Droughtlander: The Official Outlander Podcast

[Glade]

I just listened to podcast for 312 last night, and it was really informative.  The one thing that put me over the moon was the fact that the writers strongly considered writing Geillis' return into season 2, since according to Diana, she and Dougal were in Paris at that time and Geilis was even having an affair with the Count Saint Germaine (which is fascinating! especially given the wider web of relationships that it creates--Claire kills both St. Germaine and Dougal by the end of the season, though not in cold blood like Geillis murders her husbands.)  That would have been so amazing, even if just for one episode, and could have developed the character so much, her motivations and plans in the lead up to Culloden.  It still could/would have been shocking to see her become Mistress Abernathy in season 3.  I wish they managed to fit her in!!!  Geillis always leaves me wanting more...

It was also really interesting hearing the other details of how they went about adapting the the curse which is apparently very different from the book.  They basically state that the curse is about Bree, and don't mention the possibility that Geillis or any other bee-hearing woman could get pregnant and go through the stones to carry it out; it doesn't have to be Claire.     

Anyway, this podcast was great but sadly, it will be Matt/Toni next week, not Ron or Maril or Terry.  

[WatchrTina]

I'm having a random day off (using up the last of my vacation days before year-end) so I sat down and enjoyed the podcast for the season 3 finale, Eye of the Storm.  It's Matt & Toni again but it's better than usual because Matt actually directed this episode (his first full episode -- he's directed some second unit stuff in the past) so he's bringing a director's eye to the conversation and not just a writer's point of view.  That being said, it takes awhile for them to get their motors running and there is a fair amount of silence in the first third of the podcast.

One thing I learned was that the dead body that the dog finds is supposed to be the bodies (plural) of the two boys that Ian encountered when he was first thrown in the cell upon arrival on the island. Uh, if there were two boys there I sure didn't see the second one.  Now that it has been pointed out I guess I can sort of recognize the white kid in the cell as the body that is turned over.  But if they expected viewers to catch that on their own, they were wildly optimistic.

The scene with Lord John was filmed in Scotland, not South Africa.  Presumably all of David Berry's scenes in this and the prior episode were filmed all in one block to save having to fly that one actor all the way to South Africa for one scene. The ballroom scenes (in the prior ep) were all filmed in Scotland.

They spoke admiringly of what Sam does during the scene between Lord John and Captain Lieutenant Leonard. He has no lines but he has to be "present" in the scene so you have to see his reactions to their back-and-forth playing on his face.

At one point Matt was talking and then he just stopped.  I wondered why and apparently it was because there was a voiceover happening on the screen -- one that Matt apparently didn't know about.  Matt has said before he is NOT a fan of voiceovers and I got the sense that right there may have been the first time he heard that particular voiceover.  Does that seem reasonable?  It sounded like he shot the footage but Ron Moore actually edited it.  Matt spoke more than once of making sure that he was giving Ron all the coverage he needed for the edit (that came up during the cave scene.)  But surely Matt would have seen the final cut before this?  Perhaps he just forgot that that voiceover had been added and thus was taken-aback anew by it.  But a wee evil part of me thinks it would be hilarious if Ron a snuck a voiceover in after Matt had already seen what he thought was the final cut.

They talked about how that particular sex scene (which they lifted from earlier in the story in the book) is one of Diana's favorites.  In MY opinion it's a great scene in the book because they don't actually have sex.  Book!Jamie just talks explicitly about what he is planning to do to Claire once he gets her ashore and they have some privacy and space (the conversation happens in a MUCH more cramped cabin in the book, ye ken).  In my opinion, TV!Jamie talking about what he is GOING to doesn't really make sense in the episode given that they do have privacy and space and are actually DOING all the things Jamie is narrating.  Toni and Matt failed to address that particular leap of logic, choosing instead to remind the viewers that we asked for more sex scenes so:  here you go.  In fairness, they also made the point that the scene was key moment for Jamie and Claire in that it was the first time all season that they have been completely relaxed.  Their reunion, while joyful, was emotionally fraught and there were secrets aplenty between them at that time.  Things only got more tense as those secrets were revealed and then wee Ian was kidnapped.  With Ian now safe, this is the first time they have made love since Claire's return without any secrets between them and no great burdens weighing them down.  That sex scene (and more generally their steadfast love for one another) acts as the "eye of the storm" of their turbulent lives.  Hows THAT for a metaphor?  Matt was pretty appreciative of Toni coming up with that and I like it too.

You know that scene where the wave broadsides the ship and tosses Jamie across the deck?  That was Sam, doing his own stunt.

One thing that Matt said was a huge challenge was shooting the last scene on a beach that was on the WEST coast of South Africa but having to depict Jamie and Claire washed up on an EAST-facing beach.  Getting the sun in the right place apparently required a lot of thought and effort on their part.  I think that's funny because I'm pretty sure none of us would have noticed things like where the shadows were relative to the ocean.

THE END  

And now, for me, the doughtlander truly begins.

[WatchrTina]

I'm posting the link to the podcast for S04E01, America the Beautiful, below as a means of bumping this thread to the front page.  (Someone has already posted the link in the episode thread.)

http://assets.starz.com/stzcom/outlander/ols4_401_officialoutlanderpodcast.mp3

[Eureka]

My bone to pick with these podcasts is the long moments of silence because they assume you are watching the show while you listen. I don't; I listen to them in the car after I have seen the episode. Matt Roberts is a little better than Toni Graphia at filling the gaps but they all need to remember that dead air is boring. Give us some more details. For example, did they record this one before they reshot the sex scene? Because they did not mention that at all, they just talked about why they couldn't do the original, "famous" scene from the book.

[Cdh20]

I thought the podcast was boring (didn't finish it). It's the first time I've listened to one, should I listen to some earlier ones? 

[Eureka]

1 hour ago, Cdh20 said:

I thought the podcast was boring (didn't finish it). It's the first time I've listened to one, should I listen to some earlier ones? 

I think some of the earlier seasons’ episodes that Ron and Terry did were more interesting. (I like learning behind the scenes stuff, but I don’t really care what kind of whiskey etc. they are drinking.)

[GHScorpiosRule]

10 hours ago, Eureka said:

they just talked about why they couldn't do the original, "famous" scene from the book.

Why couldn’t they?

[ruby24]

What famous scene is this? Is it the one on the rocks next to the river?

If that's it, I'm guessing it was because of the weather. It was obviously cold where they were filming. Am I right?

[toolazy]

16 hours ago, ruby24 said:

What famous scene is this? Is it the one on the rocks next to the river?

If that's it, I'm guessing it was because of the weather. It was obviously cold where they were filming. Am I right?

That's what I have read elsewhere.

