Outlander Cast: Down The Rabbit Hole

Posted by Blake Larsen

Outlander Podcast Hosts Mary & Blake discuss Outlander episode 4.07, “Down The Rabbit Hole”.

In this episode we chat the poetry of closing character loops, why this episode informs characters in a unique way, and we play all the Whitney…

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6 Comments

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Isabelle L
· Reply

December 18, 2018 at 10:51 AM

Hey Mary and Blake. I’ve just watched episode 7 and I’m giving it 4 kilts. Here is my GBG.

My good: I love that Roger and Bree finally have an episode of their own. I think it was really needed especially since their breakup 4 weeks ago!!

My bad: I actually have 2

My first one is all the fabricated story with Laoghaire that took half of the episode, it makes no sense and does absolutely nothing for the plot. At the end of season 2, Claire tells her entire story to Bree and apparently she even tell her about the witch trial. So I find it hard to believe that she would not had mentioned Loaghaire to Bree. Plus Loaghaire tell Bree that a women stole the love of her life by bewitching him and I am supposed to believe Bree doesn’t see the resemblance between both stories. I mean I would have been suspicious the moment she would have told me her name was Loaghaire. The only thing needed from this was the argument at the end not the fluffy story to go along with it. Do I need to see Loaghaire read a bedtime story to Bree??? No I do not. I would have preferred to see Bree at Lallybroch with Ian and his family or bond with Lizzie who would actually play a part in future episodes or even better spend a little more time with Roger and see his journey on the Glorianna with Steven Bonnet. His story line felt rushed in this episode. Also, do we need to watch Bree getting lost in the woods and injuring herself for like 10 minutes? Seems like a deja vu right? I’m really scared the writers are making the same mistake they did last year with the Uncharted episode where they wasted 15 minutes of screen time showing Claire getting lost in the woods at the detriment of the later episodes who were rushed. Fingers crossed they didn’t make that mistake again with season 4.

My second bad: Can someone explain to me why Lizzie looks so old in the show when she is supposed to be a sixteen year old girl? I mean they cast a beautiful young actress to play Lizzie, so what was the makeup department thinking when they aged her so much. I know Lizzie comes from a poor family so she cannot look super healthy and clean, but still… I mean she could pass for Bree’s mom!! They should have asked you Mary to do her makeup, I’m sure you would have done a way better job at it and actually make her look believable.

My great: all the flashbacks with Frank. Love that the writers were able to find a way to bring Frank back and show us his perspectives of his breakup with Claire. Since the books are from Claire’s perspectives, we never knew what happened to Frank before he died. It helped filled the gaps from Season 3. So nice to see back Tobias Menzies, he brings so much to the show and is greatly missed.

All in all still a great episode but could have been better. Can’t wait for the next episode.
Allison Indaburu
· Reply

December 18, 2018 at 12:47 PM

Oh boy, this episode really has me split. On the one hand , I absolutely loved it, but on the other, I just can’t help feeling like the writers are going off trail, and wandering a bit. My Kilt Rating is a 4.925, and there is only one reason it’s not a solid 5, but I’ll get to that.
My Good was actually Laoghaire, and I think since they couldn’t do Lallybroch correctly because of Laura Donnelly’s absence, the shift to the Laoghaire plotline was a very interesting and informative change. Plus, Nell Hudson does a fabulous job going from kind and motherly, to Boil The Bunny In The Pot Crazy. She is extraordinarily talented, and I enjoyed her scenes.
My Bad was I cannot help but feel that much of this episode was a colossal waste of time that we simply don’t even have anyways because STARZ only gave them 13 episodes to begin with. I LOVED this episode, don’t get me wrong, I LOVED IT!!! But…there was so much wasted time here. I can’t find a way to justify it, even though I love what they did. In the back of my mind, I just feel they should have tidied it up somehow. I wish, even without Jenny, that we could have spent more time at Lallybroch. I know why the writers changed this part of the story, but I just feel like we needed more at Lallybroch, and for that I can’t give it a 5.
My GREAT was FRANK!!! I was acrually so happy to spend time with Frank, it caught me by surprise!! To see so much from his point of view, to realize what he knew before telling Claire he wanted a divorce, it puts so many layers on his story, and informs so much about Bree’s initially bratty attitude in Season 2. Now when we go back to our first meeting with Bree, we’ll understand the guilt she’s carrying in her heart about Frank, and why she is so outwardly resentful to her mother. There’s so much to unpick there after seeing this episode. But my Greatest Great is Frank at the Dock. I can’t even think of it without tearing up, and getting all weepy, the look of Pride and Encouragement he gives Bree hits me so hard in the Mommy Bone, I can’t handle it!! Our job as parents is to raise our children to be capable of making this journey called Life, and he has done well raising up his little girl into a capable and bold woman. She is taking on a particularly challenging journey, and he could not be more of a proud Papa, and for her to see that, it gives her the impetous and courage to go forward knowing that even though she didn’t say goodbye, he’s always with her, and he has given his blessing to her going on to find her mother and Jamie.
I gotta go wipe my face, and that’s that… I loved it, even though STARZ has once again shot themselves in the foot by not giving us the time we need to tell this story more fully.
Loved it.
Allison Indaburu
· Reply

December 18, 2018 at 1:30 PM

Omg, I forgot Stephen Bonnet!!! What a performance, crikey, he’s a phenomenal amalgum of unpredictability, and that makes him utterly frightening!!! Hes terrifying, truly. Dude can sooth an infant one minute, and toss another kid overboard the next, holy frijoles, he’s nuts!!! Ugh!!! Such a great baddie, he does uncle Black Jack proud.
Allison Indaburu
· Reply

