Sometimes I don’t know who the bigger sadist is, Black Jack Randall, or Diana Gabaldon for creating him and then setting him loose on Jamie Fraser. Let me level with you: I found this part of the book so deeply disturbing, I considered not watching the series. I was like, I can't take that happening in real time! I do not enjoy physical violence in movies and I cannot watch rape scenes. So this episode was painful.
Probably the first physical assault scene I ever saw was a PBS version of Clarissa that traumatized me at age 8. Set in the 18th century, Clarissa died of shame after her assault. Not only was it horribly scarring for an 8 year old, but talk about a vicious message, and one that has echoed throughout literature and film... the idea of being “ruined.” So often on television, characters who are survivors exist only in one-off episodes, or sexual abuse will only happen to very peripheral characters on a series. We almost never seen main characters raped (interestingly enough, an exception this year was Queen Mary on Reign, another Scottish period drama). Nine times out of 10, main characters are saved at the last minute from assault, or they help a survivor deal after the fact. Frankly, that's a way of subtly marginalizing survivors and enforcing the idea a stigma attaches to them: this can't happen to heroes! If there is any point to depicting rape in media, it’s that having it happen to beloved, developed characters sends a strong message to survivors that their story is not unspeakable. That rape is everybody's problem because yes, it can happen to the main characters in our lives.
But maybe I should start talking about the actual show? Jamie was in Wentworth prison, watching people get hung in a very perfunctory fashion by the British, when his name was called next. Being Jamie, he fought for his life, but there was a dozen redcoats and one of him. Just as the rope was put around his neck, Black Jack Randall came in and was like “Not so fast.”
Meanwhile Claire was trying to sweet talk the head of the prison. She hoped to see Jamie and walk out with some intel, but she left with a box of his tchotchkes and puked outside the prison gates. Luckily two of her sloppiest dudes gambled with some jailors and got some very useful information: there’s a one-hour window of time in which the head of the jail will be checked out, they can sneak in, and hopefully liberate Jamie.
Meanwhile, Black Jack Randall threw Jamie in a dungeon where he was chained to a wall and given enough provisions to buoy him up for the long night of psychological torture to come. He had a muscle man, Morley, with him, and the first thing he did was burn Jamie’s hard-won petition of complaint. You know, just in case he had any last desperate atoms of hope in his heart. He also let him know he will certainly die, no two ways about it, but not before Black Jack Randall had the opportunity to torture him. But, if he surrendered to Black Jack now, he’d have the privilege of stabbing himself instead of being hung in the morning. Nice deal.
It was important to define Black Jack Randall as first and foremost a sadist, as Gabaldon could otherwise be condemned for having used an extremely homophobic "Devious Gay Predator" stereotype for her villain. Sandringham exists in the story for almost this express purpose: to be a nice, normal 18th century gay dude who in no way wanted to smash people’s hands with giant hammers. That Jack was attracted to Jamie was sort of besides the point (in the world of Outlander, literally everyone was), what makes him terrifying was that he wanted possession of Jamie’s soul. He wanted to break him psychologically, and bind them together forever through fear and trauma because deep down Randall could only feel fear and trauma, so this was the only form of intimacy he was capable of. To this end, Randall sprinkled spurts of compliments and life coaching in with his torture. He broke every bone in Jamie’s hand, then tenderly revived him. He was an uncomfortably close and detailed portrait of a complete sadist.
Gabaldon: Girl, what’s up. Did you date someone like this? Would love to know.
Anyway. Claire sweet talked her way back into Wentworth when she knew the Head Jailer would be indisposed, then when she’s left to wait for him in his office she grabbed his keys and headed through the jail to find Jamie. She was soon able to follow the sound of his screams. She removed a bolt from the back door before sneaking into his cell while Jack Randall was taking a snuff break or something and desperately tried to free him. Randall almost instantly returned.
So here was the crux of the episode: no amount of fear or abuse could get Jamie to capitulate to Randall. However, the moment Claire’s life was in danger, Jamie struck a deal: do what you want with me, just let her go. It’s Christmas in the springtime for arch-sadist Randall, and it’s also a powerful insight into Jamie’s character. His love was much, much stronger than his fear. Randall kissed Jamie in front of Claire and then hustled her out of there, but before he could throw her down the “Executed Prisoner Chute” onto a heap of corpses, Claire enacted her own form of psychological torture. She told him the date of his death, which was carefully hidden from the audience because that would be a major spoiler alert for Season 2, I presume.
I am writing about this all a little cursorily because frankly this was an extremely unpleasant episode to watch, much less to relish in exquisite detail. We had to see Jamie’s hand smashed, then watch Randall grope him, then watch Randall almost murder Claire. It’s all very not okay. I am still kind of furious at Diana Gabaldon for going into so much detail in the book, and the series was being faithful to her vision, and I’m terrified of what’s coming next week. If it were a woman being victimized I would call it gratuitous, however because it was a man my feelings are more complicated.
Male-on-male sexual assault is not something we see a lot of in mainstream film and TV. Female sexuality is public space, male sexuality is more private and almost inviolable, so seeing a strong, traditionally masculine lead character be objectified and violated in this way was shocking. This is not an age where viewers are easily shocked. I mean, I can see a guy's head pounded flat on Daredevil and not blink an eye: same old same old. So why have we never seen something like this Outlander scene before? What expectations was it subverting, what assumptions was it challenging?
This was shock with a social value. This was something almost unprecedented, a completely heroic, masculine narrative for a threat traditionally relegated to marginalized female characters. This was a character male and female survivors can identify with who was clearly blameless and strong and brave and without stigma, yet still trapped and coerced into "consenting" to his abuse. As grueling as this episode was (and I fear the next episode will get even more intense), hopefully through suffering by Jamie’s side, we all gained a visceral understanding that we must, at all costs, protect survivors from feeling diminished or stigmatized by sexual abuse.
So yeah! Extremely deep dark feels for this episode. Claire was going to go back in there and those of us who have read the book know it’s going to get darkest before dawn. Get out some of your feels now, tell me if you kept your eyes open the whole time, let me know how you’re doing, and let’s all mentally hold hands through the finale.
QUESTIONS...
... Did you keep your eyes open the whole time?
... Do you think Diana Gabaldon was intentionally trying to start a larger discussion about rape with Outlander?
... How impressed are you by Toby Menzies? Is playing a psycho sadist this well “career suicide” or will it launch him into the spotlight of casting directors everywhere?
... Can you handle the finale?