'Outlander' Postmortem: The End of Droughtlander Begins With Narrator Change
Executive producer Ronald D. Moore is acutely aware that some Outlander purists are still miffed six months later about the wedding ring change. And with the decision to begin the long-awaited second half of Season 1 with Jamie Fraser as the narrator instead of Claire, he’s prepared for an avalanche of tweets.
“I knew some people weren’t going to like [the ring change] but I was like, ‘This is what we’re doing. We’ll just take that hit.’ I think the ring was the biggest change we made and I don’t think telling one episode from Jamie’s point of view will be that big of a deal, but you can never be sure,” Moore tells Yahoo TV. “You will never be able to please everyone, but I feel really good about what we have done and feel confident that our adaptation preserves the characters, the story, and the fundamental spirit of Diana [Gabaldon]’s novel. This is definitely the book. It has changed in certain ways. We emphasize certain story points, skip some, or add to it, but that’s the process of adaptation.”
Maybe it will help Outfanders to know that the change was made in the ninth episode, “The Reckoning,” to serve two specific purposes.
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“There were a couple of different reasons. One, we were like, 'OK, we’re restarting. How do we want to do that? What’s an opening to the second half that’s not just literally picking up the [midseason finale] cliffhanger?’ We thought this would be an interesting change-up and a way of introducing the audience into the story again,” Moore explains. “And, in a bigger sense, the series is really about Claire and Jamie together and this relationship. It’s a chance to pivot, include him, and tell their story, not just her story. Once we did that, it gave me permission as we moved forward to cut to him and play scenes that he’s experiencing because we’re opening the point of view to include both of them.”
Sam Heughan (Jamie Fraser) was thrilled to learn that his Highlander would be (bag)piping up in voiceover. “I remember getting that script and seeing that it opened with Jamie’s thoughts and having a really interesting conversation with the writers about where he’s narrating it from. Is it in the moment? Is it in the future? Has he already made the choices that made him a man?” Heughan says. “The change also increases the stories that can be told. You see a lot more of where he’s coming from and less that he’s just this Highlander. You see a lot more of the chinks in his armor, his relationship to his sister, and his personal relationship with his father,” he continues. “We aren’t limited to seeing what Claire is experiencing or witnessing. That is fine when we are together and the stories are interlinked, but we’re separated towards the last couple of episodes. Now you follow both timelines, and see where they go and how they’re both trying desperately to get back to each other. You get to see firsthand the hells they are both put through at the end of the season.”
Heughan admits that “The Reckoning” was pretty hard on him physically. First, there was the slap heard round the watering hole: “It was a very good slap. Yeah. Caitriona [Balfe]’s very good. I was pretty raw by the end of that day. I guess it made us even for the spanking.” Balfe suffered her lumps as well. “She’s constantly covered in bruises and I am too,” Heughan explains. “There’s never a comfortable moment. We both came out [of this episode] in bruises and cuts.”
Related: Watch a Deleted Scene Between Jaime and Claire in ‘Outlander’
Interestingly enough, most damage seemed to be done when he least expected it — during the sex scenes. “Oh my God. We had rug burn. We’d bump into things, slam down onto the floor or the bed. I had a rash on my chest. We had carpet burns on our knees,” says the actor. “Hopefully it looks a lot better than it felt making it.”
Outlander airs Saturdays at 9 p.m. on Starz./