The Prisoner #005: The Prisoner as conservative allegory

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 · 1 year ago

Date: Fri, 27 Sep 85 11:53:24 edt
From: sjuvax!iannucci (D. Iannucci)
Message-Id: <8509271553.AA19377@sjuvax.UUCP>
To: bpa!sb6!allegra!packard!MIT-MULTICS.ARPA!Lippard
Subject: Prisoner #005

The Prisoner #005 9/27/85 Moderator: Dave Iannucci (iannucci@sjuvax.UUCP)

Topics

• The Prisoner as conservative allegory
• Door behavior, bicycle, etc.
• the Supervisor
• "Once Upon A Time" and Degree Absolute
• The usual replies to past issues

Dave,

Following is the only explanation of the prisoner as conservative that I could think of.

The Village represents society. Number 6 is the person who feels that government is too restrictive. He yearns for freedom. He is also the only person who can achieve this freedom. Number 2 also yearns for freedom, but there is no way that he will ever be free. Theare happy.

If you see any logical inconsistencies, please tell me.

I also need to know if the butler smiles in the end as the door opens. This would be another factor supporting this theory.

Be Seeing You
John Giorgi

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To Dave Iannucci:
Thanks for the new installment of the mailing list. Even though we are trying to limit the discussion topics, Carl's letter opens up a lot of new ones.

1. The doors only open/close for #6. Normal people do it themselves. This lends credence the comma faction with their "You are, Number 6."

Door behavior is a discussion topic in itself. Did you notice that the Prisoner opens the door for himself the first time he leaves his room in "Arrival"? Later it opens when he says he is going for a walk, when he is not even facing the door. Others
plts allegories, etc. he administration allows - #6 suspected the Clockmaker's daughter because she was able to get in ("It's Your Funeral").

2. #6 spends some time searching for a map. How ironic that in his living quarters is an antique globe, and a detailed map of Europe!

He wants a map so he can find out where the Village is. Globes and maps of Europe are just as useless as the "generic" map the store provided.

3. Alana (my wife) wondered how many characters (other than the #2 in the last episode) were in more than one show? She seems to recall the short bald scientist showing up later on.

The bald Supervisor shows up in most episodes. So does the Butler. The Prisoner's Chief and the man at the desk in his home office appear in "Do Not Forsake Me, Oh my Darling" and in "Many Happy Returns". The #2 from "The General" and "A, B, or C" also repeats.

4. How did "Rover" (the white beach ball) get his name? I read in in some fanfiction, and people at Lastcon named him so, but is he called that in the shows?

5. The unanswerable question - is the Village run by the Good Guys or the Bad Guys?

Re: question No.4 above: I heard the the supervisor (the short bald guy who runs the surveillance center) call him Rover in one episode (I couldn't possibly tell you which one). That is the only time in the series that I can remember Rover
rom a tired, confuse have received some really good ideas for other topics, but will save those for the next issue, which I can get out much more quickly if people would send me more mail!

The methods They use are certainly ba
 cain. In a sense, they are all them Good Guys. Or does the Village represent Society and the conformity to rules that we expect, so that there are no Good Guys or Bad Guys?

6. Why did the statues move to face #6? They didn't seem to be where the cameras were located. [Carl Hommel]

There were so many camera-busts in the Graveyard that some were included in the view of others. I think what the Supervisor saw came from one of these cameras, and he could switch to any of the others to get a better angle.

What is the purpose of the see-saw camera and the rotating eye camera in the Supervisor room? Is someone watching the watchers?

Can anyone recall anyone (or anything) else in the series called by a name?
Lyle E. Wilkinson

Many characters are given generic names: The Butler, The Watchmaker, etc. I wouldn't count these as real names, since they are just as dehumanizing as numbers.

