Summary:
- "Outlander" may be ending with season eight, but fans can look forward to a new prequel series.
- "Outlander: Blood of My Blood" will focus on the origin stories of Jamie and Claire's parents.
- Production on the 10-episode series is now underway in Scotland. Here's everything you need to know.
It was announced in early 2023 that "Outlander" had been renewed for an eighth but final season, putting a pin in Starz's original plan to adapt all of Diana Gabaldon's novels (the last of which has still not yet been written).
Although that will bring Jamie (Sam Heughan) and Claire's (Caitríona Balfe) time-traveling escapades to a close, audiences will be delighted to learn that a prequel series continuing the story of the Fraser family is officially in production.
Speculation that Starz was expanding the "Outlander" universe began in 2020 when Deadline reported that the network bosses had encouraged producers Ronald D. Moore and Maril Davis to "to plot a slew of spin-offs, sequels and story extensions."
The prequel series was officially greenlit in 2022, and several months later, it was confirmed that the writers' room had started working on scripts and that the series had been given a name — "Outlander: Blood of My Blood."
Per an official description shared by Starz in February 2023, the series will "center on these two parallel love stories set in two different time periods, with Jamie's parents in the early 18th century Scottish Highlands and Claire's parents in WWI England."
The streamer had previously stated that the prequel would center on Jamie's mother and father, Ellen MacKenzie and Brian Fraser — two characters that audiences know plenty about, mainly through stories told by their son.
An abridged version of Ellen and Brian's love story was detailed by Jamie in season one: the pair eloped together and stayed hidden until Ellen was visibly pregnant with their first child, forcing her family to accept their union.
The decision to include Claire's parents in the show is sure to be a welcome one. Not much is known about Julia Moriston and Henry Beauchamp beyond the fact that they died when Claire was a young girl.
"We're thrilled to be telling the stories of these two couples," said Matthew B. Roberts, showrunner, executive producer and writer on both "Outlander" and "Outlander: Blood of My Blood."
"The origins of their relationships explore universal themes that transcend time periods, and we're so excited for fans to discover and fall in love with these characters and their love stories the way they have with Claire and Jamie."
Harriet Slater, best known for her role in "Pennyworth," will play Jamie's mother, Ellen MacKenzie, in the 18th-century Scotland storyline, alongside Lifetime actor Jamie Roy, who plays his father, Brian Fraser.
As for Claire's parents, whose story unfolds in World War I-era England, Hermoine Corfield, previously seen in "Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation," will play Julia Moriston; "Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again" actor Jeremy Irvine will play her father, Henry Beauchamp.
The story focusing on Brian and Ellen will be set sometime around 1716, some 30 years before Claire travels back in time and meets Jamie. That's when the Great Gathering at Castle Leoch happened — where Brian and Ellen met for the first time — according to the "Outlander" books.
That would make our heroine Ellen and her future husband Brian both 25 at the time the series begins, as they were both born in 1681, per details shared in "Dragonfly in Amber."
The other story about Claire's parents is likely to take place sometime in the 1910s. As fans know from the first book installment, Claire was born in 1918 and was five years old when her parents passed away in 1923. Exact details on when her parents met or how old they were are not known.
The author has confirmed that, alongside writing what is expected to be the tenth and final novel in the "Outlander" series, she is also working on several other stories connected to Jamie and Claire, including a prequel novel about Jamie's parents.
The book does not yet have a title, but Gabaldon told the audience at the 2022 Edinburgh International Book Festival that it includes romance and plenty of historical intrigue.
"The story is woven in with the Jacobite Risings – there will be a lot of clan politics and other interesting things," she said, per The Scotsman.
For those who are interested, she has shared several excerpts of the book with her Facebook audience.
As for how the show's producers are working with Gabaldon and her unfinished novel, executive producer Maril Davis told Business Insider in August: "We hope she will share as she goes, but we've kind of been taking the breadcrumbs she's left in her books and expanding on those to build a story."
