Outlander Recap: Blue-Light Special

Outlander
Abies Fraseri
Season 8 Episode 3
Editor’s Rating ★★★★
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Heeeeey, Outlander friends, how is everyone doing? Just wanted to do a little welfare check since, well, it looks like Claire Fraser has supernatural powers now? Claire has powers. CLAIRE HAS POWERS. All those people accusing her of being a witch were kind of right and that is hilarious. Someone tell Laoghaire. But before people get up in arms about how this is coming out of nowhere and oh my God this is batshit, this is batshit, right, let us all remember that this is a show about a woman who time traveled through giant stones. Honestly, it’s kind of batshit that they waited until season eight to give us additional major supernatural elements.

For what it’s worth, this development is by no means coming out of nowhere. Outlander has been setting up this reveal for seasons. And sure, a little bit of that is all the witch stuff, but, more important, as Claire talks about in this episode, back in season two, Master Raymond told her about the pale-blue light that surrounds Claire. We saw it. And that dude was always up to some weird shenanigans. And then, in season four, when Claire meets Cherokee healer Adawehi, she tells Claire that she had a dream about her in which she became a raven who swallowed the moon. “You have medicine now, but you will have more. When your hair is white like snow, you will have wisdom beyond time.” As we see in “Abies Fraseri,” that prophecy is coming to pass. This is cool, but it also makes me anxious for the next thing Adawehi says to Claire: “Do not be troubled, death is sent from the gods. It will not be your fault.” That bit could really mean anything, but in light of all the King Mountain talk, I’m worried about Jamie. And Claire. And Jamie and Claire. What’s new, I guess. Still, the tension is mounting in this final season.

So how does Claire come across these powers? Well, a young girl named Agnes comes out of the woods and finds Claire in her garden. Her mother is in labor and something’s wrong; she needs help. Claire and Jamie get Agnes’s mother, Susannah (and her midwife/friend Binta), up to the surgery. There’s almost trouble when Susannah’s husband, Aaron, shows up — as a free Black man in North Carolina, he’s wary of white men. He doesn’t think it’s safe for them to be here, as much as Jamie and Claire assure them they are here to help. Eventually, it’s less safe to leave — Susannah is having twins and they’re caught on each other. 

After hours of labor, Susannah delivers a healthy baby boy, but his twin sister is breech and when Claire gets her out, she isn’t breathing. It looks bad. She brings the baby over to a table so Susannah can’t see what’s going on, but Jamie sees. Claire, holding back tears, attempts CPR. She begs and pleads. But we see the baby and she’s gone. Claire can’t let her go. She holds her in her arms and, not surprisingly, she thinks back to holding Faith in her arms. She thinks of the heron and the pale-blue light and Master Raymond. Claire’s veins begin to pulsate. And suddenly, that baby is alive and healthy as if nothing ever happened. 

Once Claire and Jamie are alone, they take part in the age-old tradition of downloading what the hell just happened. Claire has no explanation that makes sense. When Jamie asks her to tell him the explanations that don’t make sense, he’s never been hotter. That’s true love right there. I mean, the guy’s entire family can disappear through stones, so I guess he’s used to weird shit happening by now. Claire tells him about Paris, about how she felt that blue light when Master Raymond touched her as she was dying. She felt the blue light burn up the infection inside of her. She felt that light again tonight with the baby but more powerfully. It was in her hands and it seeped into the baby, where she felt her heart beat again. She wonders if this is how Faith survived — Master Raymond brought her back with this power. They acknowledge this still doesn’t make much sense, since why would he not return Faith to them? Is this what he asked forgiveness for? I’m still unconvinced their Faith actually survived, and it’s nice to know they are still trying to piece some facts together. Even if they did already kill that smuggler over it. They are notoriously an act first, think second type of couple. It keeps things exciting! 

Claire will have a lot to mull over in regard to what’s going on with her. To add to the supernatural powers of it all, when she takes her head wrap off, she discovers that she now has a white streak in her hair. Jamie describes it as the color of moonlight, but you could also describe it as white as snow. Adawehi, girl, you called it. 

Surprisingly, the reveal of Claire’s blue-light powers is just a tiny bit of the drama that goes down in this episode. Oh, Outlander, really giving it your all as we wrap this drama up, aren’t you? If you can believe it, the Frasers actually have a wilder conversation than the one about Claire resurrecting babies from the dead. This one is about Claire railing Lord John. I’m so glad this issue is back because it’s honestly all I want to talk about all the time. Remember when Claire and Lord John had drunk, sad sex and then Lord John screamed at Jamie that he and Claire were actually both fucking him? Jamie does! It seemed put to rest when Claire and Jamie had sex on Lord John’s table and then almost died in the Revolutionary War, but one letter from John addressed to Claire, requesting Bree come down to Savannah to paint a portrait of Ben Grey’s son (it’s war time, John, be serious), and we once again get the little-bitch version of Jamie Fraser.

