Dan is a minor character in the second season of The Handmaid's Tale. He was a college professor and Emily's supervisor prior to the rise of Gilead.
Story[]
In a period shortly after the D.C. attacks, Emily is seen giving a lecture on microbiology. After the class, Emily chats with Dan, a senior member of faculty staff. He tells her that she will be getting more research time; the bad news is that it's because she won't teaching next semester: “you should think of this as an opportunity.”
He tells her that someone expressed concerns that she isn't maintaining a healthy teaching environment but this is mainly due to the fact that Emily is a lesbian and keeps a picture of her wife Sylvia and their son on her phone. Dan reveals that he moved all pictures of his partner named Paul from his office due to increasing and career-limiting prejudice, to which Emily responds, “they can’t scare us back into the closet”. Dan then says that there is unrest because of the “terrorist attack” in Washington but Emily ignores the risk and tells him that she's teaching next semester anyway.[1]
Emily sees a homophobic slur spray-painted on the ground below her while walking through a raised walkway connecting two academic buildings; a rope is visible through one of its windows. She rushes down the stairs to the ground floor to see Dan's lifeless body hanging above the graffiti.[1]
Relationships[]
- Paul: partner.