Outlander: And the World Was All Around Us

My review is below the fold and full of series finale spoilers. If you haven't seen it yet, go watch it first! Please note that there's a post-credit scene you won't want to miss.

I'm sorry, but I have to say it. I'm disappointed.

Much of this episode was saying goodbye in slomo, as Jamie wrote his will and said farewell to everyone he loved. He had an inner calm and a gentle sort of half smile throughout, very much as if he had resigned himself to death. There was one sweet, slow Jamie/Claire love scene with nudity, not terribly titillating but a reminder of how the love scenes have been an important part of the series.

Before the battle, we revisited the fact that Mandy is psychic. She sees auras like Master Raymond did, and "hears" animals. She said that Jamie doesn't have a color; he's like water, and we know he can't go through the stones. Apparently, baby Davy MacKenzie is like Jamie. Jamie wanted all of his family to go home to the twentieth century after his death, but if Davy couldn't go, to leave him with Ian and Rachel.

So who of you Outlander fans think that Bree and Roger would be able to go back to the future with Jem and Mandy and Claire, and leave their baby behind?

So we're off to the big battle that has been referenced constantly all season. And yes, I absolutely bought in. Every time someone got shot, I said, "Nooo!" I kept expecting we were going to lose Ian, Buck, Josiah, someone I cared about. (I didn't care about Hiram Crombie.)

Or Claire and Roger, medic and clergy, who initially stayed behind as ordered. And then they didn't, dashing into harm's way.

Major Patrick Ferguson was a real person and he did indeed die at the Battle of Kings Mountain on October 7, 1780. Interestingly, there is a reference to a patriot that was clearly Jamie, and I quote Wikipedia:

"...during the fighting, Ferguson was shot from his horse. With his foot still in the stirrup, he was dragged to the Patriot side. According to Patriot accounts, when a Patriot approached the major for his surrender, Ferguson drew his pistol and shot him as a last act of defiance. Other soldiers retaliated, and Ferguson's body was found with eight musket holes in it."

Claire clutched her heart when Jamie was shot. She refused to leave him even after it was obvious that he had died. That big death flashbacky thing gave us references to the pilot episode: Frank seeing Jamie's ghost looking up at Claire in the window brushing her hair, and Jamie making the forget-me-nots bloom at the stones so that Claire would come back to look for them, and travel back in time.

Outlander showrunner Matt Roberts says that the ending is open to interpretation. That final moment when both Jamie and Claire woke up gasping could mean two things. One, that Claire did heal Jamie. She brought a stillborn baby back recently, after all, and she held her arm over his wound the whole time. Or that Claire died too, and the two of them woke together in the afterlife... no, that doesn't work for me.

It's not like I wanted Jamie to die, because I didn't. But for a show like Outlander, I expected the finale to be a multi-hankie event. It wasn't, at least for me. It didn't make me cry. That doesn't mean that this was a bad season or that they didn't set things up properly. Just from what had happened so far, I fully expected Claire to heal Jamie at Kings Mountain and for her hair to turn white, as Adawehi told her it would when she would have "wisdom beyond time." And that happened. The series did end the way it began, with Claire healing Jamie. If it's open to interpretation, that is how I'll interpret it.

There is a post end credits scene, so keep watching! It's Diana Gabaldon in a book store autographing Outlander, which was her first book. By the way, nearly all of this season, including Jamie's resurrection, came from Gabaldon's ninth book, Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone. (Jamie even went and told the bees that he was going.)

The truth is, only Diana Gabaldon knows how this story ends, since she is currently writing the tenth and final book. For me, this story won't be over until I close the final page in book ten. And I intend to post a synopsis of that book here on Doux.

Bits:

— During this final season, I repeatedly wished they'd kept the Sinéad O'Connor version of "The Skye Boat Song." They made the perfect choice for this finale, though, bringing back the vocal and the credits from the first season.

— The post-credits vignette were the forget-me-nots, the same one we saw here and in the pilot episode. I've been doing a rewatch for a couple of months and have added a description of the post-credits vignette to every episode review as I watched it.

— Is that American flag flying at the church at Fraser's Ridge the gift that Washington gave Claire? Has to be.

— The poem that was referenced more than once was "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" by William Butler Yeats.

— The untranslated Gaelic phrase that Jamie and Claire exchanged was "I love you, my heart."

— As he, or they, were dying, Jamie and Claire were lying on something that looked very much like a broken standing stone.

— Outlander the series began (at least as far as the past is concerned) in October 1743 and ended in October 1780. Jamie was born May 1, 1721, making him 68 years old. I'm more confused about Claire because of the two extra years of time-traveling and her birthday being later in October, but I think she was either 73, or about to turn 73.

— Sadly, I don't have quotes. Nothing jumped out at me.

I always watch an episode twice before posting a review, but I'm not going to do that this time. No rating, either. I could give it any number of stars and justify it. Please post a comment and tell me what you thought,

Billie
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Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

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