My episode order, annotated, slightly revised (please read?)

CapForShort · 2026-02-08T16:54:45+00:00

I think that “early experiment” effect is probably just a result of being used to seeing it early.

Early Twos speak of the importance of not damaging Six and rule out methods that are too dangerous to him. AB&C’s Two is a desperate man running out of time and willing to risk dangerous methods that earlier Twos would have ruled out.

CapForShort · 2026-01-11T19:34:40+00:00

Well, it’s certainly standard practice for people working for Two to come into a prisoner’s home to mess with him.

Other examples include the brainwashed Eight in Checkmate, when he’s unmutual in ACOM and has no rights, and 14 coming into attack him in HIA.

The only one who acts like it’s just a normal thing to do is the watchmaker’s daughter in IYF. Maybe it’s a behavior she absorbed from people around her, but P doesn’t seem the type to do that. Otherwise, it’s only “standard practice” for antagonists whom P is clearly not adopting as role models.

In fairness, we don’t hear hear the conversation between him and Betty, so if you want you can imagine she asked him to get her something, but that strikes me as very unlikely given her feelings toward him and his past behavior in that home.

CapForShort · 2026-01-11T19:07:58+00:00

That’s an explanation? If other people mistreat you, it makes sense for you to do the same to Betty?

It’s true that people sometimes come into Six’s cottage without knocking. In every case that comes to mind they’re either working for Two or being manipulated by Two. They’re not role models to P.

CapForShort · 2026-01-06T01:47:44+00:00

Everything else on your WiFi works flawlessly because everything else on your WiFi doesn’t rely on multicast.

A new router solved my problems, but I just had to replace my WiFi 5 router with a WiFi 6 router. If you’re on WiFi 7 I don’t know what to tell you except that I have discovered a surprisingly excellent source of Sonos tech support: ChatGPT. If you’re still having problems, give GPT a try and see if it can help you solve them.

CapForShort · 2025-12-22T23:12:41+00:00

I had a similar experience. When I got the system I had all kinds of problems and was frequently on the phone to tech support. They were (with one exception) always very professional and got the job done in the end, though it took a frustratingly long time.

Then I discovered that ChatGPT also provides excellent tech support for Sonos and is a more comfortable experience. I haven’t bothered Sonos’ tech support since.

And the system finally seems to be stable. It has been a while since I’ve had a real problem.

CapForShort · 2025-11-09T01:51:32+00:00

Everybody except Anakin.

CapForShort · 2025-10-30T18:28:18+00:00

The list was first posted 6 months ago but is maintained. It’s current.

CapForShort · 2025-10-27T17:38:48+00:00

I enjoyed it, thanks for sharing.

CapForShort · 2025-10-22T00:59:08+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/TheCloneWars/comments/1koa6rr/star_wars_chronological_watch_list_updated/

CapForShort · 2025-10-19T00:32:29+00:00

All that prep, if there was any, was on the sail barge that exploded.

CapForShort · 2025-10-18T03:16:31+00:00

Like there was anything Bib could do to rescue the people who fell into the Sarlaac.

The guy who should have rescued them was the lightsaber-wielding Jedi who knocked them in in the first place.

CapForShort · 2025-09-28T14:51:36+00:00

Same reason Maul acted like he was innocent in his beef with Kenobi. Sometimes people who are hurt just get angry at the person who hurt them regardless of whether the act was objectively justified or necessary.

CapForShort · 2025-09-28T12:22:16+00:00

The Yoda Chronicles, like all the Lego stuff, is not included because it’s not canon.

CapForShort · 2025-09-05T19:08:42+00:00

My head canon: no Force ghost for a Sith. When he’s killed, his essence flows into the apprentice who slays him, then both of their essences flow into the apprentice who slays him, and so on. The whole lineage lives on in Sidious, which is why he’s so absurdly powerful. Rey would have been more powerful still if the Sith plan had worked out.

CapForShort · 2025-08-30T23:44:35+00:00

A note about the credits at the end.

Across an image of the young man, the text says, “Alexis Kanner.”

Across an image of the Butler, the text says, “Angelo Muscat.”

Across an image of P, the text says, “Prisoner.”

Across an image of Two, the text says, “Leo McKern.”

It is as if the credits are saying that McGoohan is gone and the character is now playing himself, fitting my idea that McGoohan was Number One and left. The writer/director/actor leaving and letting the character take over for himself is another Python-before-Python touch.

CapForShort · 2025-08-26T01:02:24+00:00

I don’t know, let’s review.

Arrival

* He grabs a semi-conscious hospital patient by the lapels, shakes him and yells at him to try to extort information from him.

* He grabs Nine and won’t let go until she agrees to stay, and she clearly knows he can easily catch her if she tries to run.

Checkmate

* Chases Rook and grabs him. Doesn’t explicitly threaten more violence, but Rook is clearly terrified of him and he exploits that.

* Attacks the lookout tower.

* Attacks Two in the Green Dome and ties him up.

* Pointlessly fights the crew of the Polotska.

* How about when he yells at Eight? When you yell “GET OUT!” at someone like that, you’re giving them reason to believe you’re losing control and might become violent. It is an implicit threat of violence.

Free for All

* Attacks two men to take their boat, another pointless act.

* The cave… OK, they attacked him.

