By Jonathan Morris

One of the reasons why The Prisoner is so confusing is because most of its episodes have the wrong titles. They have each been assigned the second-most-appropriate episode title, rather than the most-appropriate.

In order to avoid any further misapprehensions I have gone through the episodes and given them their most appropriate proper titles. They are listed below, in the order I watched them.

Arrival
Number 6 has an argument with his bosses
Should be called: Fall Out

Dance of the Dead
Features a woman who looks like she's just been dug up
Should be called: The Girl Who Was Death

Checkmate
An episode with a universal message about nonconformity and freedom
Should be called: Free For All

The Chimes of Big Ben
In which Number 6, happily, returns to The Village
Should be called: Many Happy Returns

Living in Harmony
A Western episode needs a Western song title, doesn't it?
Should be called: Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darling

The Schizoid Man
In which a black Number 6 plays against a white Number 6 in a game of metaphysical identity-chess
Should be called: Checkmate

The General
It's about a General
Should be called: The General

Many Happy Returns
In which Number 6 drives past the clock tower on the corner of Parliament
Should be called: The Chimes Of Big Ben

It's Your Funeral
It doesn't feature any funerals, but none of the others do, either, really.
Should be called: It's Your Funeral

The Girl Who Was Death
If we're all sitting comfortably, Number 6 will tell us a story
Should be called: Once Upon A Time

Hammer Into Anvil
Number 2 thinks he is going bonkers
Should be called: The Schizoid Man

Do Not Forsake Me
In which Number 6 exchanges his mind with someone else
Should be called: A Change Of Mind

A, B and C
Features C, B and A
Should be called: A, B and C

Once Upon A Time
In which Number 6 regresses to childhood
Should be called: Once Upon A Time

Fall Out
Number 6 arrives at the awful truth that lies behind The Village
Should be called: Arrival

If that's not simpler than retaining the old episode titles, I don't know what is!

[I realise that technically this means that we end up with two episodes called 'Once Upon A Time'. However, I still think that is less confusing than sticking to the original episode titles.]

So with no more ado, back to this week's episode...

LIVING IN HARMONY

Ah. No, on second thoughts, maybe not. I've had...

A CHANGE OF MIND

The episode begins with some violence in the woods. It transpires that the new Number 2 doesn't approve of Number 6's solo calisthenics. It is 'unmutual'.

The Alan Moore fan in the attic will adore this episode. It's all about how, like, society makes us conform, aaaah, and how we are indoctrinated by the system, aaaah, and how the film of The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen was a pale imitation of the original comic strip. Except, of course, what the Alan Moore fan in the attic doesn't realise is that by wearing black, smoking roll-ups and listening to The Sisters Of Mercy is that he or she is, in fact, adhering to a stereotype and is therefore far more of a conformist than those poor souls who have jobs, mortgages and the latest very good CD release by Dido.

The dangerously unmutual Number 6 is taken on a tour of the hospital, where he peers through the round window into the "Gareth Roberts room". This room is so named after a scene in Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) written by Gareth Roberts, where a character looks into one of the rooms of an asylum and sees a large, bald man in a romper suit, played by Gareth Roberts. (Gareth is also the person responsible for the above watching-order - 'the Gareth Roberts order'.)

One of the Doctors in the hospital is played by George 'subtitles, please' Pravda.

What struck me as noteworthy about this episode is that it parodies a certain well-known religious cult. I won't name the cult, because they have fingers in lots of powerful pies, but they believe all sorts of nonsense about people carrying around the ghosts of aliens in our brains. The cult was started up by a failed sci-fi writer as revenge for not being allowed to do an episode of Star Trek.

Now, what happens with this cult is that they brainwash new recruits. Firstly, they check to see if the new recruits are sufficiently gullible. They do this by telling them the stuff about how we are all carrying around the ghosts of aliens in our brains - and about how the cult leader was in fact a very good sci-fi writer who should've been allowed to do at least one of the animated episodes.

They next brainwash their recruit by using the power of peer pressure. Humans are social animals, like ducks, and will do anything to fit in. If all their friends read Kim Newman and drink Newky Brown, they will read Kim Newman and drink Newky Brown. Everyone wants to belong, it's a basic human (and duck) need. I saw a demonstration of this on telly where they got a comedian to set up a call-and-response thing with the audience whilst one audience member was in the loo. When he returned, he still joined in, because he didn't wish to appear foolish.

So that's what it's about. The Village is a metaphor for society. Aaaah.

Except it's also an episode of The Prisoner, so the metaphor is illustrating something most of us worked out for ourselves at the age of 12. And, of course, Number 6 resists the brainwashing because HE'S SO DAMN HARD and thus the powers that be are forced to use their latest Special Machine on him.

Conveniently, Number 6 wakes up during the operation. As we know from A, B and C, he has a habit of doing this. However, in this episode, he has been awoken for a reason.

...because the operation is, in fact, a fake. Delightfully the scene which features an actress repeating a load of guff about the 'aggressive frontal lobes of the brain' turns out to be a load of guff. The reason she sounds as though she doesn't understand what she's talking about is not because she's a poor actress, but because she is a very good actress trying to sound as though she doesn't understand what she's talking about.

Number 6 is supposed to believe he has had a brain operation, when in fact he has been drugged. This is a clever twist on the typical Prisoner plot.

One of the side-effects of the drug is that wherever Number 6 goes, everything looks as though it is a forced-perspective backdrop. We've all had days like that.

This week's kooky sixties chick, number 48, tries to make Number 6 a drugged cup of tea. However, Number 6 swaps the cups, and she is then drugged and reveals to him that their Special Machine is actually a fake.

Number 2, watching this on his big screen, shouts out, like Rene Artois, 'You stupid woman!'. I don't know how he does it, but somehow he manages to roll the 'r' in `you stupid woman' even though it doesn't contain any 'r's.

Number 6 is due to give a big 'confession' speech. However, realising that the people of The Village have been conditioned - like ducks - he has deviously hypnotised number 48 into denouncing Number 2 as 'unmutual'.

The denouement doesn't quite work. I can see what they were trying to do, but something fragile got lost in the clumsiness. It all went a bit The Benny Hill Show.