“Savages” – Recap and Review

Okay, y’all…here’s another Outlander recap for ya!

1700’s North Carolina

So this episode starts off with Claire and the Cherokee medicine woman spending time together picking herbs and trying to learn each other’s language.  During their conversation, the medicine woman asks Claire if she has children.  Claire replies that she has a daughter, but she lives far away.  The medicine woman informs Claire that her daughter is there with them.  Claire figures she means that Brianna is in her heart.  Shows what you know, Dr. Fraser.

In the next scene, we see the finished product of Jamie and Claire’s house, and man…Jamie did that.  It’s a pretty two story log cabin with a porch and a farm!  Jamie’s about to head out to town with Ian to get more settlers on Fraser’s Ridge, whereas Claire is about to leave the house to help a local girl give birth.  Before either of them go, Jamie mentions that he had a dream that Brianna had a diamond shaped birthmark behind her ear, and that he gave her a kiss there.  Claire confirms that Bree does have a birthmark there, and wonders how Jamie could’ve possibly known that given that she never mentioned it and Jamie’s never laid eyes on Brianna.  Of course, the answer is unknown.  Jamie leaves, but not before telling Claire that he doesn’t like leaving her all alone on that land.  Claire, being the hardheaded chick she is, assures him she’ll be just fine.  *Sigh*

When Jamie gets to town, he offers the people 100 acres of land a piece, and informs that they can live on the acres rent free for the first year.  Not one man had time for what Jamie had to say.  Neither Ian nor Jamie can figure out why none of the men would turn down that much land for no rent.  When Jamie asks one of the locals, he tells him that basically the taxes are way too high, and that they gave up their farmland so they wouldn’t have to make the rich even richer.

Later that day, Claire is still with the local girl—who comes from a German family—who’s just given birth to a little girl herself.  The girl’s father and her brother show up sometime after the birth, and they’re over the moon.  However, the happy mood soon fades when the father catches wind of the hot Native American guys committing the heinous crime of getting water for their horses to drink.  Ooooooh!  The nerve!  The audacity!  How dare those no-good bastards try to get water for their horses on land that was initially theirs?

Anyway, the father runs out with his son, guns drawn and ready to shoot the Native Americans…for the crime of watering their horses.  Claire tries to diffuse the situation letting the Natives know that although water belongs to everyone, Herr Dummy doesn’t see it that way.  Hot Guy, who’s among the men, decides to let it go, given that Claire is Mrs. Bear Killer.  However, Hot Guy decides to bless the water before he leaves.  He probably figured it was infected with stupidity.  Further proving this point, Herr Dummy tries to shoot Hot Guy for blessing the water.  Claire lets him know him know about the water blessing ritual and that he’s not trying to poison anyone.

For the next few days, Claire goes about her routine of housework, which includes feeding the animals, getting her medicinal herbs prepared, cooking dinner and throwin’ back some liquor.  I couldn’t help but notice that the animals seem to be eating better than the humans, considering that they appear to be eating salad, whereas the Fraser/Murray clan has been surviving off a beef jerky diet.  Snap into a Slim Jim!

In the meantime, Jamie and Ian’s trip to get more settlers for Fraser’s Ridge turns out to be a complete bust.  Before they head back to the house, they see that their horse’s bit is broken, and Jamie sends Ian to the local blacksmith to fix it.  When Ian goes to the blacksmith, he refuses to mend the bit, seeing as it’s almost time for him to get off work.  Ian pleads with him, and the blacksmith agrees to do it for it for 21 shillings (is that like $10.00 nowadays?).  When the blacksmith turns to face Ian, we see it’s none other than Murtaugh!  MURTAUGH’S BACK!!!!!

When Jamie finds out that Ian had to spend all the money they had to mend the bit, he’s pissed and goes to give the blacksmith a piece of his mind.  Of course, when Jamie sees who the blacksmith is, it’s all smiles and hugs.  Murtaugh even gives Ian the money back.  Awww…  Jamie and Murtaugh catch up, discussing Brianna—who Jamie is more than psyched to brag on, considering that she’s a young woman that attends a university and she’s currently living in the year nineteen hundred and seventy-one—and Claire, who Murtaugh’s more than psyched to hear about coming back through the stones to the 1700’s.  It was so cute to see him get so hyped up about that.  Jamie asks Murtaugh if he by chance knows how to forge silver, too (Jamie took one of his mother’s silver candlesticks that his Aunt Jocasta gave him, and he’s been looking for a silversmith ever since.  Every time he went to the local silversmith’s house, he’d always bump into his thirsty THOT bucket of a wife).  Murtaugh says he can work with silver, and will assist with whatever he needs.  Jamie also asks Murtaugh to come back to with him to Fraser’s Ridge.  Murtaugh refuses, especially after hearing that Governor Tryon granted Jamie the 10,000 acres.  After all, Tryon’s the one that’s been taxin’ the hell out of everyone.  Instead, Murtaugh extends an invite for Jamie to come to a meeting later that night.

Jamie and Ian show up at the meeting, and lo and behold, it’s a Regulators meeting.  It turns out Murtaugh isn’t just a member of the Regulators…he’s also the president.  Murtaugh asks Jamie to join up with them after the meeting, but he refuses, considering that Governor Tryon granted Jamie the land only under the condition that Jamie could keep the peace between the Regulators and the sheriffs.  Jamie informs Murtaugh that although he won’t join them, he won’t stop them, either.

