When we last saw Jamie and Claire they were having a super tense married moment. You know the kind … where you give a false report to the authorities just so your current Baby Daddy doesn’t run out to kill the future baby daddy of your future-past ex. Normal married stuff. Jamie can’t look at Claire, and refuses to let her touch him. She’s inexplicably gone from about 6 to 8 months pregnant in the span of however long it might take to get an English officer out of the Bastille on a false, unfounded charge. And life seems to have resolved a bit: It’s a brand new day, the sun has come out and Jamie’s got his thinking face on.
Let’s get to it.
Top Ten Moments from Outlander, ep 206: Best Laid Schemes
1. The Challenge: Demand Satisfaction
Look, you promised Murtagh a duel, and he’s day-before-the-parade giddy about it, so don’t deny Murtagh his Ten Duel Commandments.
Too bad for Murtagh that all that duel excitement is about to fizzle like a balloon covered in some kindergartner’s spittle. Jamie’s rescinding his challenge to Randall.
Jamie: Can we agree that duels are dumb and immature?
Murtagh: Sure. But Randall has to answer for his words, sir.
Jamie: With his life? We both know that’s absurd, derrr.
Murtagh: Hang on. How many men cry because Randall’s rapeyness is super numerous?
Jamie: Too bad, we’re not doing this.
We Noticed That Too: Claire makes Jamie beg off the duel the same day they encounter Randall, the same night he gets locked in the Bastille. Is this the next day, a few days later or a month? Only Claire’s Belly knows.
2. Well, Actually …
I {actually} really enjoyed the scene with Claire and the executioner man. Sure, he was delivering the longest *wink wink* warning of all time in pretty specifically horrific detail, but it felt like a scene ripped straight from the book. You know, where DianaG unnecessarily goes into excruciating detail about something medical, gruesome, atrocious (or all three), but you find yourself learning something you never knew to care about in the first place? I’m looking at you, Medicinal Uses for Maggots.
I also liked how he kept going on and on until Claire finally showed SOME sign on a light going on. I kept expecting him to slap her and say, “YOU! AND YOUR FRIEND! YOU’RE ALL GONNA DIE!” For someone who supposedly shows everything on her face, Claire mostly shows, “Whert?”
We Noticed That Too: Claire’s apron looks comfy and thick and like it’s made out of perfect throw pillow material. WANT.
3. Jamie Watches Hangoutlander
I believe just last week we were discussing this whole nonsense about Jamie owing Claire a life because she saved his life twice … and trying to count on just our two hands the times that he’s saved hers. This math does not add up in your favor, Claire. And Jamie finally threw out what we were all thinking. But my favorite line from this exchange was Jamie’s terse, “I owe Frank nothing. You had a free choice and you chose me.” DAMN STRAIGHT SHE DID.
Thank you for showing up on my television screen, James Alexander Malcolm Mackenzie Fraser. Except for that hair; that ain’t your do.
4. Murtagh Watches Hangoutlander
… and he loves Amy, who has been very vocal that it’s just time to cut Charles’ throat. Murtagh agrees and has no time for these “best laid schemes.” He is so 100% over all this convoluted chicanery.
“Why are we faking smallpox?” I have to agree Murtagh. Great idea to ruin the Comte’s shipment of wine in the same.exact.manner as the incident which caused him to put you on his shit list in the first place. He’ll NEVER catch on to that!
In this metaphor, Claire is George and Fred Weasley. That’s how far you’ve sunk, Claire. Don’t think we didn’t notice that Claire is the ultimate outsplainer, telling Murtagh in no uncertain terms why they can’t kill Charles. Thanks for outsplaining it to us, Claire.
We Noticed That Too: I was afraid the salve that Claire starts to put on Jamie’s chest was going to smell of lavender and trigger a reaction. Then I realized that was a GIANT BOOK LEAP, but hey, it’s happened before.
5. Fergus, You Sweet Summer Child
Sweet Fergus was so perfect in this episode. Everything you want that character to be: adorable, honorable, funny, quick. He’s doing is best to be everything that his lord and lady need him to be, even if that’s a bit of levity (“I will miss his happy face”) or a stoic watchman (“to guard your right”). It made the tension towards the end of the episode ratchet up to about a million percent for me. Every one of his lines and his scenes in this episode was perfectly attuned to making us fall in love with him more and more.
6. BabyDaddy!Jamie
If there is one real bone that I have to pick with Outlander novels, it is the short-lived glimpse we get into Jamie as he prepares to be a Da. For a hero like Jamie, a warrior and a scholar, a husband and a highlander, a man who is strong but sincere, the quiet tenderness that blooms when he is faced with the reality of impending fatherhood is a MOTHER F***ING PANTY DROPPER AND I WANT MORE OF IT.