[WatchrTina]

I just watched/listened to the podcast.  It was not the best ever, but I enjoyed it.  

I do have a few suggestions for anyone planning to listen to the podcast.  It's important to remember that is not intended to be listened to like a radio show.  It's intended to be used like the director's commentary track on a movie DVD. The expectation is that you are watching the episode while listening to the podcast.  (I watch on-demand on the TV with the sound turned off and the closed captions on while the podcast plays on my iPad.)  There WILL be dead air from time to time.  Sometimes it's because the commentators get so engrossed in what is happening on the screen they forget to talk (remember that sometimes it has been almost a year since they worked on the episode.)  But other times it's because what is happening on the screen is a quiet, one-on-one moment between two characters and there just isn't a lot to add.  The trickiest part, quite frankly, is getting the scene on the TV lined up with the audio.  If you start the commentary at the same moment that the "previously" scenes on the TV come to an end the two sources usually line up well, but sometime you have to play around with pausing either the commentary or the episode to get them in perfect sync.  That adds to the enjoyment because both Matt Roberts and Toni Graphia (Executive Producers) have a bad habit of referencing things on the screen in an oblique way that ends up not making sense if the commentary is not in sync with the screen.

I did enjoy them explaining why they had to changed the sex scene and their other comments.  But no, there wasn't a lot of "meat" in this particular podcast.

Unless I'm mistaken, there were also some technical difficulties with the podcast (or at least the version I downloaded.)  The podcast starts with about 10 seconds of dead air and the sound went "dead" a couple of time during the podcast in a way that lead me to believe I was missing something (though they may both have simply fallen silent at that moment.)

I think the podcasts are best when they done by someone who had a hands-on role with the episode.  I particularly like hearing the directors talk about the choices they made for shots or the writers talk about the pain of what they had to cut to fit into the format.  I always like hearing Terri talk about the costumes.  (I know some people think she talks about them too much but I appreciate her enthusiasm for her craft.)  So as much as I appreciate Matt and Toni taking the time to record this one, I'm hoping they'll mix it up and get a variety of people involved as the season moves forward.

Note:  One bonus of watching the show on-demand is that it is usually followed by an "Inside the Episode" mini-documentary (a couple of minutes worth) that you don't see if you only watch the TV broadcast.  

Edited November 10, 2018 by WatchrTina

[toolazy]

5 hours ago, WatchrTina said:

 (I know some people think she talks about them too much but I appreciate her enthusiasm for her craft.)  

I would listen to hour-long podcasts of her doing nothing but talking about the costumes. 

[Eureka]

22 hours ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

Why couldn’t they?

They said because it’s not hot and humid in Scotland.

[Cdh20]

5 hours ago, WatchrTina said:

I just watched/listened to the podcast.  It was not the best ever, but I enjoyed it.  

I do have a few suggestions for anyone planning to listen to the podcast.  It's important to remember that is not intended to be listened to like a radio show.  It's intended to be used like the director's commentary track on a movie DVD. The expectation is that you are watching the episode while listening to the podcast.  (I watch on-demand on the TV with the sound turned off and the closed captions on while the podcast plays on my iPad.)  There WILL be dead air from time to time.  Sometimes it's because the commentators get so engrossed in what is happening on the screen they forget to talk (remember that sometimes it has been almost a year since they worked on the episode.)  But other times it's because what is happening on the screen is a quiet, one-on-one moment between two characters and there just isn't a lot to add.  The trickiest part, quite frankly, is getting the scene on the TV lined up with the audio.  If you start the commentary at the same moment that the "previously" scenes on the TV come to an end the two sources usually line up well, but sometime you have to play around with pausing either the commentary or the episode to get them in perfect sync.  That adds to the enjoyment because both Matt Roberts and Toni Graphia (Executive Producers) have a bad habit of referencing things on the screen in an oblique way that ends up not making sense if the commentary is not in sync with the screen.

I did enjoy them explaining why they had to changed the sex scene and their other comments.  But no, there wasn't a lot of "meat" in this particular podcast.

Unless I'm mistaken, there were also some technical difficulties with the podcast (or at least the version I downloaded.)  The podcast starts with about 10 seconds of dead air and the sound went "dead" a couple of time during the podcast in a way that lead me to believe I was missing something (though they may both have simply fallen silent at that moment.)

I think the podcasts are best when they done by someone who had a hands-on role with the episode.  I particularly like hearing the directors talk about the choices they made for shots or the writers talk about the pain of what they had to cut to fit into the format.  I always like hearing Terri talk about the costumes.  (I know some people think she talks about them too much but I appreciate her enthusiasm for her craft.)  So as much as I appreciate Matt and Toni taking the time to record this one, I'm hoping they'll mix it up and get a variety of people involved as the season moves forward.

Note:  One bonus of watching the show on-demand is that it is usually followed by an "Inside the Episode" mini-documentary (a couple of minutes worth) that you don't see if you only watch the TV broadcast.  

I did enjoy the Inside the Episodes that came with my i-tunes purchase for season 3.  I appreciate you taking the time to explain that watching with the show running would certainly help. I may try again & start at the beginning! 

[Glade]

I could only stand to listen to 1/3 of this podcast (with the show running in the background, yes) before turning it off out of boredom (and disgust when Matt Roberts felt the need to go on a self-righteous tangent about how he doesn't care about metoo, they're just going off the book; which is not the kind of obnoxious I want to hear while watching that beautiful scene.)  I think the 'inside the episode' and other features on the starz website as well as post-episode articles and interviews will contain most of what Matt and Toni are going to say aside from their banter and random off-topic rants, so I've given up on the podcasts, even though I loved Ron Moore, Terri, and Maril's podcasts for the first 2 seasons. 

[WatchrTina]

I'm getting caught up on Podcasts today.  The one for Ep 402, Do No Harm features commentary by Toni Graphia, Executive Producer and writer for Outlander, as well as Luke Schelhaas, a co-executive producer / writer.  It took me a while to track down the spelling of his name because he's not credited on this episode at IMDb.com.  I presume that's just an error in the website.  I certainly hope he actually worked on the episode that he was invited to comment on (grumble grumble)

As for the commentary itself . . . meh.  I'm glad I listened to it because  I love the show and in my secret heart-of-hearts I wish I was a writer so I love listening to creative people talk about their craft, and about this show in particular.  I have HUGE respect for the writers and the challenge they face in converting this VERY BIG BOOK into episodic television.  But, alas, writers sometimes don't actually make the best commentators on the podcast.  I kept waiting for them to talk about the production challenges and you only really get any insight into that in the "Inside the episode" mini-documentary that comes on after you watch the episode on demand.  There they talk about finding a location for the exterior shots of RiverRun and the building of the beautiful interior sets.  The podcast just doesn't really add much (or at least this one didn't.)

