8.9/10245 votesLoading...#1 - Comes a Horseman (1)
Season 5 Episode 12 - Aired 2/8/1997
MacLeod knew him as Melvin Koren, a desperado who left a trail of death and fire across the Old West, but Cassandra remembers him as an evil far older. He is Kronos, leader of the Four Horsemen, mounted Bronze Age raiders who murdered, raped, and pillaged their way across two continents. Never was a band of Immortals more cruel or more feared. He destroyed Cassandra's people and she's been hunting him across the millenia. But Kronos has a different target now -- Methos.
Director: Gérard Hameline
Writer: David Tynan
8.8/10274 votesLoading...#2 - Homeland
Season 4 Episode 1 - Aired 10/1/1995
McLoud bought a Celtic bracelet once given to the love of his mortal life and after her tragic death he buried it with her. He returns to Glen Finnin to return the bracelet to her grave and learns of several gruesome ritualistic killings based around the one immortal who killed Mac's father. Naturally Mac must get to the bottom of the killings and keep his head in the process.
Director: Adrian Paul
Writer: David Tynan
8.7/10255 votesLoading...#3 - The Valkyrie
Season 5 Episode 11 - Aired 2/1/1997
In 1944, Ingrid Henning had the chance to kill Adolf Hitler and failed. She's been atoning for that failure ever since by killing dictators, tyrants, racists, and fascists who might have the potential to become as dangerous. MacLeod has a chance to stop her before she kills more mortals, but by stopping her, does MacLeod commit the same evil for which he's judged her guilty?
Director: Richard Martin
Writer: James Thorpe
8.5/10235 votesLoading...#4 - The Samurai
Season 3 Episode 1 - Aired 10/1/1994
After Midori Koto sees her husband, rich industrialist Michael Kent, murder her lover, she kills Kent and runs to MacLeod for protection. She reminds MacLeod of a vow of protection his ""ancestor"" (actually MacLeod himself) made to her family over 200 years before. Flashbacks tell the story of MacLeod coming to the aid of the samurai Hideo Koto after MacLeod is shipwrecked in Japan. Hideo befriends MacLeod -- even though the penalty for helping a ""barbarian"" in isolationist Japan is death. When Hideo is forced to commit ritual hari kari by his feudal overlord for that crime, MacLeod serves as his second. He vows to Hideo he will always protect the Koto family and is bequeathed the dragon head katana sword he uses to this day. Back in the present, MacLeod discovers that Kent is an Immortal and he's still alive. In order not to further dishonor her family's name, Midori returns to Kent. Kent challenges MacLeod, who fulfills his vow to the Koto family and frees Midori from her loveless mar
Director: Dennis Berry
Writer: Naomi Janzen
8.5/10228 votesLoading...#5 - Methos
Season 3 Episode 16 - Aired 3/11/1995
When two Watchers end up dead by Kalas' hand, Joe realizes that Kalas is looking for Methos, the mythical ""oldest Immortal."" MacLeod knows that, with Methos' quickening, Kalas would finally be strong enough to defeat him. Kalas and MacLeod race to be the first to find Methos. Meanwhile, Richie muscles his way onto a top level motorcycle racing team and the champion, Basil, starts to get nervous. Flashbacks are to Paris in the 1920s, when Kalas, then known as Antonio Neri, was the toast of the opera world. When Kalas threatens a young girl in MacLeod's protection, they fight. Kalas escapes, but not before MacLeod inflicts a throat wound that destroys Kalas' vocal chords and the singing that has been his life since the Middle Ages. Kalas nearly takes Methos in battle and, realizing that he will not be able to defeat Kalas, Methos offers his own head to MacLeod. MacLeod refuses and challenges Kalas on his own, nearly defeating him when the police arrive to send Kalas to prison for the dea
Director: Dennis Berry
Writer: Jean-Vincent Fournier
8.4/10240 votesLoading...#6 - The Hunters
Season 1 Episode 22 - Aired 5/22/1993
MacLeod's old compatriot Hugh Fitzcairn comes to town bearing a mystery -- some of their other Immortal friends have disappeared suspiciously. MacLeod realizes that someone may be following Fitz, and realizes too late that Fitz has put Darius in danger by visiting him. Finding Darius dead in his chapel and Fitzcairn kidnaped, MacLeod won't rest until he finds the men responsible. Tracking the killers of his old friend, MacLeod discovers that there is a band of mortals hunting Immortals, and even holy ground is no protection from them. MacLeod finds the renegades in time to save Fitzcairn and confront James Horton, leader of the Hunters, but Horton eludes his grasp.
