After recapping Game of Thrones for the past few years, it sometimes seems as though I have to type this sentence out every week, but I am not a fan of rape plotlines as a method of upping the ante in stories, and Outlander’s biggest weakness is its constant use of rape as shorthand for “danger”. This is not, however, a show without flaws. Sam Heughan impresses as the gruffly charming Jamie, Douglas Henshall has a ball as local rogue MacQuarrie, while in a double role as the vicious, complex Black Jack and the altogether more measured Frank, Menzies all but steals the show, dialling charisma and potential for evil up to 11. Not that it’s all about Claire (and Balfe). Photograph: Ed Miller/2014 Sony Pictures Television Outlander spends a great deal of time inverting traditional male and female roles to give us a fantasy in which the woman is very much centre stage and the gaze through which we view the story is hers: frank, unflinching and very definitely female.Ĭlaire Randall (Caitriona Balfe) with Jamie Fraser (Sam Heugan). Claire is passionate, experienced and open about her sexual desires but she doesn’t emotionally abandon Frank even as, trapped in the past, she begins to fall for young rebel Jamie – an altogether more innocent, virginal character, who is frequently imperilled. It helps, too, that Outlander is a deeply romantic show and one that enjoys playing with romance’s conventions. This is a woman who has survived the brutalities of a far more modern war, and the show cleverly never forgets that, allowing the audience to see how she might feel at home with this band of fighting men, and why she is still reeling from the trauma of her recent wartime experience. Claire (played with just the right amount of bolshie spark by Irish actor Caitriona Balfe) is no damsel in distress, but rather a coolly competent, sharp-tongued pragmatist who greets disaster by calmly rolling up her sleeves and trying to sort the mess out.
#Outlander season 1 episode guide movie#
Photograph: Starz! Movie Channel/Courtesy/Īs a plot, it has more holes than your average cheese grater – and yet something about Outlander works. Stuck in the past, our heroine falls in with a ragtag bunch of Jacobite rebels while unintentionally attracting the wrath of the English captain of dragoons, Black Jack Randall, a man who (in one of the series’ more remarkable twists) turns out to be an ancestor of her mild-mannered husband Frank (both are played by Tobias Menzies).Ĭlaire with Frank in 1945 (Caitriona Balfe and Tobias Menzies).
#Outlander season 1 episode guide series#
While the opening credits – scenic shots of Scotland accompanied by a mournful rendition of the Skye Boat Song – initially reinforced fears that this would be heritage TV by numbers, complete with skirling pipes, scenic ruins and brave lads and lassies battling evil redcoat troops, the reality has been clever and more complicated.Īdapted by Ronald D Moore of Battlestar Galactica fame, the Outlander TV series manages to be faithful to the source material while building on it to create a fully realised world in which you swiftly accept the (admittedly slightly ludicrous) central premise that Claire manages to slip back in time to 1743 while visiting some old standing stones on her honeymoon.
![outlander season 1 episode guide outlander season 1 episode guide](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/z8B9sucB9BCRmPoW95EhjF.jpg)
She gives her true opinion of the current state of affairs in Scotland, something that is not the wisest thing to do considering her position.Outlander’s Claire Randall (Caitriona Balfe) Photograph: Ed Miller/2014 Sony Pictures Television She loses the calm demeanor and discretion. His actions result in Claire dropping the facade of the innocent English Rose. Though it’s clear that there is little love lost between Randall and his fellow officers, he soon has them questioning Claire’s loyalties with his indiscreet questions and insults. The tide turns when Black Jack Randall enters the room.
![outlander season 1 episode guide outlander season 1 episode guide](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/93/32/6b/93326b684651f5ded75abea8704ce32b.jpg)
They don’t ask probing questions, at least not ones that Claire can’t easily lie her way out of. Charming ClaireĬlaire is initially able to rise to the occasion and charm the group of British officers who are predisposed to believe her story. He is the outlander now as much as Claire is. Dougal is left walking a tightrope of danger so as not to offend the garrison troops. Nonetheless, she ends up having to report to the garrison with Dougal as her chaperone/bodyguard of sorts. Claire, realizing the British army can be quite ruthless, does not betray Dougal and the Highlanders by stating that she has been mistreated.