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glasskey · 7 months

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Nick's Playlist

This one’s moody listen and it seems our rebellious hero, June Osborne, just can’t stop hitting that replay button no matter how hard she tries. It’s okay June, neither can we. Today I’m going to look beneath all the romance to try and decode our mutinous young commander. Welcome to our Noir resident bad boy playlist.

Everybody Breaks

This is possibly Blaine’s most famous line and it’s a confession, a warning and a prediction all in one. It sums up the Nick Blaine we first encounter and the one who ends up delivering that sweet right hook to Lawrence in the middle of his marriage festivities, yet somehow they’re a world apart……track 1; Everybody Breaks.

Nick’s realised something; June doesn’t seem to care about or understand the rules. Now the Eyes have been called and Nick thinks it’s time for a little Gilead truth bomb “it’s not about being tough or brave, brave isn’t a part of any of this……Everybody breaks….Everybody.” This is the first time we see Nick speak to June with an unmasked honesty, and while he may have intended to warn her, it’s now abundantly clear that Nick has some ghosts of his own. This is Nick version 1; afraid, alone, distrustful and broken. This is Nick resigned to servitude, to the inevitability that his cage means “it’s going to end the same way no matter what you do”. This is Nick, unwilling to step out of line, and yet here he is sticking his neck out making a bid on June’s behalf with the Eyes, to keep the wolf from the door.

While Nick may be full of reproach, he’s unintentionally told her something personal and as a result, the first chink in his armor appears. His warning to comply and resign herself to her inevitable fate is reflected beautifully when Blaine looks in his rear view to see her defiantly glaring back at him, she not only won’t be broken, but she’ll show him what real fighting looks like.

The cracks start to appear almost immediately, first he’s coming to her room alone, next he’s fessing up to being an Eye, then he’s secreting her away at The Boston Globe, before you know it he’s dragging her rapist out into a forest to die and finally in season 5 he’s laying down the law in a room full of Commanders. “Everybody breaks”……how little he knows at that point how prophetic that will be for him. June is for all intents and purposes, his breaking point.

I should've Just driven away with you.

Is it hot in here? Nick comes to June’s room with a handful of ice and instead of handing it to her he cups it in her hand and strokes it. This is one of those instances where touching hands is enough to raise the temperature by about 20 degrees.

This method of the intimate but almost casual touch is often used in period dramas where any type of incidental physical contact is a big deal and pashing someone is something you only ever do with your intended. June may have previously flirtatiously flashed a bit of knee but this right here is where it all begins, it’s the first time he’s actually touched her and it’s no coincidence that it’s the start of all their hand brushing. From then on all the hand brushing is like a secret message between the two, a reassurance of love and support.

From the second half of season 4 and most of season 5 all the hand brushing business was gone, granted there wasn’t much of an opportunity but that really was the point, the two lovers were separated. At the end of season 5 Nick visits June in the hospital and for the first time in almost 2 seasons we see him brush her hand and she stirs in her sleep, somehow she feels him there….here we go.

This sentiment of running away together, echoes throughout the seasons. These two are the very definition of “love through the barricades” and their impossible dream reveals the excruciating reality of war. This is the first time we hear Nick express his desire, it’s just a foundling idea of escapism with no solid destination at this point, but this “voice beneath the floorboards” grows increasingly louder and louder throughout the seasons. Here we see that Nick’s officially started to figuratively flirt with the idea of freedom, and as he walks out of the room he looks back at her and sighs, she’s trouble, the whole thing is trouble, but he just CAN’T help himself.

I'm just a driver

This is the first and only time we have seen Nick and Luke together and their exchange is gripping from start to finish. This few minutes provides us with an insight into how different and similar these two men are at their core:

Nick the portrait of stoicism, downplays his importance in everything, he’s wary and reluctant to engage, but he can’t leave Canada without sending June’s family word of her well being. Luke tries to be rational but he’s sensitive and becomes emotional, having said that, no one should blame him for his response to Nick’s news. The first and only time he’s laid eyes on Nick is when he was opening the car door for the Waterford’s, so as far as he knows they’re all in cahoots.

