“The Lady and the Tiger,” originally aired April 24, 1993. Nostalgia and spoilers within.
And the plot thickens this episode with a new recurring character, friends.
Hello, Jason Isaacs. Escaping from a cop with daring stunts, at that, so the episode is off to a pretty good start. And then we move to the circus! What could one have to do with the other? Who knows, but Mac and crew got tickets to the circus where an old friend (“a bad habit”) is walking the tightrope. Oooh. Aaah. But in a flashback we finally learn that Isaacs is an immortal who wants MacLeod’s head–Amanda just wants to steal jewels, which Mac got framed for, oops. This is their eternal relationship–she commits a crime, he gets the time. For the first time, Tessa gets a little (a lot) jealous, and Richie of course has heart eyes. But Zachary, the guy from the flashback, also has found Amanda, because she’s the one who put him in jail. When he’s about to behead her, she offers Duncan’s head instead. Oh, Amanda. She goes to the barge to try to find Mac and uses her ~wiles~ to enchant Richie because honestly. She also sasses with Tessa, and then talks to Mac, finally. Mac sort of assumes Amanda is just missing him (EGO), but then she leads him to the circus and Zachary challenges him. ET TU, AMANDA? Tessa and Mac investigate the history of Amanda and Zachary, and Tessa meets this sweet, old, retired circus agent, who knew the both of them back in the day. I really like the random characters on this show. Richie stalks the circus performers because he is quiet like ninja, or something, and he sees that Amanda and Zachary are planning SOMETHING–that something being a heist of a rare book at the museum. Amanda convinces her carnie friends to hold Mac hostage while she does her thing. Mac has to convince the carnies that he’s not a rube so they’ll let him go–but he uses his equestrian knife-throwing act to escape, dun dun dun! Galloping away, he makes it to the museum to watch Amanda and Zachary do their super awesome spy thief thing (all the way by horse? and don’t ask my why they don’t sense him enter there). He sets off the alarm with a fair bit of sass. The thieves do escape and are about to fight, but Mac comes again to fight Zachary himself. They have a pretty entertaining fight scene, but Amanda takes the beheading because the show wants to point out that for Amanda, rules are for suckers.
Seriously, that goes against like every Immortal good manners rule.
Amanda and Mac do have a good relationship with their push and pull of morality and adventure. Mac is so often held up as Mr. (Boring) Perfect, so it is good to show the vice to the virtue. I always find myself on the fence of whether or not I like Amanda on her own. I suppose I can think about this more when I get to Highlander: The Raven (her spinoff), and I will at least say I think she has some great backstory.
And super thieves are pretty great. But we’ll see what we make of Amanda as the series continues. There’ll be plenty of her (and not enough of her teacher).
Veni Vidi Scripsi 