Here we go, Sassenachs.
It’s the season 5Outlanderfinale, and it’s perhaps the most brutal finish since season 1.
On that very dismaying note, let’s jump into this episode.
Credit: Aimee Spinks/Starz
It begins back in the late 1960s with Claire fantasizing about a different version of her life then.
This fantasy is what she’s using to cope during her abduction by Lionel Brown and his men.
It’s incredibly fun to see all these folks in more groovy threads.
Claire’s reality is far grimmer.
She tries to run away, so they slash her breast open with a knife.
One man warns not to draw her blood, fearing her powers as a conjure woman.
She runs with this, threatening that they’ll all be dead by dawn if they touch her again.
Later, the man who warned against hurting her introduces himself as Tebby and shares his food with her.
He wants her to remember he tried to help and not hurt him.
But Lionel grabs hold of her and they scuffle.
She screams and tries to curse them, but Lionel gags her with a piece of cloth.
Later that night, a man who calls himself Donner removes her gag.
Donner guessed she was like him because of the medical advice she gave.
Claire tells him Springer was killed by the Mohawk, and she begs Donner to cut her loose.
She struggles against them, then tries to lose herself in her fantasy.
It’s done sensitively and with care, when it could easily have been gratuitous.
Gabaldonuses sexual violence far too often as a source of conflict or drama.
Only to find, they didn’t!
Ian is right there.
They were thinking of home and this is where the stones brought them.
So, they set out to return to the Ridge.
Bree is perturbed when she sees Jamie has lit the fiery cross.
Back at the house, Jamie is arming and preparing his men when Roger and Bree ride up.
They tell him the stones didn’t work but beg to know what’s happening.
He tells them Claire has been kidnapped.
Bree wants to go with him on the rescue mission, but he won’t allow it.
Josiah Beardsley volunteers to go, as does Roger.
He is honoring his oath to stand beside Jamie.
Ian puts an axe straight into Hodgepile’s face, while Roger slits another man’s throat.
Jamie runs to Claire in the dark, horrified to find her in such a terrible condition.
She’s crying and practically catatonic.
He tells her that is alive and whole.
Ian and Fergus are devastated and angry to see what has happened to her.
The men of the Ridge line up the prisoners and execute them one by one.
Jamie carries her over to see her torturers are dead.
Lionel Brown, however, is still alive.
On the journey home, Jamie reassures Claire that Marsali and the baby are alive.
She asks if Donner was in the group who died, and she explains he was from the future.
Jamie asks if he hurt her, and she replies only, “He didn’t help me.”
Jamie also tells her that Roger and Bree have returned.
They return to the Ridge and Claire embraces Bree, while taking Marsali’s hand.
Later, Bree helps Claire bathe, gently cleaning her scrapes and bruises.
She offers her hand and her ear if Claire needs it.
Later that night, Jamie rages, wanting to kill someone for Claire’s injuries.
“I am supposed to be shattered by this,” she proclaims.
“Well, I won’t be.”
Marsali isn’t taking his lip, insisting heisgetting mercy.
Claire asks Marsali to prepare comfrey for him and passes her the herbs.
Upstairs, she collapses, crying.
We pan over to her table of herbs, revealing that she put hemlock in the mixture.
Jamie walks in to find Marsali on the floor and Lionel dead.
She fears that Lionel will haunt her or she’ll go to hell, and Jamie comforts her.
Jamie brings Lionel’s body back to Brownsville and his brother.
As a courtesy, he has brought Lionel’s body back for burial.
At first, Richard seems understanding, saying Lionel reaped what he sowed and Jamie did what he must.
But then he ominously reminds him that he will do the same when the time comes.
Roger and Bree approach the house, marveling that they are back on the road less traveled.
Bree recites that famous Robert Frost poem.
Claire stands surveying the land and her family, still bruised and battered.
She wants to just enjoy the ordinary day, knowing that peace will soon be gone.
It seems Claire has told him what has happened to her, as he tells her she is brave.
He asks how she feels, and she replies only, “Safe” before we cut to black.
