The team behind the Starz drama say goodbye to one of the show's main characters in the season three premiere. Plus, they tease what's next for Claire (Caitriona Balfe), Jamie (Sam Hueghan), Frank (Tobias Menzies) and more.
[Warning: This story contains spoilers from Outlander's season three premiere, "The Battle Joined."]For Outlander's Jamie (Sam Heughan) and Claire (Caitriona Balfe), the "Droughtlander" has only just begun.
While the Starz hit time travel romance drama Outlander returned with a hauntingly beautiful season three premiere on Sunday night after a 14-month hiatus, the star-crossed couple at its core has only just begun their 20-year separation. With Claire returned to her own time, pregnant with Jamie's child and believing him to have died, she reunited with her first husband Frank (Tobias Menzies). At first pushing him away, she eventually accepted his offer to raise Jamie's child as his own. Hardly fixing their relationship issues, they reached a tenuous truce when baby Brianna is born, hoping that her arrival is what they need to finally move forward as family.
But unbeknownst to Claire, Jamie did in fact survive the Battle of Culloden while most of his Highlander clansmen did not. Laying mortally wounded on the battlefield for hours, he hallucinated his memories of his surprising reunion during the battle with nemesis Black Jack Randall (also Menzies). Their final meeting was a wordless, bloody dance, until Jamie delivered a killing blow. Black Jack fell into Jamie's arms and died on top of him, a fitting end to their complicated, traumatic and strange story.
While Jamie thought he would die from his wounds, or later executed as a prisoner of war when the English army rounded up all the surviving Highlanders, a surprising connection to his past actually saved his life (much to his chagrin, as losing Claire was enough to make him welcome death). John Grey's (David Berry) brother, presiding over the prisoner executions, recognized Jamie as the man who saved John's life years ago, meaning their family owed him a debt of honor. He helped smuggle Jamie away in a cart and sent him all the way home, back to Lallybroch to begin his long journey alone and in hiding as an enemy of the Crown.
The Hollywood Reporter sat down with Outlander executive producers Ron Moore and Maril Davis, as well as series stars Balfe and Menzies, to discuss Black Jack's (final) death, the aftermath of Culloden, Claire and Jamie's separation this season and more below.
