• Warning: Major spoilers ahead for season seven, episode 11 of the Starz drama "Outlander."
• Actor David Berry spoke to BI about shooting an intimate scene with Caitríona Balfe.
• The actor said he would always wonder if they could have done it differently.

Season seven, episode 11 of "Outlander" saw the Starz drama take on one of the most-anticipated — and controversial — storylines from the book series written by Diana Gabaldon.

After learning in the previous episode that the ship Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan) was traveling on had sunk, Claire Fraser (Caitríona Balfe) and Lord John Grey (David Berry) were left grief-stricken.

When audiences saw them next, the pair hastily married to stop the English army from arresting Claire for espionage.

While their marriage was meant to be entirely platonic — given John's sexuality and Claire's unending love for Jamie — the two unexpectedly ended up consummating their marriage while in a haze of despair, drunkenness, and delirium while both imagining that the other is their beloved Jamie.

Speaking to Business Insider, Berry reflected on the experience of shooting his first sex scene for "Outlander" and the challenges that came with it.

"This was a very big moment for me as an actor because it's the first time that I was called upon to do sort of an 'Outlander' intimate scene," Berry said, adding that it "was a moment I was afraid of but also looking forward to."

Berry's trepidation at taking on the scene is understandable. While not the most shocking scene in "Outlander" — the show has long been serving up challenging scenes — it is one particularly unpopular with fans given its implications for Jamie and Claire's romance.

But Berry said that despite his concerns, he went into the storyline with enthusiasm.

"I think as someone who's been on the show for eight years and has sometimes felt like I've been on the bench, this was a great opportunity for me to step up my game," Berry said.

"There was a lot of excitement, on my behalf, to portray something so challenging and weird and just kind of solve that mystery of how and why these characters do what they do," he continued, adding: "It's a dangerous moment for the show because it really tests the credulity of the audience to believe that these characters would do such a thing."

"You still have to ground it in some element of truth," he added.

The actor said it was no easy feat to nail the scene in a way that would communicate his and Balfe's characters' shared trauma, corporeal urges, and the humanity behind their decision.

The pair prepared for the sequence with Vanessa Coffey, who has worked as an intimacy coordinator on the show since season six.

But preparation began long before even getting to set.

"Cait and I spent some time just doing some drama school kind of nerdy stuff, just improvising through the scene to find that stuff that isn't spoken about," Berry recalled.

"Of course, everyone had different ideas about how it should be depicted, and having Vanessa there to arbitrate all that was was really great," he continued. "She had a really tough job because it was not like any other love scene that's been depicted on the show."

Due to its unique, unconventional nature, Berry said he would always look back on the scene and wonder if they could have done it differently.

"It's one of those moments in which I'll always look back and think, 'Could we have done more?' Because there are so many different ways to do it," he said, adding that he thought they "gave it a good crack."

"I was willing to push it as far as needed to go," he continued. "There were ideas about how far we should push it, of course, and questions like 'Do audiences really want to see what John and Claire get on heavy?' and I still don't know the answer."

• "Outlander" season seven has seen one major member of Jamie Fraser's family recast.
• Jenny Murray was played by Laura Donnelly in earlier seasons.
• As of season seven part two, Kristin Atherton has taken over the role.

Warning: Spoilers ahead for "Outlander" season seven, episode nine, "Unfinished Business."

The second half of "Outlander" season seven has reintroduced viewers to a few characters not seen since the show's early days.

As Jamie (Sam Heughan) and Claire (Caitríona Balfe) made their return to the Frasers' ancestral home, Lallybroch, in the midseason premiere, which aired on November 22, the couple reunited with a number of old acquaintances, including Ian Murray (Steven Cree) and Laoghaire Mackenzie (Nell Hudson).

Among the returning characters was Jamie's no-nonsense sister, Janet "Jenny" Murray. But while the character was originally played by Northern Irish actor Laura Donnelly in early seasons, she has been replaced by another actor for season seven.

Starz announced in late 2022 that Kristin Atherton would be taking over the role from Donnelly, who last appeared on the show in season three, which aired in 2017.

The reason behind the recasting decision has not been made public. Representatives for Donnelly and Starz did not respond to a request for comment sent by Business Insider.

However, Donnelly has been busy with several other projects since she last appeared in "Outlander."