Many female characters are named, especially those #6 trusts and who later betray him. Some are Nadia (TCOBB),
cannot open it unless (TSM), Janet (DNFMOMD), Kathy (LiH), Sonia (TGWWD), and Mrs. Butterworth (MHR). Some men #6 knows from outside the Village have names: Thorpe (MHR) and Dr. Seltzman (DNFMOMD) for example.

(ed. note: don't forget Cobb from "Arrival")

I noticed that in this one he is called "Carl." W. Burstein

I am almost sure the Prisoner is never named in DNFMOMD. His fiancee Janet said "Darling", not "Carl."

No one has discussed how #6 knew that Rover was the name of the robot. He was the first to mention the name. He asked what it was in "Arrival" and #2 said, "That would be telling." Presumably another prisoner told him between episodes.

Also, I'm not sure about this, but it seems to me that the sadistic doctor/scientist in "Dance of the Dead" may have become the sadistic No. 2 in "Hammer into Anvil". Matt Landau

Derren Nesbit was #2 in HIA and Duncan MacRae was The Doctor in DoTD. I agree with Matt that the first #2 in FFA was probably a decoy. The Village government would lose
En so you can't really an election.

Only the competent #2's seem to have the umbrellas... Lenore

I thought the #2 who cracked up in HIA held his umbrella as he quoted "You must be a hammer or an anvil" in german. Umbrellas are a major symbol. Most are striped, representing striped prison uniforms (the Prisoner is always in black with a white stripe). I think the unstriped umbrella of #2 shows he is not a prisoner, but still under the canopy of Them.

9. Do the doors really only open for #6!? pegasus!juliet!tek

No, they also open for #2.

Anyone have anymore good examples of Time being important in other episodes?
Lenore

The correct date is important in TSM. When #6 finds the date in the photograph he is able to shake off Their conditioning. Dates also figure in MHR, since the Prisoner tries to log the time of his journey in order to locate the Village. His recapture coincides with his birthday.

Time seems to be a force of nature that the Village masters would like to control but canno
fagadine (ABoC), Alisosoner must maintain his own sense of time to keep his identity.

...the behavior of the characters in "Living in Harmony"... ...sounds to me like real people having difficulty keeping track of reality. W. Burstein

I don't think normal people reading lines into a microphone would get as carried away as LiH depicts. There is an entire scene between the Judge and his men with #6 not present. I still find the symbolism interesting if he is dreaming - he becomes more of an Everyman.

----------

"Music makes a quiet mind."
C. David Tallman - dspo!tallman@LANL.GOV or ihnp4!lanl!dspo!tallman
Los Alamos National Laboratory - E-10/Data Systems
Los Alamos, New Mexico - (505) 667-8495

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he really thought it was quite funny that lots of liberals were taking _The_Prisoner_ as such a statement for freedom when in fact it espoused a very conservat
t ce if the real #2 looint.

If this is true, it suggests that ultimately the Village was right and the Prisoner wrong. The show is saying that it is impossible to be a completely "free man" as #6 wished. Society always has control.

If you remember in the last episode, they made a big to-do about him being the only individual, and being the "greatest" and all that crap, and they asked him to lead them.

A person who was truly individual could indeed be great. But #6 cannot live up to this ideal.

My initial impression upon seeing this episode was that the message is that even back in normal society, he is still in his own self-made prison. [Lyle Wilkinson]

I agree. This goes along with the above.

What did the bicycle symbolize? [B. Miller]

Remember the closing sequence. It starts with a little wheel, then the other parts are built out from it. The little wheel represents the individual, and the rest of the Penny-Farthing is society pulling the individual along.

------------------
ivfully master. The P----------------------------------
"I am a free man." "HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA"

C. David Tallman - dspo!tallman@LANL.GOV or ihnp4!lanl!dspo!tallman
Los Alamos National Laboratory - E-10/Data Systems
Los Alamos, New Mexico - (505) 667-8495

======

I have been following this whole discussion with some interest, because as it started, Channel 11 (New Hampshire public TV) began running the series. Consequently, I have been following the discussions partly with only my dim memories from 8-10 years ago when WGBH/WGBX Boston last ran it, and partly from recent viewing. Except for missing an episode (No. 6? -- "Schizoid Man") becaue of an egregious screwup programming my VCR, I have the entire series (so far) on tape. "Once upon a time" was just on this past weekend, so there is only one more to go, and I can't wait.

