As Outlander: Blood of My Blood continues expanding the beloved franchise, showrunner Matthew B. Roberts says the prequel was never about simply revisiting familiar characters. Instead, the goal was to reintroduce fans to a world they thought they already understood while exploring new stories, relationships, and perspectives within it.

Speaking while season 2 was filming in Scotland, Roberts explained that the first season focused heavily on establishing the foundation of the series. Although longtime Outlander fans are already familiar with the Fraser and MacKenzie clans, Blood of My Blood needed to introduce its own characters, family dynamics, and conflicts before diving deeper into the drama.

“You have to start the story,” Roberts said. “You spend a lot of time just getting the story started, getting the audience up to speed about the world and who everybody is, and then the family dynamics.”

While the original Outlander followed Claire and Jamie Fraser across multiple countries and decades, Blood of My Blood remains largely rooted in Scotland during the early 1700s. The story unfolds against the backdrop of Highland politics, clan rivalries, and the growing tensions that would eventually lead to the Jacobite uprising.

The series also introduces the Grant family while further exploring familiar figures connected to the Fraser and MacKenzie clans. Because many viewers already know where certain storylines eventually lead, Roberts believes the challenge is not about surprising audiences with the ending but showing them how events unfold.

“I’ve suffered from that since the first day that Outlander started,” Roberts said. “Everybody knows the outcome. Everybody knows that certain things happen, certain people live. It’s the how that is the interesting part.”

That philosophy has shaped many of the show’s biggest twists.

One example came in the season 1 finale when Dougal MacKenzie unexpectedly married Maura Grant. While fans already knew from established canon that the two characters would eventually marry, Roberts wanted to approach the relationship from a fresh angle.

“We know that Dougal marries Maura, that’s canon,” he explained. “I thought a really cool twist would be that he’s forced to do it.”

The marriage occurred after Ellen MacKenzie abandoned her arranged match with Malcolm Grant, forcing their siblings into a last-minute union to preserve the alliance between the families. According to Roberts, the creative team saw an opportunity to build a complicated relationship between two characters who initially had little reason to like each other.

The challenge for the writers, however, is ensuring every interaction feels believable within the realities of 18th-century Scotland. Unlike modern stories where characters can easily reconnect, people lived far apart across the Highlands, making reunions and relationships more difficult to arrange naturally.

“You want to revisit characters that you’ve already seen that were great together,” Roberts said. “But getting them together in story is different.”

The prequel also gives the writers freedom to explore characters whose histories were only briefly mentioned in the original series. Among them are Claire Fraser’s parents, Henry and Julia Beauchamp.

Because little has been established about their lives, the writers have more room to create stories. However, Roberts says that freedom comes with responsibility.

“There is a lot of freedom in telling what happens to get them there,” he explained. “With Henry and Julia, you have to be much more careful because you want to make sure you’re not exploding something.”

He compared the challenge to expanding Murtagh Fraser’s storyline in the original series. Every new story decision has the potential to affect established canon, requiring careful consideration of how future events connect to what fans already know.

Another major difference between Blood of My Blood and its predecessor is its focus on Scotland itself. While Outlander eventually expanded into France, the Caribbean, and North America, the prequel remains centered on the Highlands.

Roberts has previously described the series as an opportunity to showcase Scotland “in all its glory,” but he also sees it as a chance to spend more time examining the relationships within the Fraser and MacKenzie families.

With the world-building largely complete after season 1, future episodes will be able to focus more heavily on character interactions, emotional conflicts, and evolving family dynamics.

“That’s what we started to do more,” Roberts said. “There’s more to come, and then you can start exploring those different kinds of relationships.”

As Blood of My Blood moves forward, Roberts believes those relationships will remain at the heart of the series, offering fans a deeper look at the people and events that helped shape the world of Outlander long before Claire Fraser stepped through the stones.

Source: Compiled from various sources.