Lucy Halliday Cast as Daisy in ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Sequel ‘The Testaments’

Exciting news for anyone who’s been hooked on ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’—the story isn’t over yet. According to Variety, Hulu’s upcoming sequel series, ‘The Testaments’, just locked in a fresh face for one of its key roles. Lucy Halliday, a young Scottish actress, has been cast as Daisy, a character who’s set to shake things up in the dystopian world of Gilead. This new show picks up years after the original series, and I can’t wait to see how it all unfolds.

Halliday isn’t a total stranger to the screen, even though she’s still early in her career. She caught attention with her role as Lois in ‘Blue Jean’, a 2022 indie film about a teacher facing tough personal challenges in 1980s Britain. That performance earned her a Scottish BAFTA for best actress, which is no small feat. She’s also been busy lately, wrapping up a part in ‘California Schemin’’, a movie directed by James McAvoy about two Scots pulling off a wild music industry scam. Clearly, she’s got range, and now she’s stepping into a much bigger spotlight.

So, who’s Daisy? She’s a Canadian teenager whose life flips upside down when she learns she’s tied to Gilead, the oppressive regime we’ve come to know so well. ‘The Testaments’ is based on Margaret Atwood’s 2019 novel of the same name, set 15 years after the events of ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’. Daisy’s one of three main characters driving the story, alongside Aunt Lydia and Agnes. If you’ve followed the original show, you might guess some connections, but I’ll keep it vague—let’s just say her journey is going to pull her deep into Gilead’s mess.

Aunt Lydia, played by Ann Dowd, is the only familiar face confirmed to return so far. Dowd’s been a standout in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’, bringing that chilling mix of strictness and hidden layers to the role. She’s joined by Chase Infiniti, who’ll play Agnes, another young woman caught up in Gilead’s web. Together, these three are set to explore how this twisted society starts to crack from the inside. Bruce Miller, the guy behind ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’, is running the show again, so we’re in steady hands.

‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ wraps up with its sixth and final season in April 2025, and ‘The Testaments’ is gearing up to take the baton. The original series, which kicked off in 2017, turned Atwood’s 1985 novel into a gripping TV hit, following June Osborne’s fight against Gilead’s brutal rules. Now, with June’s story ending, I’m curious how Daisy’s arc will tie into that legacy. There’s talk that Elisabeth Moss, who plays June, might pop in as a guest star, given her character’s links to Agnes and Daisy in the book. Nothing’s set in stone, though.

Halliday’s casting feels like a bold choice. She’s young, but she’s already shown she can handle heavy roles. ‘Blue Jean’ had her tackling some real emotional weight, and ‘The Testaments’ will likely demand even more. Daisy’s got a lot on her plate—figuring out her past and facing Gilead head-on. It’s a big leap from indie films to a high-stakes series like this, but I’ve got a good feeling about her pulling it off.

With ‘The Testaments’, Hulu’s diving back into Atwood’s world, where power, resistance, and survival clash in brutal ways. The novel won the Booker Prize in 2019, sharing the honor with Bernardine Evaristo’s ‘Girl, Woman, Other’, so the story’s got serious cred. We don’t have a release date yet, but with the main cast shaping up—Halliday, Dowd, and Infiniti—it’s starting to feel real. Gilead’s not done with us, and I’m ready to see where Daisy takes this next chapter.