The Prisoner
After he has resigned, a British secret agent is abducted by a mysterious organisation and relocated to a town known simply as The Village. The aim is to get him to provide secret information but he refuses. What follows is a battle of wits and wills as the agent seeks to escape and his captors try all sorts of means to obtain the information they want.
- 1967-1968
- 1 season
- A&E Home Video
- Drama, Suspense, Science Fiction
- TV-PG
After he has resigned, a British secret agent is abducted by a mysterious organisation and relocated to a town known simply as The Village. The aim is to get him to provide secret information but he refuses. What follows is a battle of wits and wills as the agent seeks to escape and his captors try all sorts of means to obtain the information they want.
Season 1 Episode Guide
17 Episodes 1967 - 1968
Episode 1
Arrival
Sat, Jun 1, 1968 50 mins
After resigning from his organization, a secret agent is abducted and finds himself in a sunny, Continental-style village which has no name and where the taxi and phone services do not extend beyond its boundaries. After meeting an enigmatic woman, he ultimately gets to see Number Two, the apparent village head, who tells him that he is there for the information he can give. Then Number Two gives way to a new Number Two.
Episode 2
The Chimes of Big Ben
60 mins
A new prisoner, Nadia, or Number Eight, knows where the Village is, which means she and Number Six can escape. Using a boat that was disguised as a piece of abstract art, they make their way to the nearest shore and from there back to London, hidden in packing crates. But Number Six learns that nothing in this adventure was what it seemed.
Episode 3
A. B. and C.
Sat, Jun 22, 1968 60 mins
A new Number Two, anxious to find out why the Prisoner resigned, uses a 'Special Machine' to infiltrate and order Number Six's dreams, introducing, over a period of three nights, three separate characters to determine which one he was working with. Number Six, however, cottons on and uses his dreams to spoil the plan.
Episode 4
Free for All
60 mins
Number 6 is urged by yet another new Number 2 to run for his office in the forthcoming elections. Number 6 is surprised to hear that the Village even has elections but after some consideration, agrees. His platform is a radical one, posing all of the questions that he would like to have answered: where are they, why are they there, who is Number 1. His campaign seems to be popular with the residents but after questioning by a Village council, he is brainwashed into spouting the standard 'lines' and maintaining the status quo.
Episode 5
The Schizoid Man
60 mins
Having helped Number Twenty-Four in a telepathy experiment The Prisoner bruises his thumb. A new Number Two has him taken to hospital and when he wakes up he has undergone a physical transformation. He is told that he is actually Number Twelve and it is task to find out why Number Six resigned. When he returns to his cottage he is confronted by a double for Number six,who engages him in various tests. However, the realization that he bruised his thumb makes him recall his true identity and resist Number Two's scheme.
Episode 6
The General
60 mins
The Professor is an academic who has created 'Speedlearn',a process for educating the villagers, broadcast from large TV screens and developed with the aid of 'The General',whom noone has seen. In order to prevent Number Two from subverting his creation to brain-wash the population,the Professor seeks the aid of Number Six to send out a subliminal message of freedom to the village but this fails. Finally Number Six gets to meet The General,who is certainly not what he expected.
Episode 7
Many Happy Returns
60 mins
Number Six wakes up to find the village deserted and seizes his opportunity to make a raft and escape. He eventually gets back to London and reports to his superiors. However, it's not long before he is rather cruelly returned to the village where Mrs. Butterworth, a middle-aged lady whom he met in London, is wearing a Number 2 badge and preparing to serve him a birthday cake bearing six candles.
Episode 8
Dance of the Dead
60 mins
Number Six comes across a body that has washed ashore with a radio. After sending the body back out to sea, he tries to use the radio to get rescued. A former colleague finds him, but the man is resigned to his own destruction. Later, Number Six calls his ex-colleague to be his character witness during a mock trial conducted by the villagers, who are in the middle of a carnival and wearing various costumes. The man comes out in a jester's outfit; but Number Two, dressed as Peter Pan, will have the last evil laugh.
