Safety In Numbers!

   That’s what they say isn’t it, there’s safety in numbers the hypothesis is that there is safety in numbers, by being part of a large physical group or mass, an individual is less likely to be the victim of a mishap, accident, attack, or other bad event. That is hardly true of many citizens in The Village. But perhaps the phrase “safety in numbers” takes on another meaning, after all names are not used in The Village, everyone known only by a number. Mind you perhaps it’s all official in The Village, nothing personal. But really is there safety in numbers, after all there is no number 7. Number 7 has been omitted, apparently its only crime being that it’s a lucky number. As in the number 13 being an unlucky number and therefore some hotels in some countries do not have a room 13. My wife remembers when she was a little girl her father pointing out to her that the hotel they had booked in had no room 13. Perhaps Number 7 once existed in The Village, but because he often found himself in “lucks way,” as Number 6 does more often than not, the powers that be decided to expel the number 7 from The Village. And yet the number persists, 1+6=7, as does 2+5=7, as well 3+4=7 mind you so does 1+2+4=7 and not to mention 1+1+1+1+1+1+1=7. Safety in numbers, there wasn’t for Number 7!

Be seeing you

60 Second Interview

    “It’s a grand day for it.”
    “A grand day for what?”
    “Gardening, working with the good earth.”
    “Its what I do, being a gardener. Anyway what’s it go to do with you?”
    “I’m Number One-one-three, and this is my photographic colleague Number One-one-three b. We contribute to The Tally Ho.”
    “Smile” click goes the camera.
    “We all have our jobs to do.”
    “Yes, well a few moments ago you were observed driving one of the garden tractors as an electrician, how do you account for that?”
    “Do I have to?”
    “It wasn’t you?”
    “How could it be, I’ve been gardening all morning, putting in new plants.”
    “Do you have an identical twin?”
    “No.”
    “Number One-one-three b has an identical twin, Number One-one-three c.”
    “What’s that got to do with me?”
    “So it wasn’t you?”
    “Look it was me……..”
    “What were you doing masquerading as an electrician?”
    “It was Number Two’s idea. He wanted to keep Number 6 off balance. If he met me as an electrician, but a few minutes later as a gardener it might knock him back.”
    “And did it?”
    “No. Now if you don’t mind I’ve got some planting to do.”
    “What are you planting?”
    “Bulbs!”

Be seeing you

In The Village!

    Look at them, brainwashed imbeciles! Can you laugh, can you cry, can you think? In fact there’s nothing to choose between the members of the Town Council in ‘Free For All,’ and those of the Committee in ‘A Change of Mind.’ Neither have much to say for themselves, and both are led by a Chairman.
    Number 6 told the Colonel that he could have been a member of the Town Council which is elected once a year. Well it was up until sometime before ‘Dance of The Dead,’ by which time the democratic process had been swept away, although The Village is still democratic in some ways, according to Number 2.
   I like to think of the members of the Town Council as former Number 2’s seeing as according to the numbered rostrums they are sub-divided Number 2’s, perhaps they are failed Number 2’s and their fate is to stand on the Town Council. It’s a pity that it’s impossible to read the numbers on the badges worn by the members of the Town Council, they might have confirmed or disconfirmed whether or not they are ex-Number 2’s. Mind you I expect the members of the council do not need to be former Number 2’s, they could be anyone who stood for election. Its lucky for Number 6 that he wasn’t co-opted onto the Town Council, despite having been elected as a new Number 2, otherwise he would have ended up as one of those brainwashed imbeciles! And lucky for the ex-Number 2 who was allowed to leave The Village, but then he didn’t fail in his task, which is lucky for him!

Be seeing you

Guardian Times!

    There are a number of contradictions regarding a new arrival in the village, that of No.8-Nadia Rakovsky. No.2 told No.6 that she had been brought to the

village because of nervous tension, saying she’s there for recuperation. And yet when Number 6 had taken her to the door of the Green Dome, she muttered to herself "I didn't think it would be like this." Didn’t think it would be like what? What did she expect it would be like, more to the point why should she wonder what it would be like in the village? Unless of course No.2’s original story had been true. But then she did tell No.6 all she had done was resign. Ah, that was clever, No.8 telling him that, she hoped to play on his sympathies, seeing as she’s in the village for the same reason as he, for resigning her job. But No.6 has no sympathy for anyone, he trusts no-one. But No.8 is just as bad, she thinks No.2 is a very charming man, and would have thought his assistant to be the same. What about No.8? She is a very charming, and attractive woman. It’s no wonder that she appears most as The Tally Ho Pin-Up. It had been a long lunch, almost all day as it goes, seeing as No.8 was just in time to share a nightcap with No.6. No doubt during that long lunch No.8 briefed Nadia about The Village, about the Guardian. But I shouldn’t think that any amount of briefing about that white amorphous thing, could prepare her for what she would experience. Being half drowned in a whirlpool, or maelstrom created by a creature created purely out of membrane. I wouldn’t say half suffocated because she wasn’t, not in the same way as No.6 in a similar scene. But all the same it must have been a nasty experience for her. And there’s no point trying to fight the Guardian, because it has properties of a balloon, in that it offers no resistance! One thin though, it takes not one but three Guardians to bring a body back to shore.

 But how exactly does it do that? There is no actual contact between body and Guardian. It has no physical extremities with which to grasp said body. Presumably it emits some kind magnetic field, or stabilizing force to do with linear graviton, in ‘Star Trek’ they call it a tractor beam. The mechanical Rover MK1 had something more akin to a Tractor beam, a paralyzing blue light which held anyone attempting to escape, and could even absorb its prey into the machine!

