Face Unknown

    Did he, did ZM73 recognize the face staring back at him in the mirror? Is that why he punched the glass with his fist, because he recognized the face of the Colonel? The original title of this episode ‘Face Unknown’ would suggest he did not. So it must have been simply because of what they had done to him! But certainly that’s why Vincent Tilsley had to create Sir Charles Portland, because this time there was no Colonel for Number 6 to go running back to as he had twice before, as this time he was effectively the Colonel! But I don’t see why ZM73 had to be engaged, Janet Portland does appear to be somewhat superfluous. And yet to cut her out of the script would have taken a good deal away from the episode, and someone had had to keep that roll of film safe for him. Mind you, it might well have been equally secure in that wall safe hidden behind the television set! Or stowed away in a locker at Victoria railway station for example, after all that’s what Number 6 did originally in a scene in ‘Many Happy Returns.’ He jumped out of the back of the lorry in Piccadilly Circus, when he paused to look at the statue of Eros, opposite Lillywhites, an elderly gentleman pressed a two shilling into his hand, saying he hoped things get better for him. He looked at the coin in his hand, and the film he had taken of The Village and made his way to the underground, there he deposited the roll of film in a locker. ZM73 could easily have done that with the receipt for the role of film he left at World cameras. It might have been safer there!

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