Director: Paolo Barzman
Writer: Kevin Droney
8.4/10269 votesLoading...#7 - The Darkness
Season 2 Episode 4 - Aired 10/23/1993
A mortal named Pallin Wolf, one of the renegade Watchers who believes the Immortals must be eliminated, lures an Immortal to his house and kills him, getting the advantage by tricking him into a sealed room that is completely dark, then stalking him with night vision goggles. Meanwhile, a Gypsy fortuneteller they meet in a restaurant, Greta, warns Tessa that she is in danger. When Tessa is kidnapped by Wolf, MacLeod returns to Greta, asking for her help. But she's mostly a hustler, and not accustomed to getting actual visions, so the clues she is able to provide are meager. Finally, Mac finds Wolf's house, where Wolf is waiting for him. He meets Wolf in the dark room and all seems hopeless until he remembers a matchbook Greta gave him with her phone number in it. Lighting the matches, he regains the advantage and kills Wolf. However, as Tessa and Richie are heading for the car, a young junkie accosts them for money, and in an act of senseless violence, shoots them both. As Mac mourns,
Director: Paolo Barzman
Writer: Christian Bouveron, Lawrence Shore
8.3/10186 votesLoading...#8 - Song of the Executioner
Season 3 Episode 14 - Aired 2/25/1995
In the 1600s, MacLeod sought refuge for a time in a monastery founded by Paul, another Immortal. There he encountered Kalas, an Immortal monk with a heavenly singing voice. When MacLeod discovered that Kalas was routinely taking the heads of Immortals as they left the sanctuary, MacLeod and Paul expelled Kalas from the monastery, separating him from the music that was his life. Now in the present, Paul and his choir have been lured out of their monastery for a concert tour. When Paul disappears after a concert, MacLeod discovers that Kalas is after his revenge. Meanwhile, two mysterious deaths at the hospital seem to be linked to negligence on Anne's part. Later, when drugs are found in Joe's bar, it becomes obvious that Kalas is trying to destroy MacLeod's friends before coming for him. MacLeod confronts Kalas and finds that Kalas is a strong and skillful fighter, better than MacLeod has faced before, and is nearly the victor. To save himself, MacLeod throws himself off the concert ha
Director: Paolo Barzman
Writer: David Tynan
8.3/10187 votesLoading...#9 - Finale (2)
Season 3 Episode 22 - Aired 6/3/1995
As Christine tells her tale to the newspaper publisher, MacLeod and Amanda, knowing their world is about to end, finally admit they love each other. Kalas kills Christine and the publisher and steals the computer disk before they have a chance to spread the story. Kalas offers MacLeod a deal -- MacLeod offers up his head or the contents of the disk are made public. Dawson and the Watchers attempt to find Kalas, but this only results in more dead Watchers. Methos tries to talk MacLeod out of it, but MacLeod agrees to fight Kalas on top of the Eiffel Tower. Kalas is defeated and the resulting Quickening, amplified by the Tower, sends a power surge that disrupts every computer in the vicinity -- including Kalas'. The information on the disk is destroyed and Immortals and Watchers maintain their anonymity.
Director: Dennis Berry
Writer: David Tynan
8.3/10206 votesLoading...#10 - Not to Be (2)
Season 6 Episode 13 - Aired 5/16/1998
Fitz died three hundred years ago... Horton has taken over the Watchers... Joe Dawson has been reduced to a bitter, penniless vagrant... Amanda is a black widow... and Methos has rejoined the Horsemen to avenge his fiance's death. If you think that's bad, just wait till you find out what's happened to Richie and Tessa.