   The last we see of the Guardian is in ‘Fall Out,’ when it appears to be dying a death after the rocket has blasted off. And yet the brief scene does suggest Rover existing on some alien plant, the

environment of which looks distinctly uninhabitable! Hot and steamy, could be an asteroid. And yet here on planet Earth, the Guardian exists at the bottom of the sea. So I think it logical to suggest that the ‘mother Guardian,’ of which we see but segments, would have survived. It makes me wonder if the Supervisor, whoever that is at the time, during the evacuation of the village made sure that the Guardian was completely deactivated. On the other hand, perhaps it would have been prudent to leave a segment activated, to set a sentinel, a guardian! M.R. James was good at setting guardians, in his story ‘A Warning To The Curious,’ the guardian is one William Agar, even after his death his ghost protected the last of the three crowns said to guard the realm in times of trouble. In ‘The Treasure of Abbot Thomas’ the guardian set to protect a hoard of gold is a thing of slime. So it stands to reason that the powers that be would not leave the abandoned village unprotected. Its secrets must surely be protected against any probable intruder.
    And yet there are those who would have it that the village is destroyed by the rocket! I don’t see it, because the village is still there long after the rocket has blasted out of its silo, so where is the village destroyed? Besides the rocket isn’t a ballistic missile, because it’s set to carry four people to where…….to where? We do know? It is reasonable to think to a place somewhere beyond the Earth, perhaps to that uninhabitable place where we see the Guardian. The whole Earth as the village, and the village an experiment conducted by the Guardian towards that aim. An alien life form dedicated to ruling the Earth but through humans. Perhaps in that cave in ‘Free For All’ we witness human’s undergoing some kind of indoctrination by the Guardian. See how it pulsates and glows. See the four men’s attitude toward No.6 when he enters the cave, they restrain him, stopping any possible harm coming to the Guardian. Funny though,the four men in the picture are dressed in overalls like the aliens in ‘The Invaders,’

just an observation. 

See you soon                        

Quote For The Day

   “Excellent, fit for any contingency.”
   “Anything specific in mind?”
   “My dear chap how suspicious you are of us all, be seeing you.”

                         {Number 10 and Number 6 – A Change of Mind}

   They like to give Number 6 a medical now and again. The first time was after a particularly nasty experience with the Guardian. As for Number 6 being so suspicious, he has good reason. Perhaps the reason Number 6 was taken to the hospital for a medical is because they wanted the doctor to make sure he was fit for the next ordeal! But certainly Number 6 does like to keep himself physically fit and active, perhaps not for any contingency, but certainly for his next escape attempt!

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Village Life!

   What was it Number 2 said, oh yes, “You might even meet people you know.”
   Here Number 6 meets up with a former colleague, Potter, who has been given the job of manager of the Labour Exchange. Its no wonder the Prisoner threw Number 20’s toy out of the pram for him! The only question is, why they thought Potter was important enough to have been brought to The Village in the first place!

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The Prisoner

    When one has watched ‘the Prisoner’ on and off for 50 years, contemplated what it’s all supposed to be about, thought, theorized, supposed, surmised. Discussed, debated, placed interpretation upon. Put your ideas down on paper, perhaps have written a thesis, a monograph, or essay on the subject of ‘the Prisoner’ and you still have no idea what it’s about..... Because let’s face it there’s so much to ‘the Prisoner,’ so many different levels, so many ways to go, and avenues to explore that ‘the Prisoner’ means what it is, whatever that is. And if we don’t know what that it, there’s only one thing to do begin at the beginning....cue dark clouds, thunder, cue music, action. Dark clouds and thunder means there’s a storm brewing. The sound of an aircraft, a runway suggests there’s an airport nearby. The chap in the Lotus 7, where had he come from, somewhere abroad perhaps. Or maybe he’s had a call to make in the country, the Colonel’s residence perhaps. Now he’s got a call to make in town, the opposite to how it was in ‘Many Happy Returns,’ but to the same office, the same bureaucrat sat behind that same desk. There’s more thunder, the man shouting the odds, an envelope marked private and delivered by hand and a fist slammed down on the desk to emphasize it, upsetting the cup and saucer on the tea plate in the process. We assume it’s a letter of resignation, but really is there any evidence for that? But no, the man had resigned. He went home, two suitcases already packed. He collects his passport, and an airline ticket, but just a minute, the room’s going round, the skyscrapers and blackness. Before we know where we are we’re involved again and back in The Village! Now this time concentrate, it’s only a television series, it’s not rocket science, although that will become involved later in the series, it shouldn’t be that difficult to understand what it’s all about….should it?

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The Therapy Zone

   I have been thinking about No.6, 51 years ago he was all alone in a big Ocean! He must have put to sea on his raft on February 21^st to arrive back in London on March 18^th. That in turn means he must have begun constructing the raft on either the 18^th or 19^th depending on how long he took to do it. Two or three days I should have thought, although there is no indication of this in the episode.
   Our friend No.6 is a resilient fellow, he’s been on his raft now for some 16 days, at the time I wrote this article, with a further 9 days to go. He slept 4 hours out of each 24, eating cold food out of tins, and cold water to drink. I wonder why he didn’t tether himself to the raft using a life-line? After all he is in the Atlantic Ocean, and particularly when he has the Bay of Biscay to cross, a huge wave might so easily have washed him and his raft away! In the beginning he tries to maintain a certain state of hygiene, but that all soon goes by the board, and the lack of sleep must have been taking its toll.
   So when No.6 was asleep, if only for 4 hours, who was steering the raft? He had no automatic steering gear, so surely the first time No.6 slept for 4 hours he would have been carried miles off course by the tides and currents! When you think about it he was lucky to reach London at all. If it had not been for the intervention of Ernst and Günter the two gunrunners, No.6 would surely have perished at sea. I don’t think they could have been making a great deal of money from this gunrunning caper, because they don’t seem to be doing that much better than No.6. Günter is eating cold baked beans straight from the tin. They also have tinned corned beef, and tinned pineapple chunks, all Village food of course. And we come to a question which seems insoluble for many an enthusiast for ‘the Prisoner,’ are those tins of Village food, No.6’s or their own? If their own it means they were agents working for The Village. If not then where did they get it if not from No.6’s raft? If they took the tinned food from No.6’s raft, which does seem most likely, why are they eating it, have they no food of their own? Mind you No.6 soon cooks up something in the Galley!
 Günter does look genuinely p***** off he missed when trying to shoot him with his pistol at the end of the sequence! But then I thought if Ernst and Günter really wanted to kill No. 6, they could have gone after him as he swam away, ramming him with their motor cruiser. The body of No.6 mutilated by the vessel’s propeller as it passed over the body, just a thought.

