AUTHOR! AUTHOR!
"Your friend said you were in trouble and that you needed the sword" - Rachel MacLeod, Deliverance
This page recounts the present day storyline of "Highlander", for Season 4. The title chosen for each season is taken from an episode from the Season and is of my choosing, reflecting my feeling about the entire season. For Season Four, with its dark stories of vengeance and the dominating arc of stories surrounding the Dark Quickening, I've gone for "Through A Glass, Darkly". Episode titles are shown in italics.
Season Four - 1995/96
"Through A Glass, Darkly"
Regular Cast
| Duncan MacLeod | Adrian Paul |
| Richie Ryan | Stan Kirsch |
| Joe Dawson | Jim Byrnes |
| Methos | Peter Wingfield |
| Amanda | Elizabeth Gracen |
With Kalas dead, MacLeod is free to return to his normal life and resumes his interest in antiques, until one night he sees a bracelet in a private showing at a dealer's, a bracelet he thought long buried. Shadowed by a curious Joe Dawson, he returns to his "Homeland" for the first time in two hundred years to return it to the grave of his first love, Debra Campbell. Once in Glenfinnan, he is greeted with hostility by Rachel MacLeod, the local innkeeper, as the village is beset once again by mysterious murders. With the villagers recounting the legend of Duncan MacLeod, who rose from the dead to claim his father's sword and kill the Viking raider, Kanwulf, Rachel slowly comes to trust Duncan as the legend plays itself out again and, this time, Duncan make sure he takes the Viking's head and Quickening before leaving Glenfinnan at peace.
Returning with Joe to Seacouver, he is surprised to feel an Immortal at the airport and is even more surprised when the Immortal is shot by a sniper. Duncan is appalled to find that the sniper is Charlie DeSalvo, seeking revenge on Andrew Cord after Cord betrayed Charlie and killed Mara in the Balkans. Duncan warns Charlie to stay away from Cord, who is hustled away from the airport by Joe Dawson. Cord and Dawson were "Brothers In Arms" when the young Joe was a marine in Vietnam and he hauled Joe through the jungle after Dawson's legs were destroyed by a landmine. As Joe pleads with Duncan to let Cord be, Cord hunts and fatally wounds Charlie. Duncan keeps his promise and tells Charlie how he survived Horton's fusillade in "Unholy Alliance", before his friend dies in his arms. Despite Joe's entreaties, Duncan avenges Charlie and turns his back on the Watcher.
Richie returns to the dojo with an Immortal in tow, ("The Innocent"). Mikey Bellow is retarded, a child in the body of an adult, and is alone in the world after the Immortal looking after him has been killed by another Immortal, Tyler King. Duncan and Richie try to look after him, but eventually decide that he has to be taken to sanctuary on Holy Ground. Before they can reach there, the police come to arrest Mikey, convinced that he is the killer. Whilst Duncan deals with Tyler, Richie is forced to stand by and watch the frightened Mikey kill the police officers. Faced with the prospect of Mikey being imprisoned, the two friends realise that one of them must kill him, but before Richie can take his head, Mikey beheads himself by laying his head on a train track and Richie receives his Quickening.
With Richie managing the dojo, Duncan has time to take up a position teaching history at the local University as well as renovating an old house he has bought. His first day as a teacher is spoilt by the arrival of Peter Canis, who has a score to settle with Duncan after their previous meeting. Canis sees himself as "Leader Of The Pack" and is infuriated anew by Duncan killing one of his dogs when they attack him. After Duncan frustrates his attempts to find a bitch to breed his next generation of killer dogs, Canis comes for Duncan at the old house. But Duncan has a distraction prepared for the dogs and, with them out of the way, teaches an old dog a new trick as he takes Canis' head.
Kit O'Brady comes to Seacouver looking to improve the run of bad luck he has had ever since he lost his saloon, the "Double Eagle", to Amanda in a card game. A one hundred year plus losing streak doesn't seem to have much chance of improving when Amanda hits town and Duncan is driven to distraction trying to keep the two of them apart. Only when he proves to Amanda that Kit didn't burn the saloon down in revenge are the two of them prepared to call it quits. In the process, Duncan buys and loses a race horse and Amanda bamboozles Richie in one of the funniest scenes in any episode.
