S07.E04: A Most Uncomfortable Woman

[Athena]

Quote

On the way to Scotland, Jamie is pulled back into the Revolutionary War. William is sent on a covert mission. Roger and Brianna struggle to adapt to life in the 1980s.

Reminder: The is the book talk thread. This may include spoilers for ALL the books. If you wish to remain unspoiled for any of the books, please leave now and head to the No Book Talk episode thread.

[SassAndSnacks]

Richardson to William - "Are you familiar with the Dismal Swamp?"  

Me - "Ugh, F... Are we really doing that?"

But it wasn't that bad. Show definitely condensed a really dismal Buik plot. Bah dum ching!  Did they do some shots in the Southern US?  

I'm also really happy with Show condensing the whole pirate, three ships fiasco of the Buik, whereby even after reading it multiple times, I still have no idea who is/was who, what ship was which, who was taken, who sliced Jamie, etc.  Glad we didn't have to deal with that.  The reason for Jamie and Ian joining the rebellion felt much more authentic and earned in the Show than with how Jamie and Claire found themselves at Fort Ticonderoga in the Buik.

Speaking of Ticonderoga...um...no Show.  You didn't get it.  The aerial shot of the fort was wrong.  Ticonderoga is famous for its location and shape, and this wasn't right.  They couldn't fly a camera over the real fort?

Backing up a bit in the storyline, Claire and Tom Christie.  The tea scene was so good - just how I pictured it while reading. "I shall have no peace while you live, woman!" And the scene with J & C after, also enjoyable.  So much of the dialogue is right from the page, and I love it.  

I struggled through the 1980s scenes, though I did gasp when they showed the writing desk, and I like the more realistic portrayal of what it would take to bring Lallybroch up to modern building codes.  

Charles is going to make me actually care about William, I can feel it.

 

 

[Hanahope]

ok posting here since it might involve book talk.

i looked up Fort Ticonderoga.  its in northern NY!!  So one moment Jamie and Claire are in Wilmington (I think) meeting with Tom Christie and the Sons of Liberty guy and suddenly they are hundreds of (maybe closer to a thousand) miles away in NY with no adventures in between?  really?  wtf did we miss?  i guess something to do with their ship?  just quite time time jump (almost on par with the years that flew by in the 1970s for Bree/Roger)

[Night Cheese]

I've been really enjoying this season and liked this episode a lot. The showrunners are far from perfect, but they've done a good job of cutting a lot of the fat from the books. 

The Claire/Tom scene was lovely. I like CB's portrayal much, much more than I like book Claire (which is to say, I basically don't like Book Claire). I get why Tom would fall in love with show Claire despite his morals and everything. Claire's shocked expression was so good and their conversation afterwards was wonderful. It's so true to the books, but CB's Claire is so much more likeable that it made it so much better. 

I recall it taking me a while to have any interest or care for the Hunters, and nothing's changed here. Hopefully since the show is moving rapidly, that it'll get to a point where I like them quicker. 

I like the Brianna & Family in the present day storyline a lot more than most, so I appreciated the time spent with them and the struggles to bring Lallybroch back to its glory. 

[nodorothyparker]

William doesn't remember meeting Ian on the Ridge before. Hee. We don't remember it either, William, since it's obviously the first of the retconning we're going to see with fixing all the stuff the show earlier left out.

I'm the weirdo who really likes the Dismal Swamp story and loves Ian and William together in all their messiness, so I was pleased with what we got. The whole conversation about having a good death song is straight off the page. I just wish they hadn't cut their meeting up with another group of Indians, prompting Ian to repeatedly refer to William as "cousin" in what William hazily thinks is odd but probably some kind of protective claiming of kinship while he's so very ill and vulnerable. In cutting it, the show loses yet another thing William will be so furious about later, that Ian knew and was telling him who they were to each other and he missed it.

Thank you, special effects, for all the closeups of that nasty nasty arm wound even if the end result did remind just how slipshod medical care could be in this time period. "Sorry, we're going to have to saw your whole arm off with nary a painkiller in sight. No wait, there's some pus coming out. Never mind. It's fine." I'm trying to reserve judgment on the Hunters until we see how they mesh with the rest of the cast though my initial read is that the actor playing Denzel is too young and lightweight for the role. But seeing as how they've eaten so much of the last three books, I guess this is what we get.

