Episode 1

The Prisoner: The Arrival.

The Prisoner is a 1967 British television series, starring Patrick McGoohan as “Number 6,” a top-level government agent who resigns his post. As a result, he’s kidnapped and imprisoned in “The Village”, where his captors hope to interrogate him for “information.” The series documents Number 6’s repeated escape attempts and the progressively more extreme methods employed by his captors to break his will.

Synopsis

The show’s opening lays out the premise. After thundering storm clouds in a blue sky, a determined man drives his cool car, straight toward us, on an empty road. He speeds into an underground garage, and marches through a door labeled “Way Out.” A thunder clap repeats as he confronts someone sitting behind a desk by pacing and pounding on the table. He’s angrily quitting his job. Driving away, he’s followed by a black car. A typewriter blots out a file with his photograph, and drops it into a filing cabinet labeled “Resigned”. Once home, the man hurriedly packs for a trip, tossing a beach photograph into a suitcase. Suddenly, gas floods the room via a keyhole. He passes out.

This is the introduction to The Prisoner, and repeats before each episode.

The man wakes up in a strange bed. Where is he? The phone doesn’t dial out, and a grocery store only has local maps. People say goodbye to him with the phrase “Be seeing you!” We’ll soon consider this a reminder of the constant surveillance in The Village.

He finds his way to a house with the number “6″ on a sign pointing to the door. This is his new home - and his new name: “Number 6.” The phone rings - it’s “Number 2″ inviting him to the Green Dome. There, a silent midget butler leads Number 6 to a James Bond / Blofeld room, with modern furniture and a penny-farthing bicycle. A man in a big, spherical chair with a cane greets him - he is “Number 2″.

Angry, Number 6 demands answers. Number 2 explains that he’s is being held prisoner in The Village, because of what he knows and “they” want to know the reason for his resignation.

After a fruitless questioning session, Number 6 steals a car in an attempt to escape. Directed by village-wide cameras feeding into a control room, a large inflatable ball (”Rover”), tracks him down and he’s captured. A brute force, obvious attempt at escape is impossible, due to the surveillance and mysterious technology behind Rover.

Number 6 awakens in a hospital where he meets an old colleague, Cobb. Number 6 unsuccessfully tries to get information out of him. After seeing some strange sights in the hospital, Cobb suddenly jumps out the window, killing himself.

At the funeral, Number 6 finds a distraught woman who knew Cobb. She offers to help Number 6 escape, by giving him a device that will hold Rover off for a time, so he can steal a helicopter.

The plan works for a time. As Number 6 flies away in the stolen helicopter, an elderly, chess playing man mutters to the woman, “We’re all pawns, my dear.” As the meaning sinks in, we see the helicopter returning to The Village, under remote control.

We learn that the woman was deliberately set up to mislead Number 6 - Cobb’s death was faked. “They” foresaw that she would help him, and in what exact way, to teach him a lesson about the futility of escape. We never see her again; presumably she is eliminated.

Dejected, Number 6 exits the helicopter back at The Village. The closing sequence features his face rushing towards us as jail bars slam shut, signifying his thwarted escape attempt.

Thoughts

So where to begin? I’ll start by mentioning some series-wide concepts introduced in just the episode’s opening sequence alone:

• Thunderclaps = anger, conflict.
• A man driving down the road = freedom.
• Man quitting his job = rebellion.
• Faceless technology typing over his face and dropping the image into a filing cabinet = a man reduced to “a number” by an impersonal system: suppression of the individual
• Shadowed by a person in a black car = surveillance.
• Gas = loss of control.

In this first episode itself, through the workings of The Village, these concepts are reinforced. Number Six wants to escape The Village and regain his freedom. He rebels against authority by not telling Number 2 why he quit, destroying the tinker-toy sculpture, and attempting escape. Surveillance is everywhere, and the impersonal system finds it’s greatest symbol in the form of Rover, and loss of control is exemplified by the remote-controlled helicopter.

The Village

I suppose I’ll mention some thoughts about The Village as this is my first post. Through the invasive power of technology, The Village keeps a constant watch on all its inhabitants and uses this information to control them. It becomes a statement about society as a whole. What is the value of privacy? Can we really trust those that collect information to not use it for their own purposes?

It’s implied that because The Village knows so much about its population, it can predict their behavior in particular situations, manipulate them into certain actions, and even worse - do this without their knowledge, so they believe they’re acting on their own volition. Their freedom of choice or freedom of will are illusions.

But it gets worse. The Village is superficially a nice place - a sunny beach resort, where lodging, food, and entertainment are provided. The Village pretends to be free in certain ways when it explicitly is not. It’s status as a prison seems to be a non-issue to many of the inhabitants: they have been manipulated through various means (which become clearer later in the series) to the point where they no longer wish to escape.

This situation is more relate-able if the village metaphor is extended to that of a nation. Imagine that as a citizen, you are told you cannot venture beyond its borders. Meanwhile, you’re given anything you could ask for in terms of comforts. There are stories about people trying to escape and done away with, but you figure it’s easier to just stay where you are, maybe for the greater good.

Would you still feel like a Prisoner? How can one be sure freedoms exist that are never tested? Does a lack of freedoms really matter if there is no desire to use them?

A prisoner literally means one without freedom. The citizens of The Village are physical and psychological prisoners. How Number 6 deals with this injustice is explored through the series.

Next Episode: Free For All
Previous Episode: The Arrival

IMDB: The Arrival
Wikipedia: The Arrival
The Prisoner Online: The Arrival
Bookmice: The Arrival

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Related Posts: The Prisoner: Free For All :: The Prisoner: Chimes Of Big Ben :: The Prisoner: The General :: The Prisoner: Many Happy Returns ::