December 18, 2018 at 2:17 PM

Oh, one more thing– Mary, I make my bed every night, and immediately get into it. I can’t sleep in an unmade bed, and if I make it earlier in the day, my 3yo will go in and destroy the bed after I make it, so I have to do it right before bedtime.
Ned
· Reply

December 19, 2018 at 12:51 PM

Dear Mary & Blake,
I would like to point out the fact that Brianna blames herself for Frank’s death. And here she is trying to prevent the deaths of her remaining parents. Poor Brianna. And let’s not forget that Roger knew about this death notice and hesitated in telling her. Yes, she’s here and she’ll do her best to warn Jamie and Claire, but if Brianna ever finds out that Roger knew first and considered not telling her. . . Talk about unexploded bombs.
I do understand Roger’s not telling her. I know it seems like a simple thing to prevent this fire. Just go visit Aunt Jocasta during January each year. But it might not be that simple, because we don’t know what caused the fire. Will it be revenge? Murder disguised as an accident? Could it be something to do with the Revolutionary War? Or the Regulators? You know of self-fulfilling prophecies. Brianna brought matches with her.
See, you could change the date and the method of the deaths, but not necessarily the deaths themselves. So Roger has reason to stay quiet. Because if Brianna should come back from the past and the obituary is still in existence, she’ll feel like she failed to save them. So of course Roger wanted to keep her away, just as you would want to hold them back from running into a burning building. So these two have a serious conflict. They just don’t realize it yet.
Dawn
· Reply

December 19, 2018 at 4:41 PM

I just loved this episode. It captured all of the feels for me, and I am so pumped that I called the appearance of both Leghaire and Frank a couple of weeks ago.

Amazing five kilt episode for me. Right from the start, it had me captivated: In just seeing Bree making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and seeing the contents of her purse, it cemented her as a character who valued practicality.

Bravo to have her go through the stones and automatically hurt herself. It’s about time that somebody fell down those sharp hills of Scotland, if you ask me. It is more realistic to have someone unfamiliar with the terrain and hurt themselves, rather than have characters simply be unscathed.

My good, bad, great. Well there was absolutely no bad to speak of, so I’ll just go on to the good: Bree with Leghaire and Joanie.

Nell Hudson did show that there was a sweet side to Leghaire, and she was originally quite maternal to Bree, seeing her as an injured and lost girl. It wasn’t a stretch for her to to associate Bree with Marsali, hoping that somebody would take care of her if she needed it.

Even though Leghaire and her daughter had hard times, they thought nothing of sharing their food and home with a stranger.

I loved seeing little Joanie as a character again, and the three of them had some very sweet scenes together: Bree and Joanie were both so sweet, listening to stories, and Bree threading flowers in Joanie’s hair, they really did seem to bond as sisters.

If Leghaire hadn’t been so dangerously delusional about Claire, boil- your-bunny nuts, then I think Bree could have found some affinity with Leghaire and Joanie.

It was not a surprise that Leghaire turned so violent the minute Claire was mentioned, but it was quite sad. After so many years, Leghaire still mistakenly believed that Claire was the one who was the one who came between her and Jamie.

If anything I believe that back at Castle Leoch, Jamie was just amusing himself with Leghaire, and took the beating for her out of his own guilt. Leghaire was under a delusion that he cared for her more than he did.

Later in Season 3, he married Leghaire because he was in love with the idea of being a father to Marsaili and Joanie—their mother was an afterthought.

Joanie even as a little girl was affected by her mother’s sickness (as she mentioned Bree’s mother as a witch), but it was little Joanie who cared enough about Bree to rescue her and drive her to Lallyboch.

The GREAT, Bree’s recollections of Frank. I just think Tobias is an amazing actor, and I was waiting for this! We keep hearing about how close the characters of Bree and Frank were, but it was impossible to demonstrate up until now (when Tobias seemed to be around Baby Bree he seemed uncomfortable to me.

Bree’s memory of being asleep as a young child and being carried into the house out of the car by Frank was just darling.It’s something everyone can relate to: that comfort

But the dynamics between Tobias and Sophie was amazing. They seemed to be very open with each other.

The scene in Frank’s office had just the right amount of tension: should he tell the daughter he loves about her real father and break her heart? Should he tell and break his own?

The tea and scones scene was great. You could totally see that tea and scones was something that Frank and Bree had many times before–something that was theirs exclusively.

I totally cried when Bree was recalling the last time she saw Frank. It isn’t unusual when someone dies for those left behind to feel guilty and second guess themselves with what-if’s. I thought Bree’s grief at his grave was so real. Trying to work through her emotions to “soldier on,” was so gut-wrenching.

Bree seeing Frank’s ghost, apparition, spirit or whatever at the end, was so perfect given the theme of Outlander–time is just all relative and love never goes away.

And Bear’s music–Oh God.

Honorable mention: Stephen Bonnet. Or should I say hello, Harvey Dent? When I saw him pull out that coin and tell tales of luck, I was right back to Batman’s The Dark Night (okay, so I’m a nerd)

But where Arron Eckhart’s Harvey Dent had the heart wrenching pathos of a man who had lost everything and turned into a murderer, Stephen Bonnet was just so evil, simply because he wanted to show his power and dominance. He had tossed a child overboard without a thought.

The fact that he had that lovely Irish accent was all the more chilling to me. So very sinister. He’s made quite an enemy in Roger I think. It will be fun to watch that dynamic unfold.

Now that Bonnet has Claire’s ring, and Bree will surely recognize it, Bonnet just may use Bree as a weapon against Roger.

I was quite intrigued by just who the baby might be. Perhaps one of Roger’s ancestors?

I know I am forgetting so much

Dawn