I'm okay with all the streamlining of How They Got to Ticonderoga too. I only vaguely remember there were a couple of ships, some British sailor impressment, and maybe some smugglers or something? It's all a very convoluted way to get from point A to B. I really liked John Bell's line reading of "I love this land. I want to stay and fight for it." He's just so good in this role.

It sucks when you make what is supposed to be this huge final gesture of selfless love and sacrifice only for you both to live on and then have to square that the next day, doesn't it Tom? Claire and Tom's meetup was such a  wonderful mix of awkward and giddiness and nope, never gonna happen.

The early '80s story is weirdly more interesting here than it is on the page. Lallybroch would be an absolute money pit that could easily burn through everything Claire and Frank left Bree. I actually found Sophie's line readings pretty good strongarming her way into the job interview. The episode was hinting at how lost and out of time Roger is that he can't settle back into something, but it's not really getting there yet. 

[GHScorpiosRule]

33 minutes ago, nodorothyparker said:

Thank you, special effects, for all the closeups of that nasty nasty arm wound even if the end result did remind just how slipshod medical care could be in this time period. "Sorry, we're going to have to saw your whole arm off with nary a painkiller in sight. No wait, there's some pus coming out. Never mind. It's fine."

Reading this? I’m NOT looking forward to when

John’s eye is treated. I remember the description in the buik about how it was bulging and half out or something and Claire had to Pierce it with a needle?

[bluestocking]

2 hours ago, Night Cheese said:

I've been really enjoying this season and liked this episode a lot. The showrunners are far from perfect, but they've done a good job of cutting a lot of the fat from the books. 

The Claire/Tom scene was lovely. I like CB's portrayal much, much more than I like book Claire (which is to say, I basically don't like Book Claire). I get why Tom would fall in love with show Claire despite his morals and everything. Claire's shocked expression was so good and their conversation afterwards was wonderful. It's so true to the books, but CB's Claire is so much more likeable that it made it so much better. 

 

Yes!  That wasn't one of CB's typical expressions--not sure I've ever seen it before.  But it fit perfectly!  Mark Lewis Jones is such a great actor--he commands your attention without shouting or waving his arms dramatically, just with his sincerity and intensity.  I remembered that Christie had survived but wasn't sure whether they'd have him return on the show.

William reminds me so much of Lord John, in looks, attitude, everything.  Anyone would think THEY were father and son--maybe it's because William has Lord John's exact English accent.  

Denzel does seem too young and slight, but he didn't have much to do in this episode.  Rachel with her "forwardness"  seems like a 21st century young woman in 18th century costume.  She didn't seem too comfortable with the American accent or Quaker Plain Speech.  Maybe she'll grow in the part.  Hard to see Rachel and Ian as a pair atm.  

[Renee in CA]

This episode showed what a good adaptation can do. Loved the William pieces - I now actually care about him, and getting Claire and Jamie to Ticonderoga quickly was a good move even though the actual fort and landscape looks nothing like their CG enhanced overhead shot.

I’m more interested Brianna and Roger in the 1980s than in colonial times.

One downside - there seemed to be more chemistry between William and Rachel than with Ian and Rachel.

Edited July 8, 2023 by Renee in CA

[iMonrey]

16 hours ago, nodorothyparker said:

William doesn't remember meeting Ian on the Ridge before. Hee. We don't remember it either, William, since it's obviously the first of the retconning we're going to see with fixing all the stuff the show earlier left out.

It struck me that Ian allegedly saw William when he was just a small child. Yet here we are, William a grown man, and Ian hasn't aged a day.

[nodorothyparker]

Book Ian is supposed to be only about six years older than William, but yeah. John Bell has been playing Ian from about 15 when we first meet him to now a man in his later 20s while William played by an entirely different actor was only about 12 or so last time Ian supposedly saw him.

15 hours ago, bluestocking said:

William reminds me so much of Lord John, in looks, attitude, everything.  Anyone would think THEY were father and son--maybe it's because William has Lord John's exact English accent. 

