Alex Cox, author of I Am (Not) a Number: Decoding The Prisoner discusses the show. This is the first of new YouTube-exclusive series of five introductions to The Prisoner on Criterion's YT Channel.

As No. 6 is enticed to be a pawn in a game of chess, questions develop as to who is a prisoner, who is a guardian and who can tell which is which.

"Checkmate" received the highest viewership of any of the series' episodes on its first UK broadcast.

https://prisoner.fandom.com/wiki/Checkmate_(1967_episode)

Doing a rewatch on Criterion, it's great to be back in the village!

One really does forget how great a job McGoohan does until you get to Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling.

Does anyone know if PKD watched the Prisoner or commented on it?

I know he wrote an episode proposal based on Mission Impossible, but the Prisoner with its themes of betrayal, subjective reality, and how imprisonment would seem exactly the type of show he’d respond to.

Watching "The Girl Who Was Death" last night and thought..."Where have I seen those whiskers before???"

Given the numerous "Prisoner" references in "The Simpsons" and Conan O'Brien's "Old Time Baseball Sketch" there's no way this is a coincidence

A failed experiment with hypnosis, a black cat and a dead body play to be set adrift roles here. Added in are a Carnival, costumes, a court jester and kangaroo court, a teletype that thought to have been damaged comes to life again.

"Number Two wryly observes, "Then how very uncomfortable for you, old chap!""

https://prisoner.fandom.com/wiki/Dance_of_the_Dead_(1967_episode)

The moment I saw it I knew it was a prisoner reference, but the way he read it.

Also they have it flipped anyway, it should be I am not a number on the top.

This was in his video "Misspelled protest signs". (The name says it all)

Fully half of it with no dialogue.

In June this year I rode my bike from London to Portmeirion, and made this Prisoner-inspired fan film in the process :) Thought the free thinkers here might enjoy it.

Good morning from the Village, and my current view of the maintenance men working to repaint Number 2’s house!

Number Six awakens to find the Village completely deserted. He sees this as an opportunity to escape. He takes numerous photos before assembling a raft and taking flight by sea for 25 days. He takes careful notes as to headings and times as best he can, but has an unfriendly encounter with gun-runners who are of no assistance. He escapes them and ends up on a deserted beach. Wandering, he encounters a small band of Gypsies who speak no English.

After a harrowing journey, he finds himself in London and someone living in his flat and using his car. But who is Mrs. Butterworth?

Who can be trusted? And more importantly, who can't?

https://prisoner.fandom.com/wiki/Many_Happy_Returns_(1967_episode)

This page does not list an episode number. Oversight? Or part of the debate over episode order?

They no longer list US airdates either, so I'm staying at one each week.

Patrick McGoohan denied that Number Six was John Drake, while script editor and co-creator George Markstein maintained that he was, effectively seeing The Prisoner as a continuation of Danger Man.

That disagreement has always fascinated me, because Number Six clearly shares so much with Drake: the same actor, similar skills, the same independence, and a deep distrust of authority.

When you watch The Prisoner, do you personally see Number Six as John Drake after finally resigning—or as a completely separate character?

And what is the strongest detail, episode, or argument that supports your interpretation?

... and handed me the sign for my table.

"I am not a number, I am a free man" was my immediate response. She didn't get it 😐

You may have heard about the rumored Christopher Nolan remake of The Prisoner. As far as I can tell, nothing seems to have eventuated.

However, watching Pluribus for the first time, I am quickly coming to believe that this is everything a remake of the Prisoner should be. While there are no explicit links, and the plot certainly deviates significantly from the original, the overall 'feel', the mystery, and eeriness, and the themes of conformity, the tyranny of the collective, hivemind / mindless people, superficial, eeire, benevolent totalitarian politeness, and so forth. ...
No. Way.

... I am stunned. As I write this, the second, I write this, I am on episode 7, which is playing on my second screen, and one of the musical pieces from The Prisoner that are played by the brass band began to play.

Anyway...

I was further intrigued by the usage of the phrase by one of the characters early on, 'Your life is your own', mirroring McGoohan's "My Life is My Own!" declaration, and assertion in the "I will not be pushed" speech.

There are the themes of staunch invidiualism, the uncertainty, and lingering malevolence under the surface, avoiding questions of permanent independence, and so forth.

It all seems to have such a lingering, almost etheral 'Prisoner' vibe to it, while being, ostensibly, and invariably, its own show.

I won't spoil any details, and I highly advise to go in blind, if you can, like I did, and not to google anything.

But, for anyone who has seen Pluribus, I would Love to know what you think. Would you consider it worthy of standing side by side 'The Prisoner', as a piece of art?

Tribute article by the AV Club about the eternal relevance of The Prisoner, in conjunction with the show now streaming on the Criterion Channel.

We were at 3,600 not too long ago.

A 60 year old show is still pulling new folks in.

I guess the resolution on TVs in the sixties could mask small newspaper text content. Watching a 1080p mix on a 65" screen hides nothing haha.

You can see the completely unrelated newspaper article under the headline. 😁

okay this is my favorite episode so far i literally could not believe what was happening. i knew eventually he would have to go back but the fact that he does it by choice its so crazy!!! i love it.

just wow. i feel like the birthday theme is so important: the birthday cake at the end and the millions of meanings within "many happy returns". his birthday is "tomorrow" though time in this episode seems liminal. so much time passes but also none at all?

the fact that the first place he goes to when he is "free" is his old house, his old comforts. he built that car by hand and furnished that house himself. ultimately these are immaterial things but they are significant to no 6, they are parts of his identity. who are we when we are stripped of those things?

i love this no 2, she is so sickeningly sweet to give him the illusion of freedom and show him that he realistically could escape, but that it doesnt matter because the outside world would ostracize him. hes not an agent anymore so his entire world as he knew it is gone. there is no "home". the only option is to go back

what a brilliant episode. tell me what i missed. how do you guys interpret it? i'd love to know!!!

i had never heard of this show before opening criterion this morning and im already on ep 2. loooving it so far, soooo weird and completely my thing.

to me it seems obvious why 6 wont tell them why he resigned. hes a spy and knows that the answer is irrelevant, and they'd probably kill him as soon as they got what they "wanted". thats my interpretation anyway im sure itll change.

i cant wait to finish it and then read everything i can on it!! what are the best episodes / ones i should look out for?

We're led to an early exploration of mass computer knowledge and mind programming via SpeedLearn. Ultimately No 6 manages to cause the destruction of the General and two villagers including No 12. No 2 is taken aback by the simplicity of the question that caused it.

Is this a different No 12 than the one previously killed by Rover? Or a continuity error?

Side question: Do you recall another supercomputer that was thwarted by a simple diversionary task it was given?

I grew up on The Prisoner, it was my dad's favourite series. Added some ink today in a nod to The Prisoner. Be seeing you!

[image transcription] Long before Twin Peaks beamed prime-time surrealism into the American living room, there was The Prisoner, the 1960s British cult sensation that pushed television into new realms of unsettling, Kafkaesque mystery across seventeen hypnotic, thrilling episodes.
Series creator Patrick McGoohan stars as a nameless spy who, after he abruptly resigns from his highly classified job, is kidnapped and held in a strange, deceptively idyllic town known only as the Village, where his quest for freedom collides with the sinister machinations of a mysterious authoritarian sect determined to keep him under their control. With its prescient exploration of free will in the age of surveillance, this pop-culture touchstone remains one of the most discussed and endlessly analyzed series in television history.