Outer Range Review: The Time / The Loss (Season 1 Episodes 3 and 4)
I don’t think I could ever properly explain my feelings about Outer Range Season 1 Episode 3, “The Time.” But I can say this: I think I’m rooting for the bad guys.
In defense of the Tillersons, let me say that between the two rival families, the Abbotts are the ones making things actively worse. They’re going around town lying and trying to get others to lie for them while the Tillersons are committing the heinous crime of… worrying about their brother?
It seems obvious that we’re supposed to be rooting for the Abbott family. Royal is just a regular Joe trying to make a living on a family ranch with his two boys. They’re often the victims of circumstance rather than troublemakers.
The Tillersons, meanwhile, are pretty much doing the same thing. Except I guess they are troublemakers. Unlike the Abbotts, however, they have an absent mother and sick (or is he!) father and have just lost their eldest brother.
So if the Tillersons are the bad guys, what are their crimes? Aside from Wayne being a certified weirdo and Billy’s offering of tobacco to little Amy, of course?
To be completely honest, none of this actually matters all that much. Because we’ve got bigger fish to fry and bigger mountains to disappear.
For example, one of the themes I’ve noticed throughout the series thus far is Amy’s strange likeness to Autumn. Not only are they physically similar, but they also talk similarly, and Autumn remembers nothing about most of her childhood.
So maybe I’m going crazy here, but I have a theory that Autumn might be Amy in the future. I don’t have any real proof of this, but we know that the void is some kind of portal through time. So it’s not that hard to see why I may have come to this conclusion.
We see the most similarities on Outer Range Season 1 Episode 4, “The Loss.” We see both Amy and Autumn talking about enjoying hiking, attending the same events, and making the same friendships.
Let me go grab my tin hat before I continue…
Seriously, though, we need to talk about Autumn’s relationships. She’s a young, pretty girl with a strange sense of belonging on the Abbott Ranch and a whole lot of questions. Yet, she instantly seems to earn the good graces of all the members of the Abbott family.
Either way, it appears Autumn might be the key to figuring out what’s going on. Hopefully so, anyway, since we still don’t have a clue.
Now that Trevor has been found dead on the land between the families’ properties, there’s officially a murder investigation underway. Both Rhett and Perry somehow get out of their interrogation rooms and back home, despite the fact that Perry is the actual murderer.
Wayne is still a mystery I do not want to solve. He’s sick except when he’s not, he sings about things for no reason (not unlike his son), and he has something weird going on between him and that bison head in his bedroom. But Luke and Billy Tillerson can do no wrong in my eyes.
I still worry that Outer Range might push a little too hard on the mystery and take too long getting to any explanations. Maybe I’m just burned by series I’ve seen before, but I really hope this one gives us just enough to hold us over and wanting more.
And if they want me to root for the Abbotts, they’re going to have to give me a good reason.
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Outer Range airs on Fridays in two-episode increments on Prime Video.
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