There's an interview out there somewhere that if I can find it later I'll link it where Charles Vandervaart talks about how he spent quite a bit of time watching clips from past seasons of both Sam and David Berry's performances because they wanted to show how William is a classic My Two Dads case of nature and nurture. There were certain small character tics, expressions, etc., that you could really see him mimicking things we've seen from Sam to suggest inherited traits, while he also does sound and carry himself a lot like Lord John. Which makes sense given that John has really been the only parent he's known for nearly half his life at this point and that he raised him to be a well educated well mannered English aristocrat.

Even as truncated as their swamp adventure was, it did a good job of capturing that both Ian and William have something of the Fraser wry sense of absurdity and that it's something they can immediately appreciate about each other. That tends to get lost in all the overwrought drama over the ticking paternity bomb that everyone except William seems to figure out about 2 seconds in and the sort of William-Rachel-Ian triangle that writing about the show has already zeroed in on.

[shelen]

I don't know if my eyes were playing tricks on me, but when William washed his face in the pool of water, for a split second, I thought he was Jamie.

[steph369]

On 7/7/2023 at 5:15 PM, Hanahope said:

So one moment Jamie and Claire are in Wilmington (I think) meeting with Tom Christie and the Sons of Liberty guy and suddenly they are hundreds of (maybe closer to a thousand) miles away in NY with no adventures in between?  really?  wtf did we miss?  i guess something to do with their ship? 

You didn’t read SassAndSnacks’ post right before yours? She explains exactly what was missed (pirates part).

 

[Scarlett45]

On 7/7/2023 at 9:10 PM, bluestocking said:

William reminds me so much of Lord John, in looks, attitude, everything.  Anyone would think THEY were father and son--maybe it's because William has Lord John's exact English accent.  

 

Well Lord John did raise him. Makes sense they have so many of the same mannerisms. I like how they showed us William had a moral center when he tried to save the woman. 

 

On 7/8/2023 at 6:07 PM, shelen said:

I don't know if my eyes were playing tricks on me, but when William washed his face in the pool of water, for a split second, I thought he was Jamie.

He and Sam Heughan do favor in the nose and lower face. 

[GHScorpiosRule]

9 minutes ago, Scarlett45 said:

He and Sam Heughan do favor in the nose and lower face. 

That’s why he was cast. Since Willie is supposed to look so much like Jamie (as  he’s described in the buiks), they wanted to find an actor who resembles Sam.

The problem I’m having is that I burned through all the buiks after the first season, that I don’t remember how much has been condensed, since this season is

 

condensing 6-8

. Like, I don’t know if Wee Ian

 

killing that one guy who was blackmailing Claire

will be in the first half of this season, the latter, or cut out altogether.

But I also think the actor playing Willie looks more like David Berry than Sam. And like someone posted upthread, Show is going to have me liking Show Willie! Because Buik Willie annoyed every nerve in my body.

Edited July 10, 2023 by GHScorpiosRule

[Scarlett45]

Just now, GHScorpiosRule said:

That’s why he was cast. Since Willie is a supposed to look so much like Jamie (as  he’s described in the buiks), they wanted to find an actor who resembles Sam.

Yes I know. 😁

[jenn31]

I think viewers may be confusing William’s attire and speech when they say he “looks” more like David Berry, because the actor’s facial features are definitely closer to Sam’s. They did a god job there casting him.

Edited July 10, 2023 by jenn31

[jenn31]

On 7/7/2023 at 3:55 PM, SassAndSnacks said:

I'm also really happy with Show condensing the whole pirate, three ships fiasco of the Buik, whereby even after reading it multiple times, I still have no idea who is/was who, what ship was which, who was taken, who sliced Jamie, etc.  Glad we didn't have to deal with that

I wholeheartedly agree. I know times were rougher back then, but I’m so tired of Claire and Jamie constantly being attacked. 

[Scarlett45]

6 minutes ago, jenn31 said:

I think viewers may be confusing William’s attire and speech when they say he “looks” more like David Berry, because the actor’s facial features are definitely closer to Sam’s. They did a god job there casting him.

