The Handmaid's Tale is still "riding on Margaret Atwood's coat tails," says showrunner Bruce Miller

After The Handmaid’s Tale‘s frustrating season two finale, showrunner Bruce Miller has a lot to answer for from fans.

The season was the first not to be directly based on Margaret Atwood’s book, and at some points viewers thought it got too dark.

But speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, Miller described how, even if they’re not directly adapting Atwood’s work, the author is still the one guiding the story.

“I really think we’re still riding on Margaret’s coattails. Aren’t we all, really, riding on Margaret Atwood’s coattails through the world?” Miller said.

“She’s our guiding light, and the book, the world that it created, is certainly, we feel… The audience, I think, feels that we’re moving off from the central story, but we spend so much time talking about the things that happen in the book, and what are the next things that might happen.”

Miller added that even though the show has moved on from Atwood’s original work, any recognition it receives is “a testament to what she did and what kind of relevance it can have 30 years after it was published.”

The showrunner added: “That’s a miracle of literary genius I don’t think we can even approach.”

Miller also addressed fan frustration when it came to the season two finale.

“I like the fact that people are frustrated; I was frustrated,” Miller said.

“I’m glad that people are annoyed by what [June] did and have questions about what she did, and I think the reviews help me see how people feel about it because I know how I feel about the moment.

“But you can’t really tell how people are going to react until you get there,” he added.

The Handmaid’s Tale airs on Hulu in the US and Channel 4 in the UK.

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