Produced for Hulu Plus, The Handmaids Tale (THT) is a long-format adaptation of Margaret Attwood’s 1985 novel and a leading example of high-end drama originated for Internet-distributed television. THT’s setting is the nightmarish Gilead, the post-apocalyptic, faux-theocratic and totalitarian society that has usurped most of America. Absolute rule by a fundamentalist patriarchy and the biological imperative to procreate combine to legitimate the ritual rape of enslaved fertile women by Gilead’s leaders. THT’s primary character is June Osborne (Elisabeth Moss) who, having been captured, enslaved and ascribed ‘Handmaid’ status, is assigned to Commander Fred Waterford (Joseph Fiennes). In its narrative structure and approaches, THT exemplifies the drama form that I term ‘complex serial’ (Dunleavy 2018), this term foregrounding the use of up to six strategies which together manifest ‘complex seriality’ (ibid.: 105). Although these strategies also differentiate ‘complex’ from traditional high-end serials, it can be argued that complexity itself – especially when subject to expectations for commercial success and longevity – requires some reconciliation between the use of identifiably ‘complex’ and more conventional (or simplistic) strategies. This chapter argues that the reconciliation between complexity and simplicity in THT occurs in its deployment of a situational construct devised to restrict, though not evade, narrative progression. A notable example of the tension between progression and stasis for THT and the ‘moment’ chosen for analysis here is the succession of scenes that comprise the riveting, yet frustrating closing minutes of Season 2.