Our two lovelorn Highlanders got the spotlight in “Providence,” but now it’s time for those two to cool the hell off and let the sassenachs have the stage for an hour. Claire’s parents, Henry and Julia, are a greater mystery compared to their Scottish counterparts, given the information already provided, and they don’t have much time to sell us on their love story before being torn apart at Craigh na Dun. (Stop! Touching! Stones!). It’s an incredibly tall order. One thing they already have going for them before we even get started? Uh, Hermione Corfield looks and acts so much like Caítriona Balfe that I’m having trouble remembering to call her Julia. The casting on this show is so dead on. (Get it, Suzanne Smith.) Hey, maybe I’m already sold on the Beauchamps. Let’s dig into their situation a little deeper just to be sure.
We leave behind the Scottish Highlands of the 18th century, full of betrayal and heartbreak and probably so many weird smells for … well, for the absolute horror show that is the front lines of World War I in 1917. Cool trade-off, I guess. Henry Beauchamp is a Lieutenant on the Western Front, currently stationed in Belgium. Blood of My Blood doesn’t shy away from the violence and gore of this war — there is blood and guts and young men dying, there is poison gas and bodies on barbed wire. We, like Henry, cannot escape the brutality of trench warfare. These scenes serve to show us who Henry is and what he has that will surely help him when he faces the nightmare that awaits him in Inverness. Henry is brave and loyal and refuses to leave a man behind. But he’s also empathetic and kind-hearted. It’s why this war is eating him alive. It’s why he turns to writing a letter to no one in particular about the hell he is living through, about not fearing death but wondering why he and so many others have to die like this, for this. He’s “holding on to sanity” as best he can, but his hope is fading.
That letter to no one winds up on the desk of a young woman working at the Postal and Telegraph Censorship Department in the London War Office by the name of Julia Moriston. Blood of My Blood and Outlander talk about fate and destined love in such a large scale way, but sometimes fate is just a letter landing on the right desk at the right time. She is so moved by Henry’s words and pleas for understanding, she says she felt “compelled to reply.” In the few moments we spent with Julia, we learn that she is whip-smart and dreams of being allowed to earn a degree at university one day. She reads about biology, chemistry, and history in her free time. She has an uncanny memory. Sound like someone we know?
Julia wants to offer Henry any little bit of hope she can. She writes to him about how not even the smallest raindrop is insignificant, how it all makes a difference. She writes about how we are “shaped and changed by our suffering” and eventually, like water, “strong enough to cut our way through rock.” She wants him to hold on. To hope. And so they begin to write back and forth. They talk about big, existential things, and every day things like what she’s reading — she is obsessed with Scotland and like, someone play her the Whoopi Goldberg clip from Ghost because she is in danger, girl — and they trade their favorite lines of poetry. (She loves Robert Burns, naturally.) They fall in love over words. They become each other’s hope.
Finally, just when Julia is beginning to believe Henry may have been killed in action, she is walking up a set of stairs in the city, and there he is. He sees her first and calls out, “hope springs eternal,” a phrase they’ve written to one another. Now, let’s assume that at some point, she sent him a picture of herself. Otherwise, was Henry just wandering the streets of London yelling “hope springs eternal” at any woman under the age of 30? Honestly, I would watch that. But no, he knows it’s her, and she knows it’s him, and they kiss right there on the stairs.
We find them back at Julia’s apartment, giggling and kissing and pulling at each other’s clothes. It’s very cute. The sex is sweaty and full of trembling and intense and … yeah, yeah, okay, I guess I am very much in on the Beauchamps. How could you not be? They’re married and happy, but he carries the demons of the war. When he wakes up screaming from nightmares, she has to pull him out of it — she’s his tether to the real world.
And that’s all we get before Julia wakes up on the other side of the stones and everything goes to hell. Much like Claire, the first face Julia runs into in the 18th century is not a friendly one. Like, could one person just help out a confused-looking woman in weird clothes for once? Just ask her if she’s okay! These people do not ask Julia if she’s okay, they kidnap her and sell her to Lord Lovat, Simon Fraser, as a way to repay a debt. So, sort of the opposite of asking if she’s okay, if you think about it.