I'm miss Ronald Moore's participation -- he was good at offering up comments that ran the gamut from locations, to sets, to costumes (if Terry was not there to offer her take) as well as the process of converting the book to the show. No one else is quite as good.

That being said, I did appreciate the comments about how they deliberately changed the order of events and altered them to ramp up the tension.  Rufus is not brought back to the house in the book.  Claire realizes that he is doomed and gives him a merciful death right there at the sawmill in the book.  The party where Jocasta names Jamie as her heir actually happens AFTER the incident at the sawmill in the book (or so Toni said -- its been years since I read that book).  So . . . as a wanna-be writer . . . I DO find it very interesting to hear them talk about how they ramped up the tension by having Rufus brought back to the plantation house and having a torch-bearing mob arrive.  I agree that that visual does a great job of succinctly making clear the danger anyone would face who tried to alter the status quo and why there is no way they can accept Jocasta's offer.  That's important because the offer from the Governor is likewise a potentially poisoned chalice.  Claire KNOWS the war that is coming and they don't want to be on the wrong side of that.  It would take a big push to get them accept that offer as the lessor of two evils.  This episode -- and the changes in the script vs. the book --  does do a good job of depicting why Jocasta's offer IS the bigger evil.

Edited December 1, 2018 by WatchrTina

[WatchrTina]

I just finished the podcast for ep 403, The False Bride and that was excellent.  It's Toni Graphia again but this time Matt Roberts is back and those two make a better commentating duo.  Or maybe this episode just lends itself more to behind-the-scenes commentary.  I can' be sure.  I just know I thoroughly enjoyed listening to it while watching the episode with the sound off.  And kudos to Matt Roberts for syncing the commentary.  He tells you to pause it at the very beginning and then hit play when the "previously on" segment ends and the main credits start.  That's great because they didn't do that for the last commentary and I never could get the two in perfect sync.  You should listen to the commentary to get the full enjoyment but here are just a few highlights.

They pointed out how Jocasta's words to Claire from the last episode (about her holding Jamie back from being the leader of men that he was born to be) are really working on Claire in this episode.

They talked how difficult it was to get that match cut where you see Grandfather Mountain in the distance while Roger and Brianna are in the car and then they fade to Claire & Jamie in a wagon on exactly the same "road" with exactly the same view.  It's a brief moment but a really effective visual beat.

The Scottish Festival was filmed in Glasgow Park.  They found "thirty or forty" period-appropriate cars and surrounding the set with them.  Their headlights are on in the stag-burning scene because they read that that was a tactic used during these festivals to light the ending ceremony.

The mule playing Clarence was stubborn (what a surprise!) and as a result the shot of it running was away was very difficult to get.

Richard Rankin really can play guitar and has a lovely singing voice so that's all him at the festival.

There is a rule in the writers' room:  "Don't write weather."  They have to be ready to film any outdoor scene in any weather they might in encounter (which in Scotland frequently means rain.)  But in THIS episode they needed the rain so a rain machine was used -- a very rare event on Outlander.

Matt claims to have seen every cave in Scotland at this point and they are few and far between and mostly unsuitable for filming.  He's had to do this because there are a surprising number of caves in Outlander.  (I can think of a half-dozen just off the top of my head.)  He talked about that when he was explaining why Claire shelters under the root bed of an over-turned tree and not in a cave.  But I think he's mistaken.  I'm pretty sure that the overturned tree where Claire takes shelter is very close to what happens in the book (though actually I think this episode does conflate two separate events from the book so perhaps that why my recollection is different from Matt's.)

Filming the opal (the one the ghost Indian is wearing and that Claire finds) was really tricky and had to be reshot to ensure the viewer could see it.  The same goes for the footprints that Claire follows. They had to cast them in cement and set them in the forest because actual footprints in wet forest ground just did not work.  Likewise the reveal of the sliver fillings in the skull also had to be re-shot to ensure the viewer could see what Claire was reacting to.

Wild strawberries do not grow in North Carolina (or Scotland) in late Autumn and they are much smaller than what we now think of as strawberries.  So the prop dept had to build fake strawberry plants using raspberries.

The guy who called the clans just before the stag was lit was a Producer who was leaving the show and was given that cameo as a parting gift.

They built two stags but only had to burn one because it went so well.

Okay that's more than a few highlights.  You're welcome.

Edited December 5, 2018 by WatchrTina

[WatchrTina]

I just listened to the podcast for ep 404, Common Ground.  This time it's Toni Graphia and Maril Davis doing the commentary.

They clarified that the big, gorgeous shot of the view from Frasers Ridge IS a shot of North Caroline that has been digitally altered for the show.

The reason that the native Americans in the show are Cherokee and not Tuscarora like in the book is that there is very little known about what the Tuscarora looked like at this time (how they dressed) and likewise very little is know about their language (many of them moved north with the coming of the white man and their culture blended in to other tribes.)  The show-runners wanted to be as accurate as possible in their depiction of native Americans of the period so they substituted a tribe for which there is more historical information available (with regard to how they dressed) and whose language survives to this day.  That being said -- they needed to hire Canadian first nations tribe members to play the Cherokees because of union rules, which prevented the hiring of native American actors from the USA.  Note that the changing of the tribe meant that they had to change the names of the tribe members.  I presume that means the two women at the end -- the one who speaks English and her husband's grandmother -- are the ones who had their names changed from the book since I don't recall anyone else in the tribe being identified by name.

Richard was present on set to feed Sophie her lines for that transatlantic telephone conversation.  They noted how generous it was of Richard to do that and that some actors don't bother -- letting a AD or other production staffer feed the actor their lines.

The handling of the bear fight was one of their biggest adaptation challenges.  They clearly didn't want Sam to have to act with an actual black bear (which are not native to Scotland so they would have had a hard time getting ahold of a trained one in any case). Furthermore, they cited the difficulty and cost that went into filming and CGI-ing the bear fight scene in the movie, The Revenant, as something they could not afford (neither money nor time), nor did they want to be compared to that film.  But coming up with the shunned-tribe-member-in-a-bear-skin solution took a long time to work out.  

They said more than once that they regret not being able to include the scene in which Jamie startles Claire and she whacks him with a fish.  I do not recall any such scene from the book.  I recall Claire wielding a fish as a weapon in the bear attack scene and her hitting Jamie by mistake, but it HAS been a long time since I read the books.

