Arguably the best single episode of the uber-classic "The Prisoner" television series was "A. B. and C." from 1967. In this episode, Number Two and a brilliant, rather sympathetic researcher manipulate Number Six's dreams while viewing them, in an attempt to determine (of course) why he resigned -- with predictably embarrassing results.

"The Prisoner" is currently free on #YouTube Movies & TV. You can watch this episode right now, right here! Be seeing you. - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keGKsFqQUxc

@lauren this was such a weird but great and fun series. The look itself is dated, but the stories are pretty solid, at least till the series finale.

@kkeller @lauren ISTR McGoohan only envisioned seven episodes, Lord Grade of ITV wanted a full series, and they compromised on 17. So some of the 10 additional episodes were a bit hasty, and it shows; and at least one was a repurposed old Danger Man script.

@pieist @lauren yeah, I've read that too. But even then, those rushed episodes still seem better to me than the finale. And more importantly, they seem consistent with the tenor of the rest of the series. The finale just seems completely out of place. And not just because it's surreal and strange; the penultimate episode was also surreal and strange but is one of my favorites, and felt consistent with the rest of the series.

@kkeller @lauren Yes. While it was clear that he wanted the conclusion to be allegorical rather than a clean wrap-up, I never really understood what he was specifically trying to do with it.

I see the series as a whole as a battle between personal integrity and sham ideologies that are simply fancy dress for misrule, corruption and the will to power, and most of the series does speak to that. But I've never been clear on how the last one does.

@pieist @kkeller @lauren A message of the final episode is that we're prisoners of ourselves (since Number 1 is revealed to be an alter ego of Number 6, and the address of the house is Number 1 Buckingham Place), and also that there is ultimately no escape (the door to 6's house opens automatically like a Village door, and the start is the same as the end making the whole thing a loop).

@mathew @pieist @lauren that's certainly possible (Lauren thinks otherwise!), but that still doesn't explain the hot mess of the rest of the episode.

@kkeller @mathew @pieist There are (or were) on YT a long serious of behind the scenes videos cut apart from an old British documentary I believe, that goes into enormous detail regarding every aspect of every episode (including unused shots, musical cues, etc.) As I recall the last episode was largely the result of time just running out and having to cut things together way too fast.

In fact, I believe the editor noted that the final thunderclap at the end of the last scene (the repeat of him driving down the runway) was an editing error. When she apologized to Pat about that, he said it liked it and that it should remain.

@lauren @kkeller @pieist Unfortunately Lew Grade was obsessed with selling shows to the major US networks. So he often demanded 13 or 26 50-minute episodes when the budget wouldn't really cover it. Then when the show didn't sell like crazy, he'd cut it short over cost issues or force episodes to be made on a shoestring.

For example, for "Thunderbirds" he demanded the episodes be twice as long, for 1.5x the budget. And then it was canceled in season 2 after 6 episodes.

@mathew @lauren @kkeller

Presumably that's also why so many ITV shows always insisted on having at least one (typically terribly miscast) American actor in every episode. As if somehow we can't enjoy a program without a proxy Yank marysue'ing for us.

@pieist @lauren @kkeller Yep, Lew insisted that Space:1999 have two American leads.

I honestly don't mind that sort of pandering much, it's better than having a horrible US remake of the show.