Outlander: Vengeance Is Mine (2x11)

While perhaps not as solid as some other installments this year, I found "Vengeance Is Mine" to be compelling for a couple of key reasons, and I'm certainly still looking forward eagerly to the last few episodes of the season. Let's jump in.

Cons:

The reason I say this isn't as solid is that some of the big moments didn't feel as grand as they might have done. The decision to have Jamie sent away from Bonnie Prince Charlie happened in a moment, I didn't feel like the full weight of this switcheroo was fully felt. Basically, Jamie goes from being Charles' trusted advisor to being sent along to Inverness on a fool's errand, simply to get him out of the way. Jamie was the only of Charles' officers to encourage him to march forward to London, which Jamie knew would have changed the course of history. In failing, he also seems to have lost his position as the right hand of the prince. It should have felt like a serious blow, but instead the issue was muddled by the fact that we only find out about this switch because Dougal delivers a letter with the news, and suddenly our heroes are turning about-face and heading to Inverness.

The other big moment is the reveal that the Duke of Sandringham was a bigger villain than we ever knew. I think maybe the reason I sort of shrugged off this event was that it was just revealing that an obviously bad guy is a bad guy. Turns out, the Duke owed the Comte St. Germain money, and to ease some of the debt he agreed to have Claire attacked and raped. So it was the Duke who sent the men after Claire and Mary Hawkins. We also learn that the Duke is... dun dun dun... Mary Hawkins' godfather, which adds further levels of complication. While I appreciated a hell of a lot of the elements of this plot thread, the Duke's character came across a bit too camp, and a bit too comedic to ever feel like a proper threat. Let's just say that there was a lot of metaphorical mustache twirling going on.

Pros:

Those are two things that should have felt bigger and been handled better, but in a lot of ways the episode was still a success, as the pacing and the dialogue and the unexpected twists brought our characters to a place I'm sure nobody (having not read the books, that is) could have predicted they would be after last week's episode. To go from victory at Prestonpans to standing in the kitchen of Sandringham's estate with two dead bodies to deal with? What an adventure!

The plot has a lot of twists and turns, but I never felt like there was too much going on at once. Jamie and his group are unceremoniously sent to Inverness, and then they are blindsided by Redcoats and forced to flee. Jamie, Claire, Murtagh, Fergus, Rupert, and Dougal ride hard to escape, but Rupert does get a bullet to his eye. The group hides out in an abandoned church, where Claire saves Rupert's life but not his eye. Then, the British show up to kill them all. Claire acts as a prisoner, trading herself for the safety of the others by pretending to be a captive of the Scots in need of rescuing. She is taken away, with plans for Jamie and Murtagh to follow. When Claire's final destination unexpectedly alters, she manages to get a message to Jamie through Hugh Munro, the beggar we met briefly last season. Claire meets Mary Hawkins at the Duke of Sandringham's, where she is ultimately brought. Claire recognizes the birthmark on the arm of one of the Duke's servants, and knows that he is her attacker. By the time Jamie and Murtagh arrive, the truth is out about the Duke arranging the rape. Mary stabs her rapist, and kills him with an assist from Murtagh, and then Murtagh beheads the Duke of Sandringham, fulfilling his debt to Claire and Mary by avenging their attack.

Okay. As you can tell from that plot summary, there's a lot to unpack.

First of all, we've got the exciting chase on horseback, resulting in Rupert losing an eye. There were several moments in the beginning of this episode where we got Rupert talking about our dearly departed friend Angus, and it just broke my heart. I was worried that we were about to lose Rupert as well, but luckily, and thanks to Dougal's dashing horseback rescue and Claire's medical skills, he'll live. The whole sequence of them running from the British was really intense, and I honestly didn't know what was going to happen when Rupert got hit.

Jamie and Claire had a lot of adorable and intense moments in this episode, none more so than when they are all hiding out in the church, and Jamie thinks he might be able to trade himself, the notorious Red Jamie, for the freedom of the others. Claire has a better idea, one that might result in nobody getting executed: she can pretend to be a captive, like when they met little Lord John Grey. Jamie is ferocious in his disapproval of this plan, declaring emphatically that he will not give Claire up. That is, until Claire stands up for herself - is she not Lady Broch Tuarach? Are these people not her responsibility? I loved this moment because Jamie's protectiveness and Claire's inner strength both got a chance to shine. The fact is, Claire is no damsel in distress at this point. She's willingly giving herself up, and in doing so she saves Jamie, Murtagh, Fergus, and the others.

Fergus should get a shout out here for being extra adorable, and also for offering Claire a valuable suggestion: she should pretend to faint so as not to have to answer questions right away. In this manner, after an intense promise that they will find each other again, Claire and Jamie are separated, and Claire is taken away.

I love the reintroduction of Hugh Munro. As a book reader I think I remembered him a little more than somebody just watching the show would, but they used the "previously on" sections to remind us all of who he was, and it was certainly fun to see him. I loved the way that he and Claire worked together. Quick thinking! Claire was pretty clever throughout this episode, actually. I think my favorite part was when she wrote a note for Jamie and Murtagh in Gaelic so as to prevent it from being intercepted. When Murtagh and Jamie get their hands on the letter, Murtagh is flabbergasted by how bad Claire is at the language. That was hilarious! I love that Claire tried, even if her grasp of Gaelic never really gets up to scratch.

For all that the beginning parts of this episode were exciting, I still think my favorite bits come at the end, after all the big reveals about the Duke of Sandringham have come to light. The reason why I love this stuff at the end so much is all tied up in my love for poor little Mary Hawkins, who really takes on some agency of her own when she stabs and kills her rapist. What I loved so much about Mary in this episode is that we saw even in the short scenes with her that she was just about ready to break free and gain her independence. She starts off trapped in yet another marriage arrangement with an unsavory stranger because of the Duke's political needs, and ends by stabbing her rapist and earning her total freedom. Mary doesn't stab her rapist in self defense, or in a desperate bid to escape... she straight up attacks the guy with a knife strictly for the sake of revenge, and it's so, so satisfying.

The Duke's end is just as satisfying, although it is kind of brutal. Murtagh's beheading of the Duke serves a lot of different functions. Most obviously, it resolves an important dangling thread from the Paris plots, closing the door on the terrible attack, officially implicating both the Duke and the Comte in what happened to Claire and Mary, and getting Mary her revenge and her freedom. But beyond that, it also merges the Scotland story with the Paris story in an interesting way. There's the decadence and subtle cruelty of the Parisian characters, the way that the Comte dies via poisoning, or how Jamie's political maneuverings with the prince always happen behind closed doors. The vile act of rape happens, both to Fergus and to Mary, but in the dark, or behind closed doors. Then in Scotland, we see the blood and the guts and the deaths right out in the open on the field at Prestonpans. This moment, back in a "civilized" looking place like the Duke's estate, blends all the political intrigue and clever maneuverings of the Paris villains with the cut-and-dry justice of the Scottish Highlanders. Giving Murtagh his closure in this way allows us to bridge the gap between what seems like two widely disparate halves of the season, and ramps us up nicely into the final two episodes.

I guess that's where I'll leave off. I can't quite pin my finger on the exact issue with this episode, other than to say I didn't feel as satisfied with some of the big reveals as I wanted to. Remember the Geillis Duncan reveal back in Season One? Yeah. I want to feel that again. Still, this was an undeniably powerful episode that tore our lovers apart and then reunited them under some pretty extreme circumstances. Perhaps that's a pattern we're going to see play out again very soon!

7.5/10