The Therapy Zone

    The first person, or the first Number 2 to speak to Number 1 is Colin Gordon’s 2 on that ridiculously over-sized, curved, red telephone. The new Number 2 in ‘Arrival’ makes a report via a telephone about Number 6 before an interview with Number 9.

    “He has not volunteered any information so far, but appears to be settling down. He even attended the regular brass band concert today.” 

    Number 2 does not have the ‘L’ shaped turquoise telephone to his ear, so he is not listening to anyone, he is simply talking into it. It might be interpreted that this particular Number 2 is apparently using the telephone as a recording machine. Or he is dictating his report to someone who is listening, perhaps a typist in the typing pool, and that person is physically typing up that report as he speaks. It seems unlikely that he is speaking to Number 1.

   Of course one must not forget the advent of ‘Fall Out,’ that according to Patrick McGoohan Number 1 is the alter ego of Number 6, and vice versa. So perhaps it could be argued that it was the first Number 2 in ‘Arrival’ who actually spoke to Number 1 first on the telephone, that time when he invited the Prisoner to join him in the Green Dome for breakfast!

  Other than that, had the screening order of ‘the Prisoner’ adhered to the library order of the series, then Number 2 {Mary Morris} would have been the first to speak to Number 1, when she’s talking about Number 6 being no trouble. That it’s just a matter of time. And about the preparations for Carnival, along with the Ball in the evening, to which Number 1 expressed his wish that he could be there. To which Number 2 wished he could be there also. But unlike her predecessors, of ‘A B and C’, and ‘Free For All, and successor in ‘Once Upon A time,’ Number 2 of ‘Dance of the Dead’ uses a turquoise coloured ‘L’ telephone, instead of red {red’ generally being the hot-line to someone in ultimate command}. So is it the case that Mary Morris uses the wrong coloured telephone? Well not in the case of the Interim Number 2 of ‘It’s Your Funeral.’ He always uses a yellow telephone when speaking to Number 1. In the Control Room, when the call came through from Number 1, it did so via a yellow telephone. You will recall that it was the Supervisor-Number 26 who answered the phone. Perhaps, the colour of the telephone doesn’t matter at all.

Be seeing you