Outlander: Blood of My Blood‘s character focus is on Ellen MacKenzie, Brian Fraser, Julia Moriston, and Henry Beauchamp, the parents of Outlander protagonists Claire Beauchamp and Jamie Fraser, respectively. Episode 6, “Birthright”, features Harry in a particularly dangerous situation.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Roberts and Henry actor Jeremy Irvine discuss the prequel’s most shocking episode yet, and how they’ve had an impact on Henry’s mental state. During the episode, Arch Bug pays a midwife to lie to Henry that Julia and their baby died during childbirth, and are buried in an unmarked grave.
This revelation sends war vet Henry spiraling, and he begins to lose his grip on reality, which finds him in a dangerous place mentally. Check out Roberts and Irvine’s comments below:
Jeremy Irvine: We’ve seen Henry and Julia and how in love they are when they’re together. Now, we’ve got to show that if he believes she’s gone, that if she’s dead, then part of him is dead. He would die for her in a second. And if that person is gone, then he needs to be completely and utterly broken. I wanted to go from that [feeling] and then go to the exact opposite, because I thought that would be incredibly unsettling to watch — to see him go from this utter desolation and grief to elation. When we read it, there wasn’t any sort of laughing in the script, but I thought, “God, what if he starts laughing? What if he’s just suddenly incredibly happy?” I thought we have to show how mad [or insane] he is. If we don’t show him mentally losing grip on reality, then are we going to sympathize with him when he goes and does this awful thing with Seema? I just thought it’d be really unsettling to show him going to the absolute darkest place and then coming out a few minutes later in the opposite emotion to show his fragile mental state. The season definitely ends on a crescendo, so it’s building up and up. The story would be over if Julia was gone for him entirely, so yes, there might be a meeting again. And then there’s some very awkward questions to be asked from both of them. They put unconditional love to the test.
Matthew B. Roberts: They have no freedoms; they don’t have their own free will, so to speak. Certainly, with the birth of that child, it’s not good for Julia. It actually becomes worse now that she’s had a child. Henry is in the service of the Grants, and he can’t just go, “Hey, I’m going to quit now.” So I think both these characters are in their prisons, and all they want to do is get to each other — and they will eventually. But how that happens is the fun part.
What This Means For Outlander: Blood Of My Blood
Henry is going to be in a very dark place, believing Julia and their baby have died, and he’s bound to hit rock bottom. Irvine’s comments show that the series was keen to show how in love Henry and Julia are, and then juxtapose this with the grief and anguish Henry feels when he believes he has lost them.
In June 2025, Outlander: Blood of My Blood was renewed for a second season ahead of the series premiere.
There is no telling the road Henry will go down now, and what he will do in the wake of this revelation. However, as the comments suggest, this is not the end of their story, and it is inevitable that Julia and Henry will be reunited at some point over the course of the show, though it’s unclear how this might play out.
Our Take On Henry & Julia’s Blood Of My Blood Story
Outlander establishes that Claire’s parents died in a car accident, but Outlander: Blood of My Blood retcons this, showing Henry and Julia to be time travelers, like their daughter. There’s also the revelation that Claire isn’t an only child, and it will be interesting to see how this plays out for the rest of the show, assuming Julia and the baby survive.
