The Prisoner

    The thing about ‘the Prisoner’ is, it isn’t real. And yet, although it is a remarkable television series that has withstood the test of time, it has endured, it is nevertheless just that, a television series. An old friend of mine once said, just after High Definition television became readily available, that I need to see ‘the Prisoner’ in High Definition. He told me that the picture clarity was so good, it's as though the series was made yesterday. But surely that’s the point, it wasn’t, and I have never understood the need for something to look as though it was filmed yesterday, when it was actually filmed 47 years ago. I did think that the next stage for ‘the Prisoner’ was to have it converted into 3D, but it would seem that 3D television isn’t going to be what people thought. So I’ve an idea that my old chum will be itching to see ‘the Prisoner’ in “curve” television, apparently that’s television with a curved screen, supposedly imitating how the eye sees the world.
    And yet ‘the Prisoner’ isn’t real, and yet sometimes I write about it as though it were. I even try, from time to time, to put a different slant on certain situations within ‘the Prisoner.’ That’s not me trying to be humorous, or clever, some people do not like me doing that, using my imagination. But I enjoy it, and if it pleases me, then it might please others. No-one is forced to like it, no-one is forced to read it.
   Do I take ‘the Prisoner’ seriously? Sometimes, perhaps too seriously at times. But the thing about ‘the Prisoner’ is it stirs the mind, it can mess with the mind. It makes you think, and just when you think you have it all figured out, {well I don’t know anyone who can claim that} you either find a piece of the puzzle is missing, or there‘s a piece over that doesn‘t fit! ‘The Prisoner’ can be looked at in so many different ways. It can be dissected, taken apart, and there are so many ways to put it back together again.
   Next year ‘the Prisoner will be 48 years old, and it can never be fully understood, or explained, such are the mysteries that still lie within the series. How many television series can you name that can claim that distinction? Derren Nesbitt, the interim, the heir presumptive, and finally new Number 2 of ‘It’s Your Funeral,’ he once said of ‘the Prisoner’ in an interview for ‘Once Upon A time,’ “I’m not sure I knew what it was all about." Robert Asher who was the director of ‘It’s Your Funeral’ asked him if he knew what the episode was all about, and Derren said quite frankly that he didn’t. To that Robert Asher said “Oh well, I’m glad it’s not just me.”
   I Suppose Derren Nesbitt and Robert Asher summed it all up really. We like to think we know a great deal about ‘the Prisoner,’ and yes we do, but not completely everything. And yet isn’t it true that ‘the Prisoner’ is what we make of it ourselves? I mess around with scenes in the series, put different aspects on them. Make them into something they never were, and some may think that’s wrong. But it’s what I choose to do, because it’s a world into which I can disappear from time to time. My way of manipulating ‘the Prisoner’ for my own enjoyment, and perhaps for others to enjoy. After all if we didn’t write about ‘the Prisoner,’ discuss and debate it, theorise, interpret, create Prisoner fan art for example, well we’re not expected to just sit and watch ‘the Prisoner’ on television are we? Well yes, but we can do all that other stuff as well!

Be seeing you