Outlander Episode 3: The Way Out

This episode opens with a lovely beat of Frank and Claire saying good bye at the train station during the war when Claire goes off to the field hospital in France, then segues into a sequence where Claire reveals to Mrs. Fitz that “seems to have dropped through time.”  Mrs. Fitz takes this exactly as well as you’d expect, calls Claire a witch, the book readers have a collective aneurysm, and it’s revealed to be a dream sequence.

Claire settles into being the House Healer at Castle Leoch, with the requisite “Ew, wood lice!” scene while making an inventory of the medical supplies.  She settles into a pattern, with Rupert tailing after her on orders, and he’s grumpy about it because it’s like, work, man.  There’s a kid in the village who just died of a mysterious malady, and another one is sick, but the local parish priest thinks it’s possession.  Claire disbelieves. 

Claire sits with Laoghaire during an evening’s bardic entertainment (she’s also kinda drunk) and tries so hard to be Jamie’s wingman by nudging him towards Laoghaire, and Jamie is oblivious.  Laoghaire isn’t amused, but snags Jamie into a make-out session anyway.  Claire gets kind of jealous, and snarks at him later, while the other men (I think it was Murtagh, but I can’t tell him and Rupert apart yet) both think Jamie and Laoghaire are a NoTP, and Jamie and Claire should just totally get it on.  Claire doesn’t understand the question. 

Claire gives Colum a massage, and he tries to get her to admit she’s offended by his legs, when really she was just considering the best way to attack the problem (and lets be real, Colum, if I were asked to give someone with your condition a massage, my face would fall into a “Hmmmmmmmmm, what’s the actual problem I’m trying to solve, and how can I do that without causing more and different pain?” face, and my thinky-face can be scowly, so… shut up.)  And we see Colum’s butt. 

Claire hangs out with Gellis in the village, and Gellis keeps asking almost probing questions, and a kid from the village is caught stealing, and sentenced to having his ear nailed to the stocks for an hour.  Claire has issues with this barbaric form of justice and Gellis looks at her with knowing speculation. 

Claire and Jamie have one of those super relevant discussions where he talks about his misspent youth, going up to haunted monastary ruins and spending the night and eating wood garlic, but it’s not wood garlic, it’s lily of the valley, which is the thing causing the boys to get sick, and Claire whips up a antidote which works, thank God.  Then she sits and listens to the bard some more, who is telling a story about a woman who went through the stones and came back and she realizes that maybe, just maybe, she can get home to Frank and hot baths and Frank’s rocking Fair Isle sweater vest.

RHG: I am listening to the podcasts by RDM, and they are really fascinating.  I can’t fault any of his reasons for the decisions he’s made, and I know that he was concerned with keeping Frank in the minds of the viewers, so we’d know why she wants to get home to him.  The goodbye at the train station? Feels. Lots of feels. More feels than I’ve ever had for Frank ever (EVER). Tobias and Catriona played that perfectly. 

I do admit I got fooled by the opening scene- I need to trust RDM a little more that he’s not going to screw things up so badly.  (“Claire what are you… don’t be stupid. This is dream.  Right?  This is going on too long.  This has to be a dream, but….  I don’t know….? Maybe? OH THANK GOD.”) 

Elyse:  Oh, the dream sequence. I was like what the fucccckkkk… oh, thank God!

RHG:  Sam’s “I am totally not gonna let this woman know I’m getting a hard-on BUT I AM TOTALLY GETTING A HARD ON” face while Claire is checking his bandage is priceless perfection.  He also played the “Clueless dude who doesn’t realize Claire is totally trying to be his wingman” to perfection.  I feel for Laoghaire here, I do (did I spell that right on the first try?  I think I did, everything is coming up Millhouse!); of course it seems like he’d be interested in her, what with the whole “getting beat up for her” thing and then for him to (accidently) refer to her as a snot-nosed bairn? At least she got some making-out time. 

Gellis!  Lotte is pretty clearly playing her as “suspecting exactly who and what Claire is,” and watching her manipulate her husband was really fun.  I really like the juxtaposition between the two women. 

