Since we're already up to discussing the final episode, it's worth checking out the approach taken by this graphic novel:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shattered_Visage_(The_Prisoner)
Basically it treats the finale as #6's fever-dream, resulting from the stress of Degree Absolute. By seeing himself as #1, he is accepting the idea of identifying himself with a number, and thus actually is finally broken, which pretty much makes him go mad and sets up the events in the comic.
I like this understanding of it for a number of reasons:
- mostly because it allows for the abstract nature of the finale to be truly taken abstractly. Maybe it's easy to just dismiss it as "dream logic," but if the episode was made that way, then I'm fine with taking it that way. This means we can safely avoid having to take its events literally and the contradictions with other episodes can be ignored.
Most notably, this means we can physically place the Village. We have three potential locations from 3 episodes:
1. The Chimes of Big Ben: Baltic coast
2. Many Happy Returns: Northwest Africa
3. Fall Out: England, driving distance from London
In Chimes, he never actually made it home, it was all staged, so it's reasonable to assume his perceived starting point was wrong. Fall Out is "dream logic," so he didn't actually drive from the Village to his London flat. In Manny Happy Returns, however, he does actually make the trip from The Village to his home, then is flown back and dropped off at the Village. Therefore, of the 3, only the one in Happy Returns makes sense as the physical location of the Village.
Another wacky possibility is that they have multiple Villages and they move everyone around every so often. We know they can drug and transport someone without knowing it (opening credits) so maybe they can do the entire population of the Village over the course of a few days.
Personally, I'm going with Northwest Africa..
- The identify of #1:
There is no need to actually have a single individual who is #1. It can be a concept designed to intimidate and coerce the Villagers. In fact, the idea of a single authoritarian figure whose existence is taken for granted, is all powerful, people are convinced is benign- this makes him a God. However I'm not claiming an anti-religion stance on the part of the series, simply because McGoohan himself was religious.
Yes we've seen #2s talking to a superior on the phone. But I don't think that was actually identified as #1. Implied, yes, but if we're talking about some powerful conspiracy here, it would be run by many people, perhaps a committee like structure like the "syndicate" on X-Files (or Metalocalypse
).
So whether there is a "real" #1 is actually irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.
Now in dream-logic world, where these questions can be asked and answered by theme, #1 is exactly what we see.
a) #1 is an ape. People are all too eager to skip this part of the big reveal, but it's key. Our beast-like, naturalist nature comes here for two reasons:
1. One important running theme in the series is how our technological and scientific progress is outpacing our ability to absorb it. This makes us lose touch with our basic humanity and natures. Classic sci-fi here: cold technology distances us from compassion. Of course the ultimate expression of this phenomenon is the ability to completely destroy ourselves w/ nukes.
2. That same animal nature compels us to conform- it is our nature, it's what we all want, and it's what The Village masters exploit. This leads us to:
b) #1 is, of course, The Prisoner. #1 wants The Prisoner to conform = The Prisoner himself wants to conform, because he is human, regardless of his other awesome qualities and
relatively individualistic nature.
This connects nicely with the comic book- The Prisoner was bound to lose eventually.
A couple of other points:
- It is understandable to assume the Village Masters are part of the British government, because everybody speaks with a British accent. But this could also simply be a result of the same reason that almost everyone in the Star Trek Federation of Planets is an American, or every astronaut and alien in Farscape is Australian- those are just the actors they had.
The woman from Chimes of Big Ben, a central episode, is Russian or Eastern European. On the one hand, this could simply be because she's a defector that's working for the British government. But in that same episode, #2 (same one from the last two episodes) explains to #6 the idea of a post-Cold War system of population control, beyond the "who's side are you working for" way of looking at things #6 is used to.
I think the Village is even beyond the standard Cold War way of looking at things.
- I haven't rewatched Living In Harmony or Fall Out yet so I'm going to reserve judgment on whether The Kid = #48 yet.
FWIW, 48 = 6 * 8
