Outlander season 5, episode 2 recap: Between Two Fires

Jamie must face the reality of being stuck between two worlds on Outlander.

Outlander has proven to be quite the difficult predicament for our dear ‘ol Jamie Fraser. His recent loyalties to the Crown have placed him in a position in which he has to do as he’s told–or he could lose his home and new community.

Before the season began, we knew Jamie would have to figure out how to balance the order he received to find and kill his godfather, Murtagh against him actually know and hiding him. In the second episode of the season, this proves to get more complicated.

According to American history, a horrendous ritual known as “tar and feathering” used to take place to punish individuals for their crimes. It was done in order to humiliate these individuals and the fact that it actually used to happen is incredibly disturbing.

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When the episode opens, this is exactly what we find Murtagh participating in alongside the Regulators. When Jamie learns of this, the look on his face is enough to remind him that this whole debacle will be harder than he thought.

And while Jamie is trying to figure out what to do about Murtagh, Claire is trying to invent medicine long before its time. When a man comes in and dies on her table, Claire feels she needs to take matters into her own hands. She can’t let people die when she knows she has a solution.

Well, a solution that doesn’t come into play for another hundred years or so–penicillin. She starts to let bread mold so she can use said mold to create penicillin.

Umm, Claire, you are seriously tempting fate here. Even Brianna doesn’t agree with her plan, but once Claire puts her to something, nothing can stop her.

Outlander takes a moment to dive a little into Claire’s psyche in the second episode of the season. We’ve always known she is a dedicated doctor, but after one of her patients dies, she’s determined to do an autopsy on him to figure out the cause of death.

One can imagine that doing an autopsy in the 18th century would have been deemed as an act of a crazy person, which is why Claire has to keep this hidden. She entrusts Marsali (to help with the precisional cutting due to her butcher skills), along with Roger and Brianna.

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I’m glad that Outlander took some time to address the issue of whether or not Roger and Brianna will return to their time. It’s been something that Roger has been thinking about and it doesn’t seem like Brianna is too interested in going anywhere. Roger might be a difficult character to adore at times, but I do feel for him. He came to a completely different time in the pursuit of love, and now he might have to go into a war. That’s anything but easy.

It seems like Claire is in agreement with Roger over this as well. She doesn’t want her grandchild to live in a time where she can’t give him the necessary medical treatment. If anything happens, Clair will be rendered useless to provide antibiotics or anything that could stop a simple cough or infection.

We’ll have to see how this plays out with Brianna as the season goes on, but I honestly don’t know if they will go back–especially since they don’t know if Jemmy can actually go through the stones.

And if all of that wasn’t stressful enough, this Outlander episode leaves us with on jarring reminder.

Stephen Bonnet is alive.