Episode 11: The Prisoner (1967) Pilot

Hi there. I'm Chris Statue and I'm Guess Fired, and we are the host of The One Season Show, a podcast where we take a look at TV shows that only lasted one season from start to finish. Each month, we'll tackle several episodes of the show. On this episode, we're kicking off our next show, our third season. I can't believe we've actually made it to our third season this fast.

On this episode, we're kicking off our next show, our third season. I can't believe we made it to our third season that quickly. We are tackling a something a little different. We're going sci fi this time, something that spawned quite the cult following and many arguments as to how the show should be viewed. So make your judgment on whether or not we chose the correct episode listing for nineteen sixty seven's The Prisoner Metric McGowan is the Prisoner tramped ten us dreams, terrifying prison.

A lot of people are curious about what lies behind your resignation. They want to know why he was suddenly left. A man like you was with a great deal on the open market. The information annoyed is priceless. I don't think you realize what a valuable property of the count out.

So before we get to the show, let's talk a little bit kind of about the backstory of the show. Let's talk a little bit about because there's a lot of there's a lot of weird things about the show, a lot of idiosyncrasies about the show, not the least being who got credit for creating the show. So two people have credit for the show, Patrick McGowan, who plays the lead character Number six, and George Markstein who helped George or who worked on the show and was a writer on the show as well. And there's a dispute as to who wrote who has main credit for the show. Some people say McGowan, some people say mark Stein.

Reading everything that I've read, you know, I think you know what they say about success, Success has men fathers, and you know, failure is an orphan so well, and especially in like a structure, in all format like this, a medium like this, where it's is a collaborative process. So obviously yes, it's it's who. There's always going to be somebody who's doing more, who has more invested in the property, who has more at stake. But then you get muddled lines of who had what specific idea that you know may or may not have broken the show. Yeah, it seems to be more of an order of who pitched it win right, Um, so sort of like a Facebook thing where it's like, we had the idea first, but then you did something with it.

So Patrick McGowan was working on a show prior to The Prisoner called Danger Man and did he dare something fierce in it too. So Danger Man is kind of like the spiritual prequel to this show, and in some respects the ending of this show. If some people who worked on it, George mark Stein specifically had their way, it would have tied directly into this show. However, that's not the direction that they went. But that was one of the initial ideas with this show, was to have this show tie into the end of Danger Man, because Patrick McGowan wanted to be done with Danger Man and then he moved on to this show.

So there's this kind of there's this thing where this show kind of spawned from Danger Man, like kind of out of the womb of Danger Man came The Prisoner and they were going to try to tie it back to it at the end of the show. They ended up not doing it. But Patrick McGowan had the idea for this show ostensibly while working on Danger Man, and so it just seems to be the idea of who is getting credit is more about who did it in what order? Did McGowan pitch it first? Or did Mark Stein pitch it first?

There and look, if you want to go and read all about about it, there's a there's a fair amount of information kind of an evidence in both directions. So the show, the show was, you know, was it relatively received, well received when it came out, It had success, it people seem to like it. Obviously, the end is very it has been talked. I don't know what happens at the end because I've never seen it before. Um and but from what I've read, everything is very controversial about the end sequences.

So I wonder if, like just I wonder how those arguments were falling, you know, while the show was on versus after the show ended. Sure well, And and I think ultimately also when you have something where there's a credit dispute, and you know, this show, also on top of the credit dispute, like you mentioned in the opening, there is also this problem with how the show is filmed I think ordered. Yeah, not necessarily filmed. I think it's really yeah, well some of the things are. So there are multiple different versions of the sequence.

There's the production order that's not the intended viewing order. Then there's the ITC ITC being Incorporated Television Company, which was where this was broadcast on. There's their official sequence, and then there's a sequence from six of one, which is kind of a fan community for the show. And that's the order that we're going to be using for this podcast, is the six of one endorsed order. It's also the one that's used in the A and E DVDs, and then there's even another one that the av Club used, So you know, there's and look, this is a seventeen episode show, so there are a fair amount of episodes to move around.

I mean we kind of ran into that with Kitchen Confidential, where it's seemed to be that some of the episodes were completely out of order, to the case where there's characters literally missing from episodes and then they show up in the next episode. So it's it's a little weird. This is something we haven't really dealt with before on this show is trying to kind of reconcile the order of the show and what order we want to watch it in, and how that will ultimately affect our appreciation and enjoyment of the show. Right. Yeah, It's like it's the ultimate choose your own adventure before you have any idea of what's going on.

