‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ Team Talks Show’s ‘Twisted Love Story,’ Moira’s Bold Decisions & More

We last saw The Handmaid’s Tale‘s June (Elisabeth Moss) on a train with baby Nichole, hoping to get as far away from Gilead as she possibly could. When the Hulu series returns on April 8 for its sixth and final season, viewers can expect June’s journey to take a detour.

“Episode 1 brings June and Serena [Yvonne Strahovski] back together,” Eric Tuchman, co-showrunner, writer, and executive producer, previewed to TV Insider on the red carpet at PaleyFest 2025 at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. “They’re really the heart of the show. It’s a kind of twisted love story. They can’t quit each other. They’re on their way away from Gilead in this [first] episode, thinking that they’re leaving it behind – but you can’t leave your past unresolved. It’s always going to catch up with you.”

Devotees of The Handmaid’s Tale will be treated to three episodes on premiere day (April 8). Does having multiple episodes drop at once affect how Tuchman and Yahlin Chang, co-showrunner, writer, and executive producer tell their stories?

“It really didn’t,” Chang says. “We didn’t know when we were coming up with stories the release schedule. We focus on making every single episode a stand-alone.”

Disney / Steve Wilkie

“We make sure that the ends of the episodes leave you with something juicy so that you’re eager to come back,” Tuchman adds.

Teasers for the first two episodes spoil that Moira (Samira Wiley) will make a bold decision, and that Luke (O-T Fagbenle) and Moira take a big risk. “Moira has made so many bold decisions,” offers Wiley. “I think she’s inspired June in so many ways, and I think this is a sort of return to that.”

“This show and this season are predicated on the questions, ‘What happens when enough is enough? What happens when change needs to happen?’” says Fagbenle. “I think we’ll see that that’s the case [this season].”

“There’s a message of hope, and also ‘don’t give up the fight,’” says Warren Littlefield, executive producer. “That’s what I think our characters achieved this year.”

Season 6, Chang confirms, is a direct pickup from Season 5’s finale. “I’d also say that there are so many surprises,” she adds. “You think the story is going in one direction, but then, it takes a big turn, and then, another turn.”

“Bruce Miller [executive producer/creator] knew for a long time how he wanted to bring the story to a conclusion,” says Tuchman. “It’s about June’s emotional journey.”

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Tuchman and Chang expanded the material in Margaret Atwood’s 1985 novel The Handmaid’s Tale. “Margaret is such a genius and such a strong writer,” Chang raves. “We could take a sentence out of the book and construct a whole new episode [around it]. We’re very lucky that way. We went very far beyond the book, but we are so lucky that the foundation that Margaret created was there and provided infinite story possibilities.”

Some of those possibilities could be explored in The Testaments, the sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale. But Tuchman and Chang won’t be the ones telling those stories. They confirmed to TV Insider that they are not moving on with the new series. “We’ve done our time in Gilead,” Tuchman says with a smile. “I’m escaping Gilead. I don’t know what freedom will bring.”

“We both have other shows we’d like to create and make,” says Chang.

As for Josh Charles’s character, Miller teases, “I don’t want to give too much away, but he plays a commander. He has a very big role this season and he has been spectacular.”

Can Miller promise not to bump off Charles’s new role? His fans are never going to get over Will Gardner’s untimely demise on The Good Wife. “I’ll do my best,” Miller chuckles.

The Handmaid’s Tale, Sixth and Final Premiere, Tuesday, April 8, Hulu

The Testaments, Series Premiere, TBA, Hulu