Episode 716: "A Hundred Thousand Angels" (SPOILERS!)
Here are my reactions to Episode 716 of the OUTLANDER TV series, titled "A Hundred Thousand Angels".
*** SPOILER WARNING!! ***
There are SPOILERS below! If you don't want to know yet, stop reading now.
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The episode opens with an idyllic shot of Jane and Fanny as young girls, chasing dragonflies in a field. Then we see Jane in prison, being interviewed by a journalist. This scene isn't in the book, and I thought it was both unnecessary (we already heard the details of Harkness's death from Jane herself and we know she felt no remorse) and too long. I was mesmerized by Jane's nearly-unblinking stare throughout most of this scene, her face utterly expressionless. The man presses her for the gory details, but Jane refuses to tell him anything.
The "title card" for this episode is a beautiful shot of the aurora borealis, a reference to the "hundred thousand angels" of the episode title.
The next scene takes place in the makeshift hospital in Tennent Church, where we saw Denzell Hunter operating on Claire at the end of Episode 715. Jamie is sitting by Claire's bedside. This scene comes straight from the book:
Eight pints. That’s how much blood she said a human body had. It must vary some, though; clearly a man his size had more than a woman of hers. Single hairs were beginning to rise from the soaking mass, curling as they dried, delicate as an ant’s feelers."I've decided ... not to die," Claire says, her voice barely above a whisper. This, too, comes from the book.
He wished he might give her some of his blood; he had plenty. She’d said it was possible, but not in this time. Something to do with things in the blood that mightn’t match.
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 85, "Long Road Home". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
“Because,” she said, and stopped with a small grimace that squeezed his heart. “Because,” she said through clenched teeth, “I know what it felt ... like when I ... thought you were dead, and--” A small gasp for breath, and her eyes locked on his. “And I wouldn’t do that to you.” Her bosom fell and her eyes closed.Meanwhile, in the British army camp, William comes to see Lord John, to see if he can help save Jane. William is desperate, but he doesn't know where Jane is being held. Lord John promises to do what he can.
It was a long moment before he could speak.
“Thank ye, Sassenach,” he whispered, and held her small, cold hand between his own and watched her breathe until the moon rose.
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 85, "Long Road Home". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
Back at Tennent Church, Ian has returned. He tells Jamie that William is safe. Rachel hurries to greet Ian, they embrace, and Ian leans down as though to kiss her. But he stops at the last instant and hugs Rollo instead, obviously delighted to see him. I thought that was odd, as though he felt more affection for his dog than his wife.
Jamie and Rachel fill Ian in on recent events. Claire is recovering, and Jamie has resigned his commission. I liked this little exchange between Ian and Jamie:
"You're not going back to the army?"
"No."
"Will they accept that?"
"They're gonna have to."
I'm remembering the reputation Jamie had in BEES, as a General who abandoned his troops in the middle of a battle. He was lucky not to be hanged for that!
Back in the British camp, Lord John returns to tell William what he's learned about Jane. This scene comes straight from the book, and I'm glad they included one of my favorite bits:
“Do you love the young woman, William?” he asked, very quietly. The tavern wasn’t busy, but there were enough men drinking there that no one was noticing themThe next scene, back in the makeshift hospital, also comes straight from the book (yes, including the bit about elephants!) It's well done, but I wish they'd included this bit from the middle of the scene. It's one of my favorite bits in MOHB, because I see it as a glimpse of how Jamie and Claire might be in their old age.
William shook his head, helpless.
“I--tried to protect her. To save her from Harkness. I--I bought her for the night. I didn’t stop to think that he’d come back--but of course he would,” he finished bitterly. “I likely made things worse for her.”
“There wouldn’t have been a way of making them better, save marrying the girl or killing Harkness yourself,” Lord John said dryly. “And I don’t recommend murder as a way of settling difficult situations. It tends to lead to complications--but not nearly as many as marriage.”
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 132, "Will O' the Wisp". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
“Are ye all right, Sassenach? Is it bad, then?”Claire looks up at him, pleading. "Can we go home? Please?" (To Fraser's Ridge, she means.)
“No,” I said, and wiped my eyes hastily on a corner of the sheet. “No--it--it’s fine. I just--oh, Jamie, I love you!” I did give way to tears, then, snuffling and blubbering like an idiot. “I’m sorry,” I said, trying to get hold of myself. “I’m all right, there’s nothing wrong, it’s just--”
“Aye, I ken fine what it’s just,” he said, and, setting the candle and pot on the floor, lay down on the bed beside me, balancing precariously on the edge.
