged her to join them and find information about the Commander she was assigned to. At the end of episode 2, instead of Ofglen, June was greeted by a new handmaid assigned in her place.

Her fate was revealed in episode 1×03: Ofglen, whose real name was Emily, had been caught in a relationship with a Martha. They were both taken to a mock-trial and immediately sentenced of gender treachery. The Martha (real name never revealed) was sentenced to death and hanged, while Emily watched from the back of a van. Emily meanwhile was sentenced to female genital mutilation (“things will be so much easier for you now. You won’t want what you cannot have.”) and then reassigned as a handmaid.

She was missing from episode 1×04.

Emily appeared in episode 1×05, with a new name “Ofsteven”, assigned to a new Commander. June/Offred ran into her while shopping, but Emily could only manage to tell her that she was fine. She had another scene at her new home, playing with the dog when the wife of her new Commander offered to skip the ceremony, claiming she had the flu. Emily replied that she couldn’t be sick every month.

At the end of the episode, with the handmaids out shopping, Emily managed to talk to June again. She told her her real name was Emily, and told her about “Mayday”, a resistance movement, then stole a car used by the eyes and drove around the perimeter, running over one of the guards before she was stopped and presumably shot off screen.

In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, show-runner Bruce Miller confirmed that the death was intentionally ambiguous, and 1×05 was Alexis Bledel’s final episode in the season.

Alexis Bledel was promoted to series regular in Season 2.

Early Criticism

During a panel at the Tribeca Film Festival, the cast and showrunner drew criticism for not using the term “feminist” to describe the show:

“I don’t feel like it’s a male or female story; it’s a survival story,” – showrunner Bruce Miller.

“For me, [The Handmaid’s Tale is] not a feminist story. It’s a human story because women’s rights are human rights. […] I never intended to play Offred as a feminist. They’re women, and they’re humans. Offred’s a wife, a mother, a best friend. You know, she has a job. And she is a person who’s not supposed to be a hero, and she falls into it. And she kind of does what she has to do to survive, to find her daughter. It’s about love, honestly, so much of this story. So for me, you know, I never approach anything with any sort of, like, political agenda. I approach it from a very human place, I hope.” – Elisabeth Moss (Offred)

“That’s not the reason I got involved. I personally heard about all the other people involved in this show, and I thought, ‘Oh my God, I need to be there.’ . . . I think that any story, if it is a story being told by a strong, powerful woman. . . any story that’s just a powerful woman owning herself in any way is automatically deemed ‘feminist.’ But it’s just a story about a woman. I don’t think that this is any sort of feminist propaganda. I think that it’s a story about women and about humans. . . This story affects all people.” – Madeline Brewer (Janine)

The ensuing blowback prompted several of the cast to call it a feminist work. Moss clarified her statements “I’m not sure that that was exactly what I was trying to say, or what we were trying to say,” hours before Hulu released the first three episodes to stream. “I wanted to say ― and I’ll just say it right here, right now ― OBVIOUSLY, all caps, it is a feminist work. It is a feminist show.”

Bruce Miller told Vulture: “This is absolutely a feminist show. I mean, I hope it’s going to be received that way! I’d be thrilled if it was perceived as a feminist show. I always considered it a feminist book and a feminist story, and it was one of the most important books for me in understanding how feminism works together with politics and religion and social interactions in ways that were illuminating to me. This is undoubtedly a feminist story.”

Read more:

• Afterellen – The Dead Lesbian Problem in the Handmaid’s Tale S1.E3 Recap.
• The Hollywood Reporter – Surprise Return, Devastating Twist
• The Hollywood Reporter – Rape, Mutilation and That Shocking Death Explained

Appearances:

• 4 episodes. 1x01-1x03, 1x05

Female love interests:

• Martha 6715-301 💀 (Laura Wilson, lesbian, guest, 1 episode)
• Wife (unknown, off-screen, only mentioned)

Relationship story arc with a woman: No

No male love interests

Relationship story arc with a man: No

Male love interest after being identified as a lesbian? No

Filter Relationship Arc:

• None

Storyline during sweeps? No

[1] A relationship story arc is defined as explicit, developed on screen, and lasting more than 3 episodes. It is listed as questionable or subtext if romance is only implied, mentioned instead of shown on screen, part of a dream sequence, or otherwise not explicit for the viewer.
[2] Sweeps episodes air in February, May, July and November, the periods when advertising rates are set. A character is marked as "sweeps" when there is a very limited number of episodes that address their sexuality, all air during sweeps period, and the storyline is otherwise ignore/dropped.