The day Cait had to be hands-deep in fish guts was FREEZING.  You can see her breath and that of John Bell.  The day that Jamie carries Claire over the threshold of the cabin was actually the coldest filming day in the history of Outlander.  I wonder why you can't see their breath in that shot?  I wonder if they made them chew ice (which is a filming trick to prevent foggy breath.)  If so, I don't envy them

Toni and Maril got into a big debate as to whether Roger was duty-bound to tell Brianna what he found (the clipping about the fire.)  They did not agree, which I guess is good -- it means it's not a clear-cut situation and reasonable people can disagree as to what would be the ethical thing to do in a situation like that.

And now my pod-cast marathon is done!

Edited December 5, 2018 by WatchrTina

[Eureka]

1 minute ago, WatchrTina said:

I just listened to the podcast for ep 404, Common Ground.  This time it's Toni Graphia and Maril Davis doing the commentary.

They clarified that the big, gorgeous shot of the view from Frasers Ridge IS a shot of North Caroline that has been digitally altered for the show.

The reason that the native Americans in the show are Cherokee and not Tuscarora like in the book is that there is very little known about what the Tuscarora looked like at this time (how they dressed) and likewise very little is know about their language (many of them moved north with the coming of the white man and their culture blended in to other tribes.)  The show-runners wanted to be as accurate as possible in their depiction of native Americans of the period so they substituted a tribe for which there is more historical information available (with regard to how they dressed) and whose language survives to this day.  That being said -- they needed to hire Canadian first nations tribe members to play the Cherokees because of union rules, which prevented the hiring of native American actors from the USA.  Note that the changing of the tribe meant that they had to change the names of the tribe members.  I presume that means the two women at the end -- the one who speaks English and her husband's grandmother -- are the ones who had their names changed from the book since I don't recall anyone else in the tribe being identified by name.

Richard was present on set to feed Sophie her lines for that transatlantic telephone conversation.  They noted how generous it was of Richard to do that and that some actors don't bother -- letting a AD or other production staffer feed the actor their lines.

The handling of the bear fight was one of their biggest adaptation challenges.  The clearly didn't want Sam to have to act with an actual black bear (which are not native to Scotland so they'd have a hard time getting ahold of a trained one in any case). Furthermore, they cited the difficulty and cost that went into filming and CGI-ing the bear fight scene in the movie, The Revenant, as something they could not afford (neither money nor time), nor did they want to be compared to that film.  But coming up with the shunned-tribe-member-in-a-bear-skin solution took a long time to work out.  

They said more than once that they regret not being able to include the scene in which Jamie startles Claire and she whacks him with a fish.  I do not recall any such scene from the book.  I recall Claire wielding a fish as a weapon in the bear attack scene and her hitting Jamie by mistake, but it HAS been a long time since I read the books.

The day Cait had to be hands-deep in fish guts was FREEZING.  You can see her breath and that of John Bell.  The day that Jamie carries Claire over the threshold of the cabin was actually the coldest filming day in the history of Outlander.  I wonder why you can't see their breath in that shot?  I wonder if they made them chew ice (which is a filming trick to prevent foggy breath.)  If so, I don't envy them

Toni and Maria got into a big debate as to whether Roger was duty-bound to tell Brianna what he found (the clipping about the fire.)  They did not agree, which I guess is good -- it means it's not a clear-cut situation and reasonable people can disagree as to what would be the ethical thing to do in a situation like that.

And now my pod-cast marathon is done!

I enjoyed 404 podcast. Much more of the kind of info I like listening to about the behind the scenes-making of.

[Petunia846]

3 hours ago, WatchrTina said:

Matt claims to have seen every cave in Scotland at this point and they are few and far between and mostly unsuitable for filming.  He's had to do this because there are a surprising number of caves in Outlander.  (I can think of a half-dozen just off the top of my head.)  He talked about that when he was explaining why Claire shelters under the root bed of an over-turned tree and not in a cave.  But I think he's mistaken.  I'm pretty sure that the overturned tree where Claire takes shelter is very close to what happens in the book (though actually I think this episode does conflate two separate events from the book so perhaps that why my recollection is different from Matt's.)

Yeah, in the book it's exactly like they showed on the show, she's under the roots of an overturned tree. I don't think they conflated two scenes, as much as just changed the one scene to fit what they wanted to show.

[WatchrTina]

Well yay, the podcasts for eps 405, 406 and 407 have finally turned up on my iPad.  I have it set to download them as soon as they are available but for some reason the one for 405 didn't get loaded that whole week after it aired and then I sort of forgot about them. But I found them tonight.

I just listened to the one for 405, Savages.  It was Matt Roberts and the director, Denise Di Novi (a woman!  Hooray!) As podcasts go it was good, but not great.  I really love it when the director talks about the choices they made -- why they shot things the way they did.  Denise didn't talk about that very much.  She was very complimentary toward the other contributors, remarking on the excellent to the set -- especially the cabin in the woods -- and being very complimentary to the actors.  Denise did comment on the challenge of having to deal with four seasons in one day (sun, rain, hail, snow).  She also talked about how they worked hard to make the quality of the outdoor light feel different -- so you didn't feel like you were in Scotland anymore.  They noted that they actually went and hired actors from Germany to play the Mueller family, so their accents and their facility with German would be authentic.  They also talked about how one of the benefits of having Murtagh in the episode is that they were able to transfer some of the internal dialog from the novel (Jamie or Claire thinking to themselves) to actual dialog with Murtagh.  Matt did clarify that the burned cabin was filmed on the back-lot, not in the woods, for safety's sake.

Edited December 19, 2018 by WatchrTina

[WatchrTina]

Okay, I just listened to the podcast for ep 406, Blood of my Blood.  The commentators are Matt Roberts and Shaina Fewell, who wrote the episode.  Shaina also was the writer-on-set during filming.  Apparently they send one writer to be on set to help with any last minute revisions.  For example they tried really hard to figure out how to have Willie fall down into the outhouse like he does in the book but it just wasn't going to work so they wrote it out (and settled for the wee homage of the snake and the privy in the title card.)

This was a really good podcast.  I laughed a lot.  So did they.  For example they loved (and I love) the scene where Jamie takes Willie away.  Sam is great in that scene -- effortlessly snagging the recalcitrant William with one hand as he tries to run back to the house, and then -- after forcing William on to the horse -- saying "Don't try it!" without even looking at the squirming Willie.  Sam was able to clearly demonstrate that Jamie KNOWS this kid -- knows what he'll try and how to stop him.  They were very complimentary to the young actor playing Willie and I have to say, he grew on me.

Side note -- you know what else has grown on me?  Sam's wig.  It gets a lot of hate on these boards but I think Sam looked amazing throughout this whole episode (remember I was watching it with the sound off while listening to the podcast.)  The wig is fine. 

Meanwhile, back on the podcast, it was funny to hear them talk about the scene by the river where Jamie and Willie camped.  The writer, director, and others were delighted by that rushing stream and the small waterfall that is visible in most shots.  The sound department -- on the other hand -- were decidedly LESS enamored of it.  

