After killing Number Two, Number Six is granted his wish to meet Number One. However, first he must meet the Assembly and sit in as the President of the Assembly presides on cases of errant behaviour. The proceedings don't go very smoothly.
For the first 12 episodes The Prisoner was great, an intense, intriguing, intelligent battle of wits and wills between Number Six and a variety of Number Twos and their minions. Then came the 13th episode - Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling - and the quality of the show took a sharp downturn with a plot that was threadbare and didn't make much sense.
The 14th and 15th episodes - Living In Harmony and The Girl Who Was Death - were even worse, suddenly moving the setting to another time and place. Anytime a show suddenly is set in a new location and/or time period (especially) you know the writers have run out of ideas and this exactly what happened there. These two episodes weren't really The Prisoner but rather out-of-place, haphazard stories jammed into the show.
With the 16th episode I was hoping that normal transmission would be resumed and we would again see a Number 6 vs Number 2 battle of wits and wills. Plus, being the penultimate episode I was expecting an indication of how Number 6's predicament would be resolved.
Well, we have the duel and some progress toward a solution but it's not done in a good way. The writing here is all over the place, with random detours, plot developments that make no sense and all sorts of trippy images and scenes that are just there to paper over the lack of genuine plot.
This, the final episode, follows in the same vein. Plot is all over the place, random trippy scenes, stuff that's really in there just to kill time, action scenes that seem very out of place. The resolution is also pretty lacklustre: hardly the clever, gripping conclusion I was hoping for every episode of the show. Quite sad as after the first 12 episodes this was set up for a brilliant, intelligent climax.
Very disappointing.