Our resident Outlander fanatic Tara Ward shares her thoughts from the much-anticipated return of time-travel romance series. Contains spoilers. And smoulders.
This week, Claire and Jamie head for Paris, where their ‘to do’ list consisted of:
1) infiltrating the French royal court
2) drinking all the profits from their new business
3) living a life of luxury while wondering how their life became so complicated
Who will the Frasers offend this week? How many new frocks will Claire score, and will she drink all the wine? Let’s find out.
1) Jamie’s nightmare gives us all the shits
This was my exactly my response when Claire’s sex face morphed into Black Jack’s sex face. The opening credits are barely finished and we’re faced with this god-awful, face stabbing, blood spurting zombie sex tribute? No, no, no, Outlander!
I get that Jamie is suffering from his experiences at Wentworth, but for the love of all things kilty MUST WE ALL BE FORCED TO LIVE THIS NIGHTMARE?
Happy thoughts, think happy thoughts. Ginger curls. Wee Roger’s dimples. Frank wearing his 1940s high-waisted trousers.
“I won’t be getting any more sleep tonight,” Jamie muttered. Neither will I, Big Red.
2) Let them eat cake, Claz
“Running a great house in Paris had proved more complicated than I could have ever imagined.” The struggle is real. #prerevolutionproblems
3) Get a load of the French side-eye
4) Forecast for Jamie’s hair: sultry, but changeable
The thought of meeting new BFF Bonnie Prince Charlie in a brothel was enough to make Jamie’s hair curl.
5) We learn more about the private life of the French than we ever need to know
What better place to discuss an uprising than at a brothel? “They do find unique ways to enjoy themselves,” Jamie observed, knee deep in prostitutes and sex-toys as he discussed the ins and outs of the Jacobite campaign with the Prince. “They’re a sorry bunch of sodomites who cannae please their women,” Murtagh grumped. Each to their own, eh, M-Dog?
6) Murtagh should work for the Scottish Tourist Board
If Bonnie Prince Charlie is the outstretched hand of God, then Murtagh is God’s elastic tongue of truth. He hates France (“it’s the air – arses and armpits!) and Bonnie Prince Charlie (“the man is a blockhead”). Meanwhile, Scotland is a sacred land of “simple people, with no great love for outsiders”. He even washes his knees to meet the King. That beard, that bark, that burr. What a bloke.
7) Politics schmolitics, what about my new dressing gown
8) Louise de Rohan gives us advice to live by
“The bite of the man is desirable. The bite of the monkey? Not so much.”
9) Riddle me this: beware the complicated honeypot with the unthatched roof located in the barren forest of love
Any other euphemisms for an eighteenth century Parisian Brazillian? No? Good. Let’s move on.
10) Versailles’ milkshakes bring all the monsieurs to the yard
Next stop on the Kim Kardashian Tour of Paris™ is Versailles, where Claire wears a smoking new frock to show the Jacobites that a woman doesn’t wear a dress cut to her navel unless she’s really serious about kicking some partisan arse.
Murtagh was right about the arses and armpits – Versailles is overflowing with the bloody things. King Louis needs a Mexican wave of testosterone to move his bowels, Jamie is nearly swallowed whole by his ex-girlfriend’s giant sleeves, and what about this poor woman who forgot to put on her top before she left the chateau?
It’s like the time I went to Countdown with my skirt tucked into my knickers, and nobody told me until I got to the frozen food aisle. It’s only funny the first time, btw.
11) Jon Bon Jovi is also a time traveller
In an astonishing and unexpected twist, Jon Bon Jovi just fell out of the fireplace.
12) News just in: Black Jack is still alive
Those hairy coos had one job to do. ONE JOB.
P.S. Welcome back, Sandringham, you are wicked and fabulous and I love you.
13) The fireworks are a metaphor for what’s going on in Claire’s brain
Double thumbs up, Outlander, there were more twists and turns in that episode than a medium-to-fast hydroslide – and that was just keeping track of Jamie’s hair length. As the old Scottish saying goes, may the sun always rise to meet you, may the wind always be at your back, may your armpits always be hairless, and may your honeypot never fall out of whack.
Pour yourself a dram and dive into the new season Outlander on Lightbox below (new episodes arriving every Sunday at 7pm)