   So what is ‘Many Happy Returns’ all about? On the face of it, it appears to be an episode which strengthens the idea that there is no escape from The Village, and no matter where No.6 goes he can be brought back. But No.6 did make that easy for them. Perhaps No.6 was put to the test, a test or ordeal he does not fail. Upon discovering The Village to be deserted, he immediately sets about constructing a sea-going raft. He takes photographic evidence, and sets sail on a dangerous sea voyage. As well as pitting himself against the elements, he has to fight off two dangerous gun-runners. Swim a number of miles, to be washed up on the beach at Beachy Head. Then he scales a chalky cliff, and after being given refreshment by a young gypsy woman, he’s set on his way again. Avoiding a police road block, he jumps into the back of a moving Luton van. Later he hears a police siren, and it seems instinctive, that he leaps out of the back of that Luton van into the path of traffic in Park Lane London. Eventually he arrives back at his home in Buckingham Place, only to find someone else living there, Not only that, but in possession of his Lotus Seven! All of which No.6 takes in his stride.

and yet he could be back in The Village, so he looks for reassurances. The dialling tone of the telephone, the view outside, the patch of dry rot that was made good about 6 months ago, not to mention the hot and cold taps of the shower which had been put on the wrong way round. Later meets with the Colonel and Thorpe, and manages to convince them enough to have his story checked out. The final part of the test is for Number 6 to find his way back to The Village, which he manages to do, not satisfied to have someone else make the search on his behalf. And finally he returns home to his room in The Village, well it’s the only place he can ever go, whether in The Village or in London. And there’s Mrs. Butterworth bringing him a cake in celebration of his happy return, isn’t he a lucky chap! Number 6 appears to have passed the tests with flying colours! The thing about this episode is, no sooner has No.6 discovered the Village deserted than he sets about his escape. And yet having finally escaped it’s almost as though he can’t wait to get back there!

     February and March have been busy times for No.6. First on the night of Feb 10^th he was removed from his cottage and taken to the cottage of 12 Private as he’s put through mind conditioning therapy, and undergoes a physical make-over. That must have taken about four to six week’s, depending upon how long it took No.6 to grow his beard. But then in February on around the18^th he woke up to find The Village deserted and made good his escape on Feb 21^st! So while No.6 is undergoing the mind conditioning etcetera, he’s aboard his raft somewhere in the Atlantic. Work that one out? The problem must lie with the fact that two different scriptwriters were used for ‘The Schizoid Man’ and ‘Many Happy Returns.’ But there is it, it has never paid to scrutinize ‘the Prisoner’ too closely, and there are times when one simply has to ignore some things. In other words don’t think about it too much! Even if they had separated the two episodes by more then ‘The General,’ it would have made no difference, because both have to take place at around the same time simply because of the dates! To combat that some enthusiasts for ‘the Prisoner’ came up with the idea that there are two parallel Villages in which events take place at the same time. No, not even I subscribe to that idea, but each to their own I suppose, no matter how outlandish the idea!

   Mrs. Butterworth is unique for three reasons. Firstly she is the only No.2 to wear the “negative” badge against the usual “positive one. Also the number in this case is white rather than red! Secondly we have never known a No. 2’s name before, even if the name is false at least we can put a name to the face! And thirdly she is the only No.2 to be seen wearing non Village attire. The way she wears her own dress suggests she, like No.6 has only recently arrived in The Village, but long enough to bake him a cake. So why not long enough to change into Village costume? And the black cat which walks into No.6’s cottage with her, is the cat hers, or No.2’s of ‘Dance of The Dead’ as she claimed? I suppose seeing as ‘Dance of The Dead’ was supposed to have been the second episode when No.2 left she could have left the cat behind, just as Mrs. Butterworth will leave her housemaid Martha behind when she eventually leaves The Village. Martha who couldn’t go a day without her sweets, who No.6 recognized and feeling sorry for her, bought a bag of sweets in ‘It’s Your Funeral.’ Of course originally the script called for cigarettes, I wonder why it was changed to candy?  

Be seeing you

60 Second Interview With No.2

    “Hello Number Two……oh don’t tell me we have come at a bad time!”
    “No it’s alright, come in why don’t you.”
    “Can I offer you tea?”
    “No thank you, we wondered if you had another statement to make?”
    “Smile” click goes the camera.
    “No……..no I don’t think I have. But I tell you what I have been reading in The Tally Ho, apparently a hitch-hiker has been killed.”
    “What hitch-hiker?”
    “Yes that’s what I had to ask myself.” 

    “Doesn’t make any sense……does it?”
    “No Number Two.”
    “There’s isn’t a single word about any such hitch-hiker being killed is there…..is there?”
    “No Number Two.”
    “But I am intrigued about First Avenue Holly Lodge and the virtual prisoners there. Then I read this……and wondered what decision had been taken.”

