Outlander: Blood of my Blood Season 1 Episode 4 Review: A Soldier’s Heart

Outlander: Blood of my Blood Season 1 Episode 4, “A Soldier’s Heart,” gets back on track with an episode that shares the spotlight between Ellen and Julia’s two colliding worlds.

It’s not a perfect marriage of the two tales quite yet, but the series is choosing to play the long game. So patience is required.

For better or for worse, this calculating episode is simply one more piece on the chessboard in a game that is nowhere near revealing its cards.

When it comes to chess metaphors, this episode exists almost entirely to move pieces into place for a later move.

There’s nothing wrong with this kind of installment. We learn more about Henry and Julia before they went through the stones. Viewers see the darker side of Henry’s lingering PTSD and a potential conflict in the form of a British seductress.

We also see the series boldly choose to have Claire and Jamie’s parents cross paths once again, with a meeting between Ellen and Julia.

At times, it can feel quite tedious watching the episode devote so much of its plot to setting up later developments rather than lingering in the moments it’s creating now.

Some interactions feel rather forceful and require audiences to suspend their disbelief slightly to keep the story moving. The sequence of events that leads Julia from Lovat’s prison to Brian’s carriage to the MacKenzie castle, all in one day, feels less like an organic series of interactions and more like a sprint from Storypoint A to B.

It is odd that the show, not following any particular book in the Outlander world, is the one struggling to make these decisions feel like organic story developments. 

Blood of my Blood stiffens under the pressure of a series of events that are so far down the line, it is frustrating to see it already tying itself up in knots to stay faithful to Jamie and Claire’s books.

As if knowing the outcome has put these characters in a gridlock rather than freed them.

Gone is the cheeky, fun, and creative lens that led this show successfully through its first two episodes. It would be beneficial to see the next episode treat this project as its own creative entity, rather than an assignment that must check all the necessary boxes to pass.

Blood of my Blood revolves around the performances of Julia and Ellen with rightful cause.

The two ladies move through this world with a conviction that keeps this show on its feet. Other characters gravitate towards their commanding performances naturally, and the dialogue is particularly fruitful when Ellen or Julia delivers it.

As long as these two women are calling the shots, we are more than content listening.

Even so, the leading men are handled eloquently throughout this episode, never outshining those female-driven stories but not sidelining themselves to the cause either.

Henry’s mission to find his wife drives every part of his being and, in turn, gives the performance something emotional to sink its teeth into. That underlying desperation elevates his power dynamics with the Grants, and it constantly feels like there are real stakes for him to outsmart his employer.

So, while it may be something as mundane as a lottery system and some disgruntled tenants, the episode uses well-timed flashbacks between Henry and Julia to make this detour meaningful.

While Brian is dangerously underutilized, it is nice to see the show find an excuse to have the Beauchamps and the Frasers team up.

The most interesting elements of this episode are the moments spent dancing around this arrangement between Julia and Brian. It is dangerous territory to insinuate you’re only going to free a woman from your father’s enslavement if she helps you get with a girl.

Still, Blood of my Blood introduces the matter much more elegantly.

Julia sees much of her love for Henry in Ellen’s eyes when she speaks about Brian, and Brian’s fear of his father’s wrath is always a looming shadow in his decisions — especially now that we know he stays home to protect his mother.

With the decision to help each other feeling very much in character, we can enjoy the implications that Claire’s mother is the reason Jamie exists.

Ultimately, that is the concept Blood of my Blood toys with, regardless of whether it enriches the story.

This show is bold in the strokes it draws between Claire and Jamie’s intertwined fate. It’s one thing to undo the death of two people, but it’s an entirely other entity to suggest that Julia and Henry are the cause of Jamie Fraser’s existence altogether. Whether that bold swing will pay off is yet to be seen.

Yet it’s the tiny tidbits that continuously delight — this time the talk of fairies and the hundred-year dance.

The mentions of Scottish folklore are unnerving and cheeky, toying with the fantasy elements of Julia and Henry’s journey with an eerie game of telephone between the locals.

Now if this show can bottle that fairie magic up, it will be thriving!

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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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