Our trouble-prone couple are separated again in tonight’s episode, season three episode 10, of Starz’s Outlander titled “Heaven and Earth.” Jamie (Sam Heughan) would like to move Heaven and Earth to get Claire (Caitriona Balfe) off that ship, and Claire has to practically move Heaven and Earth to save lives aboard that ship. The British man-o-war is rather popular, it would seem.
If you recall, we ended season three episode nine with Claire being forcibly taken by the disease-infested bucket of rigging and wood. To start this episode, we get to see Jamie’s reaction to that event. Jamie’s still standing by the railing watching the British ship when Fergus (Cesar Domboy) arrives with little bitty bags of things from the cook. He announces that it’s a makeshift potpourri for Marsali (Lauren Lyle) since the cabins are beginning to be rather gamey.
As they’re talking, Fergus notices the British ship drop one of its sails, which is a signal for making way. Jamie practically loses it on the spot. He runs to where the first mate is watching the proceedings and snatches the telescope from him. He sees Claire standing there arguing with the captain on the deck of the British man-o-war. Jamie officially freaks out at that point.
Jamie starts shouting orders to make way but Captain Raines (Richard Dillane) stops those and gives orders of his own. Jamie realizes that based on those orders the British ship is going to outpace them, and thus get away with Claire on board. Captain Raines informs Jamie they’ll meet up with them in Jamaica, as per a notice from the other ship. Of course, Jamie’s not satisfied with that. He grabs and pushes Captain Raines and everything sort of happens at once. The ship’s crew pull out weapons, Jamie’s men pull out dirks, and one of the ship’s crew puts a loaded and cocked pistol right in Jamie’s face.
Captain Raines calls a stand-down and Jamie is taken to the cells below. Back in another prison for our hero. Jamie takes one last look at the British ship as he’s forced below decks.
Claire’s waging her own battle on the other ship. She’s fighting disease, naturally, but also male opinions of a female giving out orders. She’s used to both situations and is taking everything in stride. Captain Leonard (Charlie Hiett) has given her authority to do what she must so any rumblings are quickly shut down and all her orders are followed.
Claire’s made everyone start dipping their hands in grog, and naturally the men don’t understand germs or how dangerous they are. She puts measures in place to clean the ship, have men sanitize their hands, not touch each other even while sleeping, and several other more modern and unknown approaches the men grumble about at first.
Mr. Pound (Albie Marber), Claire’s constant helper, tells her about a couple of men pressed into service due to being convicted of making what we in America would call Moonshine. They put those men to work building a still so they can distill the grog into pure alcohol.
As Claire’s provisions are implemented, things start to level off and gradually improve. The number of infected men slows and eventually stops. Once infected, it’s still possible they may die; she does only have primitive measures to fight the disease. Claire looked back through the previous surgeon’s book to determine when the outbreak began. She rooted out that one man on the carpenters’ crew was the ‘zero’ patient. Crewman Howard (Nathan Lynn) was the carrier but didn’t come down with the illness. Guess where he was at the moment of Claire’s discovery…with the cook preparing food. He’s the ship’s Typhoid Mary, as it were. Claire has him quarantined in the hold, with no small argument from Cosworth (Lawrence Joffe) the cook since he was the last helper the cook had.
Back on the Artemis, Fergus takes food to Jamie. Jamie’s back to his seasickness thanks to not being able to have the acupuncture treatments that prevented it. Jamie’s still out of his head with worry for Claire. It’s true she cannot get the disease, but Jamie doesn’t have faith in the British to not allow other harm to befall her given there are 300+ men on board. Jamie just simply cannot lose her again.
Jamie starts hatching a plan to break out of the cell and take over the ship. Fergus tries to bring him to reason, but Jamie is not having any common sense enter his thinking at the moment. Stubbornness can be a bad thing in a situation like this. Jamie accuses Fergus of not knowing what love really is and thinks it was right for him to withhold his blessing to marry Marsali. That cuts Fergus to the quick, of course. He’s been Jamie’s man, without question, since he was a boy of 10. Jamie tells Fergus that if he truly loved a woman, he would be willing to move Heaven and Earth for her; risk arrest, death, even hell itself. Jamie says he would give Fergus his blessing if Fergus does what he asked.
