Outlander season 7 continues to be plagued by the series’ issue of a slow-moving premiere, but at least by the end of “A Life Well Lost,” when Jamie Fraser appears in a rowboat to rescue his ladylove Claire, there are flickers of the early series’ dynamic, adventurous tone. Both this visual of the core time traveling couple together, as well as key individual moments in the episode, show that the series is reemphasizing what has made viewers fall in love with each of them and with their partnership: how each of them brings goodness out in the other, but only to balance the necessary violence that ensures their continued survival. It’s not a perfect start to the penultimate season, but it’s enough to get fans feeling breathless with anticipation for more Outlander.
Spoilers for Outlander 7×01 “A Life Well Lost”
Getting tried for a murder she didn’t commit is only the latest blow to Claire’s tattered reputation, but it’s the one that seems to have spread most quickly. Everyone, from her fellow female inmates at the jail to the crew aboard the governor’s ship, immediately recognizes her as the healer slash murderess who supposedly did in her husband’s mistress (eek). Bet she misses the days of being “just” a witch.
The scenes in the jail dragged unnecessarily, with conversations that seemed more pulled from the books than actual key to the plot. By contrast, Claire’s one-on-one with Mrs. Josiah Martin was much more emotionally resonant: two mothers talking about how dangerous it is to bring new life into the world, how pregnancy is not a guarantee of a living child, and how Mrs. Martin has no choice but to trust that a supposed murderess tried to save Malva Christie’s unborn child, and that she will make the same commitment to the baby in Mrs. Martin’s womb.
Things are similarly existential on Roger and Brianna’s holiday, which coincides with his minister training. The MacKenzies are less exciting on their own, but give them another person to react to, and their rapport becomes much more engaging. Here, it’s the dilemma of whether or not to free Wendigo Donner, a fellow time traveler who stood by and let Lionel Brown’s men rape Claire at the end of season 5. Obviously they sympathize with someone else who has gone through the stones and found themselves trapped in the past; but Brianna can’t imagine risking their lives for him when he failed to do the same for her mother.
Yet it’s Roger who finds he has the most common ground with Wendigo, confessing to his wife that he was similarly passive when Stephen Bonnet was tossing babies overboard the Gloriana. Because he was trying to get to Brianna, and knew that that apathy was what would help him survive long enough to find her. Bri has difficulty accepting this, having endured the same violence and violation that Claire did at the hands of men equal parts cruel and indifferent, even though Roger makes a valid point about having to confront his darker, more cowardly survival instincts.
It’s a push-and-pull tension that the series has long handled (mostly) well, because it doesn’t silo these two roles—the one suffering violence, and the one confronting their darker self—by gender. Claire and Brianna have both been raped, but so have Jamie and Young Ian, and Roger almost died by hanging. Jamie’s bloodlust almost lost him his family when he beat Roger nearly to death over the misunderstanding regarding Bri, yet Claire, Bri, and Marsali have plenty of blood on their hands, killing Geillis, Bonnet, and Lionel Brown to defend their families or simply to get revenge.
For the moment, Roger simply prays to God to help Wendigo help himself. Somehow I think that’s going to come back and bite them in the arse.
As the eternal inverse to Claire’s oath to save lives, Jamie fights his own capacity for ending them. When the governor tasks him with the impossible price of rounding up 200 men from the Backcountry to fight for the crown in order to earn Claire’s freedom, I half expected Jamie to deliver 200 corpses, so inflamed was he. But instead the cost is just one life: Tom Christie’s. He delivers two confessions to each of them: Malva is his niece, not his daughter; she and her mother were both involved in witchcraft, which he blames for her tragic fate; and he claims to have killed her because of her wickedness, though neither Jamie nor Claire seem particularly convinced of this. Then for Claire there is an extra admission:
Is that a life well lost? It’s certainly a neat resolution to last season’s cliffhanger, though it leaves more unanswered questions about who the father of Malva’s child is, and whether Tom is protecting him. Book readers know, and I have to imagine the scandalous truth will come out this season. I will say that Mark Lewis Jones plays two sides of Tom to incredible effect in this episode: the pious man closing his eyes in reverent acceptance of his fate, appreciating his “eulogy” from Jamie like a man given the double-edged sword of attending his own funeral; and the vulnerable, lovesick man who has long accepted that Claire would never reciprocate his feelings, yet who will still make such a grand sacrifice out of that one-sided, unrequited love.
It turns out the cost of Jamie’s vengeance is two lives, the latter of which may not be as well lost, but is certainly cathartic nonetheless. The final scene is the best of the episode, in which Jamie confronts Richard Brown, who brought Claire in and tried to send Jamie back to Scotland. The slow-mounting tension that starts with Sam Heughan ominously lurking in the corner, ratchets up with a single word (“After…?”), and culminates in Jamie’s quiet order to “make your peace with the Lord, if you must,” before lunging—it’s chilling.
Goodness and violence, the true pairing at the heart of Outlander.
What was your favorite part of “A Life Well Lost,” and what are you looking forward to in the first half of Outlander season 7?
Natalie Zutter really appreciated Caitríona Balfe’s face acting at Claire’s awkward reaction to Tom’s love confession. Talk Outlander season 7 with her on Twitter!
