S06.E01: Echoes

[DoctorAtomic]

1 hour ago, Shermie said:

Claire stayed (and returned) because she loved Jamie; he can’t travel to modern times because they don’t know if he can travel through the stones. Now they’re there because of Jem (is that Brianna’s kid’s name?), not sure if he can travel through the stones.

They know Jamie can't travel. Way back when Claire went through before Culloden she asked if Jamie could hear the stones hum, he said no, and last season when 'Jem' (I don't know either) made the rock hot and it cracked, Jamie held it and said it felt cold to him. At that same time, Roger, Bree, and the baby then decided to go back to 1970-ish, and when they went through, they didn't actually go anywhere. My theory was that since the baby was born in the 1760s, he could technically only go 'back', and the other two could go 'forward' so it canceled out.

Narratively, you kind of need that as the buy in to the show because there's no other reason why Claire couldn't convince Jamie to go to 1970. I tend to think he'd adjust. And the baby doesn't know better anyway. Being able to travel has shown to be rare; I can think of Gellis and the guy who knew who Ringo Starr was last season off the top of my head. Oh and the Native American 'ghost'. I've said before, I know it's not a time travel show, but I wish Claire and Bree were a little more inquisitive about it. Jamie, Claire, et al., are the 'good guys' on the show, and I'm rooting for them just as much as anyone else. I'd be a little concerned there could be 'bad guys' that could have traveled back to ruin history or whatever. I know there's a lot going on building a settlement, but once and while you'd think it might come up. 

1 hour ago, Shermie said:

That house and barn are way too fancy and modern looking for the 1700s, at least from a bunch of frontier make-do builders.

I don't mind that it's a big house, but it's hard to buy that it's so well put together. I mean, I could see building a smallish structure and then adding on as they could, so it would be more 'sprawling'. It's the upper story and the giant chimneys that seems a bit much. That's a lot of material. It doesn't take me out of the show or anything, but those Scots can put something together. 

[Noneofyourbusiness]

52 minutes ago, DoctorAtomic said:

They know Jamie can't travel. Way back when Claire went through before Culloden she asked if Jamie could hear the stones hum, he said no, and last season when 'Jem' (I don't know either) made the rock hot and it cracked, Jamie held it and said it felt cold to him. At that same time, Roger, Bree, and the baby then decided to go back to 1970-ish, and when they went through, they didn't actually go anywhere. My theory was that since the baby was born in the 1760s, he could technically only go 'back', and the other two could go 'forward' so it canceled out.

Jeremiah; Jem or more often Jemmy for short.

What the show said was that they ended up back in the 18th century because they didn't really want to leave. Roger and Bree both admitted that when they thought "home", they pictured the Ridge.

Edited March 12, 2022 by Noneofyourbusiness

[Shermie]

18 hours ago, DoctorAtomic said:

They know Jamie can't travel.

And yet, at the opening of the very first episode, doesn’t Claire look out her window and see an 18th-century era guy (assumed to be Jamie)?

[gingerella]

14 minutes ago, Shermie said:

And yet, at the opening of the very first episode, doesn’t Claire look out her window and see an 18th-century era guy (assumed to be Jamie)?

That's supposedly:

Spoiler

Jamie's ghost. It's been common knowledge for years now. We just don't know how he gets there. Personally speaking, I think this whole story is on a time loop. Jamie comes back just before Samhain, to somehow make sure Claire goes to Craig na Dun, so that she can travel back in time to meet him 200 years before. Once they both die, they wait until Claire is born again, comes to Inverness with Frank, rinse and repeat. That's my best guess.

 

[DoctorAtomic]

It also could be a 22nd century person with future knowledge dressed as an 18th century era guy going back to 1940-whatever to make sure Claire goes through because timey-whimey she's always supposed to go through. I don't know why because it's been shown they can't really change any of the big historical things, but I suppose little things here and there do add up. I'd be totally fine with that. I mean, the stones have always worked. There's no reason why in 2145 that a descendent of Claire/Jamie or Bree/Roger wouldn't be aware of it. Now that I'm thinking of it, I'm surprised no one of them is keeping a private record of all this that could survive the centuries. I'd even really like if they ended with that person being Frank/Black Jack (the same actor; different character). 

