The Therapy Zone

The Nightmare World Of The Prisoner

    True to say that the Prisoner has been seen as many things, so how about the Prisoner as a horror story?

    Certainly Rover - that white membranic village guardian is the most original creature ever devised - because you don't know exactly what it is, what it's made of, of this Earth, man-made or alien. Yet we know what it does, it terrifies, suffocates, and originally it was to have been seen to fill with the blood of its victims, and you can't get more horrific than that.

  Several of No.2's characters are threatening, and seem capable of almost anything. And there is the hidden face, the secrets behind the locked door. Doctors, who in the confines of the hospital, are unafraid of carrying out the most horrendous human experiments, along with the implication that the villages administration could do, if forced, adds a chilling atmosphere to the village.

   The episode ‘Dance of the Dead’ is probably the darkest of the 17 episodes, and 'Dance of the Dead' is just about right. Even the original actor to have played No.2, Trevor Howard, would have been in costume as Jack the Ripper. Murder was to have been done on No.6, at the bare hands of the screaming citizens, who were baying for blood. Would they not have torn No.6 limb from limb, had they caught up with him in the corridors of the Town Hall that evening at the ‘Dance of the Dead.’ And don't forget that originally the script called for everyone at the Dance to die, save for No.6!

   'Living In Harmony' has its fair share of this nightmare world. Yet nothing equals the creepy sight of seeing the eyes of No.8 staring at No.22 from beneath the steps, and out of the darkness. And once No.8 has his bare hands around No.22's neck, and as he strangles the poor young woman, the look on No.8's face equals any maniac you can bring to mind.

   And finally, if that bomb hidden in the "Great seal of Office" had actually been detonated by the Watchmaker, there would have been "blood, guts and smashed bone" all over the place! Which od course is what happened to Colonel Hawke-Englihe at the wicket in 'the Girl Who Was Death.'

   The Prisoner as a horror story? Its certainly equals many nightmares!

The Question Is Why?

   Why do we persist in watching the 17 episode ordeal of the Prisoner? Why do we put ourselves through it all repeatedly, over and over again? Perhaps through some perverse enjoyment, safe in the knowledge that once an episode is over, we can return to the relative safety of the real world.

  Perverse enjoyment did I write? Well perhaps that's right. After all there we sit, watching a man, a prisoner such as No.6 being put through a series of ordeals, waiting for him to attempt to escape, but knowing full well that escape is not possible. Oh the anticipation we enjoy with ‘The Chimes of Big Ben’ for example, as time draws ever closer to the hour of eight, when Big Ben will strike the hour upon which No.6 will realise that he has been tricked. That he has not escaped the village at all. And again with ‘Many Happy Returns,’ the viewer knows full well that despite his having escaped the Village, having been allowed to escape the village, that he will soon be returned there. We watch with excited anticipation as No.6, dangling at the end of a parachute struggles to slow his descent to the beach below. And in ‘Fall Out,’ the Prisoner has finally escaped the Village, only to discover that he's just as much a prisoner at the end as he was at the beginning!

   Except in the Prisoner’s end is his beginning, and in that knowledge we subliminally want No.6 to remain incarcerated in the village. The viewer actually enjoys watching his confinement, sharing with grim fascination, the various ordeals of No.6's inquisition, and confinement in the village. In short we don't want the Prisoner known as No.6 to escape. Should he do so, then the perverse enjoyment which the viewer extracts from the Prisoner's confinement, the experiments used against him, and the dangerous situations he is both physically and mentally put in, are no longer open to us - the viewers perverse pleasure cut short.

   In the prisoners escape, our pleasure is lost, and so are we.

I'll be seeing the Prisoner-No.6 soon!