The Prisoner

Many Happy Returns - S1-E7

Continuity mistake: When Number 6 jumps from the gunrunners' boat, he's on the starboard (right) side. In the next shot, though, the bad guy shoots at him from the boat's port (left) side. (00:20:30)

Jean G

Living in Harmony - S1-E14

Continuity mistake: Number 6 is sitting in jail rolling a cigarette. In the long shot, you can see that he's just exhaled a cloud of cigarette smoke. But, in the next shot, he has just finished rolling the cigarette and has yet to light it. (00:11:10)

Arrival - S1-E1

Continuity mistake: When he's trying to escape, Number 6 hides behind a bush with long narrow leaves. But when the camera angle changes to his point of view, the bush now has short broad leaves instead.

Jean G

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: At the end of the chess match, the player wearing blue comes down off his platform, descending the ladder and walking onto the field. In the very next shot, as his opponent approaches Number 6, the man in blue is in the background, once again coming down the same ladder. He didn't have time to climb it again.

Jean G

Arrival - S1-E1

Continuity mistake: During the scene with Number 6 and the young woman in the stone boat, Number 6's jacket changes from one shot to the next. The design of the white piping is distinctively different.

Jean G

The Schizoid Man - S1-E5

Continuity mistake: Watch the helicopter when it first lifts off. It has regular "sled-style" landing struts. But in the air, it suddenly has water pontoons. When it lands again, though, the regular struts return.

Jean G

It's Your Funeral - S1-E11

Continuity mistake: A sleeping Number 6 is being observed by the Village girl. While she watches him, his bed clothes mysteriously rearrange themselves. First they're disarrayed, then they're neatly tucked over him and his robe has moved to a different place on the bed. A few shots later, when he wakes up, his pillow disappears.

Jean G

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: In the opening shots, the Village center is shown without the giant chessboard set up. In the very next shot, it is suddenly fully laid out on the green.

Jean G

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: When the command "Knight to Queen's Bishop Three" is given, it's not a knight that moves, but a pawn. In the next long shot, though, Queen's Bishop Three isn't occupied by anyone, pawn or otherwise.

Jean G

The Chimes of Big Ben - S1-E2

Continuity mistake: Number 2 sits down and places his umbrella beside him with the handle facing out. The camera angle changes, and although he hasn't touched it again, the umbrella handle is now facing inward.

Jean G

Many Happy Returns - S1-E7

Continuity mistake: Mrs. Butterworth has a sandwich plate in her left hand and her cigarette in her right - until the shot cuts, at which point the cigarette and the sandwiches have instantly changed to the opposite hands.

Jean G

Show generally

Continuity mistake: In both the opening and closing sequences, as well as in footage used throughout the series, "Rover" leaves the ocean floor as a transparent sphere, but arrives on the surface colored his usual opaque white.

Jean G

Hammer into Anvil - S1-E10

Continuity mistake: When he's standing against the wall of the kosho chamber, Number 6 is holding onto the rail, but when the camera reverses angles, he isn't. This goes back and forth several times.

Jean G

The Chimes of Big Ben - S1-E2

Continuity mistake: Number 6 chooses a rather thin tree to cut down and fashion into his canoe. Somehow, when he's finished hewing out the wood to form the boat, it's considerably wider than the tree he started with.

Jean G

More mistakes in The Prisoner

Number 6: Be seeing you.

More quotes from The Prisoner

Fall Out - S1-E17

Trivia: The bizarrely existential ending of the series, which answered none of the questions posed by earlier episodes (but rather seemed to say, "The answer is there is no answer!") upset viewers so much that Patrick McGoohan says he was forced to go into hiding. His phone had been ringing constantly and people who'd found his address were banging on his door to complain.

Jean G

More trivia for The Prisoner

Chosen answer: We were never told. In the series finale [Spoiler alert] Number 6 demands an answer to that question, only to be shown his own reflection.

Jean G

Answer: It's even more obvious than you think, you know who number 1 is in the very first episode. When 2 replies to the question "who is #1?" Change the way he answers from you are number one (in the monotone or accented answer to, "You are, number 6. The comma gives you the answer. #6 is #1. It's the tone of the answer.

Answer: The Prisoner was first shown on British television in 1967. I did not watch it then, but the series was was repeated on UK television in 1977, at which point it became a massive cult. Certainly, I was hooked. Well, ten minutes after I started watching The Prisoner, I was 110% certain as to who Number 1 was. In my opinion, the identity of Number 1 was so utterly, glaringly obvious that I could not understand how anybody could even ask such a question. I thought there was only one candidate for the identity of Number 1, and it was so plainly visible that nobody could even vaguely consider it to be anybody else. So, who did I think Number 1 was? you all ask. My answer? Himself! Patrick McGoohan (or rather, the character Patrick McGoohan played in The Prisoner) was Number 1. I was proved right. In Fall Out, the seventeenth and final episode, "The Prisoner" gets to meet "Number 1." Now this is a real "blink and you'll miss it" moment, but Number 1 has his face covered. The Prisoner pulls off the covering to see a mask, he pulls off the mask, to see himself! The Patrick McGoohan in Number 1's costume laughs in The Prisoner's face and runs away. Unfortunately, I don't know why Patrick McGoohan should be both The Prisoner and Number 1. I don't think anybody does.

Rob Halliday

More questions & answers from The Prisoner

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.