Time travel. Romance. Political intrigue. Bare bottoms. Yes, Outlander truly has something for everybody. Whether you’ve watched the beloved series a hundred times over or it’s your first encounter with feisty heroine Claire (Caitriona Balfe) and her hunky Highlander Jamie (Sam Heughan), the centuries-spanning story of love conquering all never gets old. 

With Season 6 now streaming alongside its predecessors, there’s no time like the present to queue up these 12 essential episodes and get caught up in Jamie and Claire’s story all over again. (And dinna fash: We won’t tell if you rewind the steamiest parts over and over again…)

Outlander

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Season 1, Episode 1: “Sassenach”

You never forget your first… episode. Thanks to stellar source material (author Diana Gabaldon’s best-selling book series) and a seasoned creative at the helm (executive producer and writer Ronald D. Moore, who scored an earlier sci-fi series win with Battlestar Galactica), Outlander burst onto the TV scene in 2014 knowing exactly what it was and where it was going. “Sassenach” introduces us to Claire Beauchamp Randall, an English combat nurse who, after reuniting with her husband, Frank (Tobias Menzies) following their respective tours of duty in World War II, mysteriously “falls” through a set of standing stones in the Scottish countryside and lands in the 18th century. There she meets a very comely Highland warrior named Jamie Fraser, who will serve as her protector (and more) as she navigates a time and place that are not her own. The debut serves up an intriguing brew of drama and mysticism that leaves you thirsting for more.

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

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Season 1, Episode 7: “The Wedding”

Outlander has earned plenty of praise for its attention to the female gaze, and nowhere is that more apparent than in this installment. Under the threat of being turned over to soldiers at Fort William, Claire makes the decision to marry Jamie to gain — in the Scotsman’s words — “my name and my family, my clan, and, if necessary, the protection of my body.” Emphasis here on body, because as man and wife, Claire and Jamie must seal their wedding vows. The first time is clumsy (Jamie is a virgin whose only real frame of reference for sex is mating livestock), but the second time, following some assertiveness on Claire’s part, is pretty good, indeed. We stan a woman who asks for what she wants — and a man who’s happy to oblige.

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

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Season 2, Episode 7: “Faith”

Make sure you have a box of tissues handy before watching (or rewatching) this heart-wrenching episode. Claire and Jamie are in France (part of their ploy to stop the Battle of Culloden), and things are far from magnifique. In fact, Jamie is locked up in the Bastille for dueling the dastardly Black Jack Randall (Tobias Menzies), and a pregnant Claire is in the hospital writhing in pain. Tragically, Claire miscarries (a daughter that the nun at the hospital names Faith), and nearly dies herself, ravaged by an infection. Healing hands prevail, but Claire’s grief over the loss of her and Jamie’s child is palpable and powerful.

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

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Season 2, Episode 13: “Dragonfly in Amber”

You could say the first two seasons of Outlander built up to this: the deadly Battle of Culloden. Despite their best efforts, Claire and Jamie’s schemes don’t stop the skirmish between the Jacobites and the British, and with her knowledge of the future, Claire is aware that this will be a bloody battle (somewhere between 1,500–2,000 Jacobites were killed or wounded, with just 300 losses on the British side). So Jamie makes a tough decision: Claire (once again pregnant) will return to her time and to Frank to raise her unborn child safely in the 20th century. Claire’s parting gift to Jamie: a dragonfly preserved in amber. (OK, you might need some tissues for this one too!)

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

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Season 3, Episode 6: “A. Malcolm”

Twenty years have passed since Claire slipped through the stones at Craigh na Dun to go back to the future, and she and Jamie have both lived a lot of life in the ensuing decades: Claire raises their daughter, Brianna (Sophie Skelton), and becomes a surgeon; Jamie sires an illegitimate son and becomes a smuggler and printing press owner (under the pseudonym Alexander Malcolm). But true love doesn’t obey the bounds of time and space, and when Claire learns that Jamie actually survived the Battle of Culloden, she returns to the 18th century to be reunited with her husband. And, boy, do they reunite [insert waggly eyebrows here].

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

Season 3, Episode 12: “The Bakra”

This one features the return of Claire’s time-traveling frenemy Geillis Duncan (Lotte Verbeek), who our heroine believes had been burned at the stake in Season 1. But Geillis is cunning, and not only did she escape death, she made a new life for herself as a wealthy widow in Jamaica. She makes her entry emerging from a giant vat of goat’s blood (the better for her skin, my dear) and with an eye towards weaseling secrets out of Jamie’s kidnapped nephew, Young Ian (John Bell), who has been turned over to the “Bakra” (aka “white lady”) by pirates. Claire must take down Geillis to not only save her nephew’s life, but her daughter Brianna’s in the future as well.

