‘Outlander’ EP Reveals the 1 Season 6 Storyline That They ‘Struggled to Figure Out’
Outlander is known for its steamy sex scenes, which usually feature Jamie (Sam Heughan) and Claire Fraser (Caitriona Balfe). But the Starz time-traveling drama also features plenty of trauma, and sometimes those traumatic scenes include sexual assault.
These are difficult storylines for Outlander writers to adapt from Diana Gabaldon’s novels. And in season 6, they’ve strayed from the books a bit with Claire’s storyline after her brutal rape in the season 5 finale. Executive producer Maril Davis recently admitted that it was something the writers “struggled to figure out.”
But she hopes they did Claire justice.
The ‘Outlander’ season 5 finale was life-changing for Claire
During the first five seasons of Outlander, fans witnessed Claire face more than her fair share of challenges. But what she faced in the season 5 finale was nothing short of life-changing.
As fans recall, Claire was using her 20th-century education, experience, and skills to help the people of Fraser’s Ridge by sharing medical advice under the pseudonym Dr. Rawlings. But when Lionel Brown (Ned Dennehy) discovered the truth, he and his men kidnapped Claire. And she became the victim of a brutal gang rape.
To survive the devastating assault, Claire escaped to a dream world in the episode “Never My Love.” It wasn’t until she was rescued by Jamie and the men of Fraser’s Ridge that she was safe and her rapists were dead.
EP Maril Davis reveals they ‘struggled to figure out’ this season 6 storyline
Lionel Brown’s attack on Claire has left her permanently scarred. And in season 6, fans have witnessed her cope by self-medicating with her newly-invented ether. This is a departure from Gabaldon’s books. And it’s a storyline that was discussed a lot in the Outlander writer’s room.
“That’s something we talked a lot about when we approached season six because in the books, Diana doesn’t deal that much with the aftermath of Claire’s attack,” Davis told Express. “Part of it might be — and everyone who’s gone through trauma like this, it’s just as important as everyone else’s.”
Davis noted that “pretty much every character in Outlander has gone through some sort of horrific trauma. Oftentimes involving rape.”
After Claire’s assault, the EP says they felt like this was “yet another character” going through this. But “maybe there was a different way to do it.”
“We struggled to figure out how to tell that story without delving deeper into Claire’s post-traumatic stress,” Davis admitted. “I’m not trying to say Diana didn’t deal with it, but it wasn’t maybe as significant in the beginning as we hoped.”
The ‘Outlander’ writers wanted to do Claire justice
Davis says that the writers talked amongst themselves and with Balfe about the aftermath of Claire’s assault when writing the season 6 scripts. She says the goal was “to do justice to her character in that way and show her trauma.”
“In previous seasons, Claire, as a doctor, has always been able to compartmentalize very well, we’ll see her starting to break down a little bit more this season,” Davis revealed. “People experience it in different ways, we tried to find a unique way to show that, and I hope we did her story justice because I’m so proud of that story and how Caitriona played it.”
Davis concluded by saying the storyline is “so powerful” because it shows viewers that no matter who you are, the kind of trauma that Claire experienced is something that doesn’t go away.
“That stays with you, and trying to get through it is really tough,” Davis said.
New episodes of Outlander air Sunday nights on Starz.
