'Outlander' Season 5 Episode 8 will not be airing this week but here's what fans can look forward to
Last week's episode 'The Ballad of Roger Mac' ended on a gruesome cliffhanger. Roger Mackenzie (Richard Rankin) was hanged as a "traitor to the Crown". This shocking turn of events occurs when Roger runs into his great grandmother, Morag Mackenzie, when he is sneaking back across enemy lines after warning Murtagh.
Morag's husband, William, gets angry when Roger hugs Morag in a gesture of familial affection. Of course, William doesn't know that Roger is his descendant and therefore has no qualms in handing him over to Governor Tryon's men.
At the end of the episode, Roger's wife Brianna Mackenzie (Sophie Skelton) watches with an ashen face as Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan) cuts his body down from the tree. It is a hell of a place to end an episode and the suspense has been made worse by the fact that 'Outlander' won't be airing a new episode this Sunday. This follows Starz's tradition of following the first half of a season with a week's hiatus before airing the rest of the season's episodes.
Outlander's new episode will only air on April 12. This Sunday, fans can catch up with all that's happened this season, with a marathon 'Outlander' binge-watch session on the Starz channel this Sunday on April 5 from 5 pm ET onward. All seven episodes that have been broadcasted till now will air, allowing fans who might have missed an episode to catch up. All the episodes, of course, are also available on the STARZ app.
Richard Rankin, who knows that fans have been left hanging, teased them with a cryptic tweet: "I’ve very much enjoyed my time on @Outlander_STARZ", suggesting that his character has made an exit for good. But the writer of the books on which the show is based, Diana Gabaldon, thankfully, put fans out of there misery by replying to Rankin's tweet, saying "So Far." with a smiley face kiss emoji.
She confirmed what people who have read her books already know. While Roger is hanged, when Jamie cuts him down from the tree, he is still alive, but barely. Tragically, his vocal cords are damaged by the ordeal and he can never sing again to his son, Jemmy. Being a singer is one of Roger's chief skills and he is always bursting into song.
While season 4 did not have a lot of scenes with him singing, season 5 is full of them. And of course, he is always playing songs from his own time (the 60s) that no one in the 1700s has heard of. He sings and strums his ukelele when he is trying to put the Brown clan at ease while recruiting for Jamie's militia. He frequently sings to baby Jemmy and also composes songs and melodies in his spare time.
This makes the loss of his voice even more poignant. However, he will still be around when 'Outlander' airs again, though the incident will leave a scar that will never heal. Going forward, we also have to see what Stephen Bonnet (Ed Speelers) does to the Fraser clan, especially now that Jemmy is the heir to Jocasta's fortune.
Brianna had foolishly told Bonnet when he was imprisoned that Jemmy might be his son and this makes the Irish pirate even more dangerous because he thinks he has the right to claim Jemmy as his own.
We will also see how Jamie will handle the aftermath of the Battle of Alamance, where he took up arms against his own godfather, Murtagh (Duncan Lacroix) and other Scottish Regulators. The guilt of Murtagh's death and Roger's vocal impairment will propel his actions for the second half of the season.
'Outlander' will air its new episode on Sunday, April 12 at 8 pm ET/PT, on STARZ, the STARZ app, and STARZ On Demand.