They apparently had some real weather challenges including snow, rain, and hail but then they also had amazing serendipity such as when they were filing the scene of Claire & Murtagh fetching water and they suddenly got beautiful sunshine -- during the same day as the aforementioned snow, rain and hail.  

Both Matt & Shaina were very complimentary of the the way the director and DP filmed the scenes between bed-ridden John and Claire.  It can be limiting when one character is confined to a bed but they really worked the camera -- the shot from directly above John was a particular favorite -- so that the scene did not fee at all constrained.

I learned something too.  The first two times I watch I could not for the life of me figure out WHY Jamie and Claire were outside canoodling at one point.  It was only while listening to the podcast that I realized that they are out there because they have volunteered to sleep outside so that John and William can have their bed.  I never noticed the lean-to that they are sitting under.  I think the reason that I missed it is that the camera is in very tight on them for the whole scene; and the reason the camera is in so close is that they shot that one scene on the back-lot, not on the location. It's fair to assume that that lean-to packs up and Jamie took it with him because he has one for William to sleep under in a later scene.  I love little bits of continuity like that.

Oh yeah, remember how William rests the gun on a stump in order to aim at the deer?  That came about after a discussion in the writers room as to whether or not Willie could handle that long gun.  The discussion came to a swift end when someone handed the writer the gun.  (It's HEAVY.)

[WatchrTina]

I just listened to the podcast for Ep 407, Down the Rabbit Hole.  The commentators are Executive Producers Toni Graphia and Maril Davis.  It was okay.  I'm glad I listened but it's not the best podcast I've heard.  They spent a lot of time explaining the decisions to focus on Laoghaire (due to Laura Donnelly's lack  of availability to play Jenny) and on Frank (due to their liking the parallels in Frank and Laoghaire's story arcs.  I hadn't really thought about it before but it is true that both Frank and Laoghaire fall in love with someone, lose that person, and then have that person come back into their lives as their spouse . . . only to realize that the marriage is a sham.  The person they love and are married to is actually in love with someone else -- someone who is gone but whose memory haunts the marriage.

They said they considered actually splitting the show into two pieces, with the first half focusing solely on Brianna and the second half showing Roger's journey after her.  They ultimately decided against that and instead cut back-and-forth between the stories but that had the unintended consequence of putting Roger on a ship first, so that he no longer appears to be "following" Brianna but rather he seems to have gotten ahead of her.  That's why they added the line about there being multiple stops along the way before Bonnet's ship will reach Roger's destination.  That makes it plausible that Brianna's ship will arrive there first.

I always like it when they talk about production issues and there wasn't a lot of that (they talked mostly about story & plot decisions) but they did note that the ship interior sets are ones they built in South Africa for season 3, which they had shipped back to Scotland.  You'll notice that there are no scenes on the deck of Roger's ship.  That's because there was no ship.  The one you see in the harbor is CGI.  All the scenes on the ship take place below deck or in the Captain's quarters (which, BTW, should look familiar since Jamie and Claire had some intimate moments in that particular set last season.)  This makes for a fairly claustrophobic feel but that's entirely appropriate given the story.

They DID answer one question I had which was: why on earth would Ian not see Brianna off?  Why would he just deliver her to the dock and then leave before she even purchases her ticket?  They confessed that that WAS a bit awkward and not really in keeping with how Ian would behave, but they wanted Brianna to be alone when she makes the decision to take on Lizzie as a servant and they also wanted Brianna to have that farewell scene with Frank's fetch -- which really wouldn't have worked if Ian had been standing there waving goodbye at the same time.

They were very complimentary about the actress who plays Lizzie so I'm hoping she's going to be a good addition to the show and therefore I'll be able to get over the fact that she is so much older than her book counterpart and that she is such a big, strapping girl -- not at all the wee, sickly Lizzie from the books.

They also noted that they wrote themselves into a little bit of a quandry when they inserted the scene (which is not in the book) where Frank tells Brianna that he's asked for a divorce and he asks her to come to England with him -- which she refuses and then she stalks away after having failed to return his "I love you."  Given that that was the last conversation they ever had it would be reasonable for that to have come up during the episode in Season 3 when Brianna learns about Jamie -- when she and Claire are working through their Frank-related issues.  Toni & Maril's rationalization for why that didn't happen is that Brianna was so deeply affected by Frank's death that she's never told ANYONE about that last conversation.  It seems unlikely that she would not have thrown that in Claire's face when they were fighting in Season 3 (e.g., "I know he was going to leave you -- he asked me to go with him!") but okay, fine, I'll hand-wave that away.

[Eureka]

On 12/18/2018 at 11:04 PM, WatchrTina said:

Okay, I just listened to the podcast for ep 406, Blood of my Blood.  

I listened to 405 and 406 on my drive home from work the other day. They have gotten better and I think part of it is when Matt and Toni commentate together, they don't actually say much. It was much more interesting to me with the director and writer. Hoping to get to 407 soon.

[WatchrTina]

I just listened to the podcast for Ep 408, Wilmington.  The commentators are Executive Producers Toni Graphia and the writer, Luke Schelhaas.  I thought it was one of the least interesting podcasts so far.  There was a lot of observations about what was happening on screen plot-wise to which my mental reaction was "Yes I know.  I watched it already.  Twice."  I like the podcasts best when they talk about the production issues like sets and costumes, or challenges they had to overcome (e.g., Scottish weather, noisy rivers).  There was very little of that. 

They did say that the play that Claire and Jamie go to see was an actual play, written by a colonist from that time -- one of the first plays written in North America.  They also said the behavior of the audience (calling out comments during the performance) was normal for the time.

One point they made that I had not thought of was that Claire deliberately gets the Governor to help hold down the patient so that he does not notice that Jamie is missing.

They also said that historically, Governor Tryon actually did have a beef with George Washington and tried to have him kidnapped (though it's not clear to me if the American Revolution had begun at that point.)  Still, it's fun to think that his distrust of Washington was born this night when Jamie accidentally throws suspicion on Washington for something that Jamie actually did.

Another thing I had not thought about was that Murtagh has not seen Fergus in 20 years and he was still a child (12 or 13) during the Rising.  So Murtagh does not recognize Fergus at first.  It's only when he speak of M'lord (Jamie) that Murtagh realizes who he is.

