WARNING: The following contains reference to potentially disturbing content, including violence and sexual assault.
On The Handmaid's Tale, why is June Osborne's (Elisabeth Moss) daughter Hannah Bankole (Jordana Blake) so scared of her mother? During The Handmaid's Tale season 3 finale, June gives up a chance to escape Gilead in favor of martyring herself to ensure 86 children make it safely out of the country. Season 4 starts with June dealing with the consequences of her actions, leading to an unexpected reunion with Hannah. The interaction is more unbearable to watch than the physical abuse June endures: her punishment for failing to reveal the hiding place of her fellow Handmaids.
Hannah's whereabouts are unknown throughout most of season 1, although June's tight bond with her is established through flashbacks. Mother and daughter see each other for the first time in years during season 2's "The Last Ceremony." Once June gets her newborn daughter Nichole out of Gilead, she spends season 3 repeatedly trying to gain access to her eldest child. June's actions eventually drive Hannah's new parents to flee to parts unknown, ensuring that June's fate is tied to the country that continues to hold her daughter hostage.
Even by The Handmaid's Tale standards, season 4, episode 3 "The Crossing" is dark and gruesome, but the physical violence is eventually replaced by a different kind of torture: Gilead using Hannah to break June down to her lowest point. While fans may have been hoping for a heartfelt reunion, Hannah's reaction to seeing June is fear. It's hard to conceive that Hannah doesn't recognize June, but it speaks to how easily Gilead has indoctrinated children like Hannah into the totalitarian regime.
Hannah is no different than the young boy in Canada who doesn't understand or care about Gilead's politics; he views it as his home. Aunt Lydia, Mrs. MacKenzie, and Commander Lawrence have all told June how her attempts to reconnect with Hannah have caused the girl emotional pain. What's unclear is if any of this has been conveyed to Hannah directly. Does she know June's the reason she lost her beloved Martha or why she had to leave her school, home, and friends? During The Handmaid's Tale season 2, Hannah remembers being taken from June, but those traumatic memories appear to have faded, undoubtedly expedited by some brainwashing. Hannah's probably been told very little, and whatever she knows is a twisted perversion of the truth because keeping girls ignorant is how Gilead can perpetuate the cycle of rape, abuse, and subjugation.
The encounter leaves June devastated, leading June to beg Aunt Lydia to kill her. June struggles to understand why Hannah is scared of her but not of "them." In discussing the source material, Margaret Atwood's book The Handmaid's Tale, the show's creator Bruce Miller told TheWrap, “nothing happens in the book to people that doesn’t happen in real life [...] And in a terrible way, ours is the sanitized version of what they would do to poor Hannah in some countries these days.” Using Hannah to get June to betray her friends works, but the bigger question is how the heartbreaking revelation that her daughter doesn't recognize her will affect June longterm. Critics of the series have expressed frustration with the violence and increasing implausibility of June's story. Will she finally accept Gilead has her daughter's allegiance and flee to Canada to reunite with Luke and Nichole?
Atwood's 2019 sequel novel The Testaments, which takes 15 years after the events of the first book, reveals Hannah's fate, and Hulu picked up the rights for Miller to adapt. According to Cinema Blend, Miller's comments at a recent press event hint that aspects of The Testaments could be incorporated into future episodes of The Handmaid's Tale which has already been greenlit for a fifth season. If Miller stays true to the source material, a happy ending for June and Hannah isn't coming anytime soon.