Outlander 4.01: America the Beautiful

WE’RE BACK Y’ALL.

We begin in somewhere in North America, 2000 BC. prehistoric people build a circle with flat slabs of stone. They dance around it as Claire voiceovers about the human fascination with circles and their symbolic properties: the rotation of the planets, a simple wedding band…the circle is life or death. The picture cuts to a view of a street seen through a noose.

We are in North Carolina, and it’s 1767. Jamie walks through a town and bribes his way into a gaol, where prisoners are waiting to be hanged. One of them is his homeboy, Gavin Hayes. Jamie has a plan to get Gavin away from being hanged, and Gavin is like, my dude, I made some very bad choices that got me here, and I won’t let you all die for me.

He asks Jamie for some alcohol, and also asks that the last face Gavin sees to be “that of a friend, smiling at me.”

One of the other prisoners asks Jamie for a sip of rum, and Jamie promises Gavin that, yes, he’ll be there for him.

On the street, Jamie tells Fergus and one of his other men, Lesley, that they’re to do nothing. That’s the way Hayes wants it. Claire stands with Jamie, Fergus, and Marsali and voiceovers that they’d been there for four months, and Jamie tried every means he could to save Hayes, but it didn’t work. Gavin is the first to be taken to the gallows, and Jamie makes sure he’s front and center, so Gavin can see him. Jamie smiles, but it’s painful and forced. There’s the drop, and Lesley completely loses it, and he charges at the guards. in the commotion, the other prisoners make a break for it, and one makes it away.

We have new credits, and a new version of the song! It has an Appalachian folk sound to it now.

The title is America the Beautiful, and the title card is a bald eagle catching a fish.

In a tavern, our heroes take stock. There’s a ship leaving for Scotland in three weeks, and they plan to go visit Jamie’s aunt Jocasta at her plantation called River Run before they go. Fergus has been to see a minister about burying poor Gavin, and the minister won’t bury a felon in his graveyard without a bribe. Ian suggests they bury him in the woods, but no, Gavin was scared of ghosts, and Jamie says they’ll bury him in the churchyard themselves that night.

Marsali is tired, and before Fergus can take her up to their room, Lesley begins singing a proper lament for Gavin in Gaelic. The rest of the patrons listen, and join in on the chorus. It’s a nice moment.

That night, they all sneak to the graveyard. Claire voiceovers that they need to sell a gemstone to pay for the passage, and there was a fancy society (such as there is) dinner where they might find a buyer. (There’s also a hilarious bit of business where Claire worries about the minister maybe noticing that there’s a newly dug grave he didn’t authorize, and Jamie’s like, lazy fuck probably won’t dig him up for nothing, so we’ll be fine.)

Jamie and Ian dig, then Ian has a flashback to his assault at the hands of Geillis Duncan. Jamie recognizes trauma when he sees it, and tells Ian that talking about it helps. Ian tells Jamie that Geillis had asked him if he was a virgin, and when Ian told her no, she made him lie down on the bed and do “Unspeakable things.” Ian cries and Jamie hugs him. Ian asks if Jamie ever laid with someone who he didn’t want to, and when Jamie says yes, Ian says so you know what it’s like to not want to but still feel pleasure at it? Jamie nods, and says that yeah, a cock doesn’t have a conscious, but you have. “It’s not your fault lad, you did what you must, and you survived.” Ian feels better.

Jamie calls for Lesley to bring Gavin’s body to his resting place, and in the middle of Lesley muttering about how this is all very shitty, the body in the back of the wagon sits up! (Lesley lets loose a BUNCH of Gaelic swearing and it’s amazing.) “IT CAME FROM HELL!” No, just the gallows. It’s the prisoner that successfully escaped. His name is Stephen Bonnet. He’s been involved in a wee bit of piracy and the like, but swears he didn’t kill anyone who didn’t deserve it.

Bonnet asks if he could get some help sneaking past the soldiers that are out looking for him? “I’m begging you, sir. In the name of Gavin Hayes. He said you’d never turn your back on a friend.” Jamie reluctantly agrees, and he and Claire agree to sneak Bonnet back to his ship.

After Gavin is buried, the Frasers drive along a road, and are stopped by a group of soldiers, who ask what they have in the wagon. “A side of venison, a sack of oats…. And a body.” They’re obviously taking it home for burial. The sergeant has the body stabbed, to make sure it’s dead, and Bonnet doesn’t move. After they get away from the soldiers, Claire bandages Bonnet’s leg – it was only a scratch. Bonnet makes small talk about Claire’s two rings and the fact that there’s something about circles that fascinate him.