When Anne Lindsay reappears in Duncan's life, it is to tell him that his cousin from Wisconsin is in her E.R. Who? It's Kenny, on the run from Terence Kincaid, who has his own reasons for wanting Duncan dead, but Duncan agrees to help Kenny. When he takes him back to the dojo, Kenny senses Amanda and accuses Duncan of double-crossing him, but they are both in for a surprise. When Amanda sees Kenny, she is overjoyed at their "Reunion", as it was her who found Kenny shortly after he was killed and taught him to survive as an Immortal. However, the pupil teaches the master some tricks as Kenny betrays her and joins forces with Kincaid in search of a double Quickening. Duncan is able to overcome Kincaid, but Kenny is only stopped from taking his head when he is down from Kincaid's Quickening by Amanda's promise that she will take his head if he takes Duncan's. Before the episode finishes, Amanda finds a new friend in Anne Lindsay.
Amanda decides that Duncan and Joe need to overcome their differences, but before she can get them together, Simon Killian comes to Seacouver, hunting Duncan after being incarcerated in a mental institution for over seventy years for war crimes. Duncan escapes "The Colonel" once, but after Killian tries to kidnap Amanda, he confronts him again, only to be ambushed and imprisoned in an abandoned military base
. The Watchers know where he is and Amanda forces Joe to help her rescue Duncan. When Killian learns he is free, he goes back to the base to see for himself and Duncan is waiting. Without henchmen to gun Duncan down this time, the Colonel is no match for MacLeod. In the midst of this, Killian almost killed a young girl who Amanda had befriended, by mistake, and Amanda, filled with what might have been, leaves Seacouver.
After an evening spent in an arthouse cinema, Duncan and Richie interrupt the attempted murder of a storekeeper, whose wife is killed instead. Chasing the killer, an Immortal, they find that he is Paul Kinman, with whom MacLeod has an old score to settle, but the police arrest him before they can settle it. The two Immortals disappear and are tracked down by the FBI to the old house that Duncan is renovating. The police do not understand why the "Reluctant Heroes" will not testify, nor does the store owner, who is wracked with guilt because his wife is dead instead of him. Kinman was sent to kill him because he refused to knuckle under to the local mob. When Kinman escapes from the FBI, MacLeod takes the opportunity to hunt him down. Kinman kills the crook who hired him to kill the storekeeper, but comes up short against MacLeod, who is able to assure the storekeeper that, although Kinman vanished, he did not get away.
The University where Duncan teaches has purchased a fine example of Indian statuary. The statue, of the goddess Kali, is on display at the University, but the Immortal Kamir, a priest of Kali and the Thugee cult, wants it back. He has murdered his way to Seacouver, bringing down "The Wrath Of Kali" on all in his path. Whilst Kamir entrances Richie with his mystique, Duncan persuades the University to let him recover the statue. But when Kamir judges the half-Indian head of the History Department a traitor to her heritage and goes to kill her, he and MacLeod confront each other and, learning that Kamir murdered his lover long ago, Duncan defends his friend and avenges his lover by taking Kamir's head.
Two Immortals arrive in Seacouver almost simultaneously. One, the entrancing Kristen Gilles, to open a new branch of her modelling agency and the other, Methos, to warn MacLeod that she is in town. Chance leads Kristen to meet Richie, when he accompanies his foster-sister to an audition for the agency, and the two Immortals become lovers. Whilst the disapproving Methos urges Duncan to take Kristen's head and turns his hand to house painting, Duncan is more concerned about Richie's heart. Richie does not listen to Duncan's warnings about his former lover, putting them down to jealousy, until Kristen tries to kill him. Knowing Kristen will be true to form, Methos and Duncan race to her home in time to stop her murdering Richie's foster-sister in revenge. Duncan fights Kristen, but cannot bring himself to kill her. The exasperated Methos has had enough of MacLeod's "Chivalry" and takes Kristen's head.