Claire watches as the British ship readies the bodies of the dead for burial at sea. They have a ceremony with Captain Leonard delivering a eulogy and the crew reciting “The Lord’s Prayer” before sending the bodies overboard to a watery grave.
Later that night, Claire’s looking out over the sea when the cook walks up making snide remarks about how many have died. He clearly does not understand that illness takes time to start and thus would require time to slow down or stop. Claire never says a word in return to his remarks. Mr. Pound arrives as this is happening and sends the cook away.
Mr. Pound asks how she handles the deaths and difficulties so easily. Claire explains the concept of ‘compartmentalizing’ things. We do what we have to do in the face of difficulties. They muse on how they hope this is the turning point in the battle with the disease, but Mr. Pound compliments Claire on all her hard work. Claire thinks it will take luck for them to save those who are left.
Mr. Pound pulls out a rabbit’s foot his mother gave to him. You might notice the rabbit theme in some of the episodes – the rabbit that Jamie saw on the Culloden battlefield, the baby bunny Bree had in her crib, and now the lucky foot on the toxic ship. Where will another one show up, do you think?
One of the other crew members comes to get Claire and says Mistress Johansen’s (Chanelle de Jager) husband has fallen ill. Claire heads down to where the couple tends the very urgently-needed goats that provide the milk that’s keeping the crew from dying of dehydration, due to the illness. Claire discovers he’s not taken with the illness but has drunk himself into alcohol poisoning by drinking the pure alcohol needed for the sickness prevention. To the man’s defense, people did not know of, nor use, pure alcohol for such reasons in that day. In the book, Claire does warn them NOT to drink it and I think a couple men even die drinking it, but the show only slightly references something about the difference in what they have been drinking and the pure distilled variety.
Claire picks up the bottle of what the man drank and does her cursing outburst thing. She assures the wife her husband will live and thanks her for all her hard work with the goats.
As Claire’s leaving the goat pens, she notices a flag of a ship she and Jamie were told might have young Ian aboard. She goes to the Captain’s office to ask about it and finds the room empty. She looks in the log to see if it lists anything about the other ship they encountered that was carrying that flag. She doesn’t find anything about the other ship but does see a note about Jamie in the log. There’s a man on board who recognized Jamie and informed the Captain he was wanted for sedition and murder. The expectation of capturing Jamie was noted in the book.
The cook enters to catch her standing at the desk. As Claire tries to get around him and leave the room, the man moves ever closer to her. Claire threatens to tell the Captain he tried to violate her and reminds the cook she has the Captain’s confidence. The cook lets her go from the room, but she’s more shaken by the news she read than the cook’s behavior.
Fergus and Marsali are talking in the cabin about Jamie’s plan. Marsali brings up a very good point about if Fergus was captured, then no one would be around to protect her from the crew. They start kissing but Fergus breaks it off, grudgingly. He says they must wait for when they are married, even though no one’s able to watch them right now with Jamie in a cell and Claire on the other ship. Marsali comments that he’s just like Jamie in that once he gives his word, Fergus will never break it. Fergus steals one last kiss and leaves the cabin.
Claire’s cleaning her tools when Mr. Pound comes in to inform her there were four new cases that very day. He muses that he thought it would have stopped by then. Claire sees an opportunity to locate the man who gave the Captain the information about Jamie, so she has Mr. Pound hunt for him under the excuse that he’s possibly a second carrier.
Fergus attempts to go steal the keys to the cells, being the pickpocket he’s always been. However, as he stands by Captain Raines’ door he overhears the Captain and some of the men talking about all of them: Jamie, him, Marsali, and Jamie’s other men. They also mention not minding having a ‘taste’ of Marsali. Fergus changes his mind and doesn’t attempt to take the keys. He simply cannot risk leaving Marsali alone if he and Jamie’s other men are captured in the overthrow of the Captain.
Claire’s still working on preventive measures when men bring in the man who knew who Jamie is, Harry Tompkins (Ian Reddington). The man just so happened to be the same man who broke into the print shop, fought with young Ian, and caused the shop to burn. Claire threatens to kill Tompkins but he says he would thank her for it after his difficulties over the past month. He explains they found the dead man in the cask of Crème de Menthe and they pinned that on Jamie. The young Captain might retain the vessel if he could turn over a wanted criminal. Claire has Tompkins placed in the same cells with Typhoid Howard.