“Ye’re hurt, a nighean,” he said softly, smoothing my hair off my wet cheeks. “And fevered and starved and worn to a shadow. There’s no much of ye left, is there, poor wee thing?”
I shook my head and clung to him. “There’s not much of you left, either,” I managed to say, mumbling wetly into the front of his shirt.
He made a small amused noise and rubbed my back, very gently. “Enough, Sassenach,” he said. “I’m enough. For now.”
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 87, "Moonrise". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
"Aye. I promise. As soon as you're feeling well enough, I'll take ye home."
What follows is a scene that is definitely NOT in the book, though it's not clear whether this is a dream or something that really happened. Late at night, Claire is alone in her bed in the hospital when a cloaked figure approaches her. It's Master Raymond, last seen on the show in the Star Chamber in Episode 207, "Faith".
"I came to ask forgiveness," he says.
"For what?"
"Someday you will know."
What does he mean by that? We can only speculate.
Master Raymond kisses her hand, and for a moment Claire sees the same blue wings -- an impression of overwhelming "blue-ness" -- that she saw when he healed her after the miscarriage in Episode 207, "Faith". (See the image at the lower right here, taken from that episode.) Then he walks out, as silently as he appeared.
When Claire wakes up, she finds that Jamie didn't notice Master Raymond's presence. Was he really there, or did she dream it? We don't know. Something else to speculate about while we wait for Season 8....
"Do you think, when I die... do you think I'll see her? Do you think I'll see our daughter?"
"I ken ye will," Jamie says, smiling. "It's what makes death easier to bear."
That's not in the book, but I like it.
In the next scene, we're back in 1739, and Roger and Buck are walking away from Lallybroch, leading their horses, when suddenly a boy appears in the middle of the road. It's Jem!! And Bree and Mandy are with him!
[They] ended facing back the way they’d come, to see a young boy standing, panting, in the middle of the road, his red hair all on end, nearly brown in the muted light. “Daddy,” he said, and his face lit as though touched by a sudden sun. “Daddy!”From Roger's point of view, it must seem like a miracle, after all this time of futile searching. I love this reunion scene in the book, and it was wonderful to see it on screen. I love that shot of the four of them, reunited at long, long last! Just perfect!
[...]
Roger was crying again, couldn’t stop. Mandy had burrs and foxtails stuck in her hair and in the fabric of her jacket, and he thought she might have wet herself somewhere in the recent past. Buck twitched the reins, as though about to turn and go, and Roger reached out a hand and grabbed his stirrup.
“Stay,” he croaked. “Tell me it’s real.”
Buck made an incoherent noise, and, looking up through his tears, Roger could see that Buck was making an inadequate attempt at hiding his own emotion.
“Aye,” Buck said, sounding almost as choked as Roger. He looped his reins and, sliding off into the road, took Jem very gently into his own arms. “Aye, it’s real.”
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 108, "Reality is That Which, When You Stop Believing in It, Doesn't Go Away". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
Meanwhile, back in 1778, Claire has another visitor. Lord John, coming to pay his respects. This scene is based on the book, and I thought it was very well done. I especially loved Jamie's reactions throughout.
John: "You should be resting, my dear."
Jamie: "Dinna be calling her that!"
That line from Jamie comes straight from the book. He's clearly FAR from reconciled to the fact that Lord John had sex with Claire, but John stays very calm.
“Do you think I’ve come to fight you for the favors of this lady? Or to seduce her from your side?”I love John's last line there. It always makes me smile, because I see it as a sort of inside joke, a reference to the endless discussions on the Compuserve Books and Writers Community (now TheLitForum) about the Claire/Lord John subplot in ECHO, in the first two years after the book came out. Diana was well aware of those discussions, and commented in some detail on the forum at the time. (I linked to some of her posts in my Episode 711 recap if you're interested.)
Jamie didn’t laugh, but the line between his brows smoothed out.
“I don’t,” he said dryly. “And as ye dinna seem to be much damaged, I doubt ye’ve come to be doctored. [...] And I doubt, as well,” Jamie continued, an edge creeping into his voice, “that ye’ve come to continue our previous discussion.”
John inhaled slowly, and exhaled even slower, regarding Jamie with a level gaze. “Is it your opinion that anything remains to be said, regarding any part of that discussion?”
There was a marked silence. I glanced from one to the other, Jamie’s eyes narrowed and John’s eyes wide, both with fixed blue stares. All it lacked was growling and the slow lashing of tails.
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 88, "A Whiff of Roquefort". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
Claire thanks John "for everything you did for me" (during the time when they thought Jamie was dead, she means), while Jamie looks on, glowering at John. With a final "Goodbye, Mrs. Fraser," John leaves.
