"A secret agent resigns, then wakes up to find himself imprisoned in "The Village"... a bizarre community with a cheery veneer, but an underbelly of mystery and threat. All occupants of the Village have numbers instead of names, with our secret agent forced to accept the mantle of Number Six."
I was first introduced to this series by one of my college roommates, back in the days when we not only had to rent the tapes but the player, too. I did not make it though the entire series at that time, but I did complete a subscription through Columbia House some years later. The first thing I learned was that the order in which the episodes were presented was not necessarily the best order in which to watch them. In fact, "episode order debate" is a popular topic of discussion among aficionados of the show. There is production order and original broadcast order as well as several others as listed here.
Back when we were first married, Tracy bought "Set 1" of the A&E collection, which took pains to explain the order which they chose. I was impressed, but I told her I already owned the entire series on VHS. (Back then I was still buying an equal number of VHS as I was DVDs, just as, decades earlier, I was still buying an equal number of records on vinyl as I was on CD.) That was a mistake, but luckily that site I linked above reproduces the "A&E" order, which is also endorsed by 6 of 1, The Prisoner Appreciation Society. That's the order I'm going to go with and see if I agree.
EDIT: I have now determined my own viewing order, which is slightly different from A&E and AVC, the two main lists I had been consulting. The discussion follows the A&E order, but the list directly below reflects my personal favorite viewing order.
More recently, Big Finish has brought The Prisoner to audio with a series of adaptations as well as original episodes released in three sets. When set two was released I listened to set one a second time, but I have yet to listen to set three. Like the TV series before it, the audio series brings the story to a definite conclusion, but I've been reluctant to listen to it because I so like the ending I've thought of myself. After I re-familiarize myself with the television episodes, I plan to listen to the first audio set a third time, the second for a second, and the third for a first. Here is the order I plan to follow...
VIDEO EPISODES:
1. Arrival
2. Free For All
3. Dance of the Dead
4. Checkmate
5. The Chimes of Big Ben
6. A, B & C
7. The Schizoid Man
8. The General
9. Many Happy Returns
10. It's Your Funeral
11. A Change of Mind
12. Hammer Into Anvil
13. Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling
14. Living in Harmony
15. The Girl Who Was Death
16. Once Upon a Time
17. Fall Out
AUDIO EPISODES:
1.1. Departure & Arrival
1.2. The Schizoid Man
1.3. Your Beautiful Village
1.4. The Chimes of Big Ben
2.1. I Met a Man Today
2.2. Project Six
2.3. Hammer Into Anvil
2.4. Living in Harmony
3.1. Free for All
3.2. The Girl Who Was Death
3.3. The Seltzman Connection
3.4 No One Will Know
Replies
DANCE OF THE DEAD:
"It is carnival time in the village, but when #6 finds a dead body washed up on the beach, he chances upon an opportunity to contact the outside world."
EPISODE ODER DEBATE: This episode has a very "introductory" feel to me. 2024 Edit: I think #6 should know a bit more about life in the village before he "runs for office" (as he did/does in "Free For All"). Also, this episode's #2 says, "We are democratic... to a degree," thus setting the stage for the election. For those reasons, I will slot "Dance of the Dead" before "Free For All" in the future. Although broadcast as episode eight, "Dance of the Dead" was filmed fourth and is certainly a very early episode. #6 says to the maid, "I'm new here," he also tells Dutton that he arrived "quite recently."
TRIVIA: The cat in this episode belongs to #2. The same cat appears in "Many Happy Returns."
SIGNIFICANT DIALOGUE:
Dutton (a former colleague of the Prisoner's and a prisoner himself) mentions "you, me, Arthur, the Colonel... everyone."
#2 referring to Dutton: "He is expendable" (the emphasis indicates that #6 is not).
Exchange between #6 and his "observer":
"This place has been going for a long time."
"Since the war? Before the war? Which war?"
"A long time."
A frustrating episode. This number 2 is my favorite of all the ones I've seen. She's charismatic and commands the screen.