    “Perhaps you can explain?”
    “I’m sorry Number Two, I can’t.”
    “You didn’t write this drivel about Londoners without garages or small boy has gone to, and if you will kill him you might give me a nice little bit of him to eat as a reward for telling you where to find him.”
    “No Number Two.”
    “And what has Mrs. Smith of four the Ridgeway got to do with The Village?”
    “Who?”
    “Her name is on the front page of The Tally Ho, in the bottom right-hand paragraph! And while we are on the subject, who is Mr. W. H. Monday when he’s at home?”
    “I don’t know Number Two.”
    “You are Number One-one-three, and you contribute to The Tally Ho.”
    “Yes Number Two. And he is my photographic colleague Number One-one-three b.”
    “Never mind him…….”
    “Smile” click goes the camera.

       “Not one column of The Tally Ho makes any sense! The only thing that makes sense is my call for an increase in vigilance, security of the community.”

    “Did you write that?”
    “No Number Two, perhaps it was our own reporter.”
    “The column is unaccredited, but who’s this “our own reporter chap?”
    “I don’t know, I’ve never met him.”     

    “You’re lying aren’t you?”
    “No Number Two.”
    “You’re in on it aren’t you…..oh yes!”
    “Making up all this drivel in The Tally Ho, to what purpose?”     
    “I don’t know Number Two.”

    “It’s as though some one has cut up pages of a book, magazine, or out of a newspaper and pasted them all on a page higgledy-piggledy and printed it all off the make a newspaper! Why should anyone do that?”
    “I’ve no idea!”
    “No neither have I…….oh get out get out!”

Be seeing you

Village Pin-Up

                Nadia Gray

   With kind permission of Gene Kirkland

Be seeing you

ESCAPE!

   It would appear that escape from The Village is only possible by sea, and when all such attempts fail during ‘The Chimes of Big Ben,’ Free For All,’ and ‘Many Happy Returns,’ Number 6 tries to send a message to the outside world by sea. Thereby a rough map together with a letter is placed in a wallet, the wallet in the pocket of a dead man, which is tied to a lifebelt and then cast adrift in the estuary to be carried out to sea on the tide. Yet even that attempt fails. Number 6 does try one further escape attempt by sea, in ‘Checkmate’ and gathered about him a prize crew to help him. But when even that fails, Number 6 doesn’t attempt to escape again. It may be supposed that had it not been for the advent of ‘Fall Out’ and the confrontation between the antagonists 6 and 1, Number 6 may well have been left to rot in The Village!

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THE TALLY HO

Improved Café Facilities

by our own reporter

   No.2 in working tirelessly for The Village and the good of its community, brought about improved Café facilities. Personally I could never see what was wrong with the old Café. But I suppose this is a sign of progress, and as No.2 once asked “We know what we must do, what must we do?” Progress, progress, progress came the spontaneous reply! But that didn’t mean the end of the old café, that does still survive. Now The Village has two cafes. I’m surprised there is any call in The Village for a café, not when citizens homes are always but a step or two away where they can make their own coffee and meals. And if its breakfast you want, for those few lucky citizens it’s brought to them on a tray!
   But when exactly did No.2 bring about these improved Café facilities? Because the first time we hear about them is during the Appreciation day ceremony. However the first time we see this new café is at the time of Speed Learn when there’s a public announcement for the history students, and that included just about everyone except No.6! So this new Café must have come about before the advent of Speed Learn, because like Speed Learn the Café is just there, there being no indication of when the work began on either. And seeing how No.2 is deeply involved with the educational experiment he had no time for the  development of The Village’s infrastructure. So No.2, who retired on Appreciation Day, must have been working behind the scenes on this improved Café facility, as well as other projects all the time, such as the new Concert Hall. Is that the same one that held the Folk Music concert, or was that the previous one? I only ask because I didn’t go to that.
   So now The Village has two café’s. I’m actually surprised that The Village can support two Café’s, after all they cannot rely on what we are pleased to call, passing trade! not to mention the Old People’s Home where anyone can go for a cup of coffee, or pot of tea, even for something to eat. Which is actually contrary to it being the Old People’s Home if anyone can go there and enjoy afternoon tea on the lawn! And yet there is another aspect to all this, sociability, the Cafés are places where people can meet up, have a chat, and socialize. The new Café outdoor facilities might look a bit cramped, it having no patio. However it does have an extension, the grassy mound opposite, which more than doubles the “alfresco” pleasure of eating out, which is the continental way. Although No.2 would describe it as being International. And the location of these new facilities? Actually not far from the original Café, on the same side of The Village, and in the direction of the pink Georgian house. Because you can see the Town Hall through the far arch of the Café area.
   And yet it is possible to become confused regarding this new Café facility. Because on occasion its part of a built up area with the Watchmaker’s shop on the opposite side. On another occasion  there is the grassy bank, but with the addition of a kiosk, but with no sign of the Town Hall through the arch, just bushes! This area of The Village seems to be have the ability to adapt itself to current circumstances!. Either that or the stonemasons and gardeners are very swift workers in order to be able to create such horticultural and architectural changes to that part. Perhaps No.2 could not make up his mind as to the development of that area of The Village. There is however one thing to be said about this new café, its atmosphere there is very different to what it was elsewhere!

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Caught On Camera!

    In a scene in ‘It’s Your Funeral’ Number 100 exchanges Number 6’s wristwatch for an identical one which is fair enough. Indeed he holds the two wristwatches together a few moments for the comparison to be made. However it’s not one of these watches he places in the top of the locker. Because the wristwatch in the above picture has a date calendar on the face, under the 12, as shown in the following enlargement, which has been rotated slightly in order to make a better comparison.

      Where as Number 6’s watch does not have a date calendar!

