**SPOILERS UNTIL IT AIRS** There are great advantages to having a subscription to Starz on Amazon. The main one is that episodes are posted online before viewing is available elsewhere. I couldn’t sleep this morning and woke up wide awake at 3:15 a.m. Sat down at the computer with a cup of coffee and had a notice that Season 301 of Outlander was up and ready. Of course, I didn’t think about going back to bed. Instead, I hit “watch now.”
To be totally honest my interest in Outlander has come and gone. Not a huge fan of graphic violence and sadistic behavior, there have been times I’ve walked away from the series with no regrets. There have been others where I’ve Returned to see what’s next. After the end of the last season with the flash forward twenty years, my interest has piqued again.
Episode 301 returns the audience to the blood, violent, and gory outcome of the battle of Culloden in 1745. Claire has returned to the future, and Jamie has returned to fight. Be prepared to watch many of the characters you’ve seen in the show die a terrible death, except Jamie who is severely wounded and miraculously spared. As an author, you have the power of life and death while writing. You can twist history and keep alive any character in order to continue the series book after book.
The show, as usual, flips back and forth from the past to present with rapidly changing scenes. In the present, Frank and pregnant Claire have moved to Boston and taken up residence. Claire is still in the past, refusing to allow Frank to touch her and retreats into a depressive shell. When she has her daughter, things appear to mend for a brief moment as they recommit to one another to raising the child. Let’s face it, Jamie lovers. Poor Frank has gotten the short end of the stick in Claire’s adventure. Regardless if he’s the spitting image of Black Jack, he’s a heartbroken man who has lost his wife to a ghost from the past. I cannot help but feel sorry for him.
The show begins to insert the reality of the times, too, where women were expected to be housewives at home and possess no opinions regarding the workplace or politics. As you know, Claire is far too outspoken to keep quiet and allow society’s norms to mold who she will become or how she should behave. It’s that part of her prickly and outspoken personality that occasionally rubs me the wrong way.
Nevertheless, lass, Outlander has returned. I’m hoping for less blood as the season continues, but once Claire starts cutting people up on the operating table, that will no doubt end. And yes, your Jamie, wounded from battle lives on. I will give Sam a high-five for his performance on the battlefield and his moaning among a heap of bodies next to Black Jack.
If you can’t wait to watch each week, ditch your cable and sign up for Starz on Amazon. A link is off to the right.
Filed under: Outlander, Reviews Tagged: Amazon Subscription, Outlander 301, Starz
