Number 6 Was a Plant: Living in Harmony

The introduction to this series of posts considering the theory that Number 6 didn't really resign and is a 'plant' in the Village may be read here:

Spoiler: this blog post spoils the identity of Number 1.

Just to recap what I've been thinking when considering the series in this light: I've been thinking it more likely that Number 6 planted himself in the Village having heard terrible things about it, because of the absence of support from his previous employers, who are clearly up to their necks in the shenanigans. Since he has clearly given his working life to a responsible job, I have surmised that discovering that all his former colleagues were either psychopaths or cabbages and that the whole thing is happily supported by the authorities in London, must have been very distressing. Seen in this light, the show isn't about the influence of society on the individual, it becomes a rogue male scenario, where the unnamed protagonist has a mission. A rather confused and confusing one, admittedly, but still.

I had also predicted that the show would fit the 'plant' theory less well as it went on. I have a theory that McGoohan thought along the lines that if Lew Grade wanted more episodes he could damn well have them and made them barmy on purpose. Of course there is no evidence for this, but the fact remains that any theory of the show always tends to get derailed by Living in Harmony and The Girl Who was Death, because they are out on their own.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I found that I had no trouble at all fitting my existing train of thought about the 'plant' theory to this episode. In fact it slipped in like in to a glove. I'm still rather gobstruck by this.

On one level I was going to say that since Number 6 is a plant and is investigating former intelligence colleagues we could look on the events of Living in Harmony as history's barmiest team building exercise (hallucinatory drugs, anyone?). Hear me out, but the Village already has the residents dressing up strange and doing strange things: getting them to act out a scenario in a fake Wild West village isn't that much weirder than anything they've already done. Alternatively, of course, you could say that Harmony is an allegory for the Village or for the world or intelligence services.

However the themes I outlined at the start are fully contained in this episode, so if you want to understand Number 6 as a plant, you can continue to do so with no trouble and explain the change of set in any way you like.

Consider, for example, the way Number 6 says he doesn't like the way Harmony is run. This line is obviously familiar from the whole series, and I'm sure he frequently expressed his dissatisfaction with his employers until appearing to resign. However instead of the 'Why did you resign' theme, this continues the theme where Number 6 is criticising the Village/Harmony. He continues to investigate rather than being questioned, exactly as he would if a 'plant'

When Catherine is found guilty of aiding a (significantly) 'prisoner' to escape, the judge tells Number 6 that 'When you work for me I'll let her go.' The judge makes him sheriff. Here, Harmonyh is trying to find a weakness in Number 6 and compromise him by giving him a gift. Did I happen to mention that virtually everything that has happened in the Village displays a complete absence of understanding that you can't bribe someone like Number 6? He has already commented that he's not for hire and tells the judge he might regret making Number 6 sheriff. Like everything else NUmber 6 does, he finds