   We know why Number 100 had to swap Number 6’s wristwatch for another. But why swap it for another altogether different for one shot?

Be seeing you

What A Spectacle!

    In ‘Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling,’ yes I know this episode again! When the Colonel/ZM73 has selected the correct numbered slides, and having placed them all in the projector, he takes a pair of spectacles from the breast pocket of his blazer adding two different coloured lenses. They are in fact sunglass shades used by people who have to wear ordinary spectacles. But that’s not important, what is important, is why is Number 6 wearing spectacles when he’s never worn spectacles before! Yes they are the Colonel’s spectacles, but the lenses wouldn’t be the right prescription lenses for Number 6. Especially as he doesn’t wear spectacles! As an added note, judging by the pink tinge to the Colonel’s spectacle frames, they look like National Health glasses!
   

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Exhibition of Arts And Crafts

               You ain’t seen me, right!

BCNU

Fall Out

    The conclusion to ‘the Prisoner,’ that raised even more questions than it answers. I like to think that Number 48 is the former Number 8 who had been with them, but who then went and gone, having died at the end of ‘Living In Harmony.’ So how did he arrive at this point? Well if they can resuscitate one man they can do it with another, and here is Number 48 wearing the same top hat he wore as the Kid. I wonder how he managed to get it? But here he is dressed as himself, and out on trial for his youthful misdemeanours, rebelling against nothing it can define. In the Village, is that? Because we’ve never seen him about at any other time than as Number 8 in ‘Living In Harmony.’ But of course there must be things which happen in The Village to which we as the casual observer are not privy. One thing’s for sure he couldn’t have spent the rest of his life thumbing a lift either way on that dual carriage way of the M1. He appears to have no sense of direction. But then again with him it might be the journey that matters and not the destination, unlike the former Number 2 who ends up back in the welcoming arms of the Establishment. And ZM73 whose future lies in an office somewhere at the end of a long dark corridor!

Be seeing you

In The Village!

    The Prisoner was invited to join Number 2 for breakfast, but it wasn’t to be a leisurely breakfast, but a working breakfast. And even then the table had only been set for one. A cup of tea, bacon, two eggs, and toast, oh the Butler had forgotten the butter and marmalade!
   It’s a question of the Prisoner’s resignation, and the information inside his head is priceless. Number 2 suggests he doesn’t realize what a valuable property he had become. A man like him is worth a great deal on the open market. Number 2 is sympathetic, knows how the Prisoner feels, perhaps he himself was once in the Prisoner’s position. And admits that “they” have taken quite a liberty, but who are they? Apparently a lot of people are curious about what lies behind the Prisoner’s resignation. He had a brilliant career, his record is impeccable, they want to know why he suddenly left. What people? Personally, Number 2 is about to sympathize again, I believe your story I do think it was a matter of principle….but err what he thinks doesn’t really count, one has to be sure about these things, and apparently that gives “them” the right to poke their nose into the Prisoner’s private business. But please, its Number 2’s job to check the Prisoner’s motives, who demands that he’s been checked! Of course, but when a man like the Prisoner knows as much as he does a double check does no harm. A few details might have been missed, what like the time of the Prisoner’s birth, I don’t believe it! But then if the Prisoner will answer one simple question, then all the rest will follow. Well it was worth a try I suppose!

     The question is what motives had to be checked? Number 2 must mean the motives behind the Prisoner’s resignation, the Prisoner demanded that he’d been checked. But by whom, and when, before he handed in his resignation, or after? One can only surmise that any checks that were done, because the Prisoner insisted that they had been done, must have been carried out by his own people. And all those people who are curious about what lies behind the Prisoner’s resignation, Number 2 could include the television viewers in that statement!

Be seeing you

Village Life!

    Its alright for some, anyone would think this place is a holiday resort. Hasn’t she got any work to do?

BCNU

60 Second Interview With No.36

    “Ah good day Number Thirty-Six, we are well met this day.”
    “Why are you talking like that, and why are we well met?”
    “I am Number One-one-three, and his is my photographic colleague Number One-one-three b, we contribute to The Tally Ho.”
    “What’s that to me?”

    “Smile” click goes the camera.
    “Why is he taking my photograph?”
    “Don’t worry about him. My editor told me this morning to go forth out into The Village and to never darken his door again. No he didn’t, he said go out into The Village and find me a human story. My photographic colleague observed you having difficulty buying a bag of sweets, and that Number Six bought them for you. Do you know why he should do that?”
    “I…..I don’t know.”
    “Number Six isn’t known for his acts of kindness.”
    “Smile” click goes the camera.
    “I do wish he wouldn’t do that.”
    “Why do you think Number Six would buy you a bag of sweets, not just out of the goodness of his heart I shouldn’t think.”
    “Perhaps he recognised me.”
    “You’ve met Number Six before?”
    “Not here, in another place.”
    “Where?”
    “In London.”
    “London! Go on Thirty-six.”
    “A Mrs. Butterworth approached an employment bureau, she was looking for a housemaid, I applied for the job and got it. Mrs. Butterworth did tell me that it was only a short term appointment, that she would be moving again soon.”
    “So where does Number Six come into all of this?”
    “Well one day there was a knock on the door, naturally I went to answer the knock, and when I opened the door this…..raggedy man stood there. I looked down my nose at this down and out, up and down. It was this man Number Six. He asked to see my mistress who wasn’t in at the time, he asked if he could wait……as though I was going to let some grubby tramp over the threshold!”
    “So what happened then?”
    “I closed the door and went back to my duties in the kitchen.”
    “And the man went away?”
    “He must have done, but a few minutes later my mistress returned, and they were in the lounge together. She asked me to make some sandwiches, and bring them together with cake into the lounge. Well I ask you, when I entered the lounge there he was, this tramp talking with my mistress. If I’d have known I wouldn’t have made my best cucumber sandwiches for the likes of him!”
    “And this man was Number Six?”
    “He wasn’t called that then, he called himself Peter Smith.”
    “An alias you thought?”
    “Well I ask you. I couldn’t believe my mistress concerning herself with the likes of him.”
    “What happened then?”
    “Well I was forced to run this man a bath, the mistress laid out her late husband’s clothes. Then she lent him her car, I couldn’t think what had got into her…..”
    “She was being charitable perhaps.”
    “Well he went off in my mistress’s car and later a policeman came asking questions. He interviewed me, not that I could tell him much, I did give a good description of the man. Then he talked with my mistress.”
    “And then?”
    “Well my mistress said she was going away and that she would like to take me with her. I thought we had come here on holiday.”
    “Here?”
    “Yes.”
    “To The Village?”
    “Yes!”
    “Perhaps I could talk to your mistress?”
    “She’s no longer here!”
    “What do you mean, no-one leaves The Village.”
    “She did, and left me here!”
    “Why would she do that?”
    “I don’t know, but I bet it has something to do with that man.”
    “Number Six?”
    “Yes.”
    “And you think he recognized you from when you both met in London?”
    “Yes, and now if you don’t mind I’m late for work.”
    “What kind of work do you do?”
    “I’m a housemaid, and I’ve got to go and dust and clean a cottage.”
    “Which cottage?”
    “Six Private!”