David Berry and Sam Heughan favor, both have strong jaws and similar noses. But I think the writers and actors have done a good job demonstrating that William has traits of both Lord John (who raised him) and his biological father Jamie, which makes sense. 
 

Also John and Jamie are alike in morals even though they come from different social spheres. Didn’t John try to save Claire from an assault as a young solider (it was a ruse she wasn’t really in danger) and that’s is why Jamie saves him, and thus his elder brother saved Jamie after Culloden. 

[Hanahope]

4 hours ago, steph369 said:

You didn’t read SassAndSnacks’ post right before yours? She explains exactly what was missed (pirates part).

 

Uh you mean the blurb about someone slicing Jamie, 3 ships and a pirate?  That doesn’t say a whole lot.

[GHScorpiosRule]

52 minutes ago, jenn31 said:

I think viewers may be confusing William’s attire and speech when they say he “looks” more like David Berry, because the actor’s facial features are definitely closer to Sam’s. They did a god job there casting him.

No confusion from this viewer. To me, he looks more like David than Sam. I said the same when his casting was first announced.

[Cdh20]

3 hours ago, Scarlett45 said:

David Berry and Sam Heughan favor, both have strong jaws and similar noses. But I think the writers and actors have done a good job demonstrating that William has traits of both Lord John (who raised him) and his biological father Jamie, which makes sense. 
 

Also John and Jamie are alike in morals even though they come from different social spheres. Didn’t John try to save Claire from an assault as a young solider (it was a ruse she wasn’t really in danger) and that’s is why Jamie saves him, and thus his elder brother saved Jamie after Culloden. 

That is a great point, my mind went directly to thinking that was a Jamie trait, but he got it from both nature & nurture! I liked that they showed that because show onlies need to like William immediately to care about him, & a lot of book lovers hate him.

[ch1]

8 hours ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

No confusion from this viewer. To me, he looks more like David than Sam. I said the same when his casting was first announced.

I always thought he resembled the actress who played Geneva when I first saw him.  

 

[Moxie Cat]

4 hours ago, ch1 said:

I always thought he resembled the actress who played Geneva when I first saw him.

Me too. I seem to recall that the younger Willie actors had darker reddish-brown hair, but noticed in this episode that adult William's hair is dark. Good thing that he resembles Geneva in that way more than Jamie and Bree. 

[ch1]

1 hour ago, Moxie Cat said:

Me too. I seem to recall that the younger Willie actors had darker reddish-brown hair, but noticed in this episode that adult William's hair is dark. Good thing that he resembles Geneva in that way more than Jamie and Bree. 

I think the actor they have now is a good grown up version of season 3 Willie.   

[Scarlett45]

4 hours ago, Moxie Cat said:

Me too. I seem to recall that the younger Willie actors had darker reddish-brown hair, but noticed in this episode that adult William's hair is dark. Good thing that he resembles Geneva in that way more than Jamie and Bree. 

Rachel was commenting that she loved the color of his beard as she was shaving him- likely his hair darkened as he aged but his beard comes in red. A nod to his Fraser heritage. 

[GHScorpiosRule]

32 minutes ago, Scarlett45 said:

Mary was commenting that she loved the color of his beard as she was shaving him- likely his hair darkened as he aged but his beard comes in red. A nod to his Fraser heritage. 

I think you mean Rachel.

[Scarlett45]

1 minute ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

I think you mean Rachel.

Yes thank you!

[nodorothyparker]

On 7/8/2023 at 7:07 PM, shelen said:

I don't know if my eyes were playing tricks on me, but when William washed his face in the pool of water, for a split second, I thought he was Jamie.

I thought I saw this too, a mere split second of a younger Jamie's reflection looking back at him and then it was gone. I've rewatched those scenes and I'm honestly still not sure if that was really there or it's just the power of suggestion. 

Since I don't think anyone wants to see Sam taking on a second role in a dark wig trying to pass himself off for 20, which is what the books would have you expecting, I think the show did a pretty good job of coming up with someone who looks plausibly enough like the product of Jamie and Geneva as portrayed on the show. I honestly don't see any physical resemblance to John beyond the same general coloring and maybe the way they carry themselves.

