Outlander Season Two, Episode Three: Not So Useless After All

First off, I want to apologize for the delay as I've been quite busy with real life and so it's been a bit hard to bang out a recap and review worthy of a read. So here we are on episode three out of thirteen and even though so much has happened in the past three episodes, there is still so much more to go. Crazy right? So let's get down to business and discuss those useful occupations.

There were certainly several key point that the show highlighted and focused on. Jamie has been run ragged working to undermine the Jacobite cause of Charles Stuart and Claire has been bored as hell doing nothing but attending teas and card games with Louise and Mary. Claire is a woman who's life has come to a stand still. She's not exactly the stay at home and mend a shirt type and her idea of a good time is actually doing something with her time that doesn't involve tittering behind a fan. She's envious of Jamie's coming and going and bored to tears and honestly I don't blame her for that. Sure it's a rich person's problem but Claire's never lived a life where she wasn't needed. She worked with her Uncle Lamb as a kid, a nurse as an adult and when she fell through time, she was a healer for the MacKenzie crew so she's never really been without something to do and it works her nerves.

Jamie on the other hand, is being run to his limit, playing politics, trying to garner information and like Claire, has the knowledge that a Jacobite uprising will end in the decimation of his culture and homeland. It's a huge weight to carry and it takes a toll on their relationship and at a key point in the episode it seems all for naught. Charles pressures Jamie into a meeting with Duvernay and it is at that meeting with Duvernay that we find out that Charles does not need as much money as Jamie nor Claire originally thought. It is revealed that high ranking members of English society are financially backing Charles and that means the amount of money needed isn't all that much. Charles also manages to turn Duvernay's head with he possibility of an alliance with England. It's to good a deal to pass up and Duvernay at least agrees to consider it and present it to King Louis once the proof is provided hat he does indeed, not need all that much from the treasury.

At the same time hat Jamie's hopes of stopping financial backers is being crushed, Claire has found a renewed purpose in life as Master Raymond has suggested to her that she could volunteer at a charity hospital. She takes that into advice and finds a renewed sense of purpose by working at the hospital. It's there we meet a very important character by name of Mother Hildegarde. A stern older woman who at first thinks that Claire is nothing more that a rich woman wanting to get a few props for doing a little charity work without much of the actual work involved. After Claire proves her knowledge of medicine and sickness, you can see that Mother Hildegarde finds some respect for a woman whom she had only assumed to be a rich lady without substance.

So after spending an entire day tending to the sick, she comes home to a waiting and impatient Jamie who is angry that she would dare subject herself to the sickly while pregnant. Their argument was certainly one that needed to happen and both of them were right to their anger. Jamie's anger stems from doing nothing but lying constantly. Claire's anger stems from Jamie's anger at her which ultimately I think is just jealousy on both of their ends. She's jealous that he's working to end the cause while he's jealous that she gets to do something that she enjoys. Obviously a more open line of communication between them would help them out.

After their fight, Jamie leaves in a huff and goes back to the brothel, where he notes the actions of a young boy picking the pockets of the brothel customers. An idea forms in his mind and he swiftly chases the boy down until he captures him and after some humorous back and forth, he essentially blackmails the boy, Fergus, into working for him and stealing letters.

The funniest part of the entire episode was when Claire discovers Fergus in the house eating some chicken and his response to her presence was to essentially tell her "nice boobs." Of course Murtagh interjects and states that he said the same thing to Suzette, the ladie's maid and Claire's response is quite funny. "Well that doesn't make me feel very special." It was honestly to me, the funniest part of the scene and Fergus is quite the little scamp and charmer. I just adore him.

So once Fergus is employed with Jamie, they begin intercepting letters and come across a musical code. A code that can only be cracked by someone with a knowledge of the German language and of Music. So it turns out that Claire's volunteer work actually comes in handy because Mother Hildegarde ends up helping to crack the musical code. So see, not so useless after all.

Once the code is cracked, Jamie and Murtagh and Claire are all celebrating but there is a dark stain on that celebration because it involves working with the Duke of Sandgringham and if Jamie sits down with the Duke, then Jamie will most definitely learn about the survival of Black Jack Randall.

It's also worth noting that earlier in the episode, there was a HUGE revelation about Black Jack Randall and Mary Hawkins. Turns out that Mary is he ancestor of Frank Randall and so that's certainly thrown a huge wrench into the cogs of the story. So how does Mary become the future great great grandmother of Frank Randall? Well, we'll just have to find out and see won't we?