Indulge me while I write a few ficlets of BabyDaddy!Jamie that we have been missing out on during this pregnancy:
- Jamie rumbling Gaelic into Claire’s belly while drunk.
- Jamie coming up behind Claire, arms around her belly, holding both of them while crooning off-key.
- Jamie on his knees kissing Claire’s pushed out navel while she whacks him on the side of the head.
- Jamie comparing the proportionate size of Claire’s ass cheeks to her belly.
- Jamie ruminating on what it means for him to be a father in the shadow of his own.
- Jamie feeling the baby kick and telling her he canna wait to meet her. OH WE GOT THAT ONE. FINALLY.
7. Suzette FTW
And the award for Most Improved Peripheral Character goes to Suzette the lady’s maid. She went from annoying me in the first episode by begging for more housework (no, I don’t care how much pleasure you take in your job, you don’t beg for extra TPS reports), to giving Murtagh that happy face, to genuinely amusing me in this episode. She’s adorable and charming, and probably a hell of a lot smarter than dumb Marcus.
8. Alpha Comte
Excuse me while I fulfill my contractual obligation to include the Comte (and Stanley Weber’s mouth) in every Top Ten of this season. But seriously, if he is going to keep showing up and stealing scenes and making Jamie look like second best, he’s going to keep making the list.
Stanley Weber is playing him SO well that I almost feel like he is going to ultimately defeat the Frasers in their plotting. He’s too smart. Like there is NO WAY the Comte believed that Murtagh’s French accent was legit. He could hear that Groundskeeper Willie under that bandana before Murtagh had even said a word.
We Noticed that Too: Jamie and Murtagh just let some poor coachman kick it in order to pull of this fake heist. Way harsh, guys.
9. Social Justice Warrior Claire
The Tupperware Party scene with Louise and the other French aristocrat ladies seemed slightly out of place in this episode; I could have done without it entirely. Claire is obviously (seriously OBVIOUSLY WE CAN ALL SEE THE BELLY NOW) far enough along in her pregnancy to beg out of any and all social engagements, especially ones she doesn’t want to attend (because the only multi-level-marketing product party I care to attend are the ones that sell nipple clamps; that shit is a good time).
But what I did love was Claire’s exasperation with the women of this time. She knows what’s going to happen to them and their children in a couple of decades, but she has no chill listening to their prattle. As often as it gets her in trouble, I still love it when Claire brings her “modern” opinions to her confused historical counterparts. But only when she’s anachronistic AND antagonistic too.
10. THAT DUEL
We had to have a duel. We’ve been leading up to having a duel between Jamie and Jack for three episodes. It was bound to happen. There was no way around it. And it was good: dudes were sweaty, swords were sharp, the fight itself looked legit. But when it comes to story-telling, to drama and to character motivation, I only have two lines for you:
“How did she ever forgive you?”
and
“CLAIRE!”
But that’s all I have.
In another story-telling misstep, the duel relied on Claire’s POV. We still don’t know why Jamie fought Jack so seemingly abruptly. We see the duel mostly from her perspective, hearing only those lines that she hears. We come upon them in medias res. And it’s certainly possible that we will get the bigger picture next week if the previews are any indication, but we were ready THIS WEEK. We were ready as soon as it became obvious that Fergus was in a locked room in a brothel with the only British red coat we know to be in Paris. There’s drama IN THAT MOMENT. So give it to us.
By bearing down on Claire’s experience as she repeats (over and over and too much), “You promised me”, as she races to them in the carriage, as she speed walks through the woods while having some sort of majorly formidable Braxton Hicks, we’ve lost the thread of why this is happening and why it’s so dramatic. Except of course for how it relates to Claire. Who can’t even get the story of why it went down THIRD HAND from Suzette. Sure, we might get the why and wherefore next week, but we’ll have other dramas to build up to, and this one will probably taper off somewhere midway through the episode. UGH.
And I had been so happy that we weren’t being treated to sloppy tell-not-show voiceovers in this episode (and there were moments when I think in the past they would have used them: when Claire was rushing to Master Raymond’s, when she’s watching Jamie and Murtagh in the courtyard, when she lays down in the hospital, etc. Hell, they probably recorded them but just didn’t put them in the episode. EXCELLENT CALL). But then in this last mad dash scene we have to hear Claire tell us what’s going on. WE KNOW. SHUT UP. Or yanno … show us the story instead.
We Noticed That Too: Jamie’s wounding of Jack seemed accidental, instead of purposeful and PERSONAL. Giant Ball of Nope.
Overall, this was one of the best episodes of the season so far (I still think the first episode tops it in terms of story-telling). What do you think?
What did you think of Best Laid Schemes? Who is your favorite new character this season? What would be your BabyDaddy!Jamie ficlet?
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