Outlander Recap: 3.08 ‘First Wife’

It’s hard to believe we now only have five episodes left of Outlander Season 3, and the series now feels as though its found its rhythm once again and promises plenty of action in the remaining episodes.

Last week’s episode saw the third wheel in Claire (Caitriona Balfe) and Jamie’s (Sam Heughan) relationship began to rear its head again: trouble. The pair found themselves with a dead man on their hands along with Jamie’s smuggling causing them grief. Unfortunately this wasn’t the only criminal issue of Jamie’s that was brought into the light after young Ian (John Bell) had a run in with a man who discovered Jamie’s treasonous papers. A fight began and led to the printshop burning down.

Return To Lallybroch

Claire, Jamie, and young Ian return to Lallybroch only to be greeted by a not-so happy Jenny (Laura Donnelly) and Ian (Steven Cree). Things only get worse when young Ian lets it slip about selling liquor, fires, and Claire killing people. Ian says Jamie can be the one to punish young Ian, but naturally Jamie finds another way to punish him: chores.

We meet Janet (Cora Tsang), one of the many Murray children, and learn that Maggie, who Claire helped deliver in Season 1, now has two children of her own. Wee Jamie (Conor McCarry) is now fully grown with many children of his own, but he isn’t all that welcoming towards Claire.

Meanwhile, Jamie tells Jenny to give young Ian more freedom and the pair talk about this mysterious wife of Jamie’s. He gives into his sister’s questions and tells her a story of preparing for Culloden and arranging for Claire to hide in a village, but he learned that everyone was slaughtered and assumed Claire was too. Jenny is suspicious as her and Ian searched for them and believes Claire would have never have stopped looking for him, so there must be more to the story.

Jamie speaks to Claire of building a cottage, although Claire wants to Jenny the truth, to which he is against. Jamie tells her of the time he went searching for her when he escaped from Ardsmuir prison. We flashback to Jamie crossing the freezing waters to an island where she supposedly waited. Unfortunately, she was not there, but he did find the MacKenzie crest etched into the stone marking the hiding place of a treasure chest. Just as the two are about to share a moment, Jamie decides its time to Claire the truth, but he’s interrupted by a red-headed girl racing in and calling him “daddy”.

The Other Wife

Next thing we see is Laoghaire (Nell Hudson)—remember the girl who placed an ill-wish on Claire, tried to have Claire killed as a witch, and longed to call Jamie hers?—well she starts calling Claire a “sassenach witch”. Claire is overwhelmed and gradually puts it together, and Laoghaire makes sure she does by telling her that she is Jamie’s wife. Leaving Claire on her own, Jamie takes them outside and speaks to little Joan about Claire being his first wife and that he will always look at for her and Marsali (Lauren Lyle).

He returns to find Claire grabbing her belongings and Claire assumes Joan is his, but Jamie denies this as he’s not the only red-headed Scot around. He explains Laoghaire was a widow with two children and they had been married for two years, but lived apart. Claire’s furious with Jamie for not telling her, and he says he was a coward because he feared losing her. The pair begin to say some unkind things to one another, especially when Jamie blames Claire for leaving him.

Claire won’t have it and says she would have gladly died with him, to which Jamie asks her if she knows what it’s like to live 20 years without your heart… He tells her of seeing Claire and Frank together, and Frank with his child. All fired up, he roughly kisses her resulting in a slap and a very heated moment begins, but it’s quickly put out by Jenny throwing a bucket of water on them for “fightin’ and ruttin’ like wild beasts”.

A Woman Scorned

Janet apologises to Claire as she was the one who told Laoghaire, but it was Jenny who told Janet to do it. Jenny and Claire have it at and Jenny blames Claire for Jamie’s latest trouble as it always follows her. Claire tries to explain herself by telling Jenny about being married in America and it was a matter of survival, and although Jenny can see some truth, she knows there’s still something and things will never be the same for them.

Claire goes to leave and Jamie stops her to apologise, but they are interrupted by Laoghaire who is brandishing a pistol in attempt to “protect what is hers”. During her yelling, she accidentally fires the pistol causing Jamie to get hit and both his wives run to him, but Claire roughly pushes Laoghaire away.

Claire puts her doctor hat on and prepares to remove the shrapnel from Jamie with young Ian remarking about her very fine tools—that’s the 20th century for you! As Jamie recovers, she wants to know more about Laoghaire and we flashbacks to Jamie returning from Helwater. It’s at an event at Lallybroch where looks on whilst everyone enjoys himself, until he is brought into the fold by two girls and becomes joyous himself. He later discovers them to be Laoghaire’s children and Jenny took notice of his enjoyment and helped to match them. Claire realises Jamie now has a temperature and gives him some penicillin she brought with her, and the redhead not scared to go into battle, but he’s beyond scared of a needle!

Trouble, Again

Ned Gowan (Bill Patterson) makes his return since Season 1, and it was beyond exciting to see him again. He declares Jamie’s marriage to Laoghaire to be invalid, but Jamie does not wish for any harm to come to her and the children. Instead of handing over the pistol and what would lead to her being sent to the colonies, Laoghaire is happy to settle on a sizeable sum.

The only way to get this money is for Jamie to retrieve the treasure, but due to his injury, he can’t so young Ian volunteers himself. Jenny initially says no, but her and Ian eventually agree to it.

Jamie and Claire watch on from the cliff as young Ian swims through the waters and Claire is worried they’ve made a mistake and if they belong together anymore. Their reconciliation is interrupted when Claire spots a ship with a boat rowing to shore. The occupants see young Ian and grab him to take him with them.

Overall Thoughts?

Last week’s episode definitely felt like Outlander once again with trouble following the pair and that definitely helped with the pacing issues Season 3 has been facing. This episode, however, felt much more like Season 1 with Lallybroch, Laoghaire, and the arguments Claire and Jamie had. Their heated argument was very reminiscent of Season 1, Episode 9 ‘The Reckoning’ after Jamie retrieves Claire from Wentworth Prison and the whole “sadist” confrontation. Despite their 20 years apart, these scenes felt most like how we knew the characters, so that was nice to see and hopefully this will continue over the course of the season, but in a more civilized manner.

What did you think of the episode? Tell us in the comments below!