But that trial is a lot of visual spectacle for a dud of an ending. He's found guilty in a rigged trial (because of course he is) and is sentenced to death, but we're told in this very episode that the powers that be don't want him dead. Then number 6 rips up a teletype machine (although when I watched I thought it was a computer), and it keeps working, and number 2 laughs in triumph. I don't see what's been proven here, on either side. And even if the mob is shown a doctored body that looks like number 6, what happens when he shows up at a giant chess match the next day? Nothing happens, because they'll all forget.
I feel like absolutely nothing matters on this show. All the stakes are presented as high, and then everything is reset...and we don't even have any recurring characters to get to know, aside from 6, the mute butler, and maybe the shopkeeper?
In 2021, I slotted "Dance of the Dead" before "Free for All," but three years later I moved it to after (my "2024 Edit" was to remove the sentence I drew a line through, if that's not clear), but I no longer recall why.
...and we don't even have any recurring characters to get to know
That will change in later epsiodes (depending on how generous you're feeling the day you watch them) when certain "Number Twos" return.
I feel like absolutely nothing matters on this show.
We'll talk more about this aspect later, after you've finished watching the entire series.
There's an exchange between number 6 and number 2 about no longer engaging in democracy; that would seem to put it after Free For All.
CHECKMATE:
EPISODE ORDER DEBATE: The very first time I watched the series through I got to this episode (fourth in sequence) and determined I was watching them out of order. At that time I didn't know anything about production order or broadcast order or even that there was a "debate" of any kind. ("Checkmate" was filmed third and broadcast eleventh. Eleventh!) If for no other reason than the cinematography alone, I determined that this was the second episode. "Checkmate" features location shots from every single corner of Portmerion, more than any other episode. But, even more importantly, storywise it's obviously a very early episode.
Obviously, not everyone who lives in the Village is a prisoner. "Arrival" indicates that part of its function is to serve as a sort of "retirement home" for spies (and others who might have once been privy to classified information). If you woke up and found yourself captive in such a strange place, what's the first thing you would do? I think I would try to determine who are my fellow prisoners, and who are the warders. and that's exactly what #6 sets out to do in this episode. (Eleventh!)
Also, chess is a symbolic motif. In arrival, a retired admiral plays chess first with #6, then with the woman observer at the very end. The last words of the episode are the admiral saying to the woman, "We're all pawns, my dear." That makes a perfect segue into the beginning of the second episode (in my estimation), in which #6 finds himself playing a human pawn on a life-sized chessboard.
NOTABLE DIALOGUE: The chess champion says, "You must be new here. In time, most of us join the enemy--against ourselves."
2024 Edit: I now consider "Checkmate" to be second.
OK, I've seen "Checkmate" now.
The Village is a really strange enterprise. Part prison, part asylum, part interrogation room, part vacation resort. The costuming alone is so weird -- are people wearing the multicolored capes just for fashion? It seems like a uniform of some kind, but mostly the plebes wear them. And then there are the striped shirts. The Village really needs another store.
But also... why on earth, if you were running a surveilance state, would you put little private cabanas on the beach? The various Number 2s and other Village Elders seem alternatively worried about what Number 6 might do, but also treat him like a cat playing with a mouse -- it's no fun if the mouse is dead, so give him a little leeway here and there. Maybe they think doing so will put them in a better position to extract information from him, and maybe they're right. But he's not the only prisoner on this island, and can they do that with all of them? Or has that job already been done with most of them.
I did like that Number 6 was correct in identifying his fellow prisoners, but because he led the charge, they distrusted him. He'd seem like a double agent to me, too.
Next up for me will be Dance of the Dead, and then I'll be on track with the order you list in the first post.
As I'm sure you've realized by now, most of your questions will go unanswered. At best, you'll be left to devise your own explanations. I have mine, but I'll save that until you've seen all the episodes.
THE CHIMES OF BIG BEN:
EPISODE ORDER: Because of the long time frame over which this episode takes place (the arts and crafts show is six weeks away at the start of the story) and a mention is made of a "gap of months" that #6 has been missing, this story must not be treated as an early episode (even though it was originally broadcast second).
