The long wait is almost over, both for Outlander’s highly anticipated return and for Claire (Caitriona Balfe) to reunite with Jamie (Sam Heughan) in the past.
Ahead of Comic-Con, Starz released the season-three trailer for Ron D. Moore’s adaptation of Diana Gabaldon’s third book in the Outlander series, Voyager, and the footage reveals a lot of information about what fans can expect to see after more than a year of waiting. Picking up right where the season-two finale left off, Claire travels through the stones to return to her life in 1948 with Frank (Tobias Menzies), pregnant with Jamie’s child. Her marriage to her first husband, Frank, suffers as she deals with the loss of Jamie and her sudden return home. But unbeknownst to Claire, Jamie survived the disastrous Battle of Culloden back in the 18th century.
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As the years pass, Jamie and Claire attempt to live their lives apart from one another, each haunted by the memory of their lost love. But when the possibility that Claire can return to Jamie in the past breathes new hope into Claire’s heart in her present, it also presents new conflicts. Separated by continents and centuries, Claire and Jamie must find their way back to each other. But if/when they find each other, will they be the same people who fell in love all those years ago?
While book readers may know what’s coming in season three, executive producer Moore has proved several times that he has no qualms about changing the story from Gabaldon’s pages to the screen. So here are the six biggest reveals from the season-three trailer, including one major change from the source material that may have wide-ranging consequences.
1. Claire and Frank return to their regularly scheduled lives
Moore threw fans for a loop when he changed up the structure of last season. The finale showed Claire arriving back in 1948 to Frank, and the season-three premiere will pick up at that same moment when she gives birth to Jamie’s daughter Brianna (Sophie Skelton) and Frank makes a promise to raise her as his own child. But the season-three trailer reveals that decision won’t be an easy one as Claire can’t let her memories of Jamie go, and every time she looks at her redheaded daughter, she sees his face instead of Frank’s. Despite Frank’s hopeful, “we’re going to be alright, I promise,” at the beginning of the footage, it’s clear that the next 20 years of their marriage will be rocky at best.
It’s clear to see the pain on Claire’s face when Frank says, “Come to daddy, give me a kiss,” to a baby Brianna. Frank sleeps on the couch, they get into shouting matches about Claire leaving behind everything that “truly mattered” to her. This is not a happy household.
2. Dr. Claire is back
While her marriage isn’t in the best of places, Claire does get back into the operating room, and she looks quite happy in her natural habitat. Her time in the past hopefully hasn’t had a negative effect on her modern surgery skills. Maybe it’s made her even better?
3. Jamie’s old life isn’t there to return to
Unfortunately, Jamie’s struggles are going to be a lot worse than Claire’s. After he sent his pregnant wife back through the stones, he fought at the Battle of Culloden and lost, but survived. When he tries to return home to his sister Jenny (Laura Donnelly) at Lallybroch in the season-three trailer, he’s promptly arrested by redcoats, and it looks like he was betrayed by his own sister. This already looks like a major change from Voyager, since in the books, he hides in a cave near Lallybroch, only visiting about once a month. He actually arranges to get himself arrested on purpose later on to help families collect a reward to keep from going hungry. This change might have bigger consequences down the line if he can no longer trust his own family.
4. Lord John Grey’s return
And that sets the stage for a big fan favorite character to return. After his season-two debut, Lord John Grey (David Berry) is back as the new governor of the prison Jamie will be kept at for a long time. They build a friendship over time, as can be seen in a clip from the new trailer as Jamie opens up to Grey about losing Claire.
5. The proof she needs
Thanks to some scholarly help from Roger Wakefield (Richard Rankin) after Frank’s passing, Claire is able to find real proof that Jamie survived the Battle of Culloden, motivating her to go back through the stones decades after their tearful goodbye.
6. The scene book fans have all been waiting for
Jamie and Claire’s inevitable reunion is officially coming this season, and now we have proof thanks to this trailer. Did you catch that “A. Malcolm” sign hanging outside a seemingly innocuous shop that Claire enters with a hopeful smile? That stands for Alex Malcolm, the false identity Jamie is living under in Edinburgh, smuggling liquor. Get ready, because the infamous printing press shop scene is coming, and sooner than you think if this trailer is for the first half of season three. Since there’s no footage of ships or sailing to the West Indies or Jamaica or even Jamie’s second family, it’s probable that Outlander will use Jamie and Claire’s reunion as a possible halfway point cliff-hanger this season.
Check out the season-three trailer above, and let us know in the comments what other Easter eggs you can glimpse from the footage.
