The Prisoner (original)...

[auntiehill]

^CBS refused to run that episode the first two times they ran the series. They claimed it was because of the drug use (not likely, IMO, if you consider how many times drugs are mentioned in the series), but the general consensus was that it was because of the obvious anti-war statement being made in the middle of the Vietnam War.

While not my favorite episode, I find it interesting in that it's an allegory of the series---so, in effect, an allegory of an allegory.

 

[Kirkman1987]

"Living In Harmony" **

Number 6 is put through an illusionary program.

Uh...just was this? I mean seriously, what the FUCK was that??? Were they that hellbent on doing a western?

Crap.

This episode actually was done mostly as a whim of Patrick Mcgoohan, who said he always wanted to do a western.

I like it better than Do Not forsake me oh my Darling, but it's still weak. No one is joking when they say this show has filler episodes.

I'll give them some credit and say that the opening sequence mirroring the regular opening titles is clever.

 

[Christopher]

Ohh, if you thought "Living in Harmony" was hard to swallow, you'd better brace yourself for "The Girl Who Was Death." This whole block of three episodes preceding the 2-part finale is definitely the doldrums of the series.

 

[Kirkman1987]

Ohh, if you thought "Living in Harmony" was hard to swallow, you'd better brace yourself for "The Girl Who Was Death." This whole block of three episodes preceding the 2-part finale is definitely the doldrums of the series.

Agreed. There's a few amusing scenes in "Girl" but it's really silly. On top of that, it is once again almost entirely unrelated to The Prisoner.

 

[Starkers]

I love The Girl Who Was Death.
I always forget the Western is called Living in Harmony, my mind gets confused and automatically assumes it's Do not Forsake me oh my darling!!

 

[Christopher]

I always forget the Western is called Living in Harmony, my mind gets confused and automatically assumes it's Do not Forsake me oh my darling!!

Me too, and that's a natural mistake to make, since "Do Not Forsake Me, Oh, My Darlin'" is the alternate title (and opening line) for "The Ballad of High Noon," the title song to the Western High Noon.

 

[Starkers]

Yeah that's what confuses me

 

[auntiehill]

^I do that, too. I always get the titles confused.

 

[Sindatur]

^Fourthed. Me too

 

[Warped9]

"The Girl Who Was Death" *

Number 6 reads children a bedtime story.

Totally stupid crap... What a waste of time with no point whatsoever.

 

[C.E. Evans]

"The Girl Who Was Death" *

Number 6 reads children a bedtime story.

Totally stupid crap... What a waste of time with no point whatsoever.

I recall a McGoohan interview in which he said it was around the time this episode was made that the ideas started to run dry. Sure, he could have kept using the formula of Number Six trying to escape the Village and always being foiled at the last minute, but that was beginning to wear thin on him.

 

[Kirkman1987]

You've made it through the filler episodes, only the two crazed final episodes to go.

 

[auntiehill]

I can't wait to hear your first impression of the final two episodes.

Prepare the "WTF" emoticons now.

 

[RJDiogenes]

I've been surprised to realize how little I remember of these episodes. It's been an awful long time....

 

[Andrew_Kearley]

The Girl Who was Death is great fun. The Prisoner is full of mad humour and whimsy, I think it fits in perfectly, by not fitting in with the rest of it. By reducing no.2 to a pantomime villain in a children's fairy tale, it completes the shift in the balance of power between 6 and 2 and leaves 6 totally in command. It's right that it should go right before the finale.

Living in Harmony is also terrific, playing the same trick in a much more serious mode. I don't like that the two episodes should run back to back though, as it weakens the WTF element of it all. My preference is to move Harmony back into the middle of the series. I wouldn't call either of these episodes fillers or doldrums by any means. The Prisoner isn't a generic show with a fixed formula or style, and being able to subvert its own format is one of its terrific strengths.

 

[Starkers]

The Girl Who was Death is great fun.

This

You.

Have.

Been.

Poisoned!

 

[RJDiogenes]

^^ That is one of my favorite moments in the series.

 

[Warped9]

"Once Upon A Time" **

Number 6 undergoes a form of regressive therapy.

"Fall Out" ***

Number 6 finally meets Number 1.

"Once Upon A Time" is the last ditch attempt to learn Number 6's secret only he turns the tables on them. Candidly this was silly as hell. I understood it to a point, but I don't think it was well done. Actually it was mostly annoying and boring.

"Fall Out" was somewhat better, but there's definite WTF going on in this. Again I kept reminding myself to take none of it literally. It's all symbolism. Candidly I don;t know if I really understand any of it. It strikes me that, in context with the rest of the series, Number 6 was basically his own enemy. He represents the constant war within each of us to either conform or assert his own individuality. To accept the rules of others or to follow his own.

For a time I actually thought Number 1 was a computer...which then later became a rocket(???). I don't know what the rocket is supposed to mean other than it might represent "the end" by refusing to conform... No, actually I haven't a clue what the damned rocket means.

The whole former spy as prisoner is a smoke screen, a distraction (maybe playing on the popularity of the spy genre in the '60s), because it's really the individual's struggle to maintain his/her own sense of identity in a world always trying to sell you something: buy this or accept this (rule or product) and reap the reward and be part of a greater whole. And don't ask any questions, just accept and it'll all be fine.

Actually I'm still not sure I really get this. It's just weird as hell.

 

[Christopher]

^If you thought you understood "Fall Out," you'd be wrong. It's not about clarity. It's about making you think and ask questions -- which, in a way, is the ultimate rejection of the Village's mentality that questions shouldn't be asked.

And since it was the '60s, the rocket probably symbolized the atomic bomb, at least on one level. Spy stuff and nuclear brinksmanship went hand-in-hand.

 

[Sindatur]

Bummer, sorry to read you didn't enjoy the conclusion