In the Highlander franchise, human beings born with the power of "the Quickening" become immortal if they suffer a premature death by unnatural means (such as by violence). After this First Death, they are ageless and cannot definitively die unless their head is removed or destroyed. From the time they are born, immortals and "pre-immortals" cannot biologically have children. Immortals can sense each other's presence and may take the Quickening, the "essence" or power that makes them immortal, from another of their kind by beheading them. They duel each other across the centuries, a deadly "Game" with few rules. One day, the last few will fight during "the Gathering" and the survivor will win the Prize, the collected energy of all immortals who ever lived, enough power to conquer or destroy humanity. "In the end, there can be only one." These immortals are first introduced in the 1986 film Highlander, featuring Connor MacLeod (Christopher Lambert), a Scottish Highlander born in the 16th century and trained to be a warrior by an Egyptian immortal calling himself Ramírez (Sean Connery). Their mythology and nature is expanded on mostly through the live-action television show Highlander: The Series, which follows Duncan MacLeod (Adrian Paul), another immortal who belongs to the Clan MacLeod. Other films and tie-in media add their own ideas. Highlander: The Series introduced the idea that the lives and actions of immortals are recorded by a secret order of mortal humans known as the Watchers.
Origin The 1986 Highlander film was written by Gregory Widen, who created its world of immortals and the ageless Scottish Highlander Connor MacLeod. Widen was studying film at University of California, Los Angeles and working on a class writing project. According to Widen, "The idea of the story was basically a combination of a riff on The Duelists – [a Ridley Scott film where] guy wants to finish a duel over years – and a visit I made both to Scotland and the Tower of London armour display, where I thought, 'What if you owned all this? What if you’d worn it all through history and were giving someone a tour of your life through it?' That scene is basically in the movie." According to William Panzer, producer of Highlander: The Series, "And that's where everything fell into place — the idea that there are immortals and they were in conflict with each other, leading secret lives that the rest of us are unaware of." Widen's class instructor advised him to send in the class project script to an agent. It became the first draft of the screenplay for the 1986 film Highlander. In the Highlander franchise, the in-universe origin of the immortals is unknown. They are people born at different times and in different places throughout history. They cannot have children, so it is not a gift that is hereditary. When an immortal is born with such a gift seems to be random. In Highlander: Endgame, Connor MacLeod says, "In the days before memory, there were the immortals. We were with you then, and we are with you now... We are the seeds of legend, but our true origins are unknown. We simply are." Seemingly by coincidence, multiple immortals of Highlander: The Series are foundlings, orphans taken in by other families but whose true parents are never discovered. In the novel White Silence, Duncan MacLeod tells Danny O'Donal, "We're all foundlings." This seems to be a metaphor, as there are several immortals in the series raised by their natural parents and there is no indication in the movies that Connor MacLeod was adopted. Highlander II: The Quickening (1991) attempted to give an origin to immortals by revealing that they were criminals from the distant planet Zeist who were exiled to Earth, becoming immortal in the process. How the journey to Earth or the environment of Earth granted immortality to people from Zeist was not explained. A later director's cut entitled Highlander II: The Renegade Version altered several scenes to remove the alien origin and cut out all verbal mention of Zeist, once again making the origin of immortality a mystery. The later films and TV series do not consider Highlander II to be canon. Highlander: The Source (2007) was a made-for-TV movie that followed the TV series continuity and attempted to hint at another origin for immortals. Taking place in a future world where society across Earth has fallen to violence and chaos, Duncan MacLeod and others investigate the Source of immortality, an energy well hidden in Eastern Europe. The closer immortals are to the well, the more their healing abilities will fail. It is implied that direct access to the Source may grant unlimited power to an immortal and/or the capability of having children from then on. Plans to further expand on the nature of the Source in future films were abandoned in light of overall negative reception to the movie among fans. At the Highlander Worldwide Convention in 2009, David Abramowitz (who wrote the film) and others from the TV series referred to Highlander: The Source as a "bad dream" Duncan MacLeod had.
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