The show has been fairly clear (see what I did there) that Jamie can't go through the stones. 

[Noneofyourbusiness]

The behind the scenes in Season 1 confirmed that was Jamie's ghost. We've also seen Otter Tooth's ghost. Ghosts are a thing.

So are psychic powers too, come to think of it. Margaret Campbell in Season 3 and an older woman Claire spoke to in Season 1 or 2. Time travel isn't this show's only novum.

Edited March 13, 2022 by Noneofyourbusiness

[Hanahope]

On 3/11/2022 at 10:59 PM, DoctorAtomic said:

My theory was that since the baby was born in the 1760s, he could technically only go 'back', and the other two could go 'forward' so it canceled out.

 

On 3/11/2022 at 11:50 PM, Noneofyourbusiness said:

What the show said was that they ended up back in the 18th century because they didn't really want to leave. Roger and Bree both admitted that when they thought "home", they pictured the Ridge.

While Bree and Roger's thought of "home" might be correct, i like the idea that Jem can't really "go forward" because he has no idea what "forward" looks like.  Also, it may very well be that no first time stone traveler can go "forward" (since Clair certainly wasn't thinking about 18th century Scotland when she went through the first time either - and Bree, while in utero did only because she wasn't yet born).  if it is somehow dependent on what the traveler "thinks," maybe Bree and Roger can impress on Jem their thoughts to override Jem's, at least while Jem is a child.  But if Jem is ever going to be able to travel forward himself in the future, if he can at all, he'll need to develop enough familiarity with the future to have his own thoughts of that time frame.

I sortof see why Claire turned to ether, she's clearly trying to block out the nightmares.  but i wish she'd just talk with Bree about it, since they have both had that traumatic experience.    but i guess even in Claire's future, "therapy" wasn't really yet a thing.

Honestly, I don't see why we had to have the long prologue to introduce Christie.  i think it would have been fine to have him show up, he and Jamie be all awkward with each other, then Jamie later tell Claire that he and Christie butted heads at Ardsmuir.  i suppose Jamie knowing freemasonry is going to be a key issue at some point this season, since that's the only other reason i can see for the Ardsmuir prologue.  that and the whole flogging bookend, though they didn't need to show Jamie being flogged again on that issue.  but yeah, Christie must really be without any other choice if he came to Jamie.

and Fergus has been so sidelined for a while now that this alcoholic story line really seems out of the blue.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[DoctorAtomic]

50 minutes ago, Hanahope said:

While Bree and Roger's thought of "home" might be correct, i like the idea that Jem can't really "go forward" because he has no idea what "forward" looks like.  Also, it may very well be that no first time stone traveler can go "forward" (since Clair certainly wasn't thinking about 18th century Scotland when she went through the first time either - and Bree, while in utero did only because she wasn't yet born).

When they learned that Jem could turn the rock hot or whatever, I was saying then that he shouldn't be able to go to 1970 anyway. I kind of wanted them to end up in the late 1500s because it could have made for an interesting episode.

Ok, they were 'thinking of home'. I like my theory better because, as you point out, on the first trip back, Claire just 'heard the stones' and wasn't thinking of Scotland in the clan times. And when she returned to find Jamie, ok, she was thinking of him, but she went back with the same amount of time passing for both of them. 

I mean, I know it's not a time travel show, but for no one to raise any questions at all, or just general curiosity is just weird. 

[Shermie]

2 hours ago, Hanahope said:

i suppose Jamie knowing freemasonry is going to be a key issue at some point this season,

Yes, they made a point of focusing on the secret handshake, so I’m sure we’ll see that again.