It's like, well, choose your fate now. Yeah, and you know what, I'm fine. I'm fine with the order that we've picked. I think that the people who put this are the more dedicated of fans and more invested in the material than say, like the ones that are put together by the television companies. They don't give a shit.

They just want people to watch the show. But yeah, I'm fine with the order that we picked. And maybe you know, those of you out there who have watched the show, if you've watched it in a different order, or if you've watched it and all the orders, maybe you have. I'm sure that there's obviously many people out there who have, then I would we would highly be interested in your takes on this. But yeah, I just kind of I came across this show on a whim the other night.

A friend of mine just I was scrolling through Instagram stories and a friend of mine that I used to write you know with, Sorry I didn't used to write with, but wrote at the same website with He posted that it was on He posted like a screen grab and it's it just the colors, the you know, the era, the sixties look. Everything about it kind of just caught my eye. But he said that it was one of his favorite shows of all time and that it was on Amazon Prime, and I was like, oh, okay, cool, I'll check it out. I saw that it was one season. Now I know that this.

I don't think that this is a one season show and that the way that we're used to it being a one season show. I don't believe that it was like actually canceled canceled. I think that it was ended on purpose, but not in not an accepted way. It tells an entire story right from everything that I've seen and read, trying not to spoil the show for myself but also doing the requisite amount of research necessary, it does seem like the show has a beginning, a middle, end, and end regardless of what order you watch it in. So but yeah, I you know, I, like you said, this is definitely a little different than what we've talked about in the past, especially just for the age of the show, for the time that the show is set in, and for the subject matter, because we've covered horror and we've covered comedy, and now we're covering sci fi well, and it's like it's spy sci fi too.

It's like sixties era spy stuff. So if you're familiar with that, you know, it's kind of that, really like swinging sixty style. We got cool cars, we got cool music. Everything's super euro they you know, everybody's dress and really nice and flashy. Um.

But it's also British, so it's not like, you know, Italian spy stuff, whereas it's super you know, flamboyant and out there. Um. I mean this is this is pretty out there and has some some flamboyant occurrences. But I just I kind of love how British it is, just with their stiff upper lip, like everybody's like, yes, well, everything's very weird here, but it would be impolite to say anything otherwise, so we're just going to keep moving on with our lives. And uh yeah, I'm I'm stoved for it.

It's it's a mix. I don't think I've seen like a science fiction spy mash up before. Well, you haven't you seen the Avengers movie from like the nineties. I have not. I'm sure it is.

It's not. It's not great. I mean, I guess, like what it's like stuff like gets I wouldn't think like Get Smart or James Bond qualify as science fiction, although they do have like really elaborate gadgets, gadget trees. I guess it's it's adjacent, it's it's similar, But this is I also can't tell. I don't know.

Maybe I wasn't. I can't tell if this is a sci fi reality in where like our main character was previously before he gets taken to this village, he was previously just living his life as a spy, and was it in normal reality and then he gets taken to this place where everything's a little bit more high tech in future or is the whole reality set in the future, because there's a we'll get as we get into the show. But there's a part where he answers the phone, and the phone's chordless and very you know, angular and spacing, and it kind of looks at it weirdly. So I didn't know if he's kind of transported, and I guess that's part of what we're figuring out as well. We don't know why he's in this village.

I interpreted as the former, not the latter. So the he was living in a real world yeah in sixty seven, Yeah, and in real world actual his historical historical, but you know what I mean, nineteen sixty seven, and then gets taken to this more hyper futuristic village that's advanced reality adjacent. I want to live in reality adjason. I think we all do at the momentum. Like you mentioned, the order we're going with is the six of one order.

It is on Wikipedia, so if you want to if you want to search that out. It is also the official order that if you buy the complete series mega set off of Amazon, that is the order it is in. We'll also let you know what episodes we're watching in the order that we're planning on watching them in so that there's not any surprises as well, because while we would say episode two and three, that's actually different episodes in the order. So right, yeah, in in case you are, In case you're listening and, like us, have not watched this show before, I want to follow along and not get screwed up. That's and they do have them all listed.

