Outlander - The Books vs The Series

I’m intimidated by big books.  Any book with over 500 pages scares me.  I like to read fast and with a large book, I know going in it’s going to take a lot longer to read.  So even after hearing so many wonderful things about Outlander, I still gave it a pass.  But after hearing constantly how Jamie Fraser was the perfect hero, I finally bit the bullet and read it.  This is probably going back about 10 years or so.  I read Outlander, skipped Dragonfly in Amber and skipped a good deal of Voyager and read the part where Clare and Jamie were reunited and I was all good.  I was never tempted to read any of the other ones. 

 

 

 

I heard talk over the years about how wonderful it would be to see the books be made into a movie and who should play what part.  I never really cared.  But then I heard Starz was going to make it into a series. A much better idea then say a three part movie franchise like they do with so many other books to movies.  And while I was ambivalent as to who would play Clare, when I saw who was chosen for Jamie, well, my hot actor radar kicked up big time and the more I read about it the more excited I got until I could hardly contain myself when it started playing in Canada on Showcase.  I love period piece movies series, North and South, Last of the Mohicans, Rob Roy, The Highlander (the television series – never did see the movies) and so on.  So I was ecstatic when I found out that yes, we would be able to see it in Canada.

 

I loved it from the opening credits, in fact I have the song now from ITunes.  I waited anxiously for 10:00 every Sunday night for it to start.  And oh my, the connection between Sam Heughan as Jamie and Caitriona Balfe as Claire!  Their chemistry leaps off the screen.

I thought three episodes in that since it’s been a while since I’d read it, I should do a reread.  And now that I had a Most Excellent Picture of Jamie – I think I didn’t really before as he was described as having red hair and

Carrot Top kept getting in the way.  I skipped the first part and started reading where the series was up to and kept reading until the end of the first series.  I figured I’d keep reading when the series had a break but that didn’t happen.

The second series started last Sunday – and hands up – who watched it??  I gave up smoking when I broke my leg but my heavenly stars I could have used one towards the end of the final scene. 

 

That was – as Jim Carrey says – SMOKIN’.  I was definitely breathing heavy.  Anyway – moving on – I figured I’d best get back on the book horse and start reading again.  And I hit a wall.  A huge wall.  I wall I don’t think I can climb and now I remember why I didn’t get caught up in the whole series like so many others have.

 

I Don’t Like Claire.  Oh no I do not like her at all.  While not as apparent in the series because I do like Caitrona playing her, in the book, I find her dreadful. 

***Rant about to begin****

I do not understand why she seems determined to press all of Jamie’s buttons. 

It seems like it’s almost out of spite.  Here she has this hot, young guy who is strong and brave and hot and patient and forward thinking for his time and hot and willing to risk his own life for her and hot and funny and protective and willing to take on the punishment of others and hot and a virgin no less but very good at it once he gets going and hot and between the Jamie in the book and the Jamie in the series just about the most perfect hero – evah – and Claire seems determined to rile him up in one way or another.  I get that she comes from the future and as a working woman is even more advanced than the usual housewife, but she’s not in her own time and so she shouldn’t play be the rules she knows.  In the past, she should be led by Jamie.  While I don’t agree with the controversial spanking, she did do an extremely stupid thing and as a result has risked the whole clan, not to mention putting a HUGE target on Jamie’s back.  She knows there are redcoats wandering about.  She knows that Black Jack Randall is after her.  And during their epic fight she had the nerve to call Jamie a sadist – when she had evidence herself and what she saw he had done to Jamie, that Randall was a sadist in truth. 

Yes, I get that she wants to get back to Frank - though why I don’t understand completely why when she has Jamie.

Yet despite everything he has done for her she accuses him of cheating.  She accuses him of marrying her for money.  NO, you stupid woman!  He married you to SAVE YOUR LIFE.  I don’t see a whole lot of gratitude for that either.  Sure there was some – but not much.  I swear Jamie has the heart of a saint to both get past his anger so quickly and forgive her so easily.

 Anyway, I’m going to have to give up on reading the book.  To do both would be a double negative on my feelings for Claire.  I would be so angry with her while reading and so angry while watching.  And because the series is so good and Jamie is so, um hot, I’m just going to stick with the series.

~*~*~*~

 

And I need to update a previous post.  I was talking about getting invested in shows only to have them cancel before their time and I completely forgot about Copper.  This was another show that ran on showcase a couple of years ago about Kevin Corcoran,  a ‘copper’ from Ireland who helped police the slums of Five Points district in New York City just around the time of the Civil War.  He was a very intriguing character, a real anti-hero.  One scene he would do something heroic, the next something despicable.  It was a series done by BBC America and I loved it.  I was devastated when it was cancelled.

Well, that's it for today.

'til later