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

Many Happy Returns - S1-E7

Continuity mistake: While the gunrunner is untying the raft, he's holding a half-eaten green apple in one hand that wasn't there in the previous shot. It disappears again as the raft floats away. Then it comes back - but it has now become a red apple instead of a green one.

Jean G

Many Happy Returns - S1-E7

Continuity mistake: One of the bad guys prepares a tea tray in the boat's galley and carries it up to the bridge. Throughout his preparations and his trip up the stairs to the upper deck, the contents of the tray keeps changing. The items rearrange themselves, and the size and shape of the bread loaf alternates several times.

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

Dance of the Dead - S1-E8

Continuity mistake: At the end, the computer produces a print-out with two lines of type at the bottom, then pauses. In the next shot, when it starts printing again, the two lines have disappeared.

Jean G

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: Number 6 gets into the buggy with the hypnotised woman (Number 8, I think) however, when seen from behind, as the vehicle drives away, there is now only one person in the buggy. (00:29:47)

Jack Vaughan

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: On the beach, the Queen is sitting on a large rock and conversing with Number 6. Then she's seen standing down near the water. After an abrupt cut, she's back on the rock without enough time to have moved there.

Jean G

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: Number 39 is writing notes on the word association test in her notebook. When the shot cuts to a close-up, however, the notebook disappears from her hands. It's back a short time later.

Jean G

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: At the start of the chess match, a man holding a stick climbs the ladder behind the Queen and settles in to watch. As Number 6 and the Queen converse throughout the game, however, both the ladder and the man have vanished. They both reappear behind the Queen as the game is ending.

Jean G

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: Rover herds the boat back to the beach, and several people who were aboard minutes before (some of them unconscious) have somehow disappeared from its decks.

Jean G

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: Number 6 is taking notes on the Village inhabitants, trying to determine which of them are prisoners and which are keepers. Next to the pond, he's observing Number 62. But on his notepad, he crosses out Number 8.

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

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

Checkmate - S1-E9

Continuity mistake: When Number 6 is setting up his antenna, there's a woman on the beach in the background in a blue bathing suit. Between takes, her beach umbrella disappears.

Jean G

Hammer into Anvil - S1-E10

Continuity mistake: When Number 2 is shouting at Number 14, calling him a traitor, Number 2's long strands of hair are flying all over his head. In the very next shot, though, his hair has nicely combed itself and he's well-groomed again.

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: Unlike me, many of you have accepted the situation of your imprisonment, and will die here like rotten cabbages.

More quotes from The Prisoner

Living in Harmony - S1-E14

Trivia: This episode was not shown in the initial U.S. airing of "The Prisoner" on CBS. There was speculation that its pacifist, anti-violence moral might have been construed as a Vietnam War protest, but the network's reason for censoring the episode has never been disclosed.

Jean G

More trivia for The Prisoner

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.

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: 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

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