Outlander Makes Its Final Arrangements Before the Biggest Battle of All


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Well that explains a lot!

Tonight's Outlander wasn't filled with a lot of action, but it was filled with a lot of emotion from unexpected people. Claire and Jamie actually took kind of a backseat as we watched complicated men mourn the deaths of their equally complicated brothers.

Claire took a little detour into Inverness as Culloden loomed ever closer, and took care of a few important bits of business.

First, she helped kill Colum MacKenzie.

Colum was very sick, and was on his way to dying anyway, and he knew that if he wanted to die less painfully and more quickly, Jamie's witch of a wife was his best bet.

Claire agreed, and got him what he needed in order to end his life. But first, he had a few amends and arrangements to make.

He had to ensure that his son, Hamish (who is actually Dougal's son), had a good guardian, and he gave that role to Jamie. Dougal was, of course, furious, but he couldn't say to Colum that he would never put the lives of his men above his cause, unlike Jamie.

Dougal and Colum had somewhat of a brotherly heart to heart as Colum was taking his last breaths, until it was really just Dougal getting out all his frustrations from a life dealing with his older brother's disability.

Finally he realized Colum had died, and he cried as he still pretended to blame his brother for leaving him alone once again.

What Happened Last Week on Outlander?

Colum wasn't the only "friend" Claire encountered in Inverness. She also ran into Mary, who had somehow grown into a completely different young woman in just an episode.

After what happened at the Duke's house, Jamie and Claire had sent Mary back home, where she and Alex Randall had gotten together, despite Claire's strange attempts to keep them apart. Not only did they get together, they got pregnant, and now Alex was dying. Both Black Jack and Mary begged Claire to help save him, but she had to inform them that there was no way to do that.

That's when Alex presented his plan to keep Mary and his kid safe: she had to marry his brother Jack.

No one was a fan of this plan, but it made unfortunate sense to Claire, since she knew that if she were unmarried, Mary would end up poor and alone. Murtagh sweetly offered to marry the girl, but Claire had to explain to him why that wasn't going to work.

Interestingly, Black Jack had no interest in this plan either. He knows he's a monster—he doesn't regret it (and specifically doesn't regret what he did to Jamie), but he knows it, and he doesn't want to hurt Mary, so he wants Claire to get Alex to change his mind. Jack also knows that the date Claire told him of his death was just a few days away, so what's the point?

In the end, Jack and Mary were married anyway, just as history said they would be, but their kid would not truly be Jack's kid. It all makes sense now!

After Alex died, Jack cried and took out his frustrations by punching the body, which OK, that's one way to grieve, we guess.

On the war front, Jamie tried to head off the battle at Culloden with a nighttime attack, until the prince got lost and decided to turn back. There's no choice but to face Culloden, and probably their deaths.

That leads us to the finale, which is so worth the two week wait. Trust us when we say this: the decision to change the structure of this season from the way it is presented in the books was a very good one, and you will not be disappointed.

Outlander's 90 minute finale will air Saturday, July 9 at 9 p.m. on Starz.