Director: Dennis Berry
Writer: David Tynan
8.2/10275 votesLoading...#11 - Band of Brothers
Season 1 Episode 13 - Aired 2/13/1993
Warning comes from MacLeod's old friend Darius, a monk over 2000 years old, that Grayson, Darius' one-time protege, is now stalking Darius' other students -- among them, possibly, MacLeod. Grayson, disillusioned that his former comrade-in-arms has become a man of peace, is killing Darius' mortal students in order to draw the monk off holy ground and into combat. MacLeod must protect peace activist Victor Paulus, another of Darius' students, from Grayson's plot to assassinate him. Later he joins Richie and Tessa in France where they will live while Tessa takes up her new job as curator of a traveling collection.
Director: René Manzor
Writer: Marie-Chantal Droney
8.2/10208 votesLoading...#12 - Unholy Alliance (1)
Season 2 Episode 14 - Aired 2/19/1994
Xavier St. Cloud returns, killing Immortals with the help of mortal mercenaries who shoot his prey, making his kill easy. His next target is MacLeod but, warned by Dawson, Mac and Charlie just manage to escape death -- though the dojo is all but destroyed in the gunfight. Renee Delaney, a CID agent investigating the mercenary angle, gets on the case. MacLeod goes after Xavier himself, and Charlie insists on coming along. During his battle with St. Cloud, MacLeod spots James Horton, the Hunter who killed Darius. Distracted, Mac is 'killed' and falls down an elevator shaft out of beheading range, and Charlie is badly wounded and lies near death. Blaming Dawson for helping Horton escape alive, MacLeod warns him not to cross his path again.
Director: Peter Ellis
Writer: David Tynan
8.2/10204 votesLoading...#13 - Unholy Alliance (2)
Season 2 Episode 15 - Aired 2/26/1994
As Charlie regains strength, MacLeod accepts help from Dawson one last time, and barely misses catching Xavier and Horton. He then follows their trail to Paris -- accompanied by the persistent Renee Delaney. They track down Horton, and when he almost escapes, he is shot by Joe Dawson. MacLeod, with the help of his humorous new neighbor Maurice, then tracks down Xavier and finally takes his head. In a coda, however, we learn that Horton still lives.
Director: Peter Ellis
Writer: David Tynan
8.2/10182 votesLoading...#14 - Star-Crossed
Season 3 Episode 15 - Aired 3/4/1995
MacLeod is picked up at the airport in France by his old friend, Hugh Fitzcairn. For the first time in the 350 years MacLeod has known him. Fitz has settled down as a Universitv Professor with the love of his life, Naomi. Flashbacks show MacLeod and Fitz's first meeting, when MacLeod was protecting the Doge's daughter from Fitz's amourous advances in Venice, 1637. When Naomi's jealous ex-lover is found strangled next to a computer displaying Fitz's falsified teaching credentials, Fitz goes on the run from the police. MacLeod realizes that Fitz is being framed by Kalas, who has followed him from the U.S. Kalas challenges Fitz and takes his head while MacLeod watches, unable to interfere.
Director: Paolo Barzman
Writer: Jim Makichuk
8.2/10191 votesLoading...#15 - Finale (1)
Season 3 Episode 21 - Aired 5/27/1995
Amanda accidentally helps Kalas escape from prison by trying to do MacLeod a favor and kill Kalas for him. After an attempt on Maurice's life thwarted by MacLeod, Kalas kidnaps Amanda to use as bait against MacLeod, but Amanda manages to escape. Meanwhile, Christine Salzer, the widow of a Watcher killed by Kalas (in ""Methos"") decides to get her revenge on Immortals and Watchers alike by exposing their secret to the media. Dawson and Methos team up to try and talk Christine out of it, but she's determined to take a computer disk with the identities of all known Immortals and Watchers on it to a newspaper publisher. Dawson, desperate, tries to kill her outside the newspaper building, but is stopped by MacLeod and Methos. Christine enters the building and the Immortals and the Watcher know their lives are about to change forever.