If you if you get you know, you have a lot of time to kill recently, you might want to just watch it in all the sequences, I guess. So with that in mind, let's talk about the first episode of The Prisoner Arrival, which is notably the only episode that everyone agrees on, and I can see why. It's very clear. It's very clearly the first episode, the first episode, and the last two episodes because while the last episode, the second last episode, was filmed sixth it is still widely considered to be the second to last episode for almost everyone. So the first and the second to last and the last are the only three episodes that are all more or less agreed on in the order, in the multiple multitude of different orders that you can watch the show in.

So. The first episode aired June first, nineteen sixty eight, on ITC, which, like I mentioned, already was incorporated television company. It was directed by Don Chaffee, was written by George Markstein and David Tomblin, and it stars Patrick McGowan obviously as Number six, Virginia Maskell as the woman. There's gonna be a lot of very kind of just it's me specific name, yeah, exactly, a lot of non specific names. Guy Dolman as Number two and then George Baker as the new number two.

And the first episode finds Number six before he becomes number six being taken to a bizarre prison village known as the Village. Yeah, it's all very everything's very big basic here, I mean, at least it's you know, simple, it's hard to not hard to follow. Yeah, but this, uh for being a spy prison or whatever the hell it is, because I don't I don't know yet. It's pretty nice, like this is a picture aside from how you're treated, but this is a picturesque town. It's very Stepford you like that.

That's very much how I mean. And we talk about this this show as we go along and how much and fluenced you know, other other entities, other mediums in the sci fi world. And yeah, it's a very Stepfordy place. You go the man, All the lawns are well manicured and brightly green. All the buildings are painted in these you know, freshly colored paints that are you know, they pop out.

Every everybody's polite to everybody's well camped everybody is just going along with their daily life. Everybody seems to be you know, bilingual or multilingual U. And of course, you know, being a spine and not really understanding how you've got here, you're going to be suspicious, as is our Number six. But he's also kind of I don't know. There's a few interesting things that happen throughout the show direction wise and delivery wise that are a little strange to me, because there are at times essentially he is trying to escape this entire episode that that's of course, but there are a few times where he seems oddly okay with what's going on.

For instance, when we're yeah, like, there's this sequence because occasionally he does seem okay with things. There's a sequence when he first meets number two when we're when he's being sort of briefed on a little bit on what's going on and why he's there. But when he first meets number two, he two wants to like is offering him breakfast, and so he's just asking him, like Odia, one bacon or sausage. She's like, bacon, you want one egg or two too. I just found that sequence.

I just found that, like exchange really strange and strangely toned, because it felt like he was like, all right, yeah, I'm not happy that I've been kidnapped and put in this weird town, but I'll totally take some breakfast. That's fine. Well, I think it's that like very British stoicism. Yeah it is, and like that that's all throughout the show, and I do love that, and I can definitely understand if, like, if you're not a if you're not a fan of British television, then maybe this isn't for you. But I do enjoy that kind of just like everything I say is kind of under my breath and snarky.

Well, and you know, I think going back to kind of this idea of like everything being perfect and kind of everything being well contained and not quarantine, but everything has a place and everything is controlled. I mean the quote that is on the sign that says questions are a burden to others answers a prison for oneself. It's just very much like don't question collectivism. You know, there is no in there is clearly no individualism here in this society. Obviously they strip you of your name on top of everything else, so you know, right, yeah, everyone's a number.

Yeah, it's very much the individual versus the collective and that's I mean, obviously that's going to be a massive theme. Oh yeah, throughout throughout the show. Is the is you know, the man, the individual man versus the kind of collective society which yes, all apparently all in cohoots to keep him there for the most part, from what we have for now, for what we can from what we can tell, And yeah, his whole number six's whole identity at this point to us is that he was a spy who has since resigned and is trying, I guess, to just lead a normal life. But much like a you know, story involving something, you know, spy related or mode related or whatever. Once you're in with an organization, you're never really out.

And this is sort of I guess a punishment or a I think it's a sport job. I think it's a way to keep him from the greater populace, to keep him away from maybe divulging secrets, right because they I mean, I'm getting the feeling that he's going to have to be doing some kind of work for them, because he keeps saying he's resigned and they're like, now you're not you're that's that's not going to happen. Um. But they do give him some some power in this village. They at least you can't really go any anywhere.