Time travel is actually a pretty problematic plot device because any little thing done in the past can affect the future in some random way. When someone in our times randomly vanishes with literally no trace and is never found, I’ve joked that a time traveller poking around in the past must have moved a rock or something. It’s an interesting concept for fiction; a terrible thing if it was fact.

[DoctorAtomic]

Claire, Bree, and Roger don't have any plans to return to 1970 anytime soon so there's not much they can do about it. Technically, Claire going back in the first place changed something. Except for 'knowing' the future, when Claire went back to Frank, it didn't look like anything changed, and the show doesn't really get into that. 

[taanja]

19 hours ago, Shermie said:

Yes, they made a point of focusing on the secret handshake, so I’m sure we’ll see that again.

Time travel is actually a pretty problematic plot device because any little thing done in the past can affect the future in some random way. When someone in our times randomly vanishes with literally no trace and is never found, I’ve joked that a time traveller poking around in the past must have moved a rock or something. It’s an interesting concept for fiction; a terrible thing if it was fact.

Think of all the people in Claire's timeline who will not be "saved" or "cured" or whatever she would have done in her own time with modern medicine.

or on the other hand - the people she does save or cure in the past who would otherwise have died. That surely has to fuck up a lot of stuff.

I know the show handwaves all this stuff. I know the show wants me to believe that true love is why Claire stays in the past. But sorry. None of that makes a lick of sense to me. And clearly I give the time travel consequences or lack thereof more thought than the author.

why would anyone in their right mind chose to live before electricity/indoor plumbing/ modern medicine? < for love? Um no. just ..no.

[DoctorAtomic]

I'm interested in the time travel too, but that's not the show we have. To their credit, Claire and Bree have shared their knowledge of things to come when it's come up, and they're using what they know to advance technology; like the syringe from last season. Jamie is smart enough to listen and use the information in his decisionmaking in general. I'd be more annoyed if they were holding back. We could always start a separate thread for just that. 

[Hanahope]

1 hour ago, taanja said:

or on the other hand - the people she does save or cure in the past who would otherwise have died. That surely has to fuck up a lot of stuff.

But how do we know that in Claire's 20th century past she didn't already do those things so she's not really "changing" the past, she's merely creating it as it had already happened?  Afterall, Roger MacKenzie is a descendent of Gillis, who time travelled back to Scotland and had Dougal's child, and ultimately introduced the time-travel gene into that family.  

yeah yeah timey whimey my head hurts.

[Noneofyourbusiness]

2 hours ago, taanja said:

Think of all the people in Claire's timeline who will not be "saved" or "cured" or whatever she would have done in her own time with modern medicine.

or on the other hand - the people she does save or cure in the past who would otherwise have died. That surely has to fuck up a lot of stuff.

In her own timeframe, Claire is just one of many equally qualified doctors and if she's not on staff, someone else will be. In the past, she knows more than anyone else.

[DoctorAtomic]

Now you have Jem with the gene, who passes that down through the generations too. 

[Quilt Fairy]

2 hours ago, Hanahope said:

Roger MacKenzie is a descendent of Gillis

Really?  When did that come up?

[Hanahope]

51 minutes ago, Quilt Fairy said:

Really?  When did that come up?

i'm not sure it was ever explicitly stated, but Geillis gave birth to Dougal's son before she was supposed to burned as a witch in Scotland.  the baby was given to another related family to raise and keep the MacKenzie name.  and later there was something about Roger being a descendant from Dougal MacKenzie's line, and he can time travel just like Geillis, so just putting 2 and 2 together.  

Edited March 14, 2022 by Hanahope

[Noneofyourbusiness]

40 minutes ago, Hanahope said:

i'm not sure it was ever explicitly stated, but Geillis gave birth to Dougal's son before she was supposed to burned as a witch in Scotland.  the baby was given to another related family to raise and keep the MacKenzie name.  and later there was something about Roger being a descendant from Dougal MacKenzie's line, and he can time travel just like Geillis, so just putting 2 and 2 together.  

