Fifty Years ago today, the Prisoner debuted.
https://www.facebook.com/PatrickMcGoohanisThePrisoner/?hc_ref=ARSKbCAjtkgd1NbMsx9t1IjbNzR-Ucnz5FARPwh1pkle1CiXwrPXdhw6X7ns3YW1Xng
:smitten: :smitten: :smitten: :smitten: :smitten:
One of my all-time favorites. I never missed it. I never understood it. But damn it was good. Happy 50th No. 6!
A WTF show unequaled - even by Twin Peaks.
Somewhere around the 3rd or 4th time I watched the series through, years ago, I came up with the theory that McGoohan, a famously devout Catholic, was partly visualizing the themes of C. S. Lewis' Abolition of Man as a critique of the hell men would make if they assumed God's judgment in putting people through purgatory.
Of course part of the genius of the series is that it works reasonably well for a lot of theories, and McG liked to let people chew on it themselves. O0
A show massively ahead of its time.
Going to start a re-watch on my blu-ray collection tonight.
Thinking the same thing.
I always thought it'd turn out he was on the other side of Gilligan's Island. Lots of strange stuff happened on that island.
Or Islands. Or Villages, plural. Arguably there are at least three in the series (at least one of which is set up simply to mess with #6 personally. Or perhaps to mess with any Prisoner as insistent on escaping as he is.)
AND NOW WE CAN GET INTO THE NEVER-TO-BE-CONCLUDED FAN DEBATE ABOUT THE PROPER CHRONOLOGICAL EPISODE ORDER! :D
Tempt me on this at your peril. >:D
Was that the first "Lost"
This is where it was filmed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portmeirion
I've been there :-)
How'd you escape?
I didn't.
I'm still there - number 48.
Quote from: Tuna on September 30, 2017, 11:34:39 AM
Was that the first "Lost"
Kind of. McG as the main author was somewhat making things up as he went along; and while there's evidence he did originally have a solid ending planned out, by the time he got there he realized he had painted himself into a corner and couldn't do his real ending anymore. So he went for a hugely abstracted crazy grand finale.
He didn't however lie to his audience during production, continuously and with contempt, so far as I know. ;)
At the time, the Prisoner finale overtook the (far more solid) grand finale to
The Fugitive as the most-watched episode in American TV history (despite being a verrrry British show); a record that stood until the M*A*S*H finale.
I thought the ending was brilliant, and the only real way the show could've and should've ended. McGoohan was right in that a traditional "Bond beats Villain" ending would've been hollow.
The ending certainly works within the general context of the series. It's hard to parse at a narrative level (except in a very superficial way perhaps), but that's sometimes true of the series, too -- just taken to the nth.
Drawing a C. S. Lewis comparison again, it kind of reminds me in various ways of the finales to the three books of his Space Trilogy, especially Perelandra and That Hideous Strength.