I want to add my part of which swords are best, and ultimately that is entirely in the eye of the beholder,
Marto swords are the baseline for all things highlander, they were the first t offer them, though they are stainless steel blades and brittle resin handle, they are awesome wall hangers and carry the full nostalgia, the Duncan SOTD IS the sword used from season 2 on, it went through the changes of no collar to bronze collar but they were basically pulled from the shelf for filming. The Marto Connor sword, at the time, was the only connection we had to the original masamune, and to be fair it wasn't a bad job all around, it was a very cleaned up version of what on screen. These are still great swords to own and are now considered collectors items, and I have several, including the ones I bought in the 90's. And they hold together very well, as long as you don't drop them.. And the costs are pretty nominal, between 1 and 500 dollars depending on where and how you find them. And they are still 'official' licensed
Then UC came out with their swords, they sculpted their own versions and placed them on carbon blades. The Duncan was awesome, deeper details and a cleaner tsuba, on what they called a full tang blade, however after disassembled it was more of a short tang... The Connor got a lot of flack over the bat nose thing but it was indeed a nice looking sword. A step up in quality from Marto in that they used a stronger resin and, though like Marto they were mass produced and had many many hands in the process and a lot of work was farmed out to other companies. But also nice to display and fun to swing around. Cost wise was pretty good, 2-400 dollars but I have been seeing them go for much much more now. And they are still licensed, though they make no more.
Then there was Sal, owner pf point gallery and sculptor for the first season highlander sword for Duncan, who then re made the season one into the more cleaned up version called the musashi. He made the carbon fiber Kevlar process and hand cast bronze tsubas, each handle made to a specific blade, each tsuba hand cast and hand fitted to a tang. He used specific hanwei blades and made them battle ready. He also had paid for the use of the mentor but gave it the sleeker and more refined handle of the musashi. And these were true masterpieces, steel pinned, tang encased in special resin that doesn't allow for moister to penetrate.
And then there's me, i trained and learned from sal and eventually bought sal out and have been making swords of all kinds, I have improved on his process and use that process for all my work. I do all the work here, from handles to tsubas, each blade is hand picked for each order, no work gets farmed out. But the cost wise is high as considered to the other brands, but I promise my work, customers are with me from start to finish. I'll replace a sword if your not happy...
But again, cost, time, and preference are always a factor
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