The Return of a Much Loved Character, Claire’s in Trouble (Again) and Roger is Wearing Even More Wool than Usual.
CONTAINS SPOILERS.
Claire (Caitriona Balfe) and Jamie (Sam Heughan) are in a good place emotionally, as witnessed in a tenderly written scene at the start of this week’s episode. Here Jamie reveals to Claire that he dreamt of Brianna (Sophie Skelton) and in this dream he kissed a birthmark of hers that he couldn’t have known existed. It’s evident that having finally settled down together in a home of their own, both Claire and Jamie’s thoughts are turning towards the child they both assume they’ll never see again.
Cue 1970s Scotland where Roger (Richard Rankin) is given a letter from Brianna informing him that she has gone back in time through the stones. Once more, Roger is dressed in knitwear, and even though I had assumed that such a thing was almost impossible, he’s wearing even more wool than usual, presumably in an effort to single-handedly support the Scottish wool industry; either that or Rankin has seriously pissed off someone in the wardrobe department. The man is constantly dressed in variations of brown knitwear.
The overall effect is that Roger looks incredibly dowdy and makes the relationship between him and Brianna seems less that of two young people strongly attracted to each other but more as if Brianna sees in Roger another father figure to replace the fathers she’s lost. I appreciate that it’s Scotland; it gets cold up there and I know he’s an Oxford don, so he wouldn’t be popping down to Carnaby Street for any sartorial needs he might have, but if it ever turns out that Brianna is allergic to lanolin their relationship is seriously screwed.
Meanwhile, Jamie and Ian (John Bell) have set off to town in search of Scottish tenants to settle Fraser’s Ridge. Considering Jamie is offering farmers 100 acres of land for free, he assumes it should be a shoo in to find willing settlers. While there, he’s on a secret mission with some silverware (get Claire a new ring maybe?) and comes across a little minx Mrs MacNeil (Laura Ferries) who is immediately struck by Jamie’s “attributes”. To be fair, who can blame her but she could be slightly more subtle about it.
While Jamie may still be able to attract female attention, he’s proving not so successful in attracting would-be tenants when all the Scottish farmers turn down his offer of land. Jamie later learns the reason why: once the land is cultivated, unscrupulous tax collectors tend to have a habit of charging illegal taxes and seizing the land for themselves.
While Jamie is contending with finding settlers, Claire is acting at midwife to a family of nearby German settlers, the Muellers. Tensions rise when the family patriarch Gerhard Mueller (Urs Rechn) takes offence to the local Cherokee helping themselves to the water from the creek outside his house. The Cherokee, on the other hand, are of the opinion that water belongs to no one and, as such, they are perfectly entitled to take it. It’s only thanks to Claire keeping the peace that a tense situation doesn’t turn bloody there and then.
This scene neatly encapsulates the growing tensions between the white settlers and the Native Americans. On the one hand, you have the palpable fear the settlers have with regard to the “savages” as Gerhard refers to them; their utter conviction in their right to the land and the inherent racism that such a belief system underpins. On the other hand, the Cherokee are no walk over and are having to contend with incomers who seem intent on encroaching on both their land and their way of life and whose mores are alien to them. Later on, we get to see how something so seemingly petty as the stand-off between Gerhard and the Cherokee over watering their horses can inflame these underlying tensions and end up having tragic ramifications.
While Claire is busy keeping the peace, Jamie is finally setting off for home. He’s failed to find any willing tenants but has come up with a plan in order to hook them in the future. He’ll protect his tenants and be the go-to man for the taxes and ensure only a fair tax is paid and nothing more. It might be a plan but it also sounds as if Jamie is about to make a rod for his own back.
But the tax issue is about to become even more complicated when the moment arrives that many an Outlander fan has been waiting for – the return of Murtagh (Duncan Lacroix). In a departure from the books, the TV series has wisely decided to keep the character of Murtagh alive and you’d have to be a die-hard book purist to quibble with that decision.
We first see Murtagh from behind and with his long white hair he’s unrecognisable but the voice and attitude (dour, pissed off, morose) isn’t. Murtagh is back and is now a blacksmith who manages to obtain a sizeable sum from young Ian to fix a horse’s bit. When Jamie hears how much Ian has been charged he storms into the smithy. Like the viewer before him, Jamie only sees the back of the blacksmith at first and gives him what for. Murtagh immediately recognises Jamie’s voice. He then turns round, and much to Jamie’s surprise he realises the blacksmith is none other than his godfather. Both men are elated to see each other again. So much so, Murtagh even smiles!