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Once Upon A Time

   This is a more serious matter, a last ditch attempt to extract the reason behind the Prisoner’s resignation. Degree Absolute is a desperate measure which Number 2 feels he has to take because there is no other way. It has to be either one of them. Number 2 was a good man, is a good man, but if they get Number 6 he will be better, and Number 2 is prepared to put his life on the line for the cause. But there are better causes to die for!
   From the cradle to the grave, all the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances, and one man in his time plays many parts, and the Butler is there to assist in the deliberations, as well as to make the tea! It is generally thought that when it comes to murder mysteries it’s the Butler who always does it, that is a fallacy. And certainly in this case the Butler is blameless, as it appears Number 2 died of a heart attack, brought on by the strain of the ordeal. But he did bring it on himself, but at least he managed to learn more about the reason behind Number 6’s resignation than any former Number 2, that he resigned for peace, for peace of mind. And in many cases that can be enough reason.

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In The Village!

   In The Village, that would be right, I found the above picture on the following website. The picture would be taken at a Prisoner Convention in the mid to late 1990’s, as that is I standing on the chessboard as Number 6, the white Queen being my wife in the white hat standing behind me.

https://www.erickbonnier-pictures.com/reports-travels/wales-portmeirion/

  As pictured in the following enlarged section of the photograph.

   Erick Bonnier’s photographs are a nice reminder of happy days in The Village, with many familiar faces brought back to mind. When everyone looks so young.

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Village Life!

    “What’s on the agenda for today?”

    “It’s a briefing.”
    “What about?”
    “I’m to be sent on a mission.”
    “A mission, what outside of The Village?”
    “Yes, two of us are being sent to London.”
    “As undertakers!”
    “Yes.”
    “I’ve done one of those.”
    “What one of those?”
    “All I can say is, be careful of that nerve gas!”
    “Nerve gas, what nerve gas?”
    “You’re on an abduction job. That means you will be given a gas gun with which to paralyse the subject. But be careful, one quirt means paralysis, two squirts means death.”
    “Who for, the subject?”
    “You if the wind turns!”
    “Oh! This nerve gas seems dangerous stuff.”
    “It is, mind you if the subject is at home it’s easier to use, just inject it into the room through the keyhole. That puts a door between you and the nerve gas.”
    “Well that sounds better.”
    “Who is the subject?”
    “We’ve had him under the closest possible surveillance. We’ve had cameras put in his house. And apparently he’s been behaving a little erratic, we think he’s thinking of resigning his job.”
    “Who is he?”
    “We don’t know.”
    “You don’t know?”
    “Well he uses several different names, mostly one of the country he happens to be in at the time. He used to call himself John Drake, but now has taken to calling himself Peter Smith.”
    “Its funny really.”
    “What’s funny?”
    “Two-thirty-one, and One-twenty-three were sent on a similar mission yesterday.”
    “Where have they gone?”
    “Berlin.”
    “Why, have they found Seventy-three’s husband yet?”
    “No, apparently he’s still over there.”
    “Over where?”
    “Oh somewhere there.”
    “That’s a bit vague. It’s no wonder they can’t find him!”

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Hammer Into Anvil

    “Would you like to sit in this chair.....no.....well don’t tell me what to do!” How is it that this man achieved the position of Number 2? Surely he wasn’t the paranoid individual that we’ve grown to know, before his arrival in The Village? What I mean is, those masters who recruited him, wouldn’t have done so if he was already a paranoiac! The doctor-Number 10 in ‘A Change of Mind’ carried out a medical on Number 6 and pronounced him fit for any contingency, whether or not Number 6 liked it, life in The Village suited him. Perhaps life in The Village didn’t suit this latest Number 2, after all we have no idea what he was like before he had been brought to The Village. But something happened to him to bring on his mental trouble, because of that he began to see enemies where there were none, and conspiracies where there were none, and no-one but Number 2 could see them. Such was his ever growing paranoia that he could trust no-one, that of course made it easy for Number 6, to play on that paranoia and so break this Number 2, who was already half-way to having a breakdown!
    Previous Number 2s have been many things, but this one was nothing but a bully, and Number 6 stood up to that bully, and we see the result, a cowering coward pleading with Number 6 not to report him. Number 6 made him report himself as a breakdown in control. No, life in The Village doesn’t suit everyone, another poor victim was Number 73 who once before tried to commit suicide by slashing both her wrists. Finally she succeeded by throwing herself out through a hospital window. She is perhaps one of the very few who were brought to The Village because she was the next best thing to her husband who they couldn’t find for some reason! All they wanted from her was information about the whereabouts of her husband. It’s as Number 6 once said, The Village is where people turn up, people who know too much or too little, Number 73 came under the latter category.

