The Prisoner!

I caught a few minutes and it seemed pretty bad.

not in comparison to the original even, just in general.

pretty sure my number two has more inner life than jesus mcnot-mcgoohan

before i knew what this was the commercial made me think it was a miniseries based on lethem's chaos moon

I was excited for this a couple weeks ago but I only watched the first 20 minutes or so before I turned it off. Hated the style (it's all digital-crazy-jumpy, like it's "The Prisoner: CSI") and the story hadn't even come close to getting anywhere interesting.

not in comparison to the original even, just in general.

basically this, although when it got to the credits sequence (the original has amazing credits) and it totally sucked that was pretty much where it lost me for good

I kind of fell asleep in the middle of this, yet somehow managed to not miss a single piece of critical plot info.

well, you can do that to the orginals, too.
my Prisoner DVDs are my go-to nap solution.
(haven't seen new one)

God this is bad. It should work but it really doesn't.

The only good thing is the wraps joke.

I found out that my gym has OnDemand on the tv boxes, and the entire first series is available. Each ep lasts about as long as the amount of cardio I want to do that night.

Making my way through the entire series for the first time. So good. The last episode involved them putting No. 6 to sleep and infiltrating his memories a la Inception.

It is funny just how polite the dystopia is. ***DRAMATIC MUSIC*** No 6 is taken to No 2 for interrogation. "Oh, would you like some tea? Perhaps some bread? That's right, we know what kind of bread you like...." DUN DUN DUUUUN "...It is in your file!"

A, B and C! That episode has a library music cue that I love to death:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=le9U0zLiBoI

Unfuckwithable, this show

Indeed! It's kind of mindblowing how quickly the plot follows during some of these episodes. Especially compared to the glacially paced Doctor Who from the same time period.

Lost really cribbed so much from the show. In particular I've enjoyed the episodes where he thinks he has made it off the island (or in some cases actually has) and yet somehow they always get him back there.

The New No. 2 seems to grow more and more frazzled as time goes on. Even the prim and proper all-seeing eye of the surveillance is in danger of falling apart due to anxieties, corruption in the ranks, fear of the implied masters behind the scenes of this whole farce. "Hammer Into Anvil" has him driving No. 2 into total self doubt and resignation. Looking forward to seeing how this strange ride ends!

McGoohan is awesome, is Danger Man as good as it sounds?

He would have made a much better James Bond than Roger Moore.

I've never seen danger man

The ending to this is ... something else. I wouldn't say it's entirely satisfying (certainly not from a narrative standpoint) but it is legit nuts and def some kind of high point for psych paranoia television.

I've enjoyed the episodes where he thinks he has made it off the island

He's not on an island... as far as I remember. I envy someone watching this series for the first time.

Pages from Jack Kirby's unpublished (still!) and uncompleted Prisoner adaptation for Marvel Comics:

http://www.theredcircle.com/blog/2009/11/15/jkirby-tprsnr/

I-I've never seen this place before! I don't know where it's located-- or, how I got here! Or why my arms are so unfeasibly long!

Realism is boring

Ok WOW that ending was insane. So good. Crowd pleasing and a good emotional/narrative send-off and yet also crazy. The bit w the tearing off multiple masks made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

This really seems to be a foundational work for a lot of things to come in the following decades. I bet Kubrick was thinking of the loony top-hat guy dancing and singing "Dem Bones" when he made "A Clockwork Orange". All the generic worker outfits look like inspiration for Devo. Something brought to mind Gilliam's "Brazil" as well but I don't remember what it was.

I enjoyed the lead-up to the finale, tho the 2nd to last episode was a bit hard to get through. It was cool that they did a Western themed episode ("Living in Harmony") and then immediately followed it with a very British spy episode ("The Girl Who Was Death") with him playing cricket and drinking at the pub. I think that may be my favorite in the entire series, I loved the fast pace, the constant twists, and the ingenuity he had to use to get himself out of all those traps and tricks.

Damn good show, should be required viewing.

Oh yeah after the tearing multiple masks off it cuts to several quick extreme close ups of distorted faces screaming at the camera, gave me a flashback to the anti-Laura Palmer shrieking in the Black Lodge in the finale of "Twin Peaks".