I think the major head scratcher for this episode, if I were to really have a complaint, would be how openly Claire, Jamie and Murtagh talk subterfuge of the Jacobite cause in front of Jared's servants. True, Jared's servants are loyal, but they also know that Jared is a very firm Jacobite. Wouldn't such open conversation make it easy for the servants to relate the undermining to their employer? Not to say that this might be utilized by the show later. I don't think it will, it's just something funky I noticed.

So what did you think of Fergus? What did you think of Mother Hildegarde? And most importantly what are you looking forward to in next week's episode or at least hoping to happen? Sound off in the comments below.

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Outlander Season 2 Episode 2: It's All About Murtagh and I Love It!

So Sassenachs, here we are, already on the second episode and can I say what an absolutely jam packed episode this was. Introductions to so many new characters in flesh form, instead of just our imaginations, so many funny and tender moments and a few changes from book to screen that some people are okay with and others are probably ripping their hair out over. Overall I found the episode to be quite fantastic but I think the real star of S2E2 was Murtagh Fitzgibbons, the ultimate Wingman played by the ever so charming Duncan Lacroix. 

Now don't get me wrong. There are some great scenes outside of scenes with Murtagh but he seems to be the central figure in nearly every important scene there is, except for the introductions of Master Raymond and little Marry Hawkins. His complete aversion to French society is apparent throughout and honestly he and Jamie play so well off each other, almost like a bantering father and son.

We get our first glimpse of Murtagh with Jamie enjoying a bit of sword practice and Murtagh enjoying a great bit of teasing at Jamie's expense, pushing him to do better but it's obvious that Jamie's hand is still in quite a bit of mending.

The exchange between Jamie, Bonnie Prince Charles and Murtagh in the brothel is certainly tense. Charles is only after the throne, and wanting to use the Scottish people to accomplish the deed, claiming that it is by God's will that his father and he be placed on the English Throne. After all, they are Stuarts and not Hanovers!Those German Georges have no right to the throne! Murtagh of course, eloquently states that most of Scotland is home to simple folk, people who work and toil the land and fight each other often. What would make a simple farmer trade in his scythe for a sword? Of course Charles' answer is more preening about he is God's chosen to be on the English throne and it's quite quickly established that there will be no convincing the good Prince that to create an uprising would be disastrous. The only good news, is that Charles at least trusts Jamie enough to get him to play as a representative of Scotland and the Jacobite cause at the French Court of Louis XV and to make friends with the Minister of Finance. Charles after all, needs money in order to support a Jacobite rebellion against the English.

Murtagh is contemplating murder of a Prince here I'm sure.

Murtagh of course, is there when the information is relayed to Claire and they all seem to agree that convincing Duvernay that Charles is a bad investment is the best way to go about stopping the Jacobite Rising and as they are hopeful, we viewers have already been cursed with the future knowledge that their plans will fail. I suppose the producers and writers of the show wanted us to feel that same dread that Claire feels in knowing what the future holds, except we can't stop it like she's trying to do.

What? No line about "verra large sausage"? Inconceivable!

French court is of course nothing like Scotland. Full of vapid and shallow well dressed french men and women, and Murtagh certainly sticks out like a sore thumb. I have to admire how the writers really have created him as a great side kick to Jamie and to Claire. He's more brash, more blunt than either of them and isn't afraid to say what's on his mind. His reaction to both Claire's dress and the dress of the King's Mistress certainly made me giggle and that's nothing compared to the outright laughter I felt watching him play out the scene with Jamie while they were both in audience of the King taking a shit. And yeah, within a historical context, those things actually happened. A King of France had no privacy at all and was constantly surrounded by servants and high ranking members of French Aristocracy. I don't know about you, but I'm certainly glad I was never a French royal forced to be audience to a whole bunch of people while I used the bathroom.

We seriously came all the way here to watch a man shit?

Perhaps the most pivotal scene in the entire episode, is the one you least expect. It's when Murtagh spots the Duke of Sandgringham and nearly draws his weapon on the sorry bastard. Murtagh is going to cut his balls off but is stayed by Jamie who doesn't want to see his godfather executed for not following the rules of French society. Murtagh shows his disgust as Jamie and Claire seemingly forgive the Duke for the part he played in Jamie's imprisonment and subsequent torture and I'm sure we all felt like Murtagh.

That moment when we are all Murtagh.