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Rover-Time!

    It’s sad to think that if it hadn’t been for The Schizoid Man the Guardian wouldn’t have a name, in fact it wouldn’t have been referred to as anything at all. Number 2 did once tell Number 1 to remove that thing, which was neatly ensconced in his chair. Really the Guardian has no identification, only a nickname which is more usually given to a dog.
   It’s not known exactly what Rover is, manmade or some alien being from another world, either way it’s been made part of the security system. Seeing as it’s not unusual for experimental projects to be conducted in The Village in order to create technological breakthroughs. Perhaps Rover itself is one of those experiments. It maybe supposed that had the Speed Learn experiment been a success it would no longer be confined to The Village. That it would have been rolled out in every educational institution in the world, ensuring that everyone was given the same educational opportunity, whether they wanted it or not. Perhaps that would have been the fate of Rover, to act as a security deterrent across the world. And yet, had that been the case, what danger there might have been, had Rover become self-aware, and broken free of its confines, and turned upon its masters and the world.........

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Caught On Camera!

   Looks like the Prisoner is about to undergo absorption!

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Bureau of Visual Records

    What was that? That as they say would be telling! Don’t you know? Well physically it’s a weather balloon, and at the same time a brilliant piece of improvisation which has proved to be the most iconic visualization in ‘the Prisoner.’ Technically it’s a piece of genetically engineered membrane, although it might be a creature from a world beyond ours which crashed on Earth, and is just as much a prisoner in The Village as you are! You know what I think, I think you’re over thinking this! Symbolically it’s a representation of our own fears? How do you work that out? What are you afraid of Number 6? I’m afraid of nothing! We are all afraid of something, something tucked away in the back of our minds, after all, that thing only appears when one is afraid! Does it? Well it mostly appears when one is afraid. What’s he got to be afraid of? Who? Number 1? You Number 6, he’s afraid either for you, or of you!

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It’s Your Funeral

    “Must get on with my work,” that’s one of my favourite lines from this episode, indeed from the whole of ‘the Prisoner’ if it comes to it. I pity the poor little Watchmaker-Number 51, he had no idea he was being used. Today we’d say he had been radicalized by Number 100 for means of a terrorist attack. But as they say, everyman’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. Not that I condone such activity, Plan Division Q was simply a plan of murder, and a complicated plan at that. One which might not have succeeded without Number 6 giving it credibility, but the plan didn’t succeed because of Number 6’s involvement. But why such a complicated plan in the first place, when Number 2, or Number 1, had the power of making people simply disappear in the night? And yet it could all simply have been another test to put Number 6 through, to see if he could stop the assassination of the retiring Number 2. No wonder the new Number 2 was in a sweat, why he rushed through his speech, he wanted to get the bomb from off his neck and shoulders. If Number 6 had failed the test, in not stopping Number 50 from pressing the detonator, it would have cost Number 2 his life! Instead he was left to live and look forward to his own retirement one day.
   There are other stand out episodes, ‘It’s Your Funeral’ is another for several reasons. A retiring Number 2, a Number 2 who has been away on leave, and a change in the time for the publishing of The Tally Ho. It used to be daily at noon, but now the broadsheet is available from 10.20 in the morning!
    I wonder when Number 6 stopped using The Village gymnasium? It must have been sometime between the end of ‘Hammer Into Anvil,’ and this episode. Mind you he hadn’t stopped using the gym altogether, there was still his semi-weekly Kosho practice. But then that was something he could hardly conduct alone in the woods!

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Village Life!

    “Tell me, these new records.”
    “Yes sir.”
    “Do you have the Prisoner soundtrack record?”
    “I beg your pardon sir?”
    “The Prisoner soundtrack LP record, I don’t see it.”
    “I’m not quite with you sir.”
    “You do sell records?”
    “As you can see sir.”
    “Well then?”
    “I’ve never heard of the record you’re talking about.”
    “The Prisoner?”
    “Never heard of it.”
    “It’s a television series.”
    “I don’t watch television.”
    “The record is the soundtrack of that television series the Prisoner.”
    “I see sir.”   
    “I doubt it. I’m the founding member of the Prisoner club.”
    “How many members are there?”   
    “One, me! There used to be two of us, but when I raised the subscription to 8 shillings and six pence the other member wouldn’t pay it, so I threw him out!”
    “Bad luck sir.”
    “Will you try and get me that record?”
    “I’ll try sir. Will there be anything else?”
    “Just The Tally Ho.”
    “Very good sir.”
    “I want to see if there has been any response to my advertisement for people wanting to subscribe to my club.”
    “What do you do in this club of yours?”
    “Go about in piped blazers and brightly coloured clothes. You’d fit right in as the shopkeeper.”
    “I am the shopkeeper.”
    “Well there you are then, you’re made for the role.”
    “And you run this club?”
    “I’m the president, treasurer, magazine editor.”
    “You produce a magazine, what’s it called?”
    “What’s It All About?”
    “What is it all about?”
    “That’s just the thing, I don’t think anyone knows. I’ve never been that sure myself, it means what it is!”

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A Bottle of Pale Ale!

    Last Sunday I enjoyed a bottle of Pale Ale with my tea, well I like a drop of Pale Ale. It was from the ‘My Generation Beer Company.’ Enjoying the beer I was also struck by the descriptive words on the back of the bottle “We are my generation, a complete unknown, with no direction of home.”