Episode 9
Checkmate
Sat, Aug 17, 1968 60 mins
After waking up from an artificial sleep, Number 6 discovers a game of "live chess" on the Village green in which the "chessmen" are Villagers and the players sit in elevated chairs and call out the moves with megaphones. Recruited by one player as the Queen's pawn, he only reluctantly obeys his "master's" orders. After the match, Number 6 enacts a new escape plan that requires the complicity of a specific type of individual. He chooses one of the rooks from the chess game, a man known for his rebellious nature.
Episode 10
Hammer Into Anvil
60 mins
Number Six is incensed when he witnesses the suicide of Number Seventy-Three who has been brutally interrogated by Number two and he informs Number Two that he will avenge her death. He begins a war of nerves,leading Number Two to believe that he is Agent D6,employed by a superior called XO4, and making him fear that he is in danger. Ultimately the prisoner is triumphant as yet another Number Two resigns.
Episode 11
It's Your Funeral
60 mins
Yet another Number Two is retiring to make way for a successor, who will receive the hand-over at a ceremony. Number Six hears that a bomb made by the elderly Watchmaker is to be detonated at the ceremony, killing the retiring Number Two and, with the Watchmaker's daughter, goes to warn him. The assassination would be calamitous for the Village. Number Six must stop this plan.
Episode 12
A Change of Mind
60 mins
Whilst exercising in the woods Number Six is accused of being 'unmutual' for not using the village gym and a fight breaks out. He is summoned before the village committee who decide he must undergo instant social training, though he is not actually given any treatment but led to believe he has. On discovering this he hypnotizes the village doctor, Number Eighty-Six, into declaring that Number Two is 'unmutual' and Number Two is then pursued by the crowd.
Episode 13
Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling
60 mins
The village is anxious to locate Professor Seltzman,inventor of a machine which can 'swap' peoples' minds. However only Seltzman knows the reversal process. Number Six is sent to locate the professor but,having been subjected to the swapping process has taken on the physical appearance of The Colonel, a new arrival at the village. The professor is found and returned to the village to oversee Number Six and The Colonel resume their old identities but the reversal is untried and those taking part are in considerable danger .
Episode 14
Living in Harmony
60 mins
Number Six finds himself in a western town called Harmony, which is run by the Judge, with the Kid, a young gunslinger, as his murderous assistant. The Prisoner would appear to have been the town sheriff, who resigned and refused to carry a gun. The Kid leads the townsfolk in an outbreak of killing: Kathy, a saloon girl befriended by Number Six, is one of the victims. This persuades Number Six to take up arms, but he then finds that he has been enacting a roleplay in the village to make him more disposed to killing, and that the Judge is yet another Number Two. The result ends in tragedy.
Episode 15
The Girl Who Was Death
60 mins
Number Six is now back in rural England as Agent X,investigating the death of Colonel Hawke-English who was on the trail of Scnipps,a mad scientist threatening to point a rocket at London to destroy it. Agent X is literally stalked by Death, alias Sonia,the daughter of Schnipps,who lures him to a building full of deadly booby traps,which he manages to avoid. He eventually traces her to a light-house,which is actually the rocket itself,and has to thwart her and her father to save the capital.
Episode 16
Once Upon a Time
60 mins
Number Two conducts tests on Number Six to force him to reveal why he resigned but Number Six's iron will resists and he uses psychology to turn the tables so that his interrogator ends up grovelling to him. Still refusing to answer Number Six watches as Number Two is locked in a cage after which he requests that he sees Number One.
Episode 17
Fall Out
60 mins
In the final episode of the series, Number 6 finds himself before a magistrate. He is given a place of honor however while the magistrate rules on the cases of several others. In the end, Number 6, Number 2, the butler and Number 48 all manage to escape and return to London while pandemonium races through the Village. .