He’s still so mad about this! And reminding Claire that he’s told her in the past that he’s a jealous man is, like, not the PR statement I would’ve made, personally. Claire has to remind him that THEY THOUGHT HE WAS DEAD. She didn’t cheat on him! Jamie admits that he just can’t shake the feeling that now John is always in bed with them. To finally put this problem to, uh, bed, Claire uses her best weapon: sex. Claire is basically like, uhh, our sex is so good neither of us are thinking of anyone else. And she’ll prove it to him. They proceed to have sex that is so in sync and has so much direct eye contact, I felt like I should be looking away. Anyway, it works and now only one of Claire’s former husbands is haunting Jamie. 

So, it looks like Bree and Roger will be headed to Savannah, not just for the portrait painting but it will give them an excuse to procure some guns since there are a good amount of Continental Army outposts — they know about the King’s Mountain battle and they think the Ridge needs to be fully prepared for whatever may come. It’s a good thing they’re headed south, because there’s some real drama brewing down there. 

William has returned from his fact-finding mission in the north and is more convinced than ever that Ben isn’t really dead. Digging up a loved one’s grave and finding a rando in there will do that to a man. Lord John still isn’t completely convinced, mostly because William’s only other piece of evidence is that the tin toy soldier he had given Ben to keep with him during the war wasn’t in his belongings. And when William spots that toy soldier in Amaranthus’s collection of Ben’s things, he loses even that very shaky piece of evidence. It’s hard to tell what William is really thinking, because whether Ben is truly dead or alive, it seems quite soon for William and Ben’s supposed widow to be flirting as heavily as they are. Over beetles, no less! Well, a waistcoat Amaranthus embroidered with beetles. Amaranthus is a Bug Girl and honestly, it’s impressive that she can make that work so well for her. William is into it. When she kisses him and then walks away, he is confused but he does not hate it. 

It’s not like he’s dropped the Ben mystery completely. Lord John encourages him to attend a British Army lunch session where Ben’s former commander will be. Surely, that guy would know if Ben escaped, right? Plus it gets William out of the house and back into society and our Emo King really needs it. Ben’s commander doesn’t have anything interesting to say about Ben — he was a great soldier, but if he’s alive this guy clearly doesn’t know anything. He does, however, drop some info about Lord John. William, apparently, had no idea his father was the governor of Ardsmuir Prison for a while and he seems put out by it. I guess this is the beginning of William learning more about John and Jamie’s friendship. We’ll find out more, next time on Outlander: My Two Dads.

Lord John’s time at that luncheon is eventful, as well. Guess who comes waltzing into that dining room? Ol’ Percy Wainwright. You remember him, right? French spy, John’s former step-brother, also John’s former fuck buddy? He gave John the intel on Richardson being a Continental spy and setting up a trap to have Hessians kidnap William. He plops down next to John, gets a little handsy under the table (these two really need to hook up again), and then asks for a favor: He’s been trying to get in touch with a local printer named Claudel Fraser (Fergus, of course) and thinks John will be able to help him get a meeting. John agrees to it if Percy will return the favor by helping him locate Richardson, who has seemed to have vanished into thin air. It’s a deal. And Bree and Roger will be arriving just in time to get caught up in the middle of all of this. Exciting! 

Exciting in a less fun way is what’s going down on Fraser’s Ridge at the moment. Jamie has grown even more suspicious of Cunningham, especially after two British officers pay him a visit at the trading post, and he feeds Jamie this story about them being friends with his late son and they came to deliver some of his belongings, including a gun. Jamie doesn’t fully buy it for a bunch of reasons but especially because those two dudes are incredible creeps and one of them tried to coerce Fanny into joining him on the road. 

A few days later, Jamie is out in the woods showing Fanny the cairn he’s built for Jane, and it’s a cute moment in which Jamie assures Fanny she has a real home here on Fraser’s Ridge that’s interrupted by gun shots, because of course it is. The shots came from Benjamin Cleveland and went directly into the chests of those two British officers. He found them trying to sneak a wagon full of rifles onto Fraser’s Ridge. Cleveland remains a terrible human being, but it is good that he warns Jamie of some shady shit going down. Jamie’s no dummy, though, and nothing about this situation is sitting right with him. He pats down one of the dead officers and finds a letter hidden in his boot — now Jamie knows exactly what’s going on here. 

He confronts Cunningham at the trading post. The letter is addressed to him from his uncle and it’s full of references to trees and arms and none of it makes sense … unless it is wholly about something else. Jamie notices the gun in Cunningham’s office again, the one that supposedly belonged to his son. He opens it up and there it is, a key to deciphering the letter. Cunningham is not retired from the British Army at all — he’s been tasked with recruiting new soldiers to join the loyalist cause and he’s doing it on Fraser’s Ridge. Jamie’s been gone a long time, he tells him, and things have changed. There are many men around here who still feel loyalty to the crown. If Jamie were smart, he says, he’d join him too. If he wants to keep Fraser’s Ridge as it is once England wins this thing, he’ll join Cunningham now. Jamie says, As if, loser!! Well, not exactly that, because he hasn’t seen Clueless yet, but he makes it clear Cunningham and his loyalist militia are not welcome here. It feels more and more like the battle at King’s Mountain is inevitable. Even Ghost Frank’s voice-over says so!