Another point that they finally did clarify for me is that Brianna's rape happened in the same tavern/inn where she and Lizzy are staying.  I did NOT get that during the first couple of viewings and I kept thinking "Why did she go to a tavern?"  At the very end I thought she was going up the stairs to go back out onto the street (which, if so, how horrible would that be given the state she was in?)  But no, she was just passing through the ground-floor tavern on her way up to her room, when she got distracted by seeing her mother's ring.  Well okay that makes more sense but it opens up a whole other can of worms.  Toni and Luke referred specifically to the real life incident that inspired the movie "The Accused" wherein an entire bar full of people failed to intervene when a woman was gang-raped.  That really happened in New Bedford, Mass in 1983.  But here's where the similarities fall down: Brianna is a paying customer staying at that inn.  I can imagine an 18th century pub owner ignoring an assault on an unknown woman who walks into his bar alone, looking disheveled, and who immediately starts chatting up a gregarious patron. I can imagine him assuming that she is a prostitute.  I don't like it, but I can imagine it.   What I can't imagine is an innkeeper being indifferent to an assault on one of his paying customers -- a young woman he knows to be traveling in the company of her maid -- which suggests that she is a person of some means and NOT a prostitute.  Would an innkeeper really be so indifferent to the fate of one of his guests?  Would he really be indifferent to his inn possibly getting a reputation as an unsafe place to stay?  I guess I can fan-wank that Bonnet is so notorious that the innkeeper would look the other way, lest he be visited by one of those local associates that Bonnet threatens Roger with in the next episode.  But it's a stretch for me.  In the book the rape takes place on Bonnet's ship where everyone is beholden to him.  But I guess they didn't want to deal with having to come up with a ship set (wait scratch that -- they already HAVE a ship set) and also Brianna going alone on board a ship to try to get back her mother's ring from someone who is clearly a criminal -- well that was not Book!Brianna's smartest moment ever.  I can understand them deciding to change that.

Final note -- while commenting they were drinking rye whiskey that is produced exclusively on George Washington's Mount Vernon estate -- supposedly based on Washington's original recipe.

Edited January 5, 2019 by WatchrTina

[WatchrTina]

I just listened to the podcast for Ep 409, The Birds and the Bees.  The commentators are Toni Graphia and Matt Roberts, who co-wrote the episode.  Well, the podcasts are back in fine form!  I really enjoyed this one.  I learned some interesting things, I laughed a lot, and I just generally had a good time. 

They talked about how unusual it was to be given the time for the leisurely getting-to-know-you bee hunt that Jamie and Brianna go on. They commented about how on other shows if a scene lasts longer than 4 pages it's "too long!" but that's not the case on Outlander.  This episode is very unusual in that in between the "union" scene (it's not a "reunion" since Jamie and Brianna have never met before) and the big dramatic ending, nothing much happens.  And that "nothing" is wonderful because we get to watch Jamie getting to know his daughter.

The funniest bit was Matt bemoaning the amount of time that was spent trying to find the perfect stock footage of that nest of baby birds. They had to be the right kind of birds -- birds native to North Carolina -- and the tree and the color grading had to match the scene and it took forever.  Interestingly he later clarified that he wasn't the one who had to do the digging thru stock footage -- that task was delegated to someone else -- but he did have to look at a LOT of baby bird footage in order to make the final selection

The other funny thing was that apparently there was a huge debate over how many times Jamie should be shown hitting Roger.  The network wanted fewer blows.  The writers wanted more. (They're a bloodthirsty lot ye ken.) 

Matt and Toni are funny together because they'll go off on some interesting tangent and then suddenly realize, oh wait -- this is the big dramatic moment when Claire finds out Brianna was raped and we're still going on and on about rhododendrons.

BTW:  rhododendrons are common in Scotland now but they were not in the past so in prior seasons they tried to avoid filming them.  Now they can use them because they ran rampant in colonial America.  Those are rhododendrons that Lizzy and Ian are lurking in when they first see Roger.

It should be noted that no bees were harmed in the filming of this episode.  They were CGI.

Edited January 5, 2019 by WatchrTina

[Scarlett45]

@WatchrTina thank you for the posts about the podcast. Are they nice to listen to long after you’ve watched the episode? I was thinking of downloading after I finish my “again with this: Beverly Hills 90210” podcast. 

[WatchrTina]

@Scarlett45 I enjoy listening to them while watching the episode with the sound turned off and the closed captions on.  I think that's how they are intended to be used.  They're not really like stand-alone podcasts.  They're more like the directors commentary that sometimes comes with movie DVDs.  As such, there are often gaps in the commentary when no one is talking and the commentators often reference what is happening on the screen.

[Eureka]

On 1/4/2019 at 9:26 PM, WatchrTina said:

I just listened to the podcast for Ep 408, Wilmington.  The commentators are Executive Producers Toni Graphia and the writer, Luke Schelhaas.  I thought it was one of the least interesting podcasts so far.  There was a lot of observations about what was happening on screen plot-wise to which my mental reaction was "Yes I know.  I watched it already.  Twice."  I like the podcasts best when they talk about the production issues like sets and costumes, or challenges they had to overcome (e.g., Scottish weather, noisy rivers).  There was very little of that. 

They did say that the play that Claire and Jamie go to see was an actual play, written by a colonist from that time -- one of the first plays written in North America.  They also said the behavior of the audience (calling out comments during the performance) was normal for the time.

One point they made that I had not thought of was that Claire deliberately gets the Governor to help hold down the patient so that he does not notice that Jamie is missing.

They also said that historically, Governor Tryon actually did have a beef with George Washington and tried to have him kidnapped (though it's not clear to me if the American Revolution had begun at that point.)  Still, it's fun to think that his distrust of Washington was born this night when Jamie accidentally throws suspicion on Washington for something that Jamie actually did.

Another thing I had not thought about was that Murtagh has not seen Fergus in 20 years and he was still a child (12 or 13) during the Rising.  So Murtagh does not recognize Fergus at first.  It's only when he speak of M'lord (Jamie) that Murtagh realizes who he is.

Another point that they finally did clarify for me is that Brianna's rape happened in the same tavern/inn where she and Lizzy are staying.  I did NOT get that during the first couple of viewings and I kept thinking "Why did she go to a tavern?"  At the very end I thought she was going up the stairs to go back out onto the street (which, if so, how horrible would that be given the state she was in?)  But no, she was just passing through the ground-floor tavern on her way up to her room, when she got distracted by seeing her mother's ring.  Well okay that makes more sense but it opens up a whole other can of worms.  Toni and Luke referred specifically to the real life incident that inspired the movie "The Accused" wherein an entire bar full of people failed to intervene when a woman was gang-raped.  That really happened in New Bedford, Mass in 1983.  But here's where the similarities fall down: Brianna is a paying customer staying at that inn.  I can imagine an 18th century pub owner ignoring an assault on an unknown woman who walks into his bar alone, looking disheveled, and who immediately starts chatting up a gregarious patron. I can imagine him assuming that she is a prostitute.  I don't like it, but I can imagine it.   What I can't imagine is an innkeeper being indifferent to an assault on one of his paying customers -- a young woman he knows to be traveling in the company of her maid -- which suggests that she is a person of some means and NOT a prostitute.  Would an innkeeper really be so indifferent to the fate of one of his guests?  Would he really be indifferent to his inn possibly getting a reputation as an unsafe place to stay?  I guess I can fan-wank that Bonnet is so notorious that the innkeeper would look the other way, lest he be visited by one of those local associates that Bonnet threatens Roger with in the next episode.  But it's a stretch for me.  In the book the rape takes place on Bonnet's ship where everyone is beholden to him.  But I guess they didn't want to deal with having to come up with a ship set (wait scratch that -- they already HAVE a ship set) and also Brianna going alone on board a ship to try to get back her mother's ring from someone who is clearly a criminal -- well that was not Book!Brianna's smartest moment ever.  I can understand them deciding to change that.

