Come sail over the sea to Skye with us this summer, as we take a trip through the stones to the first season of the television adaptation of Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander book series. First published in 1991 with Outlander, Gabaldon’s multi-genre novels features the time traveling love story of Claire (Caitriona Balfe), a 1940s woman who finds herself out of time and place in Scotland in the era of the Jacobite rebellion. The U.S. pay TV network Starz debuted the Outlander TV series in 2014, with the show concluding its fifth season last year. In celebration of the ninth novel out this autumn and the sixth season of the TV series debuting in early 2022, we’re spending our 2021 summer vacation at Castle Leoch.
As Claire starts to come around to her marriage to Jamie, we see Frank in 1945 searching for his lost wife. But an opportunity puts Claire front and center at the crossroads in her life that brought her to this place. Which path shall she take?
It should also be noted that Outlander is very much an 18+ series, with graphic violence and sexuality throughout. Spoilers within for both the tv show and the novel series.
This episode also contains a content warning for sexual assault with a knife again a woman.
1. It’s Life’s Illusions That I Recall
No doubt you’re humming Joni Mitchell’s 1969 hit when you see the title for this episode, and I can’t think of anything more apropos that captures the essence of our story to this point. If anyone has seen love from both sides now, it’s Claire, now being married to two different men in different times. Two different men in different eras and with different temperaments. Two men that both love her, but love her in different ways. One that she’s known longer but feels like she doesn’t know him at all (Frank), and one that she’s just met but feels like she could have known him forever (Jamie).
It’ll be around 25 years before Claire even hears Mitchell’s song, but I have a feeling she will certainly relate to this lyric quite well:
I’ve looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It’s life’s illusions I recall
I really don’t know life at all
2. So Many Things I Would Have Done
Although we left off with Claire and Jamie in newlywed bliss, we pick up back in 1945 in Inverness, where Frank sits in the constable’s office in hot pursuit of the missing Claire. The constable is losing interest in the case, putting out the theory that Claire left her husband for another man, something Frank vehemently denies. (If he only knew. If only.)
This is a point of view that is not in the books, specifically created for the show. And at this point in the series, it’s a good thing. We’re at the mid-season finale, and only have a view into Claire’s POV about these events. It’s a good time to check in with Frank and see how he’s doing. Which is …
One other thing about the Frank subplot: we’re introduced to a young boy who lives with the Reverend named Roger. Remember that name: Roger Wakefield. Should you progress more in the series, either books or TV, that is a name that will come back and in an important way.
3. The Dizzy Dancing Way That You Feel
But before we can dwell on all this, it’s back to 1743 and our newlyweds enjoying a romantic moment together, where you can see her resistance to falling in love with Jamie shatter like glass. The 18th century Highland life is starting to suit her, whether she likes it or not. Sneaking off for a little afternoon delight with Jamie, learning self-defense with a knife (which comes in handy when that afternoon delight gets interrupted by the British), sharing bawdy jokes at the campfire. In all of these moments, Claire’s smile is so radiant it could power Inverness (if electricity was a thing back then).
Continued belowLittle by little, she’s losing grasp of 1945, and it’s not hard to see why. The Highlanders bring not only their intense loyalty, but the delight of simple pleasures and the promise of stability that Claire seeks. They treat her as family. She’s come a long way from the strange Sassenach running through the forest in her shift in that first episode.
There is still something pulling her back, and it manifests itself in her anger. How could she forget her plans to go back home to Frank? And then she’s slapped in the face with a reminder: the stones of Craigh na dun in her face.
4. As Every Fairy Tale Comes Real
You’ll recall in the first episode Claire’s palm reading from Mrs. Graham that seems to predict just where we are to this point. Mrs. Graham certainly hasn’t forgotten and wants to share this with Frank, in spite of the Reverend’s protests. Frank absorbs this information silently and respectfully, but it’s just one step too far for him to accept. He is a man of letters, of logic, of education, not of fairy tales. This has me wondering if and when Claire does return to her time (spoiler alert: she does), what effect it will have on their marriage. She has had a singular experience, and to have the closest person in your life have a temperament that doesn’t accept such things will no doubt lead to tension.
But let’s not write off Frank’s dismissal of these stories completely. As he drives out of Inverness, he sees a marker for Craigh na dun, and turns off of the main road to find these stones.
5. To Say “I Love You” Right Out Loud
1945 and 1743 connect, as Claire and Frank find themselves at the stones in different times, the one thing that somehow binds them together. They can hear each shouting for the other, connecting across time and space. You can’t help but feel the slightest bit of hope for a reunion (as much as you love Jamie and Claire together), and you also wonder if perhaps now Frank believes all those stories after all.
Since this is the mid-season finale, it would make a fitting, if cliched, ending to the episode. The lovers almost reunited, the viewer left wondering if they got their happy ending.
But Outlander doesn’t do cliche. Mere seconds after we fade to black, we fade back into Claire under arrest by the English. It’s off to Fort William and Black Jack Randall once more. In spite of some advance planning that seems to give her the advantage initially, Claire finds herself in dire and violent straits in Randall’s company. Will Jamie or any of the Highlanders figure out she’s gone missing and get there in time?
This episode aired on September 27, 2014. Viewers had to wait until April 2015 to find out Claire’s fate. You’ll just have to wait until next week to find out.
The Lost Papers of Black Jack Randall (Our Afterthoughts Section)
- The events of this episode correspond to chapters 17, 18, 20, and 21 of the Outlander novel. Chapter 19 was not featured in the TV series at all.
- The gift Claire receives of a dragonfly in amber foreshadows the title of the second Outlander novel, Dragonfly in Amber.
- The radio report Frank hears in the car is of a car accident that paralyzed General George S. Patton, putting the 1945 story at December 9th. Patton would die approximately two weeks later from his injuries.
We’ll see you next week for “The Reckoning” and do let us know what you thought of the episode in the comments.
As of this writing, the first season of Outlander is available for viewing on Netflix, where seasons 2-4 are also available (except in the UK). In the UK, the show is available on Amazon Prime Video UK. All five seasons of the show are also available via Starz (in the United States).