There's no other place. There's a there's a bit through. There's a scene in this where he meets a clerk. Essentially, he goes into a store and is like, hey, I want a map so I can get the hell out of here. And the guy gives him a small map and it's just a map of the town, and then he's like, no, a bigger one.

He gives him a bigger map and it's just the town plus like the mountains and sea that surround it. M So we're kind of we're entirely shut off from the rest of the world, and we don't know he doesn't know where he is. Now. Of course everyone is British, everyone has an English English accent, but that doesn't necessarily mean that's where we are. We could very well not e be on Earth, I guess, or in normal reality, you know.

And having already watched a little bit ahead, it's pretty much more or less confirmed that this is still somewhere in the British aisles. Okay, it's just some hidden secret base essentially, right right, right, it's I believe the show was filmed in Port I'm going to butcher this. I'm sure Port me Iron, which is in North Wales. I mean, obviously, I mean it's a it's beautiful to look at. Oh yeah, like this village that he is in, Like I said, it's nice, it's it's a beautiful, very stepfordy place.

Obviously there's underlying terror. And thankfully the show was filmed in color because a lot of the shows at the time, especially in sixty seven, oh yeah, just being filmed in color. No, there were TV was still very much black and white in the fifties and sixties. It was just cheaper. Yeah, exactly so.

And I think that that had to do primarily with what they're doing research for this. It had to do with the show kind of going into the American market. American audiences wanted shows that were in color, which I mean at the time sixty seven. I believe what Star Star Trek is on is on the air at that time. So yeah, I believe so, or if not, it would be very soon.

Star Trek. Star Trek went on the air in sixty sixty six sixty seven. Yeah, okay, And that's kind of that's kind of the analog, like that's kind of the turning point for TV for color for sci fi is Star Trek. And so if you want to kind of capture that American audience, you have to be in color. There's not there's not a lot of choice there obviously.

So no, and I mean, and when you're you have a show that's like dealing in sci fi, I want I want to see that in color. And I mean sure, like you have episodes of Jack, the first few seasons of Doctor who are black and white. Um, you know a lot of you know, he said, I think The Avengers was in black and white. I'm not careful perfect was or not? Maybe not, I'm not sure.

But thank god this is in color because this this, I mean, I hope that this continues. I can't imagine it won't. But the cinematography and just the color palette and the lighting and everything, just the whole look of this show is rich. It is super layered. And yeah, you see all the influence.

I mean, the whole sequence in the Dome where number two were number six is meeting number two for the first time. And sort of being debriefed. Number two is like sitting in this awesome egg chair, this awesome revolving egg chair, and it's everything super mid century modern aesthetic and furniture. But there's also these different light patterns going on in the walls behind them that's sort of like a light show or a lava lamp. There's all kinds of just interesting things to look at.

And also that don't very much speaking of doctor who looked like the side of the Tartist, just without the you know, the heart of the Tartist essentially. No, it's you know, the production value on the show for sixty seven is beyond it's happen. I mean even the intro, the opening sequence alone with him driving that Lotus seven Series two is I mean that. I mean that makes it feel like a movie. It doesn't even feel like a TV show.

No, the opening sequence to this movie or to this movie. So the opening sequence to this show, while I mean it kind of it's a little sudden, and it's not. It's just a little weirdly edited, I think, But I love it, like I just love the music, I love the car, I love I have a weird like affinity for aerial shots. Of European traffic in movies. I don't know why.

I just really enjoy that. I love watching like just you know, all the roundabouts and the aerial stuff and like Italy and watching people around in those, you know, in tiny cars all over Europe. I just I don't know, I enjoy it. It makes me happy. And this, Yeah, this show I really hope and I can't imagine that it won't, but I hope it keeps up at least this you know, esthetic and quality, and because at least, if nothing else, if the show ends up going you know, way downhill and you and I end up pissed off at the end of it, like apparently a lot of people were.

At least it was a nice art piece. I mean, it's nice to look at you. Yeah. And I don't think there's any way we don't talk about I mean I think we have to. There's no question we have to talk about Rover, which is the security guard my favorite, which is a giant meteorological weather boot YEP that just rolls people over like the blob, and I fucking love it, it, like suppregates people.

