I didn't start up this blog again for the death of Leonard Nimoy, I didn't do it to commemorate Christopher Lee. No, I am doing it today because today is American Patriotastic As Fuck Day, and as a Patriotastic American I feel like saying on this day celebrating the birth of "The Greatest Nation In The World": It's a Sham. Freedom is a myth. You see, I have finished re-watching what is probably the Greatest Television Show Ever Made, and I had to come onto the internet, on this day, after a prolonged silence, to talk about it. And it's British. Ha.
1967-1968
Director: Basically Patrick McGoohan
This is a classic show. If you haven't seen it, go watch it now. Don't expect me to do a review in the classical sense and use it to decide whether you want to watch it, I'll just tell you right now. Watch it now. Now.
Now.
(17 hours later)
Okay, back? Good. Awesome, wasn't it? And really fucking confusing too, I'll bet. There's a lot of stuff in this show that makes you think, and makes you think about stuff that's not that pleasant. Individuality vs the Community is only one facet. I believe the overall conflict of the show is Freedom vs Control, or alternatively, Order vs Chaos... which ties into the Individual vs Society. Of course Society stands for Order and Control... without control there would be no order, there would be chaos... and human beings cannot stand pure anarchy. This is all Sociology 101, but the way The Prisoner star and creative force Patrick McGoohan handles it all is brilliant and nuanced. From the tone and plot of the show you would expect The Prisoner (I refuse to refer to him as Number 6, after all HE IS NOT A NUMBER) to be the unabashed hero and the controllers of The Village to be absolute, unadulterated evil, but this is not always the case. The Prisoner can sometimes be just as rigid and uncompromising in the name of the individual as the Village can be in enforcing Control -only near the end of the show does he stop flailing about in self-righteous rage and start to beat the Villagers at their own game. And while the antagonists do some pretty evil stuff in the course of the show it is made plain on a number of occasions that many of them are just as much prisoners as the main character. You can actually sympathize with some of the Numbers Two (most notably Leo McKern's).
And in the end of course (literally) The Prisoner shows that you will never be free; if society is not trying to control and limit you then you yourself are. The struggle is never over; we are doomed to conflict with ourselves and each other until the end of time... .. wait a minute, is this show British or German?
And that's why I say what McGoohan once said: freedom, or at least absolute freedom as imagined by most Americans, is a myth. It has to be. Or society would just fall apart. In America you are only as free as you can afford to be. Or as free as the powers-that-be will let you be. Or as free as your family, friends, neighborhood or community lets you be. The United States is no different. Oh, don't get me wrong, I love living in the US. As a (barely) middle-class American I enjoy a roof over my head and food whenever I need it (good, affordable medical care on the other hand....). I am "free" to express my opinions about my government and not be jailed in a gulag somewhere but make no mistake... true political dissenters and undesirables are monitored covertly and often, and those deemed dangerous to the state (whether they are dangerous or not) are dealt with. Scratch the surface of America's "free" exterior actually, and you'll find a surveillance and enforcement system that resembles a certain Village control room....
The United States (and other western countries) have done some very nefarious things to protect the community and its "freedom", many of them done during the decade The Prisoner was originally made. Things that were just as nefarious as the "evil" Communist Soviet Union or third world brutal dictatorships (some of which we helped set up and/or maintain). The East and West were not that different during the Cold War (something the show touches on).
So given the show's message and the state of the world it's all pretty depressing, right? There is no hope. Well, no. The trick, and this is the beauty of McGoohan's message, is to despite all this never let them make you think of yourself as a number (which is difficult today, isn't it, with your Social Security Number, Driver's Licence Number, etc.). Also, you have to *fight* for the rights you most want and cherish. Don't let them take everything. You should learn to compromise, but never just roll over and play dead.
All this coming from a Brit, no less. Wait, actually, Patrick McGoohan was born and died in... America.
Go America! Woo!
Happy Fourth.
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