The only revelation that isn't really made with Murtagh present is when Claire and the Duke are left alone and it is revealed that Black Jack Randall is not dead, and honestly, I wanted to run a sword through the Duke myself as he reveled in the fact that he'd caused Claire distress. That Jamie's horrible tormentor is alive and well is an icy chill down her spine. She and Jamie had been working toward intimacy and now she's debating on whether or not to tell him that the bastard that had raped and tortured him was still alive.

Seriously. Fuck this guy.

It certainly left the episode in a tense moment and that tenseness will just have to be kept until next Saturday when we see if Claire reveals the truth to Jamie or he finds out of his own volition. A distraction like this, would certainly put a damper on their plans to stop the Rebellion after all. Jamie would be hellbent on destroying Black Jack Randall in any way that he could.

Overall, I think the episodes funny moments wouldn't be quite so funny if we didn't have Murtagh in the background pulling faces. Be it the dress Claire wore, Jamie running into an old infatuation, or the Mistress to the King's swan dress, it's obvious that his face was what every one of us was thinking. It was a great episode, full to the brim with twists and turns and I am ever so impatient to watch the new installment of it come Saturday next.

The look of a man about to have a stroke. 

If he stares any harder, his eyes are gonna pop out of his skull.

I do think that my one disappointment was that the honey pot scene was not quite as humorous as it was in the book, and while I'm a little sad about it, I still found the changes very much in line with how the show is working things out. Book to screen adaptions, after all, cannot be perfectly rendered and changes have to be made to suit the medium the book is adapting too. We can just be thankful that books like these are given a tv series instead of a two to three hour long movie. Imagine how much would get cut out then!

So what did you think of this episode Sassenachs? Were you happy with the changes? Angry? Feel free to reply in the comments below!

Outlander Season 2, Episode 1: The Night Outlander Fans Lost Their Minds

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Picture it. April 9th, 2016. A hungry crowd of American women and men sit in front of their TVs, heart pounding and biting their nails in anticipation. This was it. The moment that eleven months of Droughtlander finally ended with the words "Previously on Outlander." There was a collective scream of excitement in households all along the East Coast and beyond and people on the edge of their seat as the first scene opened to Caitriona Balfe's Claire, laying on grass.

I don't know about you guys, but I feel like we're in for some depressing shit.

"I wished I were dead." Melancholy sets the tone for the first half of this episode. Gray tones in the cinematography create the environment that feeds into the depression that Claire is obviously feeling, as evident by the first words she utters and the horrifying scream as she gazes at the stones. We of course, soon realize that she has been brought back to her own time and the year is now 1948 and her plans of stopping the complete evisceration of the Jacobite Army at Culloden Moor has failed.

After the slightly altered opening credits and Skye Boat Song (partly sang in French) commence, we're back to the story and Frank purposefully steps into our lives again after a long eight episode absence. He's the concerned husband, a man shocked to discover his wife has been found after disappearing near on three years ago and you can see the nerves as he slowly enters into the hospital room where his wife lay, staring out the window.

 I wish I had a funny and clever caption for this scene, but it's just too depressing.

Now this entire first half of the episode was not written like this in the book but I think what Ron Moore and the writers did with the material was fantastic, and I'm going to go out and just say that TV Frank is far superior to Book Frank. In the book, Frank flips out when Claire tells him her story, and literally loses his shit. Now, for a lot of people, this turns them off of Frank in the books and makes him out to be some sort of super dick for it, even though he's completely within his rights to flip his shit. I've written an entire article on the issues I have with the Frank Hate in this link here, if you want to read more detail about that. TV Frank, on the other hand, is very humanized. He's seen throughout his time on screen as understanding, hopeful, angry, relieved, nervous, and desperate.

 Seriously, TV Frank is way better than Book Frank.

TV Frank's acceptance of her story, mirrors Jamie's acceptance of her time travel way back in The Devil's Mark of Season One. He tells her he believes her, and he's on board with everything until Claire tells him she's pregnant. At first, he's ecstatic, but then she reinforces that the child is not biologically his and we see him lose his sense of understanding for a split moment. It's a tense moment and you can see the anger he feels, his fist clenching up at the fury and then he just stumbles out of the room and the house of the reverend to a shed and tears it to shit. I found his behavior, not at all to much, or to out of place considering the situation, and I think aside from the fact that Claire was carrying a man's child, his own manly pride was hurt in that he could never give her a child, but this stranger had. It was something, I believe, that reinforced his lack of self worth because as a man of that time, not being able to have children was something worthy of shame. He, perhaps, did not feel like a whole man because he was unable to create a child.

