absnow54

The timeline for Outlander is always such a jumble for me. I had forgotten that she goes back in April in the book. I feel like she contradicts herself a lot with how long she's been gone, especially around the time she marries Jamie. I think she at one point says she'd been gone for 4 months, married to Jamie less than a month, but had married Jamie a month after going through the stones. Does anyone know the timeline? With the show they've clearly stated she's been gone for six weeks since Halloween and that it's now mid-December since they'll be back to Leoch by Christmas, but I feel like more time passed in the book.

Haha, yes! She kept on going on and on about how much she loved that ranch. Go run away and ride horses and enjoy smiling since everyone else on the show seems to hate happiness.

The affair finally made sense from Alison's POV this week, but Noah continues to come off like a total sleezebag. My favorite part was them selling over priced jam and in Noah's memory it being reasonably priced, and from Alison's POV they were robbing him with inflated tourist prices. The whole cooler exchange was confusing, because at first I thought she was dropping fish off at work, but then I realized she was at the train station and seemingly just showed the guy some fish before leaving. Obviously there's some sort of drug or money laundering thing going on that Cole is in on as well. I did find it interesting that the guy at the station was reading the father in law's book. I think the father in law may be the one to bite it, but that may be because I'm operating in "any one but Joshua Jackson please" mode. Maura's character seems to be on a completely different show, but I'm loving her.

U2 has done three songs I think too.

Isn't Murtagh the only one that actually dies at Culloden? I thought pretty much everyone else bites it before the battle.

I was getting a tad bored with the series, but the most recent episode was hilarious. I was angry with Jason Dohring dropping out at first, but Robert Buckley's stilted, robotic delivery of exposition made up for it. And the random cut to Wallace. Ha! I hope the rest of the episodes are like this.

I'm not always 100% on board with his line delivery, but every one of his physical acting tics have been spot on. The wedding episode especially, when he gets her out of her corset and feels her up for the first time, Claire's ready to get the show on the road and tells him that it's her turn to undress him, and his reaction is just so genuine and overwhelmed, like his brain has stopped functioning and "oh my God, she let me touch her." Even though they haven't given him many interesting things to do, Sam's really brought some life to the character that makes him feel much more real than book Jamie was at times.

I couldn't get over how creepy he came off in her POV. I think it reflects how she views him now, and not how she viewed him then, which is making it hard to buy their attraction. I almost wish every episode had 3 points of view. His, hers, and a neutral party, but it was difficult enough watching some of the scenes 2 times, let alone 3, so they'd have to interlace the narrative. I found it interesting that from his story he doesn't remember her wearing a ring, while in hers, her wedding rings were very prominent.

She has very striking eyes. I could buy that she came from Sam Heughan.

I watched the Pilot again today without fast forwarding through the 1940's stuff, and early in the episode when Frank talks about sketching Claire's hand, I'd never really paid attention to what she had told him, which was that while they were separated, she couldn't remember the sound of his laughter. I thought that was an interesting thing to note, since Jamie and Claire's marriage thus far has been lots of teasing and laughing at one another. I thought it was an interesting contrast.

I think in one of the retrospective specials, Jan Hooks mentioned this sketch when paying tribute to Phil, so although it didn't really showcase her comedic talents (the episode they played at 10 was a perfect episode to play for that) it was a nice way to honor her. I actually liked Kristen Wiig during the monologue, but I think it's because I got warm and fuzzy feelings about her and Bill's chemistry from The Skeleton Twins and their promo interviews. The Hollywood Game Night sketch was too much though. It also made me miss Celebrity Jeopardy.

I liked the unreliable narrator and the changes in details between the two perspectives, especially since they generally landed on the extremes. I hope we'll get interviews from other characters in later episodes so we can get a different perspective on the other characters involved and flesh them out more. I'm still not sure how this format can be sustained over multiple seasons, but I've seemingly made some sort of blood pact with Joshua Jackson where I'll follow him anywhere, even subscription premium cable shows, so I'll be in for at least a few more episodes. Important question though, what is Maura Tierney's connection to The Wire? JJ was on Fringe with Lance Reddick, Ruth Wilson with Idris Elba on Luther, and Dominic West I'm sure knows someone from the Wire cast... how'd Maura get in on this project?