Random points raised by earlier items: The supervisor appears to be a civil service type senior staff mem
--e, restrictive

vier, but charged with

keeping routine operations going and performing other tasks set him by #2. He is called supervisor by title in at least one episode, and in "Hammer into Anvil" is even fired. In "Once upon a time" he is left to hold the fort during "Degree Absolute," and at the end seems to be offering the services of his organization to No. 6.

Some other random points, as I look back at previous issues:

I recall one instance where No. 6's door opened for someone else ... I think it was a maid in "Arrival".

I agree that in "Living in Harmony" No. 6 is not imagining the whole thing, though he may be imagining (is forced to imagine) much of the setting. The death, after No. 6 discovers the cardboard set, of the agent who becomes too involved, shows that much of it is real.

On the topic of names vs numbers, someone mentioned Dutton in a middle episode. Also there was a named acquaintance of 6 who (supposedly) killed himself in (I think) "Arrival". I forget his name.

In discus
be--------------------on on SF-Lovers prior to establishment of this mailing list, the subject of Drake/No. 6 was mentioned. McGoohan was quoted as not intending that No. 6 was in fact Drake, though he may have been modelled on an agent like him. From that and from what I remember of _Secret_Agent_ I can see no justification for assuming any stronger relationship. I don't know what creative influence McG may have had on _SA_.

Also: I do not subscribe to the theory that the whole village is a fantasy of No. 6, nor do I believe in the comma ("You are(,) Number Six.").

That is all that comes to mind right now (but I've babbled enough anyhow).

Be seeing you... /JBL

levin@bbncc2.arpa or
...!ihnp4!bbncca!levin

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Subject: Once Upon a Time

I don't know whether the subject has come up at all, but here it is: Is 'degree absolute' a totally fictional psychological method? It is pretty obvious that most of the 'scientific methods' on the show
ticular one sounds very intriguing. BTW, I have several gaps in my knowledge of the series, as I got into it rather recently (and Fall Out is going to be on this Sat.). I find it to be one of the few shows on television where it doesn't seem to matter in what order they show the episodes (it's confusing no matter what :-). Anyway, of the shows I have seen, I have found the one in the subject line to be one of the most inventive, taking the least in terms of personnel and locations and stretching them to their limit.

Does anyone have any ideas about the class of shows which go on seemingly in 'another reality' i.e., in No. 6's mind or wherever? I don't know, but the ending of The Girl Who Was Death was a bit of a let-down to me; I guess I'm not into symbolism enough... The whole episode seemed to be just a throw-off, fun with no real purpose. Living in Harmony had a bit more of a basis, but I still found it somewhat disturbing. Anyway, these are just some semi-random ramblings f
sir -- not a policy marson. Feel free to direct your thoughts to the mailing list and/or me personally.

Stuart Freed {genrad|ihnp4|ima}!wjh12!talcott!sesame!stuart
Data General Corp. (Mail Stop E-219) {cbosgd|harvard}!talcott!sesame!stuart
Westboro, MA 01580 +1(617)870-9659 stuart%sesame.uucp@harvard.arpa

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Sorry about the volume of this edition, but I've had a lot of mail very recently :-).

I am running out of interesting quotes for my signature lines. If you know of any interesting lines involving prisoners send them along.

========

"And she said/We are all just prisoners here/Of our own device..."

Dave Iannucci @ St. Joseph's University, Philadelphia [40 00' N 75 15' W]
{{ihnp4 | ucbvax}!allegra | {psuvax1}!burdvax | astrovax}!sjuvax!iannucci

END OF Prisoner #005