15 hours ago, Cdh20 said:

a lot of book lovers hate him

YMMV, I guess. Sure, a lot of his scenes before he starts interacting with various Frasers kind of drag (and don't even get me started on the letter to Lord John in Echo that seems to go on for 50 pages about military matters that don't include any characters we know or have any reason to care about) but he's pretty well drawn for a character who doesn't appear in his own right until 7 big big books in to this increasingly crowded series and has to hit the ground running, so to speak, when the ticking paternity bomb goes off.

[Eureka]

21 hours ago, Scarlett45 said:

Well Lord John did raise him. Makes sense they have so many of the same mannerisms. I like how they showed us William had a moral center when he tried to save the woman. 

I thought at first that was going to be the storyline with Fanny’s sister (whose name I’ve forgotten). Which book is that in? Since they’re condensing, I don’t remember the order of a lot of the things that happen on their way to fight. I’m fine with not seeing a ton of that stuff either, the battle scenes have always been too long for me in the books.

[jacourt]

When I get to battle scenes I just flick through to the end. You know Jaimie will survive. 

[Cdh20]

On 7/7/2023 at 5:50 PM, nodorothyparker said:

William doesn't remember meeting Ian on the Ridge before. Hee. We don't remember it either, William, since it's obviously the first of the retconning we're going to see with fixing all the stuff the show earlier left out.

I'm the weirdo who really likes the Dismal Swamp story and loves Ian and William together in all their messiness, so I was pleased with what we got. The whole conversation about having a good death song is straight off the page. I just wish they hadn't cut their meeting up with another group of Indians, prompting Ian to repeatedly refer to William as "cousin" in what William hazily thinks is odd but probably some kind of protective claiming of kinship while he's so very ill and vulnerable. In cutting it, the show loses yet another thing William will be so furious about later, that Ian knew and was telling him who they were to each other and he missed it.

 

I distinctly remember liking that part in the book, Ian calling him “cousin”. I don’t often care what gets cut, but This would have been good. 

[Haleth]

I thought the actor playing William looked remarkably like Sam too.  

It's a good thing soooo much is being scrapped from the books because, I hate to say it, I'm about ready to say goodbye.  I actually forgot there was a new episode until last night.

And Bree still makes me crazy.

[CountryGirl]

I see the resemblance to Sam and in the sun, I see some glints of red in his dark hair. The casting folks did an excellent job with him as he looks like both parents with a dash of LJG mannerisms. 

[Moxie Cat]

8 hours ago, CountryGirl said:

The casting folks did an excellent job with him as he looks like both parents with a dash of LJG mannerisms.

When this show gets the casting right, they hit it out of the park. And when they get it wrong, they fail spectacularly. Thankfully there's far more examples of the former.

[Ziggy]

On 7/8/2023 at 6:07 PM, shelen said:

I don't know if my eyes were playing tricks on me, but when William washed his face in the pool of water, for a split second, I thought he was Jamie.

Yes!  That moment is in the theme song.  I don't always pay attention to those scenes the first time through because they generally don't make sense to me ... yet.  But I remember this one for some reason, so I was really excited that they tricked me!!!  Totally thought it was Jamie before this episode.

[Ziggy]

On 7/10/2023 at 6:47 PM, Eureka said:

I thought at first that was going to be the storyline with Fanny’s sister

I had the same thoughts! 

I seriously need to reread the books, but I'm kind of enjoying not really knowing what's going to happen next :-)

[Linderhill]

count me as one of those that is happy the Great Dismal Swamp was abbreviated. Now I'm hoping that the Fort Ticonderoga gets the same treatment.  When reading the books, both of these part seemed to drag interminably.  I was switching between reading and the audiobooks and just when I'd think they were moving on -- nope, we're still stuck at the fort.  Looking forward to some of Jamie's adventures there though, I wonder how much we'll get to see.  

I am super distracted by Sophie's awful wig and those bangs. yikes!  The '80's with Bree and Roger finally got me more interested in them then the previous books.  I'm glad they kept Bree strong arming her way into the engineering job.  We'll see if any of the other plotpoints happen.