The next scene, between Claire and Denzell Hunter, is not in the book. Denny says, "I never want to do that again," referring to his recent surgery to repair Claire's injuries from the gunshot.
"It's different, [performing surgery] on patients thee does not know. But surgery on someone who's family, someone thee loves... Has thee ever had to do that?"
"Not surgery, no. I've had to heal them at times, but never surgery."
What?!?? Has she forgotten operating on Jamie's shattered hand after Wentworth? Surely she can't have forgotten that, no matter how many years have passed? (Though I suspect the writers may have forgotten.)
The first joint was all right, but the second phalange was cracked, I thought. I pressed harder to determine the length and direction of the crack. The damaged hand stayed motionless in my fingers, but the good one made a small, involuntary clenching gesture.It was terribly difficult and traumatic for her precisely because she was so worried for Jamie, and because she'd never done orthopedic surgery before. I really wish Claire had told Denzell something like, "Yes, I understand. I've done it occasionally, when I had to. It's terribly difficult, but you did what had to be done. Thank you!" Being a mentor, in other words.
“I’m sorry,” I murmured once more.
The good hand pulled suddenly out of my grasp as Jamie raised himself on one elbow. Spitting out the leather gag, he regarded me with an expression between amusement and exasperation. “Sassenach,” he said, “if you apologize each time ye hurt me, it’s going to be a verra long night—and it’s lasted some time already.”
I must have looked stricken, because he started to reach toward me, then stopped, wincing at the movement. He controlled the pain, though, and spoke firmly. “I know you dinna wish to hurt me. But you’ve no more choice about it than I have, and there’s no need for more than one of us to suffer for it. You do what’s needed, and I’ll scream if I have to.”
(From OUTLANDER by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 36, "MacRannoch". Copyright © 1991 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
Back at Lallybroch in 1739, Bree is looking at a painting of a woman with dark hair. That's supposed to be Jamie's mother, but we know from the books (and from the upcoming prequel TV series, "OUTLANDER: BLOOD OF MY BLOOD") that Ellen MacKenzie had red hair, just like Jamie and Bree. Maybe it's just the poor lighting in that hallway, but I don't see red hair at all. Just a minor detail, but I found it confusing.
The scene that follows between Bree and Brian Fraser is not in the book.
"Mr. Fraser." [Brian turns to stare at her.] "You look like you've seen a ghost."
"If I didna know any better, I'd tell ye I had."
"I didn't mean to startle you."
Contrast that with their brief meeting in the book:
Wide, startled hazel eyes met hers, and for a second that was all she saw. His beautiful deep-set eyes, and the expression of stunned horror in them.I understand that this was meant to be a sweet little scene, but I didn't really care for it. I thought it went on too long, sort of beating the audience over the head with the fact that this is Brian Fraser (who will shortly be featured in the prequel TV series), that he still loves his dead wife, Ellen (who will also have a major role in "OUTLANDER: BLOOD OF MY BLOOD"), and that Bree herself was named after this very man. And, of course, that Jamie is his son.
“Brian,” she said. “I—”
“A Dhia!” He went whiter than the harled plaster of the house below. “Ellen!” [....] He looked back at Brianna and stretched out a trembling hand to her. “Mo ghràidh … mo chridhe …”
“Brian,” she said softly, her heart in her voice, filled with pity and love, unable to do anything but respond to the need of the soul that showed so clearly in his lovely eyes. And with her speaking of his name for the second time, he stopped dead, swaying for a moment, and then the eyes rolled up in his head and he fell.
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 107, "The Burying Ground". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
I did like this line:
"When Ellen died, I never changed the locks. In grief some folk find a way to close the door to their hearts, but mine is still wide open, and memories come unbidden, even after all this time."
In the next scene, Jamie is helping Claire unfasten her stays. (She must be feeling better, to tolerate wearing them!) The bantering dialogue here is not in the book. Suddenly there's a knock at the door. It's William, reluctantly asking for Jamie's help.
[William] was on his feet, fists clenched.Jamie goes in to tell Claire he's going with William, and the scene switches to Jane in her prison cell, drinking from a bottle and watching the night sky through a small window, where the aurora borealis is clearly visible. Jane waves at it as best she can with her bound hands.
“Don’t bother, then. I’ll do it myself.”
“If ye thought ye could, ye’d never have come to me, lad,” Fraser said evenly.
“Don’t you call me ‘lad,’ you, you--” William choked off the epithet, not out of prudence but out of inability to choose among the several that sprang at once to his mind.
