Review of The Prisoner

Does a 1960's avant grade UK spy thriller have more legs in 2019? Absolutely as time has elevated the brilliance of this off-beat TV series. It must be remembered that TV was already maturing into pablum. There were good shows like 77 Sunset Strip that still tended toward the silly over the sublime, the trendy over the introspective. The Prisoner was an island. It carved a path of mysteriousness and paranoia never overtly and outright outing showing itself. I'd say it took a cue from 1984 and ran with it. It foretold what we now hear often referred to as "the shadow government". Someone or ones who beyond a veil have a kind of ultimate control. If they single you out is your life you believed in just a creation of their manipulation? This presents a larger question as to what their goal is and what, or who, do they fear? To present these things all in the strange indenture of No. 6 is a kind of masterstroke. To present it so surreal in a TV culture that resisted such is amazing in that it comes out so deep and arty rather than unwatchable. It has an excellent hook because it inspired many interpretations in spite of often being frustratingly obtuse. If you were in you simply must keep watching much like an addiction. As it went it becomes more so culminating with what I'll only call "a fitting finality" that still kept so much open to ponder. I do not think I've seen another series as off-center and able to attract a large audience. This proves to be, perhaps, more amazing today when we often hear people ruminate that the world we've created is an illusion ran by some invisible super powerful cabal. With the masses being controlled by central banks and all-watching electronic surveillance I sometimes ask if I'm living in "The Village"? That said I find the show one of the finest ever to air and watching it again, over and over, every few years makes it seem even better as time passes.