Cynical though Methos may be, he can still be entranced and he falls for one of the waitresses in Joe's bar, Alexa, ("Timeless"). Whilst she is initially uncertain about her boss' friend, Duncan is very certain that someone is trying to kill concert pianist Claudia Jardine. He knows that Claudia is pre-Immortal and it isn't long before he finds out that the would-be killer is Walter Graham, who wants to preserve Claudia at the height of her talent. Walter has nurtured artists for centuries, but is horrified when he finally tricks Duncan and kills Claudia, only to find that her talent has deserted her. Distraught, she flees from him, but finds that her fear of dying restores a measure of her talent when Walter threatens to take her head if she will not stay with him. Meanwhile, Methos and Alexa fall for each other, but he does not understand why she pulls away from him. When Joe tells him that she is dying, Methos confronts her - she can spend the rest of her days dying, or living with him. As the two lovers leave Seacouver to see as much of the world as they can in her remaining days, Duncan watches Claudia leave without a sword or knowing how to use one, prepared to live with fear so that she can draw on it for her music.
A news item on the radio draws Duncan and Richie away from house renovation to the city centre, ("The Blitz"). A gas main has exploded and a medical team led by Anne Lindsey has been trapped. Duncan and Richie race against time to find Anne in the collapsing subway, where the shock of all the events has triggered her labour. Whilst Duncan stays with Anne, Richie leads the fire crews to the trapped people, only to find by the time they return that Anne had given birth to a girl. She names the baby 'Mary', having found out from Joe that it was the name of Duncan's mother. The reason for MacLeod's home improvement is revealed - he gives the house to Anne fully furnished, a refuge to bring up the child that was almost his.
The arrival of Jim Coltec, the American Indian Hayoka, should have been good news for Duncan, but when his old friend tries to take Richie's head on sight, Duncan is forced to intervene, but Coltec gets away. Duncan struggles to understand why the most peaceable of Immortals is now "Something Wicked" and, in desperation, asks Dawson what he knows about Dark Quickenings. The Watchers believe that this is a myth, the overwhelming of an Immortal by the power and strength of those they have killed, but Coltec is living proof. Duncan tries to bring Coltec back, as the Hayoka once helped him, but when that fails, he challenges his friend and kills him. The force of Coltec's Quickening carries the accumulated evil with it and Duncan is submerged within the evil of those he and Coltec have killed. After a fight in Joe's, he returns to the dojo and almost takes Richie's head before Dawson shoots him. Richie flees into the night, not wanting to believe that Duncan would kill his own student, leaving Dawson to face the tortured MacLeod. He cannot kill Duncan, but there is still enough left of the Highlander that he cannot kill Dawson either and he too flees into the night, signing on board a tramp steamer bound for only the Watchers know where.
The freighter arrives in France, where MacLeod is thrown off the ship by the captain, Davis, ("Deliverance"). Duncan is at war within himself and telephones Sean Burns, an old friend who has been a psychoanalyst since long before the term was invented. Before he can tell Sean what is wrong with him, he sees Davis and beats him senseless. He goes to Davis' home and seduces his wife, only to be chased from the house by Davis, who shoots him several times. Duncan only escapes because of the timely arrival of Methos, who has left Alexa in Greece. Duncan eludes Methos and goes to Sean Burns, but is overwhelmed by his evil and takes his friend's head, fleeing from the horrified Methos and returning to Paris. Methos tracks him to Darius' chapel and persuades him to accompany him to an ancient spring, said to have magical healing powers. Immersed in the wellpool and armed with his father's sword, Duncan faces and defeats the evil within himself. Returning to the barge, he finds Rachel MacLeod waiting - she lent the sword to Methos and came to help if she could.
Methos returns to Greece, but Rachel stays with Duncan, accepting that the legend of her childhood is real and not wanting to know more. Duncan foils an assassination attempt on the ruler of a small Arab country, only to find that the President's chief of security, Kassim, to whom he is indebted, had arranged it. Kassim insists that Duncan kill the President, but Duncan cannot kill in cold blood. Kassim kidnaps Rachel and torches the barge, in a very convoluted story about "Promises" that ends with the defeated Kassim walking away with his head, but swearing vengeance. Rachel returns to Glenfinnan and asks Duncan to go with her, but he declines.