Now, book purists, I hear you grumbling about this added and modified plot, but I think I see where this is going (Spoilers for shit happening later in the book, and speculation for the shape of the season:  I think this is cleverly setting up Father Bain as more of a big bad for the first half of the season- I suspect the witch trial is going to end thefront half of the season and be our cliff hanger for the midseason break- and can I say how much I HATE I HATE I HATE ridiculous long midseason break thing and splitting season into two years?  Just wrap it the fuck up, Mad Men and Breaking Bad. Anyway, they’re setting Father Bain up to make the witch trial more of a payoff, and story structure on screen works differently than on the page.  I’m good with it. End spoilers)

I’m also impressed with other beats that we get but are shuffled around a bit- Alec has been more or less removed from the narrative, but a lot of the scenes with him have been given to other people (Rupert, you’re becoming my fave.  “CAN’T YOU SIT DOWN FOR A MINUTE, WOMAN.”) 

Elyse: I need to reiterate how badly I need this soundtrack.

I felt like this was a filler episode. We get the conflict of Claire's medical expertise versus religion and superstition. We also get some Claire/Jamie flirting but that's about it, except for the end. Now Claire knows she can go home.

I like how the entire castle is shipping Claire/Jamie. The comment about him needing a woman and not a girl was interesting.

I am still loving Claire's bulky cowl and need to knit it.

Bummer that we see Colum’s naked ass and not Jamie's but eh.

Carrie:  The train scene – oh, poor Frank.  “Promise you’ll return to me” – OUCH.

The moments I enjoy most from the Outlander series have very little to do with time travel.  I agree that this episode was filler-ish in the sense that it was low on plot, but I found it immensely enjoyable because I liked hanging out in the world that’s been created.  I am a little over the “evil religious guy” trope, though.

One thing that’s fun about watching the series is that I read the first book in the series so long ago that I forgot how young Claire and Jamie were when they first met!  Why, the lad’s an infant – as is painfully obvious in his clueless behavior towards Laoghaire.

I enjoy the juxtaposition between Claire and Gellis.  They both are both smart, resourceful, and capable of being ruthless and pragmatic, but Claire has a conscience and Gellis does not, in addition to the fact that Gellis is accustomed to things as everyone else is (even kind-hearted Jamie isn’t alarmed about the boy’s ear punishment).  Canny Gellis probably could have figured out what was wrong with the poisoned boy – but she wouldn’t bother, because she knows it will blow up in her face later, and Gellis is all about her own survival, first and foremost. 

I also love the fact that we’ve now passed the Bechdel test a zillion times – with Claire and Mrs. Fitz and with Claire and Giellis.  I liked it that Claire admitted to herself that she was jealous, and I thought this episode effectively brought out her desperate loneliness and isolation.  Also the actress’s line reading of “Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ” when she opens the jar of bugs was sublime.  Did anyone else crack up when Jamie said that Claire fainted because she doesn’t like the sight of blood?  I kept flashing back to Claire’s very first scene and giggling.

And wow – we made it through a whole episode with nary a rape threat or threat of a woman being beaten!  But – there was the ear thing.  We’re really never going to be able to feel all warm and fuzzy about this time period, are we?

RHG: Not really, no. But to be fair, that’s true of literally all time periods.

Amanda:  Yep, opening song has definitely grown on me. It’s official.

I both love and hate glimpses into Claire & Frank’s relationship. I DON’T WANT TO FEEL PITY FOR FRANK RANDALL!

And there’s a butt. Not my first butt choice, but eh…I’ll take it.

The scene during the bard’s performance makes me cringe. It’s not bad, but the fact that Jamie is clearly not picking up on Laoghaire’s flirting is just so awkward, especially when he says he doesn’t remember her during the last time the bard played. Dumb boys.

The Jamie/Claire eye sex is pretty prime in this episode. And Gellis is still beautiful. I’ll admit it, I ship her and Rupert. It’s happening. Don’t try to talk me out of it.

“A priest once told me my healing skills were a gift from God.” Claire: kicking ass and taking names.

You guys can have Claire’s awesome cowl. I want that shrug thing she wears to dinner.

Fuck that priest. And his stupid hat.

Does Gellis have red shoes? Please tell me I didn’t imagine that. And she definitely knows more than she’s letting on.

RHG: She does have red shoes.  The costume designer described them as magically fitting Lotte after they fit NO ONE else.

Amanda: IT WAS FATE!

The episode was a little underwhelming for me, but I know we’re still working on characterization and exposition. Outlander, the book, is a hefty set of text. I know some of the comments mentioned this before, but do we know roughly how many pages/chapters tend to be covered with each episode?