Here is a NEW Interview with Ed Speleers from Collider
From Collider:
Outlander sped things up for Sunday night’s episode, addressing a book storyline sooner than expected.
In episode 510, “Mercy Shall Follow Me,” villain Stephen Bonnet was finally brought to justice, jumping ahead to a plotline from Diana Gabaldon‘s sixth book in the Outlander series, A Breath of Snow and Ashes. Bonnet, played by British actor Ed Speleers, was shot by Brianna Mackenzie (Sophie Skelton), after being sentenced to death by drowning for his crimes.
More after the jump!
Bonnet was the series’ most chilling character since Black Jack Randall (Tobias Menzies). He entered the show in Season 4, and after escaping hanging due to the kindness of Claire (Caitriona Balfe) and Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan), the pirate and smuggler went on to rob them, murder their friend and rape their adult daughter Brianna (who ended up pregnant, though it remains uncertain in the Starz drama who the DNA-father of her son is).
In his final episode, Bonnet came back not just for the boy he believed to be his son – Jeremiah Mackenzie – and to murder his way into owning Aunt Jocasta’s River Run plantation (Jocasta had made Jemmy heir to the estate) – but due to a disturbed desire to form a family with Brianna. But, after he learned Brianna was only placating him to escape (he had captured her earlier in the episode and was holding her against her will), the twisted Bonnet attempted to sell her to another ship’s captain. Thankfully, Claire, Jamie, Roger Mackenzie (Richard Rankin) and young Ian Murray (John Bell) turned up in time and rescued her, captured Bonnet and delivered him to Wilmington where he was sentenced to death by a fate he’d previously revealed haunted him – drowning. As he was beginning to choke on the waves as the tide rose, Brianna shot him in the head instead, giving him a quicker death, and one which her husband Roger asked if it was for justice or to make sure Bonnet was dead.
Speleers, a downstairs alum of Downton Abbey and the titular character in 2006’s big screen feature Eragon, was at home in England, observing social distancing and the U.K.’s rules related to COVID-19, when Collider spoke to him about his exit from the show. But first, we had to ask him about the runs he’s been doing – and sharing on his Instagram story – aimed at raising funds for Britain’s National Health Service (NHS) during the coronavirus pandemic.
How’s your plantar fasciitis, which you mentioned on a recent run-related Insta-video, doing?
ED SPELEERS: It’s all right. It’s OK. I’m actually currently [elevating it]. My mum, who was a nurse in the NHS for many years, gave me some sound advice and I’m currently sat out upstairs with my foot out the window, watching the street, listening to the birds go to sleep, and the trees are sort of very gentle, and I’m hoping that my foot’s going to be fine for me to run tomorrow. But we’ll see.
Even though we got to absolutely despise Stephen Bonnet, it is always sad to see a great actor such as Ed Speleers leave the Outlander series. Ed Speleers was fantastic and am sorry to see his role in Outlander over. His role as Bonnet and Tobias Menzies role as Black Jack, was that they were the hated villains, but they were so good at it that you hated to see them go. Sort of you loved to hate them, but their roles gave a depth to the series.