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I think my issues with the "Nick was so much worse than Serena >:(((" and "You hate Serena because she is a vagina-haver" takes that people forget that Serena Joy was the one who wrote the laws for Gilead. And not just that.
She wrote an entire book about women's "biological destiny" is produce as many children as they can. And that was before Gilead. That was before being an actual warcriminal.
I think season 6 managed to water Serena down to a brainless cultist with a spiritual naivity, silly girl who thought women are the sacred vessel of God and she respected these women all along.
BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUuuuuuuuuuuuuullshit.
Serena spent the entire Season 1 abusing June physically and mentally for not getting pregnant.
No. Serena is a fertile woman with good upbringing and she had been preaching a lot about that every woman who has a healthy womb should submit to the cause of repopulating the Earth. ---> This is why she had been assassinated in the first place, got shot in the womb in the process and then this made her infertile. This is why her arc for fighting to becoming a mother started. Not before. Before that, she was just a power hungry preacher who fought for the "greater good" and was ready to sacrifice everyone for the "greater good".
Serena Joy was one of the CREATORS of Gilead who later realized that very system she created won't reward her and without a man on her side, SHE IS NOTHING. (the problem with season 6 that it applied this Gilead-narrative into the end game for the good guys too. that women without man with guns are nothing). It wasn't just an oopsy-daisy mistake. She and Fred happily rejoiced when their origanization started to kill people and bombing various places to fake terrorist attacks, so the Government can finally announce martial law.
Serena is NOT a victim. Maybe a victim of her own machinations and with it, patriarchy she actively supported. But bad things happening with Serena should have been an poetic justice. An artistic tool. Not a victimization so the audience would feel sympathy for her but also the characters also forget and FORGIVE about her crime. Or idk, she shouldn't have been reduced to this "I was just a sad stupid little girl who wanted to make daddy proud, I didn't know that killing people would end up people being dead. :(((("
Serena was so interesting to me because SHE KNEW exactly what she was doing. Only she miscalculated her own future role in it.
But what about Nick Blaine?
Nick is people of color with troubled upbringing. His mother is nowhere, his dad and older brother are alcoholic so he is the breadwinner of the family. Or at least he tries to be. He had trouble keeping his jobs. After Nick punched him in the face, the recruiter for Sons of Jacob recognized that he can brainwash this kid into their cause through promising him finanical safety and the safety of belonging. This is how Nick ended up in the system before Gilead.
Objectively? Nick and Serena are both warcriminals. They did horrible things to ensure the initial reign of Gilead. Serena through legislations in the background, and Nick through actual violence.
But because Nick being a Guardian/Eye makes people accociate of the current IRL situation of the US/ICE, people immediately getting enraged in the fandom so you can't have this conversation about fictional characters.
But I will say here:
The major difference between them is that Serena had IDEOLOGY.
Nick didn't have an ideology. He had nothing. Nick Blaine is the most morally grey character of the story beside June Osborn and this pisses off people even more if he was an actual villain. (Congratulation Season 6, you actually made Nick Blaine the moral villain of the story.)
I love both characters, but the Black & White moralization around them in the fandom is just so annoying.