Yes, Claire told Roger explicitly in Season 2 that he was Geillis and Dougal's descendant. "You mean I'm descended from the war chief you talked about? And the witch?"

Geillis and Dougal's illegitimate son (raised by more distant MacKenzie cousins) was William Buccleigh MacKenzie, the one played by the same actor as Dougal who had Roger hanged because he saw him hugging his wife Morag (whose life and that of her baby son Roger saved on Bonnet's ship, because he knew they were his ancestors) and drew the wrong conclusions. William's baby son is also named Jeremiah, like Roger's father and little Jemmy. Roger is aware his own ancestor had him hanged, as he complained of to Brianna.

Claire researched Roger's ancestry before she went back. That's on his father's side, the MacKenzies. His adoptive father Reverend Wakefield was his mother's biological uncle.

3 hours ago, DoctorAtomic said:

Now you have Jem with the gene, who passes that down through the generations too. 

That's a good point. We know Roger's ancestry, but we (and the characters) have no idea if there are Frasers descended from Germain and MacKenzies descended from Jemmy running around in the future.

.

[Hanahope]

3 minutes ago, Noneofyourbusiness said:

Geillis and Dougal's illegitimate son (raised by more distant MacKenzie cousins) was William Buccleigh MacKenzie, the one played by the same actor as Dougal who had Roger hanged because he saw him hugging his wife Morag (whose life and that of her baby son Roger saved on Bonnet's ship, because he knew they were his ancestors) and drew the wrong conclusions. William's baby son is also named Jeremiah, like Roger's father and little Jemmy. Roger is aware his own ancestor had him hanged, as he complained of to Brianna.

oh, that's right, i totally forgot about that plot point. 

[Hanahope]

8 minutes ago, Noneofyourbusiness said:

That's a good point. We know Roger's ancestry, but we (and the characters) have no idea if there are Frasers descended from Germain and MacKenzies descended from Jemmy running around in the future.

nevermind, i was thinking about time travel gene, which Germain doesn't have (to our knowledge).  Yeah both could have descendants in the 1970s.

Edited March 15, 2022 by Hanahope

[Noneofyourbusiness]

Just now, Hanahope said:

I don't think we know if Germain has the time travel gene.  Neither Fergus nor Marsali Fraser are blood relations to any time traveler, that i know of.

No, I was just remarking on whether Fergus and Marsali have descendants in Claire's time.

[DoctorAtomic]

Given all this, there probably should be a non-negligible number of time travelers in the 'present'. 

[TV Anonymous]

On 3/11/2022 at 9:13 PM, Shermie said:

That house and barn are way too fancy and modern looking for the 1700s, at least from a bunch of frontier make-do builders.

I thought that too. The interior wood paneling of Frasier Manor was obviously varnished. Did they have the means and the time to make varnish?

I admit that I do not pay enough attention to the details of this show as I should, but was there a case that someone travelled to the future? By that I mean one travelled to the future of when one originally was. Claire, Geilis, Brianna and Roger all travelled to the past. Their travels forward were return travels.

From a very superficial point of view I have to applaud Claire that after around 35 years her breasts were as perky and as firm as before, with no sign of sagging. And this was without the help of modern medicine. Wonder what her secrets were to maintain herself.

[GHScorpiosRule]

8 minutes ago, TV Anonymous said:

but was there a case that someone travelled to the future? By that I mean one travelled to the future of when one originally was. Claire, Geilis, Brianna and Roger all travelled to the past.

Nope.

 

[DoctorAtomic]

It's been all from your starting point back. Even in the song from the first season, it was clear the traveler went back, but as it was pointed out, it was the ability to return that Claire didn't know yet. 

[mythoughtis]

I find it hard to believe that Christie would be Presbyterian unless the Presbyterians have changed drastically in the last 200 years. His beliefs don’t sound like my old Presbyterian church.  Granted I’m in America not Scotland.  His fundamentalism, abhorrence of alcohol, and thrill  of fire and brimstone seem more like Baptist to me.  

