Outlander fans were overjoyed to welcome Claire (Caitriona Balfe), Jamie (Sam Heughan) and the Fraser-MacKenzie crew back for season six on Sunday after a two-year Droughtlander with no new episodes.
However, some were a little unsure over darker plot lines that were set up during the season’s opening feature-length episode, namely concerning time-travelling nurse-turned-doctor Claire.
The Starz series opened with a lengthy flashback to Jamie’s time at Ardsmuir Prison 20 years prior in 1753, to set up his relationship with new settlers at Fraser’s Ridge, led by the pious and cold Tom Christie (Mark Lewis Jones).
However, it’s not just the uneasy arrival of the Christie family and the nearing of the American Revolutionary War that is set to cause ‘tension’ and ‘disruption’, as teased by stars Richard Rankin and Sophie Skelton, for our favourite settlers – it turns out there’s trouble brewing in the Big House itself.
During the episode, Claire is shown experimenting with an early form of anaesthetic and triumphs in recreating ether as a gas, which she hopes to use on patients going forward, rather than having to rely on laudanum or whisky.
As Jamie remains slightly concerned over its power, having had trouble rousing Claire from a testing attempt early on, she is then shown turning to the substance as she struggles to sleep later in the episode.