# The Prisoner (2009)

> A man wakes in a mysterious village where residents have numbers instead of names and their past lives are denied.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/28848

## Facts

- Seasons: 1
- Episodes: 6
- Episode runtime: 60 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: drama, science fiction
- Created by: Bill Gallagher
- Network: AMC
- Cast: Jim Caviezel, Ian McKellen, Hayley Atwell, Ruth Wilson, Jamie Campbell Bower, Lennie James, Rachael Blake, Renate Stuurman
- TMDB rating: 6.1/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1043714/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: measured
- Intensity: moderate
- Complexity: layered
- Violence: mild
- Tone: paranoid, eerie, claustrophobic, surreal, dread-filled

## What critics say

Reviewers and audiences largely found this 2009 miniseries a weak, confused remake that loses the original's surreal political edge in favor of a soap-opera style.

## Synopsis

The Prisoner (2009) is a United States television miniseries created by Bill Gallagher for AMC, a remake of the British original. Jim Caviezel plays Six, a man who wakes in a isolated community called The Village, where residents are known by numbers and every trace of their former lives is renounced as delusion. Ian McKellen plays Curtis, the community's authority figure, while Hayley Atwell plays Lucy, a fellow resident whose allegiances remain unclear. Ruth Wilson and Lennie James round out the principal cast in a six-episode run. The engine of the story is Six's unrelenting attempt to learn who runs the Village, why he was brought there, and how to get out, while each episode confronts him with new manipulations, rival residents and inscrutable rules. The show moves through a sealed, sun-bleached desert community where surveillance is constant and trust is scarce. Its tone is paranoid, eerie and claustrophobic, with a slow-building sense of dread and dark absurdity. Themes of identity, conformity and the struggle for selfhood run throughout. Fans of the original 1967 Prisoner, Lost and Twin Peaks will find resonance in its allegorical mystery and its unsettling, enclosed world.

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