Duncan is lying "dead" and being shown around an alternate universe by a resurrected Hugh Fitzcairn, a alternate universe that has never had a Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod, and is a dark and terrifying place.
Tessa is alive and married with children. She has submerged her passion for creating art into merely running an unsuccessful gallery, supported by her condescending businessman husband. Fitz allows Mac to meet Tessa, and they spend one night together. Tessa regrets their night of passion, and they part with tears on both sides.
Poor Fitzcairn has been dead for 280 years, without the intervention of Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod, and missed making a whole lot of women very happy.
Methos, in his Watcher guise of Adam Pierson, fell in love with Jillian, a mortal Watcher. In a misguided effort to prove to Horton that Adam/Methos is not a creature to be destroyed, she betrays Methos to Horton. Horton "kills" them both, but Kronos saves Methos who rejoins the Horsemen. Because Methos has not come under the influence of Duncan MacLeod, he goes all evil again.
Richie is Methos' student after spending a period after gaining Immortality running around wondering what's happened to him. Richie does okay with the thefts, but when he is ordered by Methos and Kronos to kill Joe Dawson, he balks. He goes to Joe's apartment, but fails in his mission. Methos whacks him, which makes the ghostly Mac unhappy.
Methos and Kronos seek Horton and kidnap Joe for informational purposes. Mac enters the alternate reality to fight Methos. It looks as if Mac takes Methos' head, but we'll never know because Fitz interrupts with the news that Mac can click his heels three times and go home! No, he doesn't .. I lied about that bit.
Mac awakens in current reality with Methos standing over him, and it turns out Mac is not averse to putting up a good fight to save himself, Joe and Amanda after all! Huzzah! Huzzah! Mac fights O'Rourke, much to O'Rourke's displeasure, and takes his head. Quickening!
Adjournment of the proceedings to the barge, where the drinking begins, and Mac tells each of the players what they mean to him. He accepts the good and evil in Methos. He can't imagine life without Joe. Amanda makes his heart glad and always did.
Mac rides into the future/out of the past on a horse in his Scottish warrior guise, hair all flowing, looking just as wonderfully Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod as it is possible to look. Mac also walks into the future, alone.
Questions:
1. Tessa and Mac were doomed to be parted with tears in either universe. Was this ending any more or less tragic than their parting with Tessa's death?
2. Richie Ryan was doomed to be beheaded by his teacher in either universe. Is being beheaded in an "oops" any worse than being beheaded on purposes, on his knees and begging for mercy?
3. Kronos seems to have profited by the lack of a Duncan MacLeod in his universe, being alive and everything. He and the almost-Immortal Horton could play hide 'n' seek through eternity. Do they deserve each other? Does either world deserve either of them?
4. Of all the characterizations in the alternate universe, I disagree with Joe's. Do you believe he would really have fallen to such depths just by the lack of Duncan MacLeod? This is Joe Dawson we're talking about.
5. To Be or Not To Be. That is the question. What is the answer?