Duncan moves the barge down river to repair it and is surprised by Amanda arriving, newly blonde, ("Methuselah's Gift"). Mortals had tried to take her head and she barely escaped. When they track one down, they find he has been shot and the dying man tells her that they were after the piece of crystal given to her by Rebecca. Amanda realises that the Watchers must have found the rest of the pieces after Duncan killed Luther, (in "Legacy"), and breaks into their headquarters, only to disturb another thief - Methos. Convinced that he sent the assassins, she confronts him, but he will not kill her and she is persuaded that she was wrong. He wants the whole crystal for Alexa, believing it will grant her health and longevity, an almost-Immortal life. The two try to steal the pieces from the Watchers and find that the assassins were sent by Amanda's Watcher, who wants the Methuselah Stone for himself. In the confrontation between Immortals and Watchers, all but one piece of the crystal are lost in a river and Methos returns to Switzerland empty-handed to be with Alexa as she dies.
Visiting a circus, Duncan and Amanda are surprised at the new headline act - "The Immortal Cimoli". Newly Immortal, failed magician Danny Cimoli is using his Immortal powers in a death-defying stunt that would, of course, kill any normal man. Whilst Duncan tries to teach Danny how to survive the Game, Immortal Damon Case challenges Cimoli, who runs from him. Duncan asks Case to let Danny alone, but when he refuses, fights and kills him. Danny, desperate for his fifteen minutes of fame, leaves France for Las Vegas, still in his high profile act as The Immortal Cimoli, but doesn't survive long without Duncan's protection.
Methos returns to Paris with Alexa's body and buries her there, so that he can be close to her. As he and MacLeod remember her, they feel another Immortal close by, who turns out to be Warren Cochrane, ("Through A Glass, Darkly"). Cochrane has forgotten who and what he was and, in helping him remember who he is, Duncan uncovers a horrific truth - the short tempered Cochrane killed his own student in a fit of rage and is hiding from the fact in his own mind. Trapped in his twisted recollection of the past, Cochrane flees, hunted by the police as a murderer.
Woken by the police in the early hours of the morning, Duncan is surprised to find that Renee Delaney is back in Paris, ("Double Jeopardy"). She and the Sûrete are investigating a series of jewellery store robberies and have identified the man they want as Xavier St Cloud. Out of earshot of the police, Duncan tells Renee that they are on the wrong track, as Xavier is dead, although he neglects to mention that he killed him, in "Unholy Alliance". Returning to the barge, he sees a man on the Quai dressed as Xavier used to and discovers that the thief is Xavier's student, Morgan D'Estaing, who has come to avenge his teacher's death. Duncan regards Morgan as nothing more than a cheap imitation of St Cloud and has little problem in dealing with him. Delaney returns to the United States, where she is to marry.
Every 100 years, Immortal lovers Robert and Gina de Valicourt remarry, in front of all their friends. As their anniversary approaches again, Robert confides in Duncan that all is not well, as Gina proves when she asks for a divorce. Duncan decides to show Gina that she really loves Robert "Till Death", by making her think that she has almost lost him. He persuades a very unwilling Methos to fake a fight with Robert, a plan which works beautifully, until Gina swears to hunt down this "Adam Pierson". As Robert and Duncan celebrate, Robert casually mentions that Gina has gone to see him at the barge - where Methos is staying. The two race back to the Quai, only to find that Methos and Gina have settled their differences and turned the joke back on them.
The cliffhanger ending to Season Four starts with a telephone call that brings Joe Dawson to Paris, in the belief that MacLeod is dead, ("Judgement Day"). Standing on the Quai, he is kidnapped in front of Duncan, who finds out from Methos that Joe is on trial for his life before the Watcher tribunal. Watchers are being killed across Europe and the Watchers believe that Joe's revelation
of their secret is the root cause, unaware that it is the consequences of their own hypocrisy and double standards that is visiting destruction upon them. Blind to their own arrogance and willingness to interfere in the Game, they ignore Duncan's pleas for clemency. As they prepare to execute Dawson, it is they who are judged as a mysterious Immortal guns down the Watcher hierarchy and flees past Duncan, who arrives in time to find Dawson wounded and unconscious in the final scene.