Claire tells him that the hangman’s noose is a circle, and maybe he should avoid it. He admits that what he’s really afraid of is drowning. He’s had a recurring nightmare that he’s held fast and the sea rises above his head, and he can never wake up until the water is over is head. He asks if Claire has ever felt the sea pulling at her, and she says yes, she did nearly drown in a hurricane that one time.

Bonnet is off on his way, and asks if Jamie was expecting some sort of reward for all this trouble. Jamie, like an idiot, says no, they did it for Gavin’s sake. Bonnet, fantastic, I’ll trouble you no further then. “I’d advise you to be wary. Travelers in these woods are often beset upon by thieves and outlaws.” FORESHADOWING MUCH? Claire wishes Bonnet good luck, but he says he makes his own luck.

Jamie thinks they’ll seem really suspicious if they pass the soldiers again so soon, so they should camp for the night. Plus that means they can bang loudly. In their underwear by the fire, Claire worries that life is fleeting, and Jamie’s like, my girl, death barely means anything for us. You left and I was dead for you, and you were dead for me, and yet here we are. “Nothing is lost, only changed.” “That’s the first law of thermodynamics.” “No, that’s faith.”

Claire climbs on top of him, and I get distracted by the really excellent quality of linen that her shift is made out of. You can show the costumer some sex, I guess, but she’s still gonna be distracted by fabric.

In the morning, Claire gives Jamie the rundown on the future of America. It’ll go all the way west to the Pacific Ocean, the American dream, fifty states, etc. “Is that the same as our dream?” “A chance to live in a place where the only limitation are a person’s own abilities and the will to succeed.”

Well…That’s…mmmmmm.

Jamie asks what happens to the Native people, and Claire admits that they get a shit deal. Driven from their lands, killed, reservations, genocide: “A dream for some can be a nightmare for others.”

Back in Wilmington, Claire is wearing a lovely gown with… I can’t tell if it’s embroidered or printed, but it’s gorgeous. Jamie has had the ruby set in a necklace, and says that he’s been told the governor will be at dinner, along with a baron of some kind. Hopefully one of them will really want to buy the ruby.

At the dinner, the governor and some other stuffy, annoying men are complaining about the costs of running a colony and how annoying it is that the Cherokee are voicing some objection to the incursion of settlements. Claire is working really hard at controlling her face, but she’s not very good at it, especially when the baron implies that she’s too stupid to understand all this taxation talk. Claire: “I think excessive taxation brings out the savage in all of us. Especially taxes that hinge disproportionately on the poor.” Everyone laughs delightedly at her witty wordplay but no one gives a shit about her actual statement.

Fucking rich people.

One of the ladies implies that Claire is out of fashion, and Claire’s like, bitch, please. The Baron ogles the ruby, while another man asks if Jamie is the nephew of Jocasta Cameron. The governor is familiar with the plantation, and Jamie says they’ll be visiting Jocasta before heading home, and governor is like, well, Mr Fraser, I have a proposition for you.

In the governor’s study, the governor says that North Carolina is looking for industrious immigrants to come and settle, and he could give Jamie a land grant, and Jamie could sponsor other immigrants. Jamie: Yeah, but getting a land grant costs money. The governor: There is the law, and there is what is done. The payment could be waived with the issuance of an oath of loyalty. Jamie: I swore that oath already, I get what you’re saying.

Back at their lodgings, Jamie is pleased with the price for the ruby – 100 pounds- and they have enough money to go back to Scotland the take up printing again. Claire looks worried, and they discuss the offer the governor made. Jamie knows why the governor made the offer: he’s had trouble with “Regulators.” Claire and the audience goes, the what now? They are men that have settled in the wilderness, and they don’t like the governor’s tax collector and they think he’s pulling illegal shit. “Called meetings, drawn up petitions, stirred up a spirit of resistance.” (Huh, weird. I don’t know what that’s like at all.)

Anyway, the governor wants people loyal to him that’ll stand against the regulators. Claire’s like, huh, that’s pretty damn smart. But there is going to be a war in 8 years, and if you accept his offer, he’ll expect you to fight on the side of the crown, which is the wrong side of history, AGAIN. We’ll be branded as loyalists and lose everything. It will suck.

Jamie: this is Brianna’s country, right? Jamie doesn’t want to fight in a war again, but he’d like to do what he can to make this a good place for her, eventually. “If my presence now can be felt by her later, well, that would be something.”