Donnelly played the protagonist in HBO's "The Nevers," which began airing in 2021, and has appeared in the movies "Tolkien" (2019) and "The Heist Before Christmas" (2023). Most recently, she played the older version of Emma Healy's character in the Hulu historical drama "Say Nothing," which premiered on November 14.

Elsewhere, Donnelly, who is an Olivier Award-winning and Tony-nominated actor, has been appearing in the Broadway run of "The Hills of California," directed by Sam Mendes and written by Donnelly's husband, Jez Butterworth.

Meanwhile, Atherton, who made her "Outlander" debut in Friday's episode, is best known as a voice actor and has voiced several video game characters. Her television roles include appearances in the British dramas "Waterloo Road" and "Doctors."

Jenny is just one of several key characters from past seasons who'll be making a comeback this season. As well as the aforementioned characters, Dougal MacKenzie (Graham McTavish), Geillis Duncan (Lotte Verbeek), Brian Fraser (Andrew Whipp), and Joan MacKenzie (Layla Burns) will appear.

Given that these returning characters are dead, audiences may be wondering how exactly they will be written back into the story. While flashbacks are possible, showrunner Matthew B. Roberts hinted at another possibility.

"One of the many joys of our epic story is the element of time travel which allows us to revisit some of our favorite characters in different times and places," he said in a statement to BI.

"Outlander" airs Fridays at 8 p.m. ET on Starz, streaming on Prime Video with Starz or Hulu with Starz.

• The time-traveling romance drama "Outlander" returns to Starz on Friday, November 22.
• The first half of season seven aired in 2023 before the series took a lengthy midseason hiatus.
• Here's where we left Jamie, Claire, and the rest of the characters the last time we saw them.

Warning: Spoilers ahead for "Outlander" season seven, part one.

The time-traveling romance drama "Outlander" finally returns on Friday after a lengthy midseason break.

The first eight episodes of the Starz drama's seventh season aired in the summer of 2023, meaning it's been more than a year since audiences last caught up with 18th-century Scottish warrior Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan) and his time-hopping wife Claire Randall Fraser (Caitríona Balfe).

While season seven began with the couple once again being separated by enemy forces, by the midseason finale, the two were reunited and on a ship bound for Scotland.

If you're struggling to remember what else happened in the first half of season seven, here's a reminder of where every major character ended up when audiences saw them last.

Claire started season seven in jail and ended it returning to Scotland with Jamie.

Claire began season seven in a jail cell in Wilmington after she was falsely accused of murdering her pregnant apprentice, Malva Christie (Jessica Reynolds).

Although Jamie was determined to free her by any means possible, it was Tom Christie (Mark Lewis Jones) who came to Claire's rescue by confessing to the murder of his daughter (although he did not do it either).

Audiences eventually learned that Tom's older son, Allan Christie (Alexander Vlahos), was the one who killed Malva. Scared that his abusive, incestuous relationship with his half-sister would be revealed because Malva did not want to lie about her child's paternity, he slit her throat.

Once freed from jail, Claire returned to Fraser's Ridge and continued her duties as the community's doctor and healer, which included delivering her granddaughter.

Not long after, Claire found herself at the center of the Revolutionary War, caring for wounded rebels fighting alongside her husband.

By the midseason finale, Claire and Jamie were making the journey back to Scotland after an unexpected turn of events at the second battle of Saratoga.

Season seven saw Jamie continue to protect his family at any cost.

While he wasn't the one to get Claire off for the murder of Malva, he did get his revenge by going after Richard Brown (Chris Larkin), the man who arrested Claire.

Following the destruction of their Fraser's Ridge home, Jamie decided to return to Scotland. However, his plan was derailed when he was conscripted and sent to Fort Ticonderoga.

During one particularly bloody battle, Jamie was knocked unconscious and left for dead. However, Claire found him just before scavengers did and nursed him back to health.

Once recovered, Jamie found himself back on duty as a rebel rifleman and tasked with taking out Simon Fraser (Angus Macfadyen), one of the British Army's most important military leaders, who also happens to be one of his relatives.

He intentionally bluffed his shot, nearly shooting his estranged son, William Ransom (Charles Vandervaalt), another redcoat officer, in the process.

However, Simon was fatally wounded in the battle. Learning of Jamie's presence in the Continental Army camp, Simon requested, in his dying breath, that Jamie do the honor of conveying his body back to their native home, Scotland.

Brianna gave birth to her second child, prompting her to return to her own time period.

