Outlander: Blood of My Blood Season 1 Episode 2 Review: S.W.A.K. (Sealed With A Kiss)

Two new Sassenachs arrive in Scotland for this bleak but brilliant mirror image of Ellen and Brian’s love story.

Outlander: Blood of My Blood Season 1 Episode 2, “S.W.A.K. (Sealed With A Kiss),” gives Julia and Henry Beauchamp a character study devoted to their resilient war-torn romance.

Entranced by the sounds of pens scratching and typewriters clacking, this outing basks in the strange alchemy of hope and love. At the same time, it weaponizes the whimsy of faerie dances and faraway places to establish a menacing undertone to the romantic saga.

Now having something to compare Julia and Henry’s first outing to, it is quite remarkable what Blood of My Blood has done with this two-part series premiere.

This show intends to be a captivating character study. It prioritizes the four leads whose fates and those of their children are unknowingly entwined.

These first two episodes are mirror images of each other, following a graceful dance alongside one another as each couple experiences drastically different yet timeless acts of love and loss.

It’s magical storytelling to see the lush highlands of Scotland and the wet cobblestone streets of London become a crossroads for two completely different couples to find common ground.

It is even more fascinating to witness how the cinematography moves in tandem with them to demonstrate physical similarities between the two journeys, hundreds of years apart.

The shot of Henry calling out to Julia from the top of the staircase echoes the first meeting between Ellen and Brian on the bridge during their episode.

That mirroring of each other’s stories might be the exact thing to carry this show far — not just in visual similarities, but also in how each couple’s conflicts mirror the other’s strengths.

Ellen and Brian are just beginning their love story, but they are aware of their place in the world. Julia and Henry are a fortified couple with several years and a child under their belt, but they are strangers to the world they find themselves in.

The dueling tale could easily be a disconnected love story that jumps back and forth between the two couples with little regard for their intersecting paths.

Thankfully, Blood of My Blood understands that intersecting these love stories is the entire appeal of the show.

Both couples are pulling their weight with a gumption that makes even the most confident of us flinch.

Julia and Henry meet us amid a terrible war steeped in senseless tragedy and sorrow. Yet they demand just as much love from their screen time. With similarly scorching chemistry and a determination so immovable that we never once have to question if they could be Claire’s parents, these two are proper adversaries.

Even when the bleak stillness of the war threatens to weigh this episode down, Hermione Corfield and Jeremy Irvine break through the grim haze with a chemistry that burns bright and hot.

They are aided by an ingenious choice to use the couple’s letters to navigate through time, space, and perspectives with an ease that puts the horrors of war to rest before they overwhelm the love story.

Circling back to the letters as a means for these two to continue communicating throughout the season, despite being separated by the stones, is another excellent choice.

While the episode rightfully focuses on introducing and then acclimating the Beauchamps to 1700 Scotland, it finds its moments to poke at the Outlander lore — and send a few curveballs our way.

A big one is the offhanded mention of Mr. Bug, the lackey who ushers Henry to the Grants’ estate. If we had our doubts about the Grants, the appearance of Arch Bug is enough to set us on edge.

Then there’s the matter of Brian’s father purchasing Julia as a servant (Lord Lovat is so thirsty to dethrone Black Jack, it’s sad).

Julia and Brian’s brief exchange has the power to upend this entire show, because one wrong move on Brian’s part would make it difficult to root for him moving forward. Of course, he is ever the Fraser gentleman and takes the lashings for Julia — again, like father like son!

You can’t help but let all these little interactions build to bigger “what-ifs” as Claire’s world intertwines with the Frasers before meeting Jamie.

With Julia living in the same castle as Claire, just decades apart, it’s giddy to see these two worlds come so close to one another without touching. What if it had been Claire who met Brian and not Bree, and he had seen the ghost of Julia before him?

And Julia’s unborn child is a potentially jaw-dropping mystery. Suddenly, a child who never existed before this series could easily become a notable character within the Outlander universe.

It’s all just too good not to surmise what stones this show will uncover next.

Blood of My Blood is enriching the story of Outlander; deepening the emotional bonds and time-travelling lore with every new development. The spin-off is rewriting history in its favor while creating the kind of TV event we lie awake and hope for at night.

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Outlander: Blood of My Blood airs Fridays at 8/7c on Starz and all available Starz streaming platforms.

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