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Outlander Recap for Season 7, Episode 9 Mid-Season Return “Unfinished Business”

By Rueben | November 23, 2024

It’s been over 15 months since the last new episode of season 7 of Outlander aired on Starz.

Fans have been waiting patiently (well, sort of patiently) for Droughtlander to finally come to an end, and the return of the second half of the next to last season of the long-running series based on the Diana Gabaldon franchise of books didn’t disappoint.

There were two stories happening, all seeming to lead to an unexpected convergence at Lallybroch, the ancestral home of Jamie Fraser; but that inevitable meet-up was not what the viewers nor Roger MacKenzie were expecting.

Let’s backtrack for a minute, though.

The mid-season return opened in Scotland with a voice over by Jamie, talking about bringing his second cousin Simon Fraser to rest in their homeland then he, his wife Claire and their nephew Ian Murray made their way back to Lallybroch. The home they had not seen for at least a good 10 years after Ian was abducted, taken to Jamaica with his Auntie and Uncle on the trail to get him back only for them to eventually end up shipwrecked on the coast of Georgia (in America).

Admittedly the reunion between Young Ian and his mother Jenny (now played by Kristin Atherton, who has taken over the role from Laura Donnelly) was sweet, it was her reaction to seeing her brother and his wife again that was even more touching. Jamie – and the viewers – were expecting a much different reaction from Jamie’s high-spirited sister than the big bear hug she gave him. But that sweet reunion was quickly interrupted by the sounds of a man coughing, rather uncontrollably.

Turns out Old Ian is sick and has been sick for a very long time with a persistent cough that has never gone away. In fact, it was quickly revealed that he has consumption or what we now know as Tuberculosis; and while Claire is a healer in that time thanks to her 20th Century medical knowledge, in the late 1770’s she is ill-equipped to take care of him. Her having to tell her sister-in-law that there isn’t anything she can do for Old Ian was heartbreaking to say the least.

Even more surprising was Claire telling Jamie she wanted to come clean with his family, telling them the truth about her. As she shared details with Old Ian, Jenny and Young Ian’s brother Michael – who lives and runs the family’s wine business in France – about the upcoming Reign of Terror that would plague that country, she warned Michael to get his affairs in order and leave France before 1788.

Elsewhere in the story, Jamie told Claire that he had some unfinished business that he needed to attend to; primarily speaking with his former wife Laoghaire, the much reviled woman who Jamie married a number of years after Claire returned to her own time before the Battle of Culloden took place. It was Jamie’s intentions to tell her he was sorry for everything that had happened between them, but in true Laoghaire-fashion she lashed out at him. That scuffle ended up pitting her farmhand – Joey Boswell – at the wrong end of her “fight” with Jamie. Much to everyone’s surprise, Laoghaire reacted in concern for Joey’s well-being. Who knew that that bitch could actually have warm feelings for anyone?

It was around this time that the convergence between Roger and those at Lallybroch was seemingly going to happen except the knock at the front door ended up heading in two very different directions. Roger was greeted by Brian Fraser, Jamie’s father who was still very much alive while Jamie was greeted by his step-daughter, a now full grown Joan MacKimmie.

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Roger quickly realized that he and Buck were in a different time – around the year 1739 or 1740, a time when a teenage Jamie Fraser was in France and his sister Janet (nee Jenny) was a young, unmarried girl. Of course, Roger had to be careful in explaining to the Frasers what he was doing there and who he was looking for. He was invited to stay the night at Lallybroch and the following day, he was taken by Jamie’s father to meet with Ian Murray’s father to discuss a “faerie man” who had been seen recently on the moors, wearing strange clothes. Could this possibly be Rob Cameron, the man who had abducted Roger and Brianna’s son Jemmy?

Roger’s meeting with Ian’s father was then interrupted by Jenny who arrived to alert Roger that word from Buck had been received at Lallybroch stating that he was ill and needed Roger’s help. Jenny and her father suggested Roger take Buck to the herbalist in the village. More on that shortly…

Meanwhile at Lallybroch in Jamie and Claire’s time, Joan had asked Jamie to work something out for her mother before she left for the convent. It seems that Joan had her heart set on becoming a nun, but she couldn’t have her mother living in sin with the farmhand Joey. Thankfully, Jamie consulted with a still-living, but very elderly Ned Gowan (who did not actually appear in the episode), and an agreement was worked out. Laoghaire and Joey would be married, Jamie would deed the homestead to Laoghaire and then Laoghaire would provide Joan with her dowry. It was a win-win-win situation for everyone even if Laoghaire bulked at first.

In the end, two very different letters led not only Claire back to America but also Young Ian. With his father so gravely ill, Young Ian decided to remain at Lallybroch to spend whatever time his father had left there with him, but his mother told Young Ian they both wanted him to return to Rachel, who Young Ian had told his father about. At the same time, Claire received a letter for Lord John Grey, who was now in Philadelphia, expressing his great need for Claire’s help in saving his nephew from a critical injury. Jamie and Jenny both told Claire to go there to help. Because of that trip back to America, Young Ian was going to have Claire take a letter to Rachel explaining that he would not return because of his father’s health; but instead Jenny told her son that he had to move forward with his life and return to Rachel.

As they left on the wagon being driven by Jenny and Ian’s eldest son Jamie, named for his uncle, Roger and Buck were in the village knocking on the door of the herbalist who could help with Buck’s malady. Only to have the door be answered by none other than Gillian Edgars aka Geillis Duncan.

Roger uttered, “Oh, Christ” to himself when she greeted them (he and Buck, that is) at the door.

Oh, Christ, indeed!