COMMENTARY: I am really enjoying this. Even going to Portmerion a few years ago didn't inspire me to re-watch the episodes, but the goal of assembling them in the "proper" viewing order has re-energized me. Why were the originally episodes broadcast so wildly out of order? I suspect I know. Sometimes Networks make decisions for reasons that don't make good storytelling sense. Case in point: the first episode of Star Trek to be broadcast was "The Man Trap" (the 6th episode produced) rather than "Where No Man Has Gone Before" because the Network wanted an episode with a more traditional B.E.M. Similarly, as The Prisoner went on, the stories were filmed less often on location in Portmerion and more frequently in the studio, and I speculate that maybe ITC wanted to "mix then up" a little bit. In any case, the first six episodes were filmed in a block and, apart from the last, the first five of those should be the first five shown... in whichever order one thinks best.
NOTE: The sixth episode filmed was intended to be the first season cliffhanger, and was ultimately slotted in as the penultimate episode of the series.
Most episodes of The Prisoner fall into one of two categories: either an escape attempt on the part of the Prisoner, or an exotic experiment on the part of the Village. "The Chimes of Big Ben" represents both. #6's erstwhile "ally" this episode is ultimately revealed to be a double-agent working on behalf of the Village, but #8 (or "Nadia") plays her part to the hilt. She is very convincing. I viewed the episode this time with a an eye toward plot holes or misdirection, but didn't find any of either. At any time #2 was talking about her, it was for #6's benefit, and there wasn't a time she was shown by herself that she wouldn't have known she was being observed (by #6).
The location of the Village is "revealed" to be in Lithuania, 40 miles away from the Polish border, but that "fact" can be discounted because it's part of the plot. What can't be discounted is that, while #6 thinks he is in London, he recognizes both the Colonel and Fotheringay. this means, at the very least, that those two men (if not the entire government) are in league with the Village.
NOTABLE DIALOGUE:
"There are methods we haven't used yet, of course."
"He doesn't even bend."
"That's why he'll break."
And, significantly...
#6: Has it ever occurred to you that you're just as much a prisoner as I am?
#2: My dear chap, of course! I know too much. We're both Lifers. I am definitely an optimist. that's why it doesn't matter who "#1" is... it doesn't matter which "side" runs the Village.
#6: It's run by one side or the other.
#2: Oh, certainly, but both sides are becoming identical. A perfect blueprint for World Order. When the sides facing each other suddenly realize that they're looking into a mirror, they'll see that this is the pattern for the future. \
#6: The whole Earth as the Village?
#2. That is my hope. What's yours?
#6: I'd like to be the first man on the Moon.
"I am really enjoying this."
Enjoying it so much, apparently, that I've forgotten to post capsule synopses of the last two episodes (that, and I can't seem to get my formatting consistent). I don't suppose anyone unfamiliar with the series is even reading this, but even so it had been my intention to post a brief synopis of each episode to refresh the memory. Although I have been following the A&E recommended order, I am consulting multiple lists. My final order promises to be unique, if for no other reason than no other list places "Checkmate" second. When I finish the video section of this project, I will edit the initial post to reflect "Earth-J" order. In the meantime, I have divided the episodes into three sections which I have cleverly titled "Early," "Middle" and "Late." The "Early" episodes are all of an introductory nature and have a "hook" upon which to hang the plot. Specifically...
1. Arrival - #6's "arrival"
2. Checkmate - the human chess match
3. Dance of the Dead - the carnival
4. Free For All - the election
5. The Chimes of Big Ben - elaborate escape.hoax
Tomorrow I will begin to examine the "Middle" series of episodes.
I am following the A&E order, but there are also things about the AV Club order I like. I'm not considering only the order of the episodes, but also how they relate to each other. I'm going to look at the next five episodes as a block (which does not comprise what I see as the series' "Middle" episodes in its entirety, but rather the episodes where the two lists differ.
A&E:
6. A, B and C
7. The General
8. The Schizoid Man
9. Many Happy Returns
10. It's Your Funeral
AVC:
6. The Schizoid Man
7. The General
8. A, B and C
9. It's Your Funeral
10. Many Happy Returns
Whereas the Early episodes can be divided into either "escapes" or "experiments," the Middle section adds an additional element: whether #6 "wins" (gets the better of the Village) or loses.
[There's freezing rain today and Tracy's working from home; I may not be able to continue this discussion until tomorrow.]
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