Outlander is the only TV show in which a man and a woman truly listen to each other
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The Starz series offers a great and rare lesson in how to listen and communicate with each other, says Hank Stuever. "What more could we need from a TV series in 2018 than to see two adults persist against all odds by listening to one another?" says Stuever. He adds: "Outlander’s” best moments are found in those smaller, more insular moments in which Jamie and Claire see the world through one another’s perspectives. TV is full of couples who misconstrue, raise volumes, ignore key issues, assign blame, gossip to outside confidants about spousal shortcomings, disappoint in the bedroom and storm out of the house a lot. The technical term for that is conflict and most writers of relationship stories would be lost without it. Which is why, the more you watch Outlander, the more you see just how intentionally it veers from prestige TV’s frustrating parade of toxic, temperamental couplings — everything from You’re the Worst to The Affair to Camping. Jamie and Claire deal with all sorts of external melodramatic dangers, but together they might as well be gorgeous unicorns. They don’t bicker. They don’t interrupt one another. He doesn’t ramble on about battlefield heroics; she doesn’t start in with monologues about electricity and indoor plumbing. Their presence within a shared present asks the viewer: When was the last time anyone really heard what you were saying?"