Yeah, I mean, you know, it's ridiculous and it looks ridiculous because it is just a it's a huge balloon just running into people, but the implication of that is really awful, Like being suffocated to death by a sentient balloon is would be pretty shitty. Yeah, and it's just one. They just have the one as far as we know. Yeah, it's um, you know, it might not sound particularly intimidating, but it definitely is. I mean it also obviously serves as kind of a datosex mochina within the show, right, Yeah, exactly, you know, because it's like, oh, here comes the rover thing is bouncing around and just kind of you know, like suffocating people are engulfing them.

And I mean it's it's dorky and it's goofy, but it is both of those things in an endearing way that also works with the esthetic of the show. Yeah, because you know, honestly, the show, there's a lot of things in it that come off as funny or cheesy or goofy, and part of that is it just being you know, the time in the sixties. But the show never really like I can't tell if it's trying to play some things for laughs or not. And I kind of like that, and I in a rover sort of the show. I mean, I know you've seen it, Chris.

I don't know if our audiences have funch the movie Rubber about a sentient tire and the sort of overlying themes and messages in that movie where it's like, yeah, it's just happening because it doesn't matter. It's just happening, doesn't matter why, it just is. And I think that this show, really it works for them, and that's a hard thing to pull off, that nice blend of actual intrigue and interest and you know, some drama and actually pulling us in to find out why he's here and what's going on. And obviously there's some sinister stuff going on and like you know, people are dying or being killed, but there's also the sentient balloon. But it doesn't ruin the mood, at least not for me.

It doesn't. No. I mean again, it works within the constructs of the show, and it's going for I mean, we may get to the point where it feels very much like Daisex Machina or kind of like a plot trope. It just kind of shows up and stops him every time, like you know, right, well, I mean there has to be something that stops him from leaving the village, or at least getting even to a point where you could attempt to leave the village, because he never makes it out of like the main town, Like he never even makes it into the mountains you know that are featured on the on the map. She's just constantly right and trying to escape.

And look, you know how many times you have to get in a helicopter or getting a boat and realize that there's somehow being controlled by well, hey, when you're a spy, I'm sure that that really fucking galls you. You got tricked, you got taken to this island, and you can't escape. I mean in the opening sequence where all of a sudden his room gets filled with smoke, it's just like done, Dune done. He's like, oh damn, like somebody put like yeah, like you said, like, you don't want to have someone put one over on you, You want to be the one to put one over on someone else. I mean, you know, the way I look at it is imagine, you know, I'm imagining this character is like a James Bond esque character without some of the problematic things that James Bond, you know, has but I'll tell you what though, I really and as an American viewer who hasn't had a lot of exposure to him as an actor, I really like Patrick McGough and his number six I do too.

And I mean there's there's some silly that's the kind of I like it because he's very serious in the show, but I sense a little bit like just underneath of it that he knows what he's doing, and I know like that there's just some shakiness about it um that I think is very British. Yeah, but there's a very British like just like yeah, I'm I don't know. It kind of makes me laugh because throughout this show there are so many like close ups and medium close ups of his face just staring, just just fiercely just staring angry, you know, like I don't know. It makes me laugh. But it's also I like him.

He's charismatic, he's he's you know, I believe him as a spy. I believe him, you know, I buy into him trying to pull off all the escapes and all of this stuff. I do think that sometimes he's you know, I mean, this is as a character, it's a good flaw and it shows us that he's got some you know, stuff going on with him as well, because there's a sequence where towards the beginning when he's kind of shown to his quarters and everything's set up exactly how it needs to be, and there's this radio that's playing opera that just keeps getting louder or classical or whatever, just keeps getting louder and louder and louder, and he tries to destroy it that the music still plays, and this woman walks in, who's his mate essentially, and asks like what she can do, and he just kind of goes off on her.

And I was like, why, you know, what's wrong with you? Why would do not question why you're here? Well, I's like, I've I've learned best not to This is all I've ever known. This is all I've ever known, and I've learned that it's better not to ask questions. So, Hey, why don't you stop being a douche to me the first time you meet?

So I and I kind of, you know, that's just a part of his character. That's sure something that that's a flaw in his character that he's probably gonna, you know, his temper is probably something that we're going to learn more about. We don't know why he resigned as a spy. We don't know why he's because throughout it where we're told that he was, you know, essentially like a James Bonds though, like he's a great spy, like he's just like the best spy ever, and then all of a sudden he decides to resign. So there's some there's some intrigue in that too, just in his own story, and I'm I'm very interested to see how the rest of this progresses well.