"The Girl Who Was Death" is a comic episode of the English television series "The Prisoner" which originally aired in the UK on ITV 18 January 1968. According to several sources, including The Prisoner by Robert Fairclough, this episode was adapted from an unused, two-part script originally commissioned for Danger Man.

Ah, makes sense! I may have to watch "Danger Man" next.

Also they were shooting 2001 in the same studio which makes it extra cool that No. 1 speaks through a HAL-like computer eye.

if I remember from my high school obsession days, part of the idea behind The Girl Who Was Death was that ratings weren't great and the brass was getting on him to do something more crowd-pleasing and less pretentious so he found the unused Danger Man script and presented it as a story being told within the story, with the send-off at the end of the reader saying "goodnight to children, everywhere" or something like that, a bit on the nose commentary on the desires of the executives.

not sure if this documentary has been seen by many of you; i am unfamiliar with it.

http://dangerousminds.net/comments/six_into_one_seldom_seen_doc_on_patrick_mcgoohans_cult_tv_classic_the_priso

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUysgDRYYqo

very cool, thanks for posting this!

Oh, I remember that dude that ran the Prisoner shop in Portmeirion.

Whoa, check this out:

http://www.comiclink.com/auctions/item.asp?back=%2Fauctions%2Fpreview.asp%3Fcode%3D2016aug%26itemtype%3D1%26Artist%3DJACK%2520KIRBY%23Item_1133913&id=1133913

An unpublished Jack Kirby Prisoner story from 1976!

v cool!

yeah, that's been around here and there. pretty cool stuff.

Weirdly, there's also a complete unpublished Prisoner strip pencilled by Gil Kane and written by Steve Englehart that was never published either:

http://comics.ha.com/itm/original-comic-art/complete-story/gil-kane-original-art-for-the-prisoner-complete-18-page-story-marvel-unpublished-an-instant-hit-upon-its-debut-in/a/803-5955.s

Englehart apparently first suggested Gene Colan for the job, but Colan turned it down because it was "just a guy on an island"

Did the Ian McKellen series ever make it to DVD?

I saw maybe two, don't remember much about either of them..

http://www.dailypost.co.uk/business/business-news/portmeirion-pokmon-go-treasure-trove-11651694

I'm up to ep 13 of 17 -- not sure whether I like this or hate it. I do admire it.

Come back when you've seen episode 17...

Ive had the box set of this for years and never got past more than a few eps, not out of dislike just never got round to finishing it!

McGoohan's unwavering commitment to delivering every single line, no matter how innocuous or minor, in that clenched teeth mode of barely suppressed rage and/or sarcasm is just incredible. It makes every exchange feel fraught with conflict.

would love to hear him read things in the style of the Prisoner - the Bible, Dr. Seuss, the phonebook

He’s great doing passive-aggressive faux-friendly as the baddie in Silver Streak. Much better than Braveheart when he’s plain old evil

I don't recall seeing him anything else except Scanners tbh, in which mostly he just comes across as drunkenly angry

He's in at least 4 Columbos and brilliant in every one.

Danger Man is on Amazon Prime, surprisingly entertaining for a b&w series that debuted in 1960 (McGoohan secret-agenting well before the Bond movies)

in the last week or two The Prisoner also showed up as included on Amazon Prime -- I'm looking forward to seeing it in order for the first time

he's the warden in escape from alcatraz!!

yeah I noticed this on Amazon Prime and just watched a couple eps (Free for All and Checkmate)

imagining the Prisoner at a diner

Waitress: What would you like this morning?
Number 6: To mind my own business.

xp McGoohan adds some much-needed tension to Ice Station Zebra, basically reprising his Danger Man role

is there a more menacing orb in television or cinema than Rover

Danger Man is way more "sophisticated" than I had expected when I first watched it about a decade ago ... there are a few episodes that prefigure the Prisoner.

Rover reinforces my antipathy to balloons ... best menacing orb

imo he's great in almost everything he's done. Dunno if this was posted already - All Night Long is a good film with McGoohan stealing the show as a treacherous jazz drummer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hl5p80BMHYk

very sinister drum solo

that tune sounds kind of like the Danger Man theme

don't forget Baby, Secret of the Lost Legend

He's also on Hell Drivers, the cast of which is o_O - a doctor who, a James bond, Sid James, a Professional, a man from uncle, a ladykiller, Alfie bass...