One might argue that Nick telling Luke that he and June are pals should be good enough and initially it is, but add to this the devastating news that his wife is now pregnant to the New wave version of Hitler, he understandably becomes a little emotional. It’s not an unusual reaction, in our everyday lives it’s those in closest proximity that usually bear the brunt of our frustrations. So why doesn’t Nick admit to the parentage of his own child? As horrifying as it is, a commander is expected by Gilead law to impregnate the handmaids, but what the fuck would a driver be doing impregnating his wife? It’s up to June to tell Luke about this and he knows it.

The first time Nick sights Luke he’s holding a huge picture of June with her family, for the first time Nick is confronted by the reality of her stolen former life. The three of them look blissful in the photograph and holding it is her enraged husband, Nick understands Luke’s love and grief all too well. He does the one thing he can do; brings news of her to her desperate, mourning family. At first Luke doesn’t seem particularly grateful, he’s gutted that Waterford is using his wife as a walking womb and pushes Nick out the door. Suddenly realizing that Nick is his only link to his wife and daughter, he takes after him with questions and a message for June.

The shot in the doorway is bathed in red light, there’s a certain sense of intimacy and closeness in this moment, reflecting the bond these 2 men share in the woman they both love. “You tell her I’ll never stop” Luke says, but unconsciously he speaks for Nick as well. Ever the enigma, Nick minimises his importance to June, referring to himself as “just a driver” and disappears into the descending shadows, but it won’t be long before Luke will learn the truth about the man he met that night.

I'm trying to keep you alive

Beneath the romance lies a deeply symbolic connection between Nick and June and despite its incredible importance, it’s one that’s easily missed. Ever notice how June is constantly bathed in a glowing golden light around Nick? Well that’s because June Osborn represents freedom, a breath of new hope, and in season 1 and 2 Nick Blaine falls deeply in love with the incarnation of his own liberty and that of his country.

While he sacrificed this dream for the sake of June and Holly’s freedom, and acquiesced to become the good little soldier throughout seasons 3, 4 and 5, his constant longing for freedom could clearly still be seen beneath the veneer. Nick Blaine was introduced as a character disillusioned by the political landscape of his country and deceived into a fascist dictatorship. He for all intents and purposes is the personification of the imprisonment of America’s masses, while June represents freedom and rebellion. Together these two conceive the embodiment of what will become the liberty of their country. Almost everything that Nick Blaine does and says, and the entire landscape of Nick and June’s relationship, can be reframed to match this analogy. If this is true, then the Nick and June endgame is a self fulfilling prophecy, for The Testaments tells us that one day Gilead will fall and America will be free. It is no coincidence that just as he holds Holly in his arms, his eyes filling with tears of joy and June tells him she loves him for the first time. This symbolic union is concrete evidence that Nick and only Nick could be her father, for Fred would NEVER have the capacity, nor possess the desire to give life to rebellion.

“I’m trying to keep you alive” Blaine says dressed from head to foot in military commander garb, June lies helpless on the ground and at the front lines a war is raging. In his heart he tries to keep the dream of liberty alive. June slowly rises to her feet, their eyes meet and a blinding light surrounds them. As he kneels in the van pleading with June to allow him to help her, he is literally begging for that dream of freedom not to die.

Ultimately the Handmaid’s must be given up for June to survive and freedom to prevail, like troops being sacrificed in battle for the greater good. Blaine understands sacrifice all too well, before he was Military fodder he was the Waterford’s whipping boy and before that he was the forgotten bottom of America’s working class. There’s not a day he’s lived that he’s known actual freedom and he’ll do just about anything to keep the one person, who gave him a glimpse, alive.