Joshua Jackson on MTV After Hours: http://www.mtv.com/videos/movies/1089260/joshua-jackson-cant-get-over-dawsons-creek.jhtml JoshJam2014 forever.

I believe actors/agents post the videos themselves to help build buzz/fan support. Not sure how that effects their chances, but I'm sure it has a negative impact.

I'm not sure if the height thing will really be a factor in the show verse. While Sam is approximately book-Jamie's height, Cait and Tobias are several inches taller than their book versions, so there isn't much contrast there. I think so long as they cast a red head (or, you know, someone with access to hair dye) Brianna's paternity will be pretty obvious. The casting department has been phenomenal at finding actors who have an easy natural chemistry, so I don't mind them cutting or twisting some of the book descriptions if it means we get an actress who can effortlessly fade into her character the way Sam and Cait seem to.

I kind of don't like the fact that they've left this ambiguous. A lot of the juxtaposition of this episode with Frank searching for Claire while Claire settled into her new marriage seemed to draw undeserved sympathy towards Frank, when Frank has implied that he was with other women the last time they were separated. Yes, Claire going missing is a horrible thing, but the whole "SHE RAN OFF WITH ANOTHER MAN!" angle without Frank admitting his own possible past indiscretions in some form, painted this imbalance between Frank and Claire that rubbed me the wrong way.

It's kind of funny, everyone is obsessed with finding out who Claire is a spy for when she's essentially one of Frank's agents. Frank has been heavily researching the region and the time period, and most of the things Claire has used in the field is the information that he's passed onto her. If she ever makes it back, and if they make it past the whole adultery/pseudo bigamy thing, she'll have tons of intel to pass on.

I don't feel like Frank's story was really fleshed out though. The only two substantial things we got from it is that Frank now knows the legend of the stones, and that he's really good at describing broaches... I mean he suspects that the mysterious man outside the window had something to do with Claire's disappearance. I really think they could have condensed his scenes to Frank at the police station, Frank going through Claire's suitcase, the story of the stones, and then Frank stopping at Craigh na Dun on his way out of dodge. The Frank/BJR parallel seemed unnecessary and the writing was on the wall with the lady trying to dupe him ("Come alone! Bring the reward money! Did I mention the money? You should bring it.") that the whole plot lost any suspense. The only scene where I felt like Frank was desperately trying to find Claire was at the stones, and that scene worked really well. The rest he just seemed mundane and bored and more annoyed than sad.

Does anyone know if these movies are playing on Starz at the end of the series?

Yes, Jamie was in a difficult position where Frank was only an idea to him, and one that he was jealous of at that. I don't think his actions were spiteful towards her other husband, but I do think that if Claire's existence was at risk, and not the existence of some guy he didn't even know, he would have behaved differently.

I couldn't deal with the fact that Claire began to sympathize with Randall while she was estranged from Jamie. I don't recall if she knew about Fergus at this point, but the way she viewed Jamie's actions as entirely selfish when her actions were just as selfish drove me crazy. Her single minded focus on ensuring Frank's birth while ignoring Jamie, who was obviously suffering from his rape, made her seem so cold.

I thought it was an interesting change to have Claire so close to the stones without realizing it because she was so swept up in her new marriage and fun times with the clan (this of course is pre-deserter attack.) If Claire had been focused on her plan to get back to the stones, she would have noticed how close she was and probably could have gotten Jamie to take her there to show her the magic stones from the songs they had heard, instead of choosing to take a roll in the heather with him.

Claire's quest to protect Black Jack and Black Jack's half-assed redemption arc really turned me off to the story. I understood she felt guilty about the whole Frank situation (I never got the impression that any of it involved whether or not she'd cease to exist in the 1740's if Frank was never there to take her to Scotland, but I've only read it once) but Black Jack was a very real and immediate danger to the people she cared about in the present, and she seemed to be not only blind to it, but smug about the fact that she believed that she was right. I felt so bad for Jamie during that time period because he was constantly thrust into his rapists orbit and was powerless to do anything because Claire had granted BJR immunity until he could father an offspring.

This reminds me of that joke where the iceberg didn't sink the Titanic, it was the added weight of all the time travelers trying to stop its sinking.

Didn't Claire also have the scar from the blood vow on her wrist when she has her palm read in the first book? I thought that meant that Claire had in some way existed in the 18th century first. So yes, Colloden is her fault. ;-)