In the first half of season seven, Brianna (Sophie Skelton) gave birth to her and Roger's (Richard Rankin) second child together, a girl they named Amanda.

However, their moment of joy was cut short when Claire realized that the baby had a heart condition that went beyond her skill level as a surgeon. Their daughter, she told the couple, needed modern-day medical care, or she'd die.

Brianna then made the difficult decision to return to her own time period with Roger and their kids, separating them from Claire and Jamie by almost 200 years.

Once settled back into the rhythm of life in the 20th century, Brianna landed a job at a nearby dam, which brought her into contact with a new adversary named Rob Cameron (Chris Fulton).

When Rob discovered that Brianna and Roger's young son Jeremiah (Matthew Adair) knew the location of some legendary Jacobite gold, he kidnapped him in the hopes that Jeremiah would lead him to it.

Brianna and Roger were led to believe that Rob had taken Jeremiah through the stones and into the past.

Roger was forced to take another trip through the standing stones after believing his son was in danger.

At the start of season seven, Roger began training to become a pastor, following in the footsteps of his adopted father, Reverend Reginald Wakefield.

However, his training was interrupted when he realized that he and Brianna needed to return to their own time period.

Once back, Roger turned his attention to renovating Lallybroch, the dilapidated home that once belonged to the Fraser family, and teaching local kids the ancient Celtic language of Gaelic.

He and Brianna got a surprise when they discovered that they weren't the only ones living in the home. Buck MacKenzie (Diarmaid Murtagh), a distant relative they had previously encountered, was also taking refuge at the tower, having accidentally traveled into the future when he stopped for a respite near the standing stones.

They helped Buck acclimate to his new modern surroundings with the goal of eventually helping him return to the past. This came sooner than expected when Roger realised he too would need to travel back to the past to find his son.

He and Buck — who took an immediate dislike to Rob — made the journey to Craigh na Dun, while Brianna chose to stay behind with their daughter, believing they were safer.

Young Ian continued to serve as his uncle's right-hand man in the first half of season seven.

Young Ian (John Bell) helped Jamie hunt down Claire in Wilmington, fight in the Revolutionary War, and eventually joined the Frasers on their return to Scotland.

Elsewhere in the season, Ian discovered that he had a son. After he was dispatched to deliver a letter to someone in the Mohawk community, he ran into his former wife, Emily/Wahionhaweh (Morgan Holmstrom) — and her infant son.

Audiences may remember that Ian was instructed to return to Fraser's Ridge by the tribe elders, who said that his and his wife's spirits were in conflict after they lost two children before they were born.

When Ian met the child, who had red hair like his own and mixed ethnicity, he quickly realized he was the child's father.

Emily/Wahionhaweh confirmed this when she asked Ian to give the child an Anglicized name in case he ever decided to leave the tribe. Ian gave him the moniker Ian James, after himself.

Before the midseason finale, Ian embarked on a new romance with Quaker woman Rachel Hunter (Izzy Meikle-Small), whom he shared a parting kiss with at Ticonderoga.

Lord John Grey only appeared briefly in the first half of season seven.

Fan favorite Lord John (David Berry) made a singular appearance in the first half of the season.

During a meeting with Jamie in episode two, he tried to convince the Scot to fight on behalf of the British Army rather than remain loyal to the Sons of Liberty in the Revolutionary War.

As book fans may know, Lord John has a significant story arc in the second part of "Outlander" season seven.

William unwittingly met a lot of his extended family and was left feeling uneasy about his role in the war.

While Jamie was called up to fight for the Americans, his secret biological son William was on the opposing side of the war.

Initially eager to serve the crown, William underwent a change of perspective after witnessing some of the brutalities of war, including seeing his friend Sandy Hammond (Henry Ashton) killed on the battlefield.

Throughout the season, William also came into close quarters with his extended biological family — he just didn't know it.

He had a chance run-in on the streets of Wilmington with his sister, Brianna, was rescued by Young Ian when he found himself lost in the Dismal Swamp, and even was among the British soldiers who held Claire captive in the British Army for a short while.

He and Jamie eventually came face-to-face when Jamie entered the redcoat camp to say goodbye to Simon as he was dying. While William recognized Jamie, he failed to remember the close bond they once had or spot any similarities between the two.

"Outlander" airs Fridays at 8 p.m. ET on Starz, streaming on Prime Video with Starz or Hulu with Starz.