At least Julia thinks to leave a message for Henry, as confused as she is — she writes S.W.A.K (sealed with a kiss), how they signed their letters, with an arrow pointing in the direction she would be going. I don’t know exactly how much good it does Henry, but he does find it and it does lead him into Inverness.
He finds himself in a small tavern, and although very confused about the way people are dressed and speaking, and the fact that there’s a notice on the wall that says 1714, he starts asking for Julia. He is desperate to find her, but realizes right away that whatever is happening to them, it won’t be an easy task. At the tavern, he makes a quick friend of Malcolm Grant, who he persuades to stay out of a terrible property deal his family’s bladier, or spokesperson, is trying to talk him into. Malcolm brings Henry home to speak to his father, and Isaac, impressed, asks him to work for him as his new bladier. Oh, excuse me, first he has his current bladier’s head put on a pike, and then he asks Henry to join him. So, I guess that’s not really asking. There is something in it for Henry, though: Isaac says he can continue his search for Julia from Castle Grant. His work will take him all over the Highlands, plus he’ll have protection. It’s not the worst plan, exactly, and also I have to imagine Henry is so over it — he was in a car accident and swept down a raging river just that morning! This is the same day! Let this man sleep!
Over at Castle Leathers, Julia has no idea that her husband has followed her through the stones and is searching for her. She’s not thrilled about being held against her will or being told she’s now a housemaid and has no choice about it, and she’s definitely taken aback when the housekeeper, Mistress Porter, informs her it is 1714, but she doesn’t have a ton of options here. She seeks out a map to Inverness and avoids Simon Fraser and his “particular needs” as best she can and one night she makes a run for it. It’s Brian, who’s already run interference between Julia and his father, who stops her. He’s trying to protect her — it’s night, a storm is coming, and before long his father will definitely send his henchman after her. He wants to help her, but not this way. (Hmm, remember that other time when a curly-haired Highlander stopped a Sassenach from running away, knowing it would not be safe for her? I sure do!)
It’s too late, though. Simon discovers she tried to make a run for it and demands punishment in the form of 20 lashes with the strap. Brian steps in. He tells his father it was his idea, he encouraged her to escape, and he’ll take the lashes. It’s so gallant that yeah, I did have to check in the mirror to see if I had cartoon heart eyes, leave me alone about it!! So, at the absolute very least, Julia has one ally in that house.
Resigned to their current situations, recognizing they are trapped in a new sort of nightmare, what can either of them do but write letters to one another? They know the other may never read it, but talking to each other, writing to each other, is the only way they know how to stay tethered to one another.
Clan Business
• We fast forward a month later and meet up once again with Henry at the MacKenzie Gathering, this time after Dougal uses Malcolm Grant’s face as a punching bag. He meets with Ned to discuss some sort of reparation. Isaac Grant wants Dougal head (he’s got a thing for heads!), but Ned offers Ellen’s hand in marriage. It doesn’t seem like a fair trade, but when Ned mentions that he could be a big help in Henry’s search for a certain lady, Henry agrees to take the offer to the Grants. An interesting alliance, to be sure.
• The rules of Outlander time travel are, uh, fluid, but Julia does lose the gemstone in her wedding ring when she travels through, so that obviously helped her. Henry is pulled by his connection to Julia. But I have to wonder if there was also a reason Julia was pulled to 1714? Is it as simple as her fate dictates Claire’s fate? She has to go there to make sure Brian and Ellen get together or something? Something to watch out for!
• Isaac Grant’s muscle is Arch Bug! So that guy was always a little psycho with a taste for violence. It all makes sense. If history is destined to repeat itself, I do fear he may cause trouble for Claire’s dad.
• How’s everybody feeling about Blood of My Blood’s theme song (written by music supervisor Bear McCreary and performed by Julie Fowlis)? Outlander’s theme song is one to belt every single time it’s on, this one? This one I’m dancing to the entire time. When that beat drops? Come on! Play it in the club, baby. This rips.
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