Rating: - No Way Out
The Prisoner series is unique insofar as it combined a compellingly intense actor with an intriguing concept and some for-the-time very special effects. As other reviewers have provided synopses of the storyline I'll simply focus on the good and the bad in these stories.

First the good: though the sixties motifs seem now rather silly and trite they add to the overall ambience. The Village (actually Portmerion in Wales) is both jolly and sinister at one and the same time, visually appealing while being small enough to induce claustrophobia fairly quickly. The exploration of society as a prison for the individual is several times touched upon but never really developed. Our hero Number 6 is a lone wolf but it is in fact perfectly valid to ask where such lone wolves really fit into a society that works only on the basis of cooperation and some degree of mutual trust. This society, however, is rotten to the core and that's another sixties theme that hasn't really worn the test of time.

The first half-dozen episodes are nevertheless very entertaining and we watch the newly arrived Prisoner attempting first to escape and then gradually settling down to a life of pacing his cage and resisting where he can.


Unfortunately, the plot lines are at best highly implausible and at worst downright risible and there are enough loose ends that you'd go mad trying to look for logic or consistency. Even the dialog is frequently tired, saved only by McGoohan's intense delivery and hypnotic screen presence. Worst of all, the team clearly had no idea where to take the series nor how to end it. The final half-dozen or so episodes are embarrassing in the extreme and the Grand Finale is really just a tedious exposure of McGoohan's utter inability to rise to the occasion. It's really best to watch just the first six or eight episodes and then imagine for yourself what could have been, rather than watch the painful reality of what was done with the series.

If the rights were available there's enough good ideas in this old TV series for one really good 150-minute motion picture, perhaps starring a really compelling actor-with-an-edge like Daniel Craig. But it would need competent script writing and a sense of where to go, both of which are catastrophically lacking from this 17-episode set.