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*“Outlander: Blood of My Blood” expands the beloved “Outlander” universe with a bold new chapter, one that unpacks the origin stories and introduces fresh faces.
The prequel series follows two sweeping romances: Ellen MacKenzie (Harriet Slater) and Brian Fraser (Jamie Roy) in 18th-century Scotland, and Julia Moriston (Hermione Corfield) and Henry Beauchamp (Jeremy Irvine) set against the backdrop of World War I.For showrunner Matthew B. Roberts, the guiding principle was to dig deeper into the lore while keeping the heart of “Outlander” intact.
“Well, the idea is just to tell new Outlander stories to open up the universe a little bit and dig deep into the lore,” he explains. “Obviously, the Brian and Ellen story… there’s threads of that through the books. I wanted to know more about that. It’s very interesting how Jamie came to be. You know, how do his parents meet and evolve?”
Roberts also reveals an intriguing twist at the core of the new narrative. “So the idea was… what if they didn’t die in that car crash? Let’s explore that couple and how their love came to be, and how the two couples’ love stories create the ultimate love story. That’s kind of the idea that pushes our narrative forward. The love stories that tell the love story.”
Casting these pivotal roles required balancing authenticity with originality, says executive producer Maril Davis. “Our first job is to make sure we’re getting the best actors we can. We got very lucky with this round that we got actors who not only are phenomenal in their own right, but also embodied some part of the legacy characters they were playing.”
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On Jamie Roy as Brian Fraser, Davis notes, “Jamie Roy has a sprinkling of Sam Heughan there, but he brings a very different performance than Sam. He’s his own person. We didn’t want a Jamie 2.0. We wanted Brian to be his own character and be different than Jamie.” Harriet Slater, she adds, captures Ellen perfectly: “In the book, she is described as a fiery redhead, and in Harriet we found someone who has such fire, but also such deep emotion. She commands every room that she comes into.”
With Claire’s parents, the team had more creative freedom. “We didn’t have that much of a template for them, aside from Claire, because not much is said in the book about them at all, if at all,” Davis explains. “But we wanted two people we could kind of believe that embodied things that Claire would have inherited.”
She praises Hermione Corfield’s portrayal of Julia: “There’s such a presence to her, and there’s such an intelligence and vulnerability at times. That character is a master of all trades. She’s very artistic. She can fiddle with things and put things together. She’s great with herbs. It was so many of those things that will be passed on to Claire.”
As for what audiences, both longtime fans and newcomers, can expect, Roberts hopes for a deeply emotional journey.
“I hope it offers good story, well told visually, that they go on an emotional roller coaster ride. There’s a lot of highs, there’s a lot of lows. I think you’ll cry… chuckle here and there, and you’ll cry even more.”
He adds that while the series retains the essence of “Outlander,” it introduces “a lot more family dynamics in the show… There’s clan rivalries, there’s family rivalries… There’s so much more. And then there’s all of Scotland. We try to show Scotland in her best light, in her worst light. So there’s a lot to offer here.”
Watch our conversation with Matthew and Maril via the clip below.
“Outlander: Blood of My Blood” debuted Friday, August 8, on STARZ, with new episodes streaming weekly on Fridays on the STARZ app and airing at 8:00 pm ET/PT in the U.S. and 9:00 pm ET/PT in Canada.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
MORE NEWS ON EURWEB.COM: Hermione Corfield and Jeremy Irvine Open Up About Joining the World of ‘Outlander: Blood of My Blood’ | EUR Video Exclusive
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