Director: Mario Philip Azzopardi
Writer: David Tynan
8.2/10188 votesLoading...#16 - Deliverance (2)
Season 4 Episode 14 - Aired 2/25/1996
MacLeod arrives in France, leaving a trail of hate and destruction in his wake. Methos finds him and discovers just how evil MacLeod has become when he tries to take Methos' head on holy ground. After MacLeod kills another good friend, Methos realizes that the only way to save MacLeod may be to kill him.
Director: Dennis Berry
Writer: David Tynan
8.1/10194 votesLoading...#17 - Courage
Season 3 Episode 6 - Aired 11/5/1994
Cullen, an old friend of MacLeod's, is burnt out from centuries of playing The Game and has turned to drugs and alcohol to get the courage to keep on playing. Cullen had a run-in with Richie and now he's coming for Richie's head. While playing ""chicken"" with Richie on a mountain road, Cullen crashes head-on into a bus full of passengers, killing many. MacLeod tries to convince Cullen, who he once knew as the greatest of the warriors, to stop using the drugs, but a paranoid Cullen believes MacLeod is just trying to render him helpless. Finally, MacLeod has no choice but to confront his former comrade and defeat him.
Director: Charles Wilkinson
Writer: Nancy Heikin-Pepin
8.1/10181 votesLoading...#18 - Shadows
Season 3 Episode 9 - Aired 11/26/1994
MacLeod is tormented by visions of his own death, beheaded by a mysterious dark-hooded figure. Anne tries to convince him to seek medical help, but instead he turns to his old friend Garrick, who has spent centuries studying the mind. MacLeod saw Garrick in the 17th Century, when MacLeod barely escaped being burned as a witch. What MacLeod didn't know was that Garrick was not able to escape as well. Garrick convinces MacLeod that the dark-hooded figure is a racial memory that haunts all Immortals and that the way to defeat it is to not fight it, to accept it for what it is. When MacLeod, haggard and exhausted, faces the specter for the last time, puts down his sword and refuses to fight it, the figure goes for MacLeod's head -- until at the last moment MacLeod realizes the figure is Garrick, seeking his revenge after all these years. In the Tag, Anne, frustrated that MacLeod won't open up to her despite their intimate relationship, leaves him.
Director: Charles Wilkinson
Writer: David Tynan
8.1/10183 votesLoading...#19 - Judgment Day
Season 4 Episode 20 - Aired 5/26/1996
Dawson's life is on the line when the Watchers try him on the charge of treason for his friendship with MacLeod. Watcher deaths have risen dramatically since Dawson first told MacLeod about the Watchers and the Tribunal is determined to punish Joe and stop the killing. MacLeod and Dawson argue his case, but even as the trial goes on, the Watcher killings continue.
Director: Dennis Berry
Writer: N/A
8.1/10176 votesLoading...#20 - Prophecy
Season 5 Episode 2 - Aired 10/5/1996
When MacLeod was but a wee lad in the village of Glenfinnan, he thought Cassandra, the Witch of Donan Woods, was only a myth, a fairy tale concocted by crafty old men to frighten unwary children-- until the night she found him alone in Donan Woods. Now, four hundred years later, Cassandra comes to MacLeod again, this time to tell him of his role in an ancient prophecy -- that only Duncan MacLeod can challenge and defeat the voice of darkness.
Director: Dennis Berry
Writer: David Tynan
8.0/10233 votesLoading...#21 - The Watchers
Season 2 Episode 1 - Aired 10/2/1993
Determined to investigate the death of his old friend Darius, MacLeod follows a lead back to his old stomping grounds in the Pacific Northwest. He meets Joe Dawson, a bookstore owner with a secret; he soon learns that Dawson is a high-ranking member of an ancient secret organization known as The Watchers, who observe and record the lives of the Immortals, passing their archives down from generation to generation. Unbeknownst to Dawson, his brother-in-law, James Horton (the man who killed Darius), has been recruiting Watchers to kill Immortals. We are left with the knowledge that other renegade Watchers may be waiting to try for MacLeod's head.