God is not to be mocked

Ever notice how Fred is always showing up to ruin all those special Nick and June moments? Well this is officially the last time that’s ever going to happen. You see dear old Fred’s about to have a very, very bad day (or night as the case may be) and it is undoubtedly one of the most satisfying things you will ever watch. Nick Blaine spends so much time standing in the shadows and playing fetch and carry, that people lose their ever loving minds when he finally steps up and becomes a bit of a boss. Just prior to June chasing Fred down like a dog and tearing him apart, comes one of the most gratifying Nick moments you will ever see. Nick comes and collects Fred from the border and gives him THIS look....

I think it’s fair to say that right there, Fred should have already known he was dead AF. Marching his belligerent former master through a cold dark forest, Nick delivers a vicious back hand across Fred’s whiny mouth sending him to his knees. It’s a call back to a slap Fred gave June in season 2 when he’d been helpless to act. Aside from holding his child for the first time, it was also the closest we ever saw Blaine to tears. In that dark forest it is not only June, but Nick who reclaims his power back from Fred. Fred has stolen his pride and laid claim to the woman he loves, and at last it’s finally time to make him bleed for it. When he kisses June in front of him he blatantly exposes Fred’s sense of control as nothing more than delusion, he’s been duped by the two lovers. As June comes over the hill towards them, she is surrounded by light and Nick stares at her with adoration.

“God is not to be mocked, whatever a man sows, so shall he reap” Blaine says, delivering his most notable “fuck around and find out” speeches to date. This entire scene is a stunning callback to the Noir sequence at the end of Nightshade, and it’s evident that here Blaine’s also speaking for himself, for throughout the seasons we’ve seen Nick sow the seeds of freedom again and again. Now he’s brought liberty and rebellion herself a blood sacrifice to feed the soil, she looks at him with love and thanks him…..inevitably these seeds must bloom.

In season 1 Nick attempted to sever ties with June, but this is season 4 and June is everything to him, she is the lover, the leader, the creator and the destroyer. Fred is about to find out exactly what that last one means.

I'm nothing

Easily my favorite track on the whole Nick Playlist, this is where Blaine finally crosses over and tells Gilead to go fuck themselves and IT IS AWESOME. Being the finale this was of course a stand out episode for season 5 and Blaine’s walk across the bridge was a huge season highlight.

It signified an incredible moment of growth for his character, the attempt on June’s life being the catalyst for change needed to push him over the edge, or the bridge as it were. Nick finally made the choice we always knew he would: he would prefer to die at the barricades for freedom, than live in slavery for the rest of his life. Tuello and Blaine finally strike a deal for June and Nicole’s safety and his eventual immunity, in exchange for becoming a government spy. Tuello and Blaine stand together looking in on June framed in the hospital windows like eyes, a sign of their burgeoning partnership. Nick gets 5 minutes alone with June, the hospital room is silent and ghostly and he watches her sleep. He strokes her hand and she gently rouses, it’s time to fight again.

“It’s best she doesn’t know I was here” he says and while Tuello acquiesces, you just KNOW come season 6, June’s going to find out and personally I cannot wait. Tuello has increasingly become the voice of reason in the last few seasons and there’s one thing he is dying to know, Why the Hell didn’t Nick run away with June when he had the chance? “She doesn’t need me. I’m nothing.” Blaine says to a visibly gob smacked Tuello. His face softens and his voice cracks just a little as he reassures the young commander “No you’re not Commander, not to her.” June is his liberty and she has not forgotten him, one day he will be free.

“You will never let her go will you” Rose asks Nick, having witnessed his act of dissent in a room full of commanders, “I can’t…I tried, I really tried” he sighs. In The Handmaid’s Tale, freedom and true love are the highest rewards, for Nick and June these are intimately intertwined. Where 4 09 had left me a crushed wailing mess, 5 10 gave us a glimmer of hope and it came in the most unlikely of places. In storytelling, one hallmark of earning the reward of true love is to humble yourself before it entirely, to fight for its namesake with no expectation of reward. When Blaine signed Tuello’s contract and said those two words; that is exactly what he did.