After he cools down and talks it over with the Reverend, it seems that a cool head prevails and he and Claire have a bit of a chat. Start from scratch, renew their life together. I found it rather touching that he was so willing to be there for her and for the child in her belly. That he was going to stand by her when he had every reason to leave her to raise a child on her own and face the stigma of being known as that "crazy runaway wife with the bastard child." It showed that Frank was indeed an honorable man, who was so willing to start over with his wife and begin again. He's a good guy, a little flawed for sure, but ultimately, a good man to Claire.

So, Frank and Claire are onto new beginnings, but what happened that led her back to the stones? A question that is starting to be answered when the scene transitions back to the past and to France.

The depression and melancholic look of the film is replaced with a bright and bustling port and with Claire and Jamie and Murtagh. I don't know about you guys, but finally seeing Claire and Jamie together made me literally scream out loud in happiness. FINALLY! As great as Frank was in the first half hour, I was so ready to see Jamie's sexy ass again and there he was, dressed well enough, still pained, his hand bound and dealing with a good bit of sea sickness. At least he's finally got his sense of humor back eh? At least of a fashion.

 Murtagh's look of disgust as he talks about Frogs really mimics my own face when I get told to stop obsessing about Outlander.

Obviously, Jamie is still recovering from his terrible ordeal with Black Jack Randall and there's almost a motherly feel to the scene when she tells him "I'm here." Her voice is soothing and soft, reaffirming that she isn't going to let him go so easily.

They set their goal to try and stop the Jacobite uprising so as to prevent Culloden. Of course, it has already been revealed that the terrible Battle of Culloden Moor will happen, so it makes the optimism of Claire and Jamie a little harder to swallow and we as the audience, cheer them on, even though we know their endeavors will end in failure. Meeting Jared Fraser was certainly interesting and it's a shame we shan't see to much more of him. I like the passionate guy, that's for sure. Jared promises to get Jamie in on the Jacobite cause and to meet with the leaders of said cause, while also giving up the reins of his winery as he goes off on another business venture. It is after this meeting, that there is a panic on board a newly docked ship and as Claire is not the type to hold fast and leave things be, she jumps right in and lo and behold, the ship is infested with Smallpox.

"Seriously Sassenach, can you stop being selfless for once?There's no room in the past for you to be a decent person."

Smallpox being one of the most dangerous diseases in the world before vaccines were invented, causes everyone to panic and it is then that we meet Stanley Webber's Comte St. Germain. Now, I've seen Stanley Webber act before as Juan Borgia in Netflix's Borgia but seeing him in that powdered wig did make me giggle a little (not even gonna lie). Even so, the man cut's an intimidating figure and thanks to Claire's selfless act, he now has to deal with the fact that he's losing an entire shipment of cargo that he would have willingly put to the masses, knowing about the possible spread of small pox. Greedy selfish bastard.

 Is it bad that I think he's kinda hot?

Of course, losing all of that cargo certainly would put quite a hole in his finances so it's really not all that surprising that he would try to save himself money despite the horrendous outcome of spreading possibly small pox tainted cargo. Jamie notes that it sure doesn't take Claire long to make enemies but he still loves her anyway and they have a big ole smooch right there as St. Germain's ship lights up the night sky.

I'm sure the Comte will forgive them for making him lose a fortune. He seemed rational to me.

Now I did find the pacing of this episode a little off and while the Frank and Claire moments were engaging, words can't describe how happy I was to finally see Claire and Jamie together again after months upon months of waiting to see them back in action. I do think it's obvious that Season 2 will blaze through the source material a little faster than the original season of Outlander did with it's book. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing, though with the liberties taken to Frank's story line might make some people upset. I'm not going to be upset because I really found Frank's character far more endearing here than I ever did in the book. I happen to like that such liberties were taken with the story line but that's of course, my own personal opinion.

Overall, the first episode was really great, and while the original premier of Outlander seemed slow to start, this one was full of raw emotion from the very beginning, gripping us by the heart strings and holding us tight through all of it. It set's the scene perfectly and makes sure to immerse us once more in a story we all love.

Though I love Wee Roger most.

So what were your thoughts on the premier? Did you enjoy it? Anything negative to say about it? I'd love to hear from you so be sure to leave a comment below or leave one on our Facebook page or on Tumblr.

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Until next week, Sassenachs!

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