Final note -- while commenting they were drinking rye whiskey that is produced exclusively on George Washington's Mount Vernon estate -- supposedly based on Washington's original recipe.

I liked this one actually. I think the writer was interesting. Toni's commentary bugs me, so I have been holding off on 409, lol. I like listening to Maril and Matt.

[toolazy]

On 1/4/2019 at 6:26 PM, WatchrTina said:

 What I can't imagine is an innkeeper being indifferent to an assault on one of his paying customers -- a young woman he knows to be traveling in the company of her maid -- which suggests that she is a person of some means and NOT a prostitute.  Would an innkeeper really be so indifferent to the fate of one of his guests?  Would he really be indifferent to his inn possibly getting a reputation as an unsafe place to stay?  I guess I can fan-wank that Bonnet is so notorious that the innkeeper would look the other way, lest he be visited by one of those local associates that Bonnet threatens Roger with in the next episode.  But it's a stretch for me.  In the book the rape takes place on Bonnet's ship where everyone is beholden to him.  But I guess they didn't want to deal with having to come up with a ship set (wait scratch that -- they already HAVE a ship set) and also Brianna going alone on board a ship to try to get back her mother's ring from someone who is clearly a criminal -- well that was not Book!Brianna's smartest moment ever.  I can understand them deciding to change that.

 

 

I imagine that Bonnet has a bit of a reputation and the innkeeper is probably afraid of incurring his wrath so he looks the other way.  If it was just some random ruffian, the innkeeper would probably be more protective. 

 

Edit to stay on topic:  Since we're almost done with the season (!!!) I'll probably wait until the end and listen to them all from the beginning. So far I haven't listened to any of them.  

Edited January 11, 2019 by toolazy

[WatchrTina]

I just listened to the podcast for episode 410: The Deep Heart's Core.  The commentators are Matt Roberts and the writer, Luke Schelhaas.  It was a good one -- I thoroughly enjoyed all they had to say.  A few things that stood out.

When Luke turned in the script it was fairly short, which was good thing since they so often end up with too much content and have to be cut. Nevertheless, the episode ran long and they speculated that it's because there are so many scenes where actions are happening on the screen but there is no dialog -- particularly in the life-on-the-ridge montage and the Roger-traveling-with-the-Mohawk scenes.

They confirmed that the Canadian first nation actors portraying the Mohawk are not, in fact, Mohawk.  As such, the actor who told the Mohawk creation myth while sitting around the campfire had to learn his speech phonetically.  (That reminds me of the Scottish actors having to learn Gaelic phonetically in season 1.)

I had wondered why there was a scene set at night with everyone sitting around a campfire instead of inside their nice, snug cabin.  The reason was that in the original script that scene immediately followed the Roger scene that is set at night (when the Mohawk are telling stories around the fire and Roger and the other guy have their last talk).  As such the original script had them going from one night scene with a campfire to another night scene with a campfire.  In the final cut, however, all the Roger scenes were reorganized.  In the original script they did not show you Roger with the Mohawk until after the big "Where's Roger!" scene back at the cabin -- leaving the viewer in the dark as to where Roger was until Ian confesses what he did.  They changed their minds during editing (obviously) and Roger's situation is made clear to the viewer much sooner than to Brianna & Claire.  As a result, the motivation for including that campfire scene at the cabin was gone.  They suggested that we should assume they were cooking something out there that was too big to cook on the cabin's hearth (but of course nothing of the sort is shown.)

They talked a lot about wanting to make sure that the dream sequence was understood from the beginning to be a dream because they didn't want the viewer to feel tricked.

They particularly loved Claire's line "You told me you hit a tree" because it's a wee-shout out to season 1 where Claire does actually see Jamie punch a tree in frustration.

Edited January 16, 2019 by WatchrTina

[WatchrTina]

The podcast for 4.11, "If Not For Hope" is with Toni Graphia and Maril Davis (who, interestingly, does not have a credit on IMDb for this episode).  It disappoints me to say this but it was not a very good podcast.  When those two get together they have a bad habit of talking exclusively about the plot instead of giving behind-the-scenes production insights, which is what I prefer.  I've read the books and seen the episode (more than once) so I don't really need more insight into the plot.

One interesting point they made is that one of the drivers of plot for this episode the the fact that both Jamie and Claire "go internal" to try to deal with the trauma in this episode and that tactic leaves them somewhat remote from one another for most of the episode (despite Ian's best efforts).  But then again, we already know that.  The story arc of Jamie and Claire being distant from one another and finally finding their way back to one another is played out quite clearly in the episode.

The only behind-the-scenes production detail I heard was that Sophie's faux pregnancy belly was really hard to keep in place with those corseted gowns.  They were constantly having to adjust it to a more realistic location.

[WatchrTina]

I just listened to the podcast for ep 4.12, "Providence."  It's Toni Graphia and Maril Davis doing the commentary again and once again Maril is not listed in IMDb as an Executive Producer.  That's so weird.

So . . . definitely one of the less enjoyable podcasts.  They make the point that this episode is unusual in that it has several long scenes that are just one-on-one conversations between two people (Roger and the priest in the hut, Brianna and Bonnet in the jail).  There is always tremendous pressure (in TV) to shorten those kinds of talky scenes and get to some action.  Toni & Maril were grateful to have been allowed the time and space that they wanted for those scenes (and I agree -- Roger's scenes in particular are amazing.)  But it leaves them with almost nothing to say during those parts of the episode. Or maybe they just kept getting engrossed in watching the performance.  At any rate there were long LONG periods when nobody said anything and then when they did speak it was about the plot but didn't really shed any new light (because I know the plot -- I've read the book AND watched the episode more than once.)  So for the most part I was just annoyed during this podcast.  Here are the few interesting things I heard.