And again, I mean that's I mean, obviously that's going to be the kind of underlying thing that drives the plot. Is I hope? I mean I hope that there's an underlying narrative. But again, at the end of the day, when it's a show from sixty seven, look at a show like Star Trek, that show didn't really have an underlying narrative, you know kind of stories throughout a season, is right? Is a recent construct?

Yeah, there's like story arcs are are now more of a draw than they used to. Exactly, people yearn for a connected storyline even in their sitcoms. So but the other thing that we should talk a little bit about is essentially the character of number two is recast every episode. Oh really, I didn't know that. Yes, yes, so and I And that's kind of that's kind of one of the underlying kind of repeating themes in the show is number two is recast, right, everybody's always replaceable.

Yeah, so Guy Dolman and then George Baker are the number two is in this episode, and then in the next episode we're talking about it's going to be a different actor, and then the episode after that it's another different actor. So just prepare yourselves for interesting. I mean again, it also kind of reinforces this notion that they're going for with the show of kind of this idyllic community, but at the same time, like not everything is as it seems right really right, Yeah, And I think that's okay, Like it works for the show. But at the at the end of the day, the only way it works for this kind of show is because it is this kind of show, right, And it wasn't this kind of show, it wouldn't work.

I mean, you couldn't watch Star Trek and all of a sudden every episode Spock is being recast. No, Yeah, because it's it's a it's not in the character. In this character of number two, and especially with no name, no we know what his function is, and essentially that's too basically just he's on. Yeah, he's an antagonist for number six like that, that's essentially what he's meant to be yourself. So the agent for number one, the unknown number one, yes, right now, always the unknown.

Another respect I like of this is the score, which is sort of I don't know if you have ever seen the movie Tourist Trap, but that score too. It is very similar to this and kind of like the bops and buzzes and whistles and corks trap featuring Chuck Connors. Yes that Werewolf, Yes, exactly Chuck Connors, a kind of Werewolf theme. Couple couple episodes of Werewolf, a few episodes of Werewolf theame. You should check out Tourist Trap if you seem like the first ten minutes of it.

Yeah, it's it's real weird, but that that same kind of just sort of I guess the best way I can describe it how it sounds to me is like circus or fair music, where it's a lot of like pops and buzzes and whistles and whizzes and and all that kind of stuff. It's also composed of I can't remember which specific what the song is specifically, but of sort of children's music, you know, recognizable you know Diddy, Yeah, lighthearted like kind of little family friendly ditties that play all throughout this village all the time. And the village is very much set up like you're walking around like a zoo or a botanical garden or something, with all the signs that point in various directions for various things, and you have people driving golf cards all over to take you to your destination.

It's like you're on like this big weird resort slash, you know, a hotel thing. It's very it's very strange, but it's also I don't know, I can everything looks very act. It's manufactured. It's very manufactured. It is absolutely manufactured.

Um. So, Patrick McGowan reprised his role as Number six on another famous TV show. Do you know what TV show that is? I have no idea. The Simpsons?

Oh really? Yeah? So there is an episode of The Simpsons called The Computer Wore Menace Shoes, And I didn't know what show they were referencing in that episode, but they reference this show in that episode and in The Joy of Sect, another episode of the show where they have Rover in that episode killing Oh shit, I feel like, I remember, I'm gonna have to check those out after we do that. I'm also gonna have to track down the we should track down the documentary that they did on this there's like a ninety minute. I don't know if it's anything or whatever, but but on the episode the Computer Were Menace Shoes, Homer even goes to the village because he's like, I think the whole premise of the episode is he gets a computer and he starts spreading information, thinking that it's all fake because this is around, this is in two thousands, so kind of write it what we would consider to be kind of the height of the introduction of the Internet.

And he just starts spreading information and kind of conspiracy theories and stuff, and he ends up creating stuff like hitting upon things that are true, and so he gets taken away to the village where people who know too much are taken. That's fantastic. Yeah, they also I'm sure you saw this. They also did a remake of the show into a mini series in two thousand and nine. Yeah, I did.

I read about that. I didn't. I haven't looked anything really up about it or to see. But that's starring one Jim Caviezel, interesting and Jim Caviezel plays number six and Ian McKellan plays number two. Now that I would like to see.