[DoctorAtomic]

I think they lumped it all into a generic colonial 'great awakening' style religious extremist. 

[Noneofyourbusiness]

On 9/30/2022 at 7:55 PM, mythoughtis said:

I find it hard to believe that Christie would be Presbyterian unless the Presbyterians have changed drastically in the last 200 years. His beliefs don’t sound like my old Presbyterian church.  Granted I’m in America not Scotland.  His fundamentalism, abhorrence of alcohol, and thrill  of fire and brimstone seem more like Baptist to me.  

Times change. For example, the Presbyterian Church in America preached strict abstinence from alcohol until the 1980s.

Edited October 3, 2022 by Noneofyourbusiness

[Camera One]

Finally forgot how traumatizing this show is to watch, and decided to give Season 6 a try.  My thoughts are mostly the same as many others.

The 20 minute prologue took awhile to get engaging.  I was confused for awhile about what was going on.

On Fraser's Ridge, it was nice to see things a bit calmer.  At least the episode didn't end with horrific gory murder, so that's a plus.

However, it looks like the usual M.O. of this show is going to repeat itself, aka No Good Deed Goes Unpunished.

Jaime and family went out of their way to help Mr. Christie, who was annoyingly sanctimonious and ungrateful.  I can see him getting mad at Claire later if his daughter starts learning science from her.  Hopefully, both his kids will turn against him.

I'm wary of the two addiction storylines though.  As others have said, I too had long wanted Fergus to get a storyline, but abusive drunk was not what I had in mind.  Meanwhile, Claire's self-medicating was revealed as why she seemed so well adjusted after the trauma of last season, which is believable, I guess, but not what I want to see.  I did think it was cool that she re-invented ether, though.

The shortage of tea due to taxes was a nice touch. 

I'm not sure if I want to see Jaime acting as Indian agent, which would put him into all sorts of compromising situations, but that could be interesting, from a historical perspective.

Edited December 20, 2022 by Camera One

[TVForever]

On 3/7/2022 at 1:52 AM, ferjy said:

 

I’m happy to see Mark Lewis Jones (Tom Christie), even if he is a baddie in this. A fine, fine actor. And Alexander Vlahos as his son is a treat. He was fantastic as the king’s brother Philippe in Versailles. They’ve put together a really good cast this season. 

 

Thank you! I've been wondering where I've seen him before, and I just couldn't place it! I'm just getting to see Season 6, so I'm a little late to the party, I'm afraid...

[DoctorAtomic]

Hurry up! You've only got a week before the new episodes!

[SassAndSnacks]

On 6/8/2023 at 9:56 AM, TVForever said:

I'm just getting to see Season 6, so I'm a little late to the party, I'm afraid...

 

On 6/8/2023 at 12:21 PM, DoctorAtomic said:

You've only got a week before the new episodes!

And make sure you post your thoughts on the episodes so we can all get back into the show!  No pressure!  😁

[Maisiesmom]

Hello everyone I'm back! I moved some channels around so I could get the new episodes and wanted to share my thoughts. Didn't really care about the flashback to the prison. Where was Murtagh? I thought he was at the prison too. The old guy who thought he was the Bonny Prince was funny, tho.  And the Ridge has improved a lot! They have stables now and lots more fencing all around. But Clair using ether? WTF? And poor Fergus becoming a drunk? No way would Marsali put up with that shit. Will she ever have that baby? I don't like the Chrisities at all. The dad always spouting off about the firey pits of hell shut up please. His kids look shady too, especially Malva. It was good to see Jamie and Claire and Ian! It was nice of Roger to invite the Chrisities to stay but I don't think Jamie was too thrilled about it. Last thought for now-I don't like the new singer of the theme song. Too strange to have a male voice when it's always been a woman. Anyway, chat at ya later!