It was filmed during a heat-wave.  The temperature got up to over 90 at one point.  This led to the sound department deciding to go for a swim in the STILL VERY COLD Highland lake (the one you see in the episode) one morning. 

The speech that Roger gives -- the one where the "Idiot" hut gets it's name because Roger calls himself an idiot over an over -- got a significant re-write the night before filming and Richard had to re-learn it at the last minute.

The scene between Brianna and Bonnet was one of the most hotly-contested scenes ever in the writers room (strong differences of opinion as to how Brianna could/would behave in that situation).  The other hotly contested scene was the decision by the priest's lover to put down her child and walk into the flames to die with him.  There was a strong difference of opinion as to whether or not a mother would abandon her child like that.  Someone asked would either Jamie or Claire -- participants in the great love story at the heart of this show -- do that for each other?  If not, why would this Indian woman do it for a man who is essentially choosing to abandon her and their child?

When "Adagio for Strings" was added to the last scene (where Roger ends the priest's suffering) a bunch of male writers said "Hey, that's from Platoon."

The scene where the priest's lover walks into the flame was actually filmed with stunt woman walking into real flames.  

Edited January 29, 2019 by WatchrTina

[Eureka]

Listened to 4.13 podcast with Maril and Toni. I liked it a lot this time, they were very talkative about the whole season actually, bc it was the last one. Apparently it was very hot weather when they filmed some of it and even set a heat record for Scotland. Also they said they tried to have Claire give Jamie the baby in the scene where she gives him to Jocasta, but every time they gave the baby to Sam, the baby cried. 

[WatchrTina]

On 1/31/2019 at 8:45 PM, Eureka said:

Listened to 4.13 podcast with Maril and Toni. I liked it a lot this time

Me too.  It's a good one!

Toni (who wrote the episode) said that they toyed with trying to depict a slow bubbling courtship between Murtagh and Jocasta but then got to the point (in the writers room) of just saying "Well, what if they have a fight and then we hard cut to them in bed?"  That, as we know, is what they went with.  Toni even talked about how that sort of thing is a bit of a recurring theme in TV romances -- specifically mentioning how Maddie and David suddenly hooked up in the TV show "Moonlighting" -- and Maril was at first confused because she thought Toni was talking about the movie "Moonstruck," which has essentially the same trope. (Remember Cher slapping Nicholas Cage saying "Snap out of it!" and then he sweeps her off her feet (literally) and carries her to bed.)  I'll add one more to the list -- remember the TV Show "Cheers" when Sam and Diane have their first kiss?  It comes after a snarling fight during which (I think) she slaps him as well (Sam: "Are you as turned on as I am?"  Diane: "More!" <smooch>)  I have my doubts about whether or not that kind of thing really happens in real life AND also has a happy ending, but TV writers certainly think it does.

As others have mentioned, they actually contemplated ending the show with the line "Where's Roger?"  Even Diana was on-board with that cliff-hanger ending.  Ultimately they opted to include the Brianna/Roger reunion and end on a different cliffhanger and one of the reasons they went that way was out of sympathy for Richard Rankin.  They didn't want him to have to go a year giving evasive responses to questions about whether or not his character returned (like Kit Harrington went through when Jon Snow "died" at the end of a season of Game of Thrones.)  Of course it would not have been the same -- we readers know from the books that he DOES return to Brianna whereas with Game of Thrones the TV show had gone beyond the last published book in the series.  But still, I'm glad Richard doesn't have to live through a year of some fans being mad at his character for "abandoning" Brianna and the baby.

One interesting production note is that when they scouted the location for the scene between Team Jamie and the Team Wahkatiiosta (the group that wants the opal) it was an overcast day but when they showed up to film it was a bright, sunny day, which is is a problem when you are shooting in a forest.  People constantly moving in and out of bright sunlight and shadow is a filming and continuity nightmare.  So they had to raise a huge canvas sunshield to block the light on most of that clearing and shoot all the action within that shadow.

They also mentioned that while Wahkatiiosta tells the story of Otter Tooth the scrip always intended that they would cut-away a few times to depict the story, rather than just have the viewer watch her tell the tale.  But the director filmed a LOT more footage to illustrate the story than was originally planned.  He cleverly made use of whatever down time there was between set-ups for major shots to capture a few more images to illustrate Otter Tooth's story.

And now . . . my watch is ended.  Sigh.

Edited February 3, 2019 by WatchrTina

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Introducing the official Droughtlander podcast, where executive producer and showrunner Matthew B. Roberts interviews the people that help bring Outlander to life.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Episode 1: Executive producer and showrunner Matthew B. Roberts interviews Outlander executive producer Maril Davis on what it takes to make the epic series.

 

Edited June 22, 2021 by ElectricBoogaloo

[ElectricBoogaloo]

 Episode 2: Matthew B. Roberts takes a dive into the world of post production with Elicia Bessette and Michael O’Halloran and answers your fan questions!

 

[taanja]

I'm at work and can't listen - when is this damn show returning? or is it? I know nuthin'! Droughtlander indeed

[Scarlett45]

I LOVE podcasts!!!! Thank you for sharing this. 

[Cdh20]

The post production one was was fascinating to learn how many people work on that aspect of the show, & how detail oriented it is! 

[WatchrTina]

Hi everyone.  I'm  just bumping this topic to the top to remind people that the show-runners usually post a behind-the-scenes podcast for each episode.  The one for Ep 601 is not up yet (at the time I posted this) but there ARE four podcasts from STARZ that were posted to iTunes during the last "Droughtlander."  They address the following topics:

• Composing for TV
• Running a Production in Scotland
• Post-Production
• All Things Producing.

I'll be enjoying these in the coming days as we wait for the episode 601 podcast to drop.

You can find the podcasts by going to iTunes, limiting your search to podcasts, and then searching for "The Official Outlander Podcast."  You'll know you found the right one if it shows STARZ as the source.  Note that if you click on the "Related" tab of that iTunes screen you will find a bunch of other podcasts from other sources that also focus on Outlander.  They are of varying quality but I have listened to some of them in the past and enjoyed them.  But "The Official Outlander Podcast" is, of course, my favorite as it generally includes interviews with people involved in the making of the show. (Interviews with the directors are my favorites.)  The way the podcasts are USUALLY set up is that the podcaster watches the episode and makes comments in reaction to what is shown on the screen.  So what I like to do is watch the episode on-demand on my TV with the sound turned off and the closed captions turned on, while listening to the podcast from a second source (iPhone, iPad, laptop, etc).  Sometimes it can be a bit tricky to synchronize the podcast commentary with the playback on the screen, but I usually can get there in the end.  Here's hoping they ARE going to continue posting behind-the-scenes commentary for each episode this year.  I love them.

Edited March 10, 2022 by WatchrTina