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

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Season 4, Episode 6: “Blood of My Blood”

Despite its title, this episode includes much less of the viscous red stuff than the previous one on our list. The “blood” here refers to Jamie’s son, William, who makes an unexpected (albeit brief) reappearance in Jamie’s life when the man raising him — Lord John Grey (David Berry), full of not-so-secret longing for Jamie — lands in Virginia on business. William doesn’t know Jamie is his father, but the two end up spending something of a father-son weekend in the woods together when John falls ill with measles and must quarantine. But the duo aren’t the only ones to bond: Claire tends to the sick John, during which time they both reveal small jealousies over the others’ relationship with Jamie, though eventually reach a detente. It's a melancholy, yet hopeful, conclusion (in other words, signature Outlander).

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

Season 4, Episode 9: “The Birds and the Bees”

Let us not forget about Jamie’s other child, Brianna — because she has been on one long and arduous journey to find her parents in the 18th century to warn them about a future fire at Fraser’s Ridge. (She’s a time traveler like her mother, Claire.) Not only does Brianna reunite with her mom, but she finally gets to meet her biological father. Except, well, it’s not exactly a Kodak moment. In keeping with the plot from the book, when she stumbles upon Jamie on the streets of North Carolina, he is in an alley — peeing against a wall, in fact — and mistakes Brianna’s greeting as some sort of come-on. (Major yikes!) But that misunderstanding is cleared up soon enough, and what follows is a truly tender and long-awaited moment for father and daughter (and fans).

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

Season 5, Episode 7: “The Ballad of Roger Mac”

Ever since Jamie and Claire made their home in the colonies, the Scotsman has felt torn between his Highlander roots and his debt to the crown, having been granted parcels for a homestead of his own. That tension comes to blows in “The Ballad of Roger Mac” as Jamie, forced into a red coat by Lord Tryon, finds himself on the opposite side of the battle line from his godfather, Murtagh (Duncan Lacroix), who’s in league with the rebel Regulators. In a tragic twist, Murtagh saves Jamie’s life, only to be felled by an enemy bullet moments later. Murtaugh’s life lasted a lot longer on the TV series than it did in the book series, but it’s a hard goodbye, nonetheless.

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

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Season 5, Episode 11: “Journeycake”

It might be a needlepoint sentiment, but that doesn’t make it any less true: Home is where the heart is. In Season 5’s penultimate installment, Brianna and husband Roger (Richard Rankin) make plans to return to the 20th century, where their son, Jemmy, can be raised in an era of modern medicine, indoor plumbing, and Bruce Springsteen hits. (C’mon! You know you love the Boss!) They concoct a cover story that Roger has gotten a job offer in Boston to avoid suspicion and make their teary goodbyes. But when the little family steps inside the rock outcropping and thinks about “home,” it isn’t the 1970s that greet them… 

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

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Season 6, Episode 1: “Echoes”

Season 6 opens with an extended flashback to Jamie’s time spent at Ardsmuir Prison as punishment for his involvement in the Jacobite uprising. And it’s against this harsh backdrop that we meet a character whose actions (and those of his family) will have nasty repercussions for the Fraser clan: fellow inmate Tom Christie (Mark Lewis Jones). A devout Protestant, Tom is often at odds with Catholic Jamie and his crew at Ardsmuir, but when Tom lands in America years later with his children Allan (Alexander Vlahos) and Malva (Jessica Reynolds), he has the audacity to ask his onetime foe for land to settle on Fraser’s Ridge. Unfortunately, Jamie and Claire’s generosity towards the Christies will eventually be their undoing — in more ways than one. 

Outlander

16+   2014

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Outlander

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Season 6, Episode 4: “Hour of the Wolf”

Why did Young Ian leave the Mohawk tribe? It’s a question Jamie’s nephew has left largely unanswered — until this gut-punch of an episode. An unexpected run-in with former Mohawk brother Kaheroton (Braeden Clarke) prompts Ian to reveal his heartbreaking story of love found with Wahionhaweh (Morgan Holmstrom) — and ultimately lost — to Jamie. But it’s a later split-second decision to save Kaheroton’s life during a duel that finally gives Young Ian much-needed closure. Indeed, our Young Ian really is growing up! 

Outlander

16+   2014

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Still not enough for you? There’s an bounty of shows like Outlander you can check out after revisiting these episodes.

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