Back at Fraser’s Ridge, things start to take a turn for the worse.  The local preacher visits Claire and tells her that the young German girl that just gave birth died of measles, and so did her baby.  Claire immediately tries to go to the German family’s home to console them, but the preacher stops her.  He tells her that Herr Dummy is blaming the Native Americans and her for what happened, and he’s out for blood.  You best believe Claire’s on her guard then!

Sure enough, Herr Dummy comes to Claire’s cabin a few days later, and Claire makes sure to have her rifle and Rollo ready for any foolishness that might jump off.  However, Herr Dummy tells her that he’s actually there to make sure she’s okay and that she wasn’t infected with measles like his baby girl and grandchild.  When Claire hears that she lets ol’ boy in and allows him to grieve over the loss of his family.  Herr Dummy mentions that he and his son had measles not too long ago, and Claire lets him know that measles is contagious and can be passed from person to person (duh).  Herr Dummy still thinks the Native Americans had something to do with, considering that the baby died so quickly.  *Sigh*  He tells Claire that he took care of everything though, and he gives Claire a gift.  Claire assumes it’s the doll she previously gave the young lady as a gift after the baby was born.  Sadly enough, it’s not the doll…it’s the medicine woman’s scalp.  Claire is understandably horrified; Herr Dummy justifies his actions by saying he just took out the witch that concocted the spell the Natives put in the water in the first place.  Whatever.  Claire promptly kicks Der Furher out of her house.

It turns out that Herr Dummy isn’t just ignorant when it came to measles or being tolerant of other people’s beliefs/cultures, he’s also hella dumb when it comes to the subject of vendettas.  Violence just begets more violence, and the Natives were definitely all about taking an eye for an eye.  The hot guys show up at Herr Dummy’s house again, but this time, they don’t want no doggone water.  Just the opposite—they start shooting flaming arrows, Robin Hood:  Prince of Thieves style.  Herr Dummy’s poor wife catches an arrow to the back, and God only knows if his son makes it out of the house alive.  Maybe he did and traveled back to Germany and sired the man, that sired the man, that sired the man that sired Hitler.  Just kidding.  Anyway, Herr Dummy turns up just in time to see his wife’s dead body burning and for the Natives to light his ass up…literally.

Jamie finally comes back home, and after living in fear for the last few days, Claire is more than happy to see him.  He asks her what’s wrong, and Claire asks him to just hold her, which he does without question.  A day or so later, Claire’s out gathering firewood, and she hears someone whistling “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy” behind her.  She turns and sees Murtaugh, and she couldn’t be happier.  Yay!

1970’s Scotland

Things aren’t too much better in modern day Scotland.  Roger goes to Inverness to try to find Brianna, but according to the taxi driver and the woman that runs the local bed and breakfast that he speaks with, they’ve seen Brianna, but she’s been gone for a hot minute.  The innkeeper gives Roger a letter that Brianna left for him.  Even though Brianna instructed her not to give Roger the letter until a year passed, she goes ahead and gives it to him right then, seeing as his heart was broken.  She makes sure to advise Roger to go “find a nice Scottish girl.”  I don’t know why, but for some reason, that cracked me up.

In the letter, Brianna tells Roger that she found out on her own that Jamie and Claire die in that fire, and she has to go back and try to help them.  She also refuses any help from Roger and tells him not to follow her (yeah, right!  Like he’s really gonna listen to that!).  The next thing we know, we see Brianna at Craigh Na Dun, dressed in 18th century garb.

She walks up to one of the stones as the camera pans around the back side of it.  By the time the camera reaches the other side of the stone, Brianna is gone!

This episode was really good, but the non-stop racism that the Frasers are experiencing lately is just depressing.  Yes, I know this is how things were in the good ol’ U.S. of A. during this time period, but it’s infuriating nonetheless.  Thankfully, they don’t have to deal with that in the next episode (more about that later).  I was so glad to see Murtaugh again.  After he disappeared on season three and didn’t get so much as a mention afterward, I figured he’d just remain out-of-sight, but they brought him back.  His reunion with Claire and Jamie and the Native Americans’ revenge were the highlights of this episode, hands down.  Yeah, I said it.  Herr Dummy had no business killing an innocent woman—an innocent old woman, at that—that had nothing to do with what he thought happened to his daughter and grandchild.  I just hate that his wife and son had to suffer for his sins.  On another note, I love Jamie more and more as the series goes on.  The silversmith’s THOT wife kept throwing herself at him, but Jamie was just like, “I’m married, so don’t even try.”  On top of that, he was so proud of Brianna’s accomplishments and he it was adorable how happy he was to come back home to Claire.  I also loved the way his joy immediately shifted to concern once he saw that Claire was upset, and all he wanted to do was comfort her, just like she asked him to.  We all need a Jamie in our lives.

—Written by Nadiya

What did y’all think about “Savages”?  Who did you believe was the real savage:  Herr Dummy or the Native Americans?  Is Claire hard-headed?  Should she have listened to Jamie when he mentioned that she shouldn’t be alone?  How did you feel about Murtaugh’s return?  Are you excited?  How do you feel about Brianna traveling through the stones?  Let me know in the comments section!