‘Outlander’ season 2, episode 1 review: Of matters of death, life, and ship-burning
What does being alive mean when a part of you is gone? How do you perceive the destruction of your world? These are two questions that stood at the heart of “Through a Glass, Darkly,” the Biblically-translated title for the “Outlander” season 2 premiere on Saturday night.
Typically, flashbacks and flash-forwards are the stuff of groans in the TV landscape, mostly given how “Lost” has already done the majority of them so well that few other shows can replicate the magic. What “Outlander” did instead was bend time and our feelings to go along with it. We began all the way back in the 1940s, where Claire found herself back in Inverness after transporting back through time. There, she met Frank Randall, and after some heart-pains and deliberation, eventually she did clue him in on the other life she had, the one as Claire Fraser stocked to the brim of passion and heartache. Through her narrative, you could see her coming to grips of the life she once had being snatched from her, and trying to find the life within this one.
You see, Frank Randall does indeed love her, and the show has done at times a nice job of depicting that he is not a dreadful man. He may be the silhouette of Black Jack in appearance alone, but he does not contain his soul. It is therefore odd that we saw him so content with her marriage to Jamie, and then enraged to the point of destroying things at the thought of her with child. While we know he questioned his own ability to have children, his physical tirade upon hearing the news may be the one moment in the premiere we find problematic, constructed as a TV moment rather than the way that someone of Frank’s demeanor as interpreted on TV. (We put that in here as a reminder that we are not someone who reads the Diana Gabaldon books or researches future events; we find that complicates our opinion on matters at present, which may be a somewhat ironic thing to say in regards to a show about time travel.)
Eventually, Claire vowed to him to have the past remain the past (we’ll have to see if she holds to that) and have their child believe him to be the father; with that, we venture off now to Boston, the site of potential adventures we may or may not see. We do hope that Frank returns more frequently than in the second half of season 1, where he was understandably a bit of an afterthought given there was not much going on with him.
From this point in the future, we jumped back into the past to see the arrival of Claire and Jamie in France. It did not take long to uncover the new mission to infiltrate the Jacobite rebellion, and meet a man very much associated with it in Jared Fraser. He is Jamie’s cousin, who helps to orchestrate plans for the couple after he sees the torment laid out by Black Jack. He offers him a residence in Paris and a job running his wine business, where the two could be close to the action as they fight for their own brand of history … and yet, not without enemies.
Our first rival emerged tonight in Comte St. Germain, a man infuriated by Claire’s move to destroy the ship. After the discovery of smallpox aboard it, what else did he expect to happen? Yet, her benevolent act could have far-reaching consequences, and like with Frank, we will have to see where this romance goes.
For the romantics, “Through a Glass, Darkly” contained lovely moments of faithfulness from Jamie and Claire as you could see very much how they were in on everything together. Where we not concerned about potential roadblocks in the weeks ahead, it’d be easier to not have a pit in our stomach and feel like all was well.
For this episode, it was clear that executive producer Ronald D. Moore picked up exactly where he left off in delivering an excellent television series, one still anchored by great performances (Caitriona Balfe was in particular extraordinary this week) and also historical drama that few others replicate. The Droughlander is over; now, prepare for the flood. Grade: A-.
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