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 133, "Last Resort". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
The scene where Jamie and William break into the building where Jane is being held comes straight from the book. I'm glad they included this bit:
The big Scot was sweating; he pulled his cap off for a moment to wipe his brow, then put it back on, and, taking the treacle from the bag, he un-stoppered the bottle and poured some of the sticky syrup into his hand. This he smeared over a pane of the casement and, taking a sheet of paper, pasted it onto the glass.When I asked Diana Gabaldon about this reference a few years ago on TheLitForum, she confirmed that it was inspired by this P.G. Wodehouse story.
William could make no sense of this proceeding, but Fraser drew back his arm and struck the glass a sharp buffet with his fist. It broke with no more than a small cracking noise, and the shattered pieces were removed easily, stuck to the treacled paper.
“Where did you learn that one?” William whispered, deeply impressed, and heard a small chuckle of satisfaction from behind Fraser’s mask.
“My daughter told me about it,” he whispered in reply, laying glass and paper on the ground. “She read it in a book.”
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 133, "Last Resort". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
Jamie and William enter the house stealthily. The lone guard sees them, but is overpowered pretty quickly. They break into Jane's cell and find her dead, her wrists slashed with a broken bottle.
I liked their reactions to Jane's death. Jamie cutting a lock of Jane's hair "for her sister" is very touching, and William's grief is moving.
But I have to say again, for the record, Jane's suicide is definitely Not My Fault! <g>
In the next scene, William takes Fanny to meet Jamie and Claire. The girl is silent and withdrawn.
"You can come and live with us on the Ridge, lass," Jamie says. How is Fanny supposed to understand what "the Ridge" means? It might as well be on the other side of the world for all she knows. I think that could have been phrased better.
Jamie's promise to protect her comes from BEES:
Behind me, I heard Jamie say, quite casually, “Frances, no man will ever take ye against your will, while I live.”Claire escorts Fanny outside, and finally Jamie and William have a chance for a private conversation. This scene is taken almost verbatim from the book, and I thought it was really well done. Notice the brief glimpse of Geneva from Episode 304, just before this bit:
There was a startled silence, and I turned round to see Fanny staring up at him. He touched her hand, very gently.
“D’ye believe me, Frances?” he said quietly.
“Yes,” she whispered, after a long moment, and all the tension left her body in a sigh like the east wind.
(From GO TELL THE BEES THAT I AM GONE by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 24, "Alarms By Night". Copyright © 2021 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
“Are you sorry?” he said, and made no effort to keep his voice from shaking. “Are you sorry for it, damn you?”That small glimpse of Jamie and young Willie's farewell hug from Episode 304 is still heartbreaking even after all this time.
Fraser had turned away; now he turned sharply to face William but didn’t speak at once. When he did, his voice was low and firm.
“She died because of it, and I shall sorrow for her death and do penance for my part in it until my own dying day. But--” He compressed his lips for an instant, and then, too fast for William to back away, came round the table and, raising his hand, cupped William’s cheek, the touch light and fierce.
“No,” he whispered. “No! I am not sorry.” Then he whirled on his heel, threw open the door, and was gone, kilt flying.
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 136, "Unfinished Business". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
William's line at the end, "I will never call you father", is not in the book, and I thought it was unnecessarily harsh. But then again, "never" is a very long time. Maybe we'll see him change his mind at some point in Season 8?
In the next scene, which is not in the book, Jamie and Claire go with Fanny to visit Jane's grave, an anonymous plot in a sort of "potter's field". They don't even know which grave is hers, and I thought that was sad. (Also a bit odd. Wouldn't it be the most recently dug grave in that field, and thus easy to spot?) Fanny goes running through the cemetery, calling her sister's name.
Claire goes to comfort Fanny, who is distressed because she thinks Jane's death is her fault. Claire encourages her to talk about her memories of Jane. "Our mother used to take us to see the dragonflies," Fanny says -- and now we understand what the scene in the very beginning of the episode was all about.
"She loved the dancing lights, blue and green in the sky. Our mother used to say that was a hundred thousand angels dancing, and if you waved at them, they'd reach down and carry you up to heaven."
That's a beautiful image. And now we understand, that's what Jane was doing, waving at the lights dancing in the sky outside her window on the night she died.
Claire hands Fanny a small packet of Jane's possessions. Among these is a locket that Fanny says belonged to their mother. It's inscribed on the back with the name "Faith". Naturally, seeing the name of her stillborn first daughter unnerves Claire.