Would that would be worth watching it? I think just for that here's the problem. Apparently it was not very good. So that's why I said I think it would be worked because I kind of figure especially two thousand and nine, So that's weird. That's kind of like right at the beginn ending of where TV had its like second Golden Age, right yeah, like and I bet you know, like I think around that time was when Doctor Who in Sherlock and like kind of the BBC boom was happening for American TV audiences, like everybody you know that for that brief moment in time where it was a couple of years of nothing but Doctor Who in Sherlock fandom happening.

Two thousand and eight I believe is also when Game of Thrones started, right, yeah, like the Golden I think they like with the Golden Major television or the second Golden Major television. I think that was. Yeah, that like Game of Thrones, Madmen, like those shows kind of herald it in that and you know, this show was probably trying to, uh to kind of piggyback off of problems. Right, I'm going to try to see if I can find it, track it down and maybe give an episode or two a watch. But yeah, I would assume it's not very probably not.

Yeah. I mean, from what we've watched so far, and I've watched a couple episodes, is already into this. I'm enjoying this show. And I the way I look at it is is if I'm enjoying a show now in twenty twenty on its own, I don't need you to remake it, I can just watch the original, right, just make it available. I mean that, well, now it is available, Thank you Amazon.

I mean this is this is easily available. And I would assume in this day and age, everybody has Amazon Prime. If you don't for the most part, yeah, for the most part, I mean, you know, but at the end of the day, if you have Amazon Prime, you can watch this on Prime. You should watch this on Prime. But again take into account that the easiest way to watch this is not the order on Amazon Prime, because the Amazon Prime order is its own, its own refritation order.

So it's the Bezos version, Bezos approved, Jeffy B approved, So Jeffy B and Jeff D. So one inside joke for no one, inside joke for the two of us. And that's it. So on the next episode of the one season show, which episodes of the show are we talking about? On the next episode, we are going to be talking about episodes called Free for All and Dance of the Dead, which I'm intrigued just by Dance of the Dead title, um and so, and again, I would like to point out that those episodes are technically I think episode like five or something three episode that's technically episode three and seven, So it's Free for All and Dance of the Dead.

Yeah, this is this wild things a little bit of a pain in the ass. Yeah, I mean, yeah, exactly, we're talking about Free for All and Dance of the Dead. But again, this wasn't our choice. This is kind of what we're doing to make sure that we're getting the best that we can out of right, are in our first time watching this show, and I'm going to try to track down the there's a graphic novel that they did couple of years ago. Yeah, exactly, And like you said, we're gonna probably talk about the documentary at some point.

There's a lot of ifema associated with the show that you know, Kitchen Confidential, I mean, Kitchen Confidential had the book, and obviously we talked about that a couple of times as as I had read the book, and we're worth not so much ephemera, but this show has definitely a lot of ephemer associated with it, So we'll do our best to kind of bring our opinions on those things as as well. So until then, where can people find you, Jess, Well, you can find me on Twitter at writer Jess Byard, and you can find me on your show, Chris the Culture Cast twice a month where we're talking movies, you can find me. And bonus announcement, we are going to be starting a new podcast Chris and I a little different from what we're usually talking about, and usually we sit in the movie and television world, but we are going to jump out of that for a little bit and explore some true crime, some unexplained phenomena, some horror culture, and our new show called Scary Stories.

We tell we are both really really excited about. I know we've already started recording and started doing some research and building up some social media stuff that's going to be fun for everybody to see. Yeah, but we're still going to be doing this podcast as well, obviously, and Chris has a million other things that he will tell you about here in a moment. But yeah, that scary stories we tell. Keep an eye out for that because we are pumped.

Yeah, And like Jess mentioned, I have a couple podcasts that I'm on. Chronicles from the Crypt is one where we talk about tales from the Crypt. I'm also another podcast called Life and Times of Barney Miller where we talk about the Barney Miller TV show, and also Dreams for Sale nineteen eighty five, which is a podcast about the Twilight Zone from nineteen five. We need to pick the music for this at some point, which we should totally do after this if you have a moment. Big thanks as always to everyone to our listeners.

Heading over to one Season show dot com, where you can find this episode and all of our previous seasons. We kind of do this in a season format, which is the easiest way to do it. We're on all podcatchers iOS Androids, Spotify, Google Music, everywhere that, everywhere that you can find a podcast, that's where we are and we'll catch you on the next episode.