Outlander season 5: A look Richard Rankin’s Emmy-worthy performance
For Richard Rankin’s character of Roger, he faced one of the greatest challenges of his life. Not only did he lose much of his voice, but also a part of himself. His voice was his identity — before losing it, he still questioned his role in a society well before his time. He did not come to the 18th-century well-equipped for a day-to-day life, and he had just started to find a role. Then, said role was snatched away from him. He became a man who lived inside his head … and Richard Rankin became an actor defined in this episode by his movements rather than his words.
One of the hardest challenges as a performer is how to make a lot out of a little. For Richard entering this episode, he had to often show despair without saying it. He turned the moments he had with Sophie Skelton into silent spectacles of pain and sorrow. He wanted to connect and yet doubted he could. He saw no real path forward and when he would mentally take a step forward, the trauma would still find a way to throw him right back.
As fantastic as Rankin’s scenes were with Skelton, some of the most breathtaking material came in his scenes with a totally-transformed version of John Bell as Young Ian. Here you had two men working through their own trauma together, confronting one another on what they have and don’t have. They can get through this together, as they were struggling mightily to get through this apart.
One of the reasons why we’ve long loved Roger as an Outlander character is that he’s the most relatable — he’s not a warrior in a battlefield, he’s a little bit bookish, and he’s trying to find a way in the world. His one constant is his true love. Through this episode, and through Rankin’s Emmy-worthy performance, this journey back to Brianna feels earned. you buy into it, and sometimes the most heart-wrenching moments come when Roger says nothing at all. That speaks to the versatility of Richard as an actor, and then also the show’s own ability to tell stories on a multitude of emotional levels.
What did you think about the new Outlander performance from Richard Rankin?
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Photo: Starz