The next scene comes straight from the book. Ian and Rachel are talking in bed. Ian wants to go back to Fraser's Ridge, to settle down and start a new life as a farmer.
“I own some land, ken, on the Ridge. Uncle Jamie gave it to me, some years back. ’Twould be hard work, mind, clearing fields and planting and plowing, but farming is mostly peaceful. Bar things like bears and wild pigs and fire and hailstorms, I mean.”"Is it a place where we could be happy?" Rachel asks. "A place where we could raise our family?" And with that, Ian realizes that Rachel is pregnant!
“Oh, Ian.” Her face had gone soft, and so had her hand, now resting peacefully in his. “I should love to farm with thee.”
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 115, "The Raveled Sleeve of Care". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
Just as in the book, this happy revelation is followed immediately by sad news: the discovery, the next morning, that Ian's beloved dog, Rollo, has died of old age. Personally I thought Ian's emotional reaction was a bit excessive, considering that TV Ian has never showed much affection to Rollo. But it's true that the dog has been part of his life for a very long time.
"He waited, I think, until he kent ye were here for me." I love that line, which comes straight from the book.
At Lallybroch in 1739, Bree and Roger finally have some time to themselves, to talk about what's happened and decide what they're going to do next. They don't want to stay in 1739, but it's not safe to go back to 1980 with Rob Cameron and the Nutters still after them.
"So it's not a question of where we belong," Roger says. "It's when." (The phrasing echoes the early key art for Season 7.)
Meanwhile, as the Frasers, with Ian and Rachel, prepare to depart for Fraser's Ridge, Claire sees Fanny sitting by herself and goes to investigate. She finds the girl singing softly to herself. The song catches Claire totally off guard. It's "I Do Like to Be Beside the Seaside", the same song Claire sang to Faith in that heartbreaking scene in Episode 207, "Faith", when she held the stillborn baby in her arms.
Just one problem: That song is from the early 20th century! (According to Wikipedia, it was first recorded in 1909.) So Fanny could only have heard it from a time-traveler like Claire.
"How could you possibly know that song?" Claire asks.
"My mother taught it to me," says Fanny. WOW!!!
So that brings up a number of intriguing questions. Among them, is it possible that:
a) The stillborn baby Faith somehow survived, with Master Raymond's help
b) She grew up to be Jane and Fanny's mother (!)
c) She might be a time-traveler (!!) and therefore Fanny might have inherited the time-travel gene.
Claire and Jamie talked about this possibility in BEES:
“So…um…I know this is nothing but pure fantasy, the sort of thing you think in the middle of the night when you can’t sleep…”That was my first reaction, too: The idea is pure fantasy! How could a stillborn fetus at around 20-24 weeks gestation somehow be resuscitated (days after being delivered!) and survive long enough to grow to adulthood? But before you dismiss it entirely as something the OUTLANDER writers made up on their own, I encourage you to read this comment from Diana Gabaldon in the PARADE interview about this episode:
[Jamie] made a low noise, indicating that I should stop apologizing and get on with it. So I took a deep breath and did, whispering the words into his chest.
“Master Raymond was there. What if--if he found...Faith...and was able to...somehow bring her...back?”
(From WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 136, "Unfinished Business". Copyright © 2014 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
“They actually did get the (general) idea from me, though,” she admits. “When chatting with [showrunner] Matt [Roberts] about All Things plot wise, I mentioned that if I had written a second graphic novel (I didn't, for assorted reasons), I would have shown what actually happened after Faith's presumed death at the Hopital des Anges, and how/why Master Raymond resuscitated and nurtured the baby secretly, but wasn't able to come back with her before Claire and Jamie left France. So, they liked that idea and ran with it.”Jamie comes to find Claire in the church, saying they're all packed and ready to leave. Claire is understandably distraught. "I think Faith lived," she says.
Wow!! Quite a bombshell to end the season, to put it mildly! We will no doubt be speculating about this for a long time to come.
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I hope you enjoyed this recap. Look here for my recaps of all of the OUTLANDER episodes.
IMPORTANT NOTE!! This is the last episode of Season 7, but there WILL be a Season 8! Season 8 will be 10 episodes long, and it will be the final season of OUTLANDER. They finished filming Season 8 in late September, but we don't yet know when it will be shown on STARZ. As of January 17, 2025, all we know is that it's "COMING SOON". As soon as we hear anything official about a release date, I will post here. Stay tuned!
Looking for a place to discuss All Things OUTLANDER? Check out TheLitForum.com, formerly the Compuserve Books and Writers Community. You have to sign up in order to read or post on the forum, but it's free. For more about the forum, look here.
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