After all, apart from Claire, Murtagh is the other great love in Jamie’s life. Jamie even delays returning to Claire who, let’s not forget, is stuck alone in the middle of nowhere, and spends the evening with Murtagh, catching up on all that’s happened since Ardsmuir. Mind you, Jamie sidesteps the bit about him marrying Laoghaire, presumably on the reasonable grounds that on hearing that particular snippet of matrimonial news, Murtagh might walk back out of his life again and this time for good.
However, Murtagh is overjoyed (I honesty have never seen him so happy) when he hears that Claire has returned to Jamie. Nevertheless, Murtagh turns down Jamie’s offer to come with him to Fraser’s Ridge and we soon find out that the “grave work” he can’t leave behind is that he is one of the main regulators (opponents to the British tax system). By the way, if you’re watching this with the subtitles on and are Scottish, there is an unintentional funny moment when Murtagh shouts “haud yer wheesht” and the subtitles say “Speaking in Gaelic”. Guessing whoever did the sub-titles never had Scottish parents.
I’m also guessing having Murtagh as a chief regulator and Jamie as the governor’s de facto man on the ground is setting up Jamie and Murtagh to be on different sides of what seems to be a future uprising in the making, and laying the groundwork for an interesting and presumably rather dramatic bump in the road of their friendship. This should prove an interesting facet to the story, given that the love they feel for each other is in no doubt; just watch Murtagh’s face as Jamie leaves, having refused to take sides with him and his fellow regulators.
Unfortunately, Jamie’s delay in leaving for home proves rather bad timing on Jamie’s part, as we find out when Pastor Gottfried (Albert Welling) arrives at the cabin. He informs Claire that the Mueller children and grandchild have died of measles and that Gerhard, driven mad with despair, holds Claire responsible, convinced she allowed the Native Americans to curse the water and thus infect his family.
Advised to leave, Claire does what she always does in these situations: she does the exact opposite, and assures the pastor that she’ll stay where she is, as Jamie will be back soon and she has her rifle to protect her in the meantime. This well-meaning, protestant pastor, who has already had a busy morning apparently acting as if he were a catholic priest by giving the last rites to the dying Muellers, then sets off in search of Gerhard before the latter can cause any mischief.
And true enough Gerhard arrives: Clare is at the ready with rifle in hand but for some reason has forgotten the first rule of safety when under possible attack by an armed nutter and failed to lock the front door (no, no idea why you’d do that either).
And mad, Gerhard most certainly is. He hands Claire what she assumes is the baby’s doll as a keepsake. In fact, it turns out to be the scalp of Adawehi (Tantoo Cardinal), the Cherokee wise woman. From her interactions with Claire we know that Adawehi was nothing but gentle and kind, and for once the unusually unflappable Claire is horrified and quite rightly so. It doesn’t take long, however, for the Cherokee to take their revenge which ends in both Gerhard and his wife (Nicola Ransom) meeting their deaths with Rosewitha’s a particularly gruesome one.
Fortunately for Claire not all unexpected visitors are unwelcome when Murtagh turns up to Fraser’s Ridge and we see Murtagh smile yet again (!) when he and Claire finally get to see each other after more than 20 years.
But it looks as if other unexpected guests may be on their way as we see Brianna go through the stones at Craigh na Dun in what seems to be less 18th century dress and more a 60s fashion choice. Surely the dress she is wearing is far too short and where are all the petticoats? As a former history student, presumably Brianna would have done her research and dressed just a bit more appropriately? Or has Skelton also pissed off wardrobe? Perhaps we should just be thankful she’s not dressed head to foot in brown wool.
That aside, after a bit of a rocky start, Outlander Season 4 is back on track and it looks as if the story is about to go from strength to strength. How will Brianna fare in 18th century Scotland? How will she get to America? And will she get there in time to prevent the terrible thing that is supposed to happen to Claire and Jamie? (OK, we know the answer to that one). What will happen between Jamie and Murtagh? Will Jamie get tenants? Will the regulators start fighting back? Will Roger follow Brianna? (OK, we know the answer to that one). Will Roger and Brianna get back together? (OK, we know the answer to that one too). But surely the burning question on everyone’s mind is: will wardrobe ever allow Roger to stop modelling knitwear?
Illustration by @sarsketches
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