Claire returns to check on Mrs. Johansen’s husband. He’s better and Mrs. Johansen gives Claire some goat cheese to thank her for helping her husband. She doesn’t speak English well but as Claire tells her that she’s worried for her own husband when they arrive in Jamaica, Mrs. Johansen eludes to a plan for her to escape. She says she’s happy to help when the goats need grass. She can’t explain what she means, so Claire’s not clear what she’s saying.
Fergus brings Jamie water, but no keys. Jamie’s angry when Fergus admits he didn’t try to get the keys. Jamie’s still dead set on his plan and doesn’t see that Marsali would be alone and at the whim of the crew should the plot fail. Fergus says he’s doing it for Jamie as well as Marsali, but naturally Jamie doesn’t see that Fergus is right. That shows you the level of blindness Jamie’s in. He’s supposed to be Marsali’s Da and he’s completely disregarding her welfare in all of this.
The crew of the British ship notice they’re improving in their situation. Some of the crew on the upper deck actually start singing as one member plays the fiddle. Claire walks through them to many nods and smiles as she looks for Mr. Pound to return his rabbit’s foot. She finds him sick and in a hammock. Somehow, she missed the signs he was taken with the illness before it was too late. As they prepare him for burial, Claire returns the rabbit’s foot and they finish sewing him into the shroud.
That evening, Claire’s standing at the rail as the Captain approaches her. Captain Leonard explains that things are better and her efforts are heroic. As the Captain’s walking away, Mrs. Johansen and another crewman interrupt to say they’ve smelled land. Mrs. Johansen mentions the grass for the goats again. Claire now understands what she meant about the goats needing to feed.
Claire attempts to get away once they’re all on land with the goats, but she’s found by Captain Leonard. He reveals he knows she’s trying to leave to warn her husband. He cannot let her go and has her taken back to the ship.
Jamie’s sitting in his cell looking at his pictures of Bree and Claire when Captain Raines comes in and says they’re close to land. He mentions that he’ll need every able body to help with the ship. Jamie notices Marsali standing there. She informs Captain Raines that if he makes Jamie give his word he won’t rebel, Jamie would not break his word. Marsali tells the hard-headed man behind the bars that Fergus did what he did for his well-being, though he’s too stubborn to see it.
Captain Raines lets Jamie out and gives Jamie a minute to speak with Fergus and Marsali alone. Jamie finally gives his blessing to let them get married by a priest in Jamaica. Jamie then is told to be on deck to help the rest of the crew manage the ship.
That same night, Claire and Mrs. Johansen hatch and execute a new escape plan. Claire’s to jump off the ship and use a makeshift raft Mrs. Johansen made by strapping a couple of smaller barrels together. Claire’s scared and very much against it. Mrs. Johansen gives Claire the money she has and helps with other provisions. They push the makeshift raft over and Claire jumps in behind it to close out this week’s episode. Jamie was going to risk his life to save her, but Claire actually does risk her own to save him.
Next week we might actually see land and trees again. Join me as we watch season three episode 11, “Uncharted.”
More on Outlander:
– Outlander Season 3 Episode 1 “The Battle Joined” Recap
– Outlander Season 3 Episode 2 “Surrender” Recap
– Outlander Season 3 Episode 3 “All Debts Paid” Recap
– Outlander Season 3 Episode 4 “Of Lost Things” Recap
– Outlander Season 3 Episode 5 “Freedom & Whisky” Recap
– Outlander Season 3 Episode 6 “A. Malcolm” Recap
– Outlander Season 3 Episode 7 “Crème De Menthe” Recap
– Outlander Season 3 Episode 8 “First Wife” Recap
– Outlander Season 3 Episode 9 “The Doldrums” Recap
– Exclusive Interview on Season 3 with Executive Producer Ronald D. Moore
– One-on-One with Sophie Skelton
– Richard Rankin Interview on Outlander Season 3 and Playing Roger
– Caitriona Balfe, Sam Heughan and Tobias Menzies Q&A