    It didn’t take me two moments to think of Number 48, and how that description just about sums him up. He is a complete unknown, and as he attempts to thumb a lift on both carriageways of the M1 motor way, he has no idea of direction as to the way home!

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The General

    Report to The General that’s a new one, but Number 6 didn’t mean report to the General personally, and now we can see why. The General is nothing more than a mass of wires, circuitry, flashing lights, switches, and memory banks! Ask the General a question it cannot answer, of course it couldn’t answer WHY? Because it hadn’t been programmed with sufficient data, it wasn’t given the basic facts! But why self-destruct like that, computers do not do that kind of thing just because they cannot answer a question. Ah but the General had to be destroyed, if it hadn’t been it would have been an anti-climax. The final scene had to comply with the Professor’s desire that the General must be destroyed. Even if he did do his best to save it, and Number 12, he tried to save the Professor as Number 6 tried to save Number 12 from Number 2 who was about to have his suspicions about him confirmed by the General. But it all went wrong, and there was no-one to save Number 2 who would ultimately pay the price for this latest failure. Not the failure regarding Number 6, worse than that, the failure of the educational experiment known as Speed Learn! Judging by Number 6’s reaction at the café in the opening scene, gives me the impression that Speed Learn has already been running for a long time. So where has Number 6 been all that time?

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The Therapy Zone

   The central fact of ‘Many Happy Returns’ is, the Prisoner-Number 6 does actually return to London! What is not so clear is, why on the Prisoner's eventual return to British Intelligence, does he not get to meet with his former colleagues the Colonel and Fotheringay, which he did during ‘The Chimes of Big Ben?’ And yet the Prisoner is familiar with the Colonel, they are old, old friends. The openly sceptic Thorpe, the Prisoner is not so familiar with, to whom he barely utters a word. Why is it the Prisoner does not meet up with his first two contacts within British Intelligence? Perhaps the Colonel and Fotheringay were removed from their positions, well we know they do not like failure, and perhaps Fotheringay fell foul of those embarrassing questions as suggested by Number 2. Whatever the reasons why the Prisoner does not meet with Colonel and Fotheringay in ‘Many Happy Returns,’ and there may be a number of plausible reasons for that, it is inexplicable that the Prisoner makes no reference to them to the Colonel and Thorpe. That he did not report them for their betrayal, as working for The Village. But then the Prisoner is unsure which side runs The Village. Perhaps he is suspicious, he might not trust the Colonel and Thorpe, but he needs their co-operation. To bring up the fact that the Colonel and Fotheringay of British Intelligence were once in The Village, could detract from his current priority, to find the location of The Village! The Prisoner has his suspicions. If it’s the other side that runs The Village, then the Colonel and Fotheringay are traitors and are working for the other side, whichever side that is. As for the Colonel and Thorpe, it is unclear whether or not they, like their predecessors, are working for The Village. But certainly they do not make any attempt to stop the Prisoner going off to return to The Village! Perhaps there is a clue in the line spoken by the Colonel “He’s an old, old friend who never gives up.” An old, old friend of The Village who never gives up what, trying to escape?

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Exhibition of Arts And Crafts

                   The Death Of Rover

BcNu

No.1’s The Boss Or Is he?

    “Are you going in?”
    “To make my report, there’s a lot to do.”
    During ‘Once Upon A time’ Number 2 claimed he’s the boss, but Number 6 corrected him by saying Number 1’s the boss. And yet on more than one occasion we hear rumours of “masters,” who are these masters Cobb mentioned? Cobb said he mustn’t keep his new masters waiting. Then in ‘The Schizoid Man’ Number 2 told Number 6, or was it 12, well both now I come to think of it, that he couldn’t use the usual methods against Number 6, “Too important, mustn’t damage him permanently say our masters.” And here we have Number 2 about to go in that room in order to make her report, not to Number 1 obviously, otherwise she would use the red telephone as she had early on in the episode. So Number 1 isn’t the boss at all, he must be as responsible to those “masters” the same as everyone else. That’s why Number 2 sends her reports to those masters back in London, and from whom she receives instructions, via the teleprinter.

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The Girl Who Was Death

    It’s a bit of light relief really, not really to be taken seriously, something in the guise of ‘The Avengers’ but based on an idea for a ‘Danger Man’ script. That makes it a glimpse into Patrick McGoohan’s former employment as John Drake from which he resigned because he wanted to do something different having become bored with ‘Danger Man,’ the scripts for which had become stale and repetitive. And yet here he is, Drake taking on The Girl Who Was Death, because good ideas for Prisoner scripts had dried up!
   Whoever it was who thought Number 6 would lower his guard with children wasn’t thinking straight, but I suppose it was worth a try as Number 10 said to Number 2, anything is worth a try once. But really they were scraping the bottom of the barrel with this one. Entertaining enough as ‘The Girl Who Was Death’ is it was never going to reveal the reason behind Number 6’s resignation, all he did was to reveal the kind of work he used to do. And the symbolism behind the toy clown? Well Number 6 knew all the time, he was playing with them, perhaps he wanted them to know not to fool around with him!

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A Favourite Scene In A change of Mind

    Looks like Number 6 is just in time to be taken to the hospital for his medical! But what were three medics doing lurking in the woods? Number 6 was there legitimately, he’d just left, well disrupted a meeting of a social Group, and here he is in the hands of three medics. Perhaps it was arranged that they should be there so as to collect Number 6 after the Social Group meeting and drive him to the hospital from there. Usually Number 6 uses brute force to resist as he had in the opening scene of this episode, however in this case he must have thought discretion the better part of valour. Especially seeing the size of that one getting into the Moni-Moke, he’s built the size of my grannies outdoor privy!

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