Ian has been adopted by a dog. Wolf. Thing. Ian won him while dicing, “Lucky roll of the dice, so I called him Rollo.” He also won money! Jamie grumbles that Ian shouldn’t be gambling, and Ian’s like, my man, you do all the damn time. Claire tells them both that they won’t need to make money by gambling for a while, they’ve got lots of money.

At the table with Fergus, Marsali, Ian, and Lesley, Claire and Jamie tell them that they’ve decided to stay, and Ian is like THIS IS THE BEST NEWS EVER. I LIKE IT HERE. Jamie intends to send him back, and Ian does not like that idea at all.

Jamie: What would your mother say?
Ian: Who cares? She’ll be saying it in SCOTLAND.
Jamie: You’re to be educated and shit. Don’t waste your life.
Ian: God, really? WHY.

Jamie and Claire are going to figure out where they’ll settle when they visit River Run, but they’ve got money for everyone else to go back to Scotland. Lesley wants to stay with Jamie- Jamie will need a right hand man. Marsali and Fergus will also stay: she’s knocked up and being on a ship for two months would be awful. Everyone is delighted… once Marsali says that SHE’S delighted. But no one is more delighted that Jamie. He gets a grandkid! They will stay in Wilmington for the time being.

Lesley and Ian will journey with Jamie and Claire to River Run, a journey which they take on a slow-ass barge up the river. Claire asks what Jocasta is like, and Jamie says “She’s a Mackenzie.” Nuff said. She’s married three Cameron men, and outlived them all. She and her last husband fled Scotland after the Rising and settled in North Carolina with their plantation and sawmill.

Claire notes that the man at the tiller is an older Black man, and assumes that he’s a slave. The captain of the barge says that no, he’s a free man and gets a fair wage. He had been a slave, but after he saved the captain’s life, they petitioned the court for his freedom and gave him a job. I guess that’s… something. Certainly better than nothing.

Later, Claire is taking a turn at the tiller, and Jamie sends Ian up to take her place. Jamie has a present for Claire: a small trunk full of medical instruments, including a microscope. He found it in town. “Perhaps one day I’ll deck you in laces and jewels. I haven’t been able to give you much, ever, save this wee ring and my mother’s pearls.” Claire tells him that she gave the pearls to Brianna, and Jamie notes that they married 24 years ago. “I hope I haven’t given you cause to regret it.” “Not for a single day.”

It’s night, and the music is suddenly a bluesy piano. Rollo wakes up, and barks to alert everyone – Stephen Bonnet has boarded the boat with his pirates. As Ray Charles’ version of “America the Beautiful” plays, the rest of the sound fades out, and the pirates beat the shit out of Jamie and Ian, and get the rest of the jewels. A man holds Claire at gunpoint, and demands her rings. Lesley tries to help her, and gets his throat cut. Bonnet demands Claire’s rings, and she pulls them off her fingers, and tries to swallow them. He gets the silver one from Jamie, but she still has the gold. (I think.)

Bonnet and his men leave, with Claire trembling in the corner. Jamie staggers back towards her, but damn, things are already a mess.

RHG:

I’ll be honest, Drums in Autumn isn’t my favorite book in the series, and…we’ve met one of my favorite characters! He isn’t quite how I pictured him. He’s more blond here and less gray.

I am, of course, speaking about Rollo. What a good boy.

There’s a bunch of things I want to hold off on saying, because spoilers. But I am very interested in how RDM visualizes the rest of this season. The behind the scenes vignette talked about how they continued to film in Scotland, which is neat! There’s just some fairly simple changes to make in costumes and set and boom, there it is.

Elyse: 

RHG, you promised me that Gellis Friggin Duncan was really gone, but apparently we’re going to get Bathory-esque PTSD flashbacks this season.

I do think the fact that we have two male rape survivors talking openly about their trauma was really powerful.

Also RHG messaged me about this episode and Claire’s shift in the “fist” sex scene. She meant “first” of course, but my tired brain went “there’s fisting in this? I feel like that’s a stretch for Gabaldon.”

Spoiler: there’s no fisting.

I did find the fight scene with America the Beautiful playing over it to be kind of disconcerting. It’s a lot of violence and seems campy with the song playing over the top. It was a jarring end.

NOTE: Elyse has not read the books. Many people watching have not read the books. If you want to talk about a spoiler in the comments, please use the spoiler tag (remove the spaces before and after the brackets:

[ spoiler spoilerwarning=”Click for spoilers!” ]
Here’s a spoiler! Whoa! Shocking stuff!
[ /spoiler ]

Thank you!