Number 6 was a Plant: Free for All

You can read the introduction to this series of posts considering the theory that Number 6 didn't resign and was a 'plant' in the Village here: https://culttvblog.substack.com/p/number-6-was-a-plant-introduction

This post spoils the identity of Number 1.

A few posts in and I've identified the difficulty with the theory that Number 6 was a plant: it is the obvious one that we are so used to reading the show in terms where Number 6 is in continual protest and is the object of the Village's activities. To turn this round to Number 6 being a current senior intelligence officer planted as a spy on the Village - as it were the subject, one of the people responsible for the Village - requires us to turn this on its head.

Of course in actual fact this is exactly the point of the series: Number 6 is actually Number 1 and so is actually a plant. The rest of the show where he is continually stamping his foot and trying to escape is a smoke screen covering the real point of the show, and allowing the multitude of different interpretations. In fact I would go so far as to say that the show only makes sense if Number 6 is a plant, because he's the boss. This paragraph is complete Prisoner heresy, but I defy anyone to identify any bit which isn't supported by the actual show.

This is not to say that this interpretation is easy, of course, and since I'm now a few posts in I have started thinking that the theory won't apply so well to the episodes which are not part of Patrick McGoohan's original seven. Particularly Living in Harmony, because that's not going to make any sense whatever theory you're adopting.

Free for All is a case in point that if you turn another understanding on its head, it supports the idea that Number 6 is a plant. I mean the explanation that Free for All is an allegory of our own political systems, that they're not real, and everyone is just being moved round like pieces on a chess board. It seems to make perfect sense that the fake election in the pocket democracy is a trick played by the Village and isn't real; the allegorical interpretation seems to make the most sense.

Except if you start from the correct assumption that Number 6 is the boss; which, as Number 1, he actually is. Why would his underlings be having a fake election where he is given fake power which he doesn't really have, in a fake Village? It makes even less sense when you think that there is no particular reason Number 6 should be one of the candidates, since there are many other resignees there, who could also stand and are also having information extracted from them. There are no nominations, just Number 2 inviting Number 6 to stand. In fact it is made clear that our hero (and therefore us) will know who Number 1 is if he wins.

This makes better sense when you assume that Number 6 is being treated as an existing senior agent, a VIP in the Village, exactly as if he is a senior intelligence officer who is there on a visit to evaluate the Village's procedures and security. Seriously, watch the episode with that assumption in mind and it is clear at every point that he is being treated as a senior boss who has to be handled carefully.

The fact that it is all pretend and Number 58 speaks a nonsense language merely reinforces that this is a performance for an important visitor.

I have now blogged through this series several times from different points of view, and have not found that any single explanation is fully supported by the show (in fact McGoohan was adamant that a single understanding was impossible), and this episode and explanation is no exception. I have been unable to reconcile the brainwashing session with the explanation that Number 6 is a plant and being treated as the boss. I have toyed with the idea that the Village is on to him as a plant and has to brainwash him to stop him breaking open what they are doing there, but that would rather mess up the rest of the show so I'm not very happy with that idea.

You may also say that Number 6's ongoing efforts to sabotage everything in the Village and escape also militate against the possibility that he is a plant, but I'm much happier with the possibility that this is part of his 'investigation': if you assume he's heard terrible things about the Village authorities and/or the security there, his behaviour makes much more sense.

In fact his behaviour invites a retaliation of sorts from the Village authorities,not only by the brainwashing but by the drugging, which we particularly see in the new Number 2's treatment of him at the end: of COURSE his attempts to trial the Village to destruction invite the control of the Village to be exerted, that's the point.

If Number 6 is actually a plant, he has found out the extremes to which the Village will go to control and contain its inmates, and his mission has been a success.

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