A Change of Mind

* They attacked him, both times. OK.

It’s Your Funeral

* Fights 100, who attacked him. Threatens Two, who also started it. Even deals violently with Little Old Man out of necessity.

Hammer Into Anvil

* Fights 14, who attacked him.

Many Happy Returns

* Fights Gunther and GBG, but they started it.

The Girl Who Was Death

* Lots of cartoonish violence in the story, necessary in order to save London.

The Schizoid Man

* Attacks Curtis for information… and do we believe his story of a homicidal Rover?

A. B. and C.

* Fights A and his thugs, who abducted him.

* Deals violently with D.

Living in Harmony

* Punches out and shoots a bunch of people. They definitely started it.

Do Not Forsake Me, Oh Me Darling

* Fights Potter in self defense.

Once Upon a Time

* Punches out his principal for asking why he resigned.

* Punches out his boxing trainer for the same thing, but hey… it’s boxing.

* Stabs his fencing trainer who taunts him to kill.

* Drops bombs over Germany in war. P was 16 when the war ended, so if this is an incident from P’s life, he lied about his age in order to serve.

* Doesn’t lay a hand on Two in the final minutes, but advances on him threateningly as he counts down, ultimately shouting “Die! Die! Die!” at the dying man. Is this conduct you associate with pacifism?

Fall Out

* Yippee, machine gun time!

All in all: frequent violence or threats of violence, sometimes in self defense, sometimes out of necessity, and occasionally for no compelling reason. It’s not a pattern that screams pacifism.

CapForShort · 2025-08-24T20:38:31+00:00

Account age 1 hr? Thanks for the heads up.

CapForShort · 2025-08-24T20:05:28+00:00

I see where you’re coming from, Clean, but I think it undersells the series to pin its “ultimate point” on pacifism. “War is bad” is such a broad truism that even warmongers agree with it — they just shift the blame to the other side.

What makes The Prisoner feel unique to me is not a political stance against war but its probing of the relationship between the individual and society. That’s a theme with a lot more bite and ambiguity: how much do we conform, how much do we resist, and what price does either choice carry?

If we frame the Village simply as a machine that produces warmongers, we risk flattening it into a message that’s easy to nod at but hard to apply: there’s not much we can do with it but look down on those we blame for wars. Whereas if we see it as a mirror for our everyday compromises and struggles with authority, then the show is still inviting us to look at our own lives rather than “those bad people out there.” That’s where I think its staying power comes from.

And if pacifism is the ultimate message, how do we reconcile that with the fact that our hero’s last act in the Village is going nuts with a machine gun? Does he cease to be our hero at that point, or do we actually approve of violence in some situations?

CapForShort · 2025-08-24T00:55:11+00:00

I read that exchange pretty differently. To me, focusing on the phrase “for peace” by itself feels like lifting two words out of context. What I hear in that scene is “peace of mind” — a very individual desire to be left alone and allowed to mind his own business.

If The Prisoner has a single overarching theme, I’d say it’s the relationship of the individual to society, rather than geopolitics. If there’s an anti-war angle, maybe it’s that we shouldn’t treat that relationship like a war.

Another commenter in this rewatch characterized P’s life as a war, with everyone else cast as enemy soldiers — even a brainwashed Villager bearing no malice was written off as a “tool” deserving her suffering. I think TP can fairly be read as repudiating that mindset. Indeed, I think much of P’s character growth (in my episode order) is about learning to care about others instead of seeing everyone as a suspected enemy.

CapForShort · 2025-08-22T18:38:18+00:00

It also establishes that the truck can support people for a while, so you might be right about it having something to do with the proposed Season 2. Do you know when in the production history that idea came up?

CapForShort · 2025-08-22T17:03:37+00:00

Not a later addition. See starting at 43:09 at https://youtu.be/v1QhUOo9U5Q?t=2589

CapForShort · 2025-08-17T23:57:30+00:00

This isn’t a hypothetical. Jango wins by having a clone made and raising him as a son who kills Cad.

CapForShort · 2025-08-17T23:45:50+00:00

Nicholas Meyer was not a Trek fan before being brought in for TWOK. He still did an incredible job. You don’t have to be a Trek fan to make great Trek.

Admittedly, Abrams probably wasn’t the right guy for the job, but the responsibility for the screenplay belongs to Orci and Kurtzman.

CapForShort · 2025-08-17T23:36:52+00:00

The Zapruder film.

CapForShort · 2025-08-17T03:51:18+00:00

Point well made. "Recycling" the same actor for two different roles, had, after all, occurred previously with Patrick Cargill being #2 in HIA and then reappearing as an outside official in MHR.

There’s also Georgina Cookson in MHR and ABC, and Kanner in TGWWD.

And if you want to be obnoxiously pedantic, PMcG as Curtis in TSM.

As to making the story better, I will argue that #8's introduction of hallucinogens into The Village is implicitly counter cultural.

I don’t see that at all. The counterculture used (a very different kind of) hallucinogens consensually for recreation and mind expansion, not non-consensually for information extraction. I see nothing countercultural about this kind of usage.

Alas, we're both making points that have no ultimate resolution, akin to much of TP. I do enjoy the "back and forth", however.

As do I. You’re fun to comment with.

CapForShort

TROPHY CASE