Director: Clay Borris
Writer: Marie-Chantal Droney
8.0/10199 votesLoading...#22 - Legacy
Season 2 Episode 19 - Aired 5/7/1994
When her mentor Rebecca is killed, Amanda is determined to avenge the death, even though it means going up against the formidable Immortal Luther, and very possibly losing her head. She comes to Mac for a final fling before her likely death, and when he discovers that she's after Luther, he tries to take the battle on himself, feeling he has a better chance of survival. Together they discover that Luther is hunting the pieces of an ancient crystal that Rebecca divided among her students, believing that the whole crystal will make him invulnerable and ensure that he is the Last Immortal. In the final confrontation, both Amanda and MacLeod take their turns battling the ascetic Luther.
Director: Paolo Barzman
Writer: David Tynan
8.0/10180 votesLoading...#23 - Mortal Sins
Season 3 Episode 19 - Aired 5/13/1995
Father Bernard has a secret he thought he'd buried 50 years ago at the bottom of the Seine. When Ernest Daimler, the Nazi Major who Bernard killed as a young boy and threw in the river, appears at his church looking not a day older than the day he died, Father Bernard realizes he's like MacLeod. As a child, Bernard watched MacLeod die and revive during a mission for the French Resistance and MacLeod swore him to secrecy. Bernard goes to MacLeod for help. Meanwhile, Anne tells MacLeod that she is pregnant -- by an old friend she sought for comfort after MacLeod's ""death."" MacLeod tries to adjust to the concept of being a father. When Daimler kills Father Bernard and comes after Anne, MacLeod kills Daimler and Anne witnesses what being part of MacLeod's life really means. Unable to deal with the part of herself that wanted to see Daimler die, Anne leaves MacLeod.
Director: Mario Philip Azzopardi
Writer: Lawrence Shore
8.0/10188 votesLoading...#24 - Something Wicked (1)
Season 4 Episode 13 - Aired 2/18/1996
The Immortal Coltec is a Native American Hayoka -- a shaman whose responsibility is to take evil into himself to protect his people. After the massacre of MacLeod's Indian family in 1872, Coltec saved MacLeod by taking in the evil and rage he felt. Since the death of his tribe, Coltec has become Hayoka to the world, protecting it from evil Immortals. But Coltec's capacity for evil isn't endless and when evil finally overtakes hin, MacLeod must find a way to save Coltec without being drawn into the evil himself.
Director: Dennis Berry
Writer: David Tynan
8.0/10183 votesLoading...#25 - The Ransom of Richard Redstone
Season 5 Episode 14 - Aired 2/22/1997
The Chateau LeMartin has been in Marina's family for generations, but now the slimy Carlo Capodimonte threatens to foreclose on an old loan and take the chateau for himself. Desperate to save the family heritage, Marina kidnaps an American millionaire in order to pay off the loan. Unfortunately for Marina, the rich and charming ""Richard Redstone"" she has tied up in the cellar is none other than Richie Ryan.
Director: Gérard Hameline
Writer: David Tynan
The Best Episodes of Highlander: The Series
Every episode of Highlander: The Series ranked from best to worst. Let's dive into the Best Episodes of Highlander: The Series!
Duncan MacLeod cannot die -- he is a 400-year-old immortal, who has seen his share of humanity's history. Still, he risks his life in battle...
Genres:Sci-Fi & FantasyDramaAction & Adventure
Network:Syndication
Best Episodes Summary
"Comes a Horseman (1)" is the best rated episode of "Highlander: The Series". It scored 8.9/10 based on 245 votes. Directed by Gérard Hameline and written by David Tynan, it aired on 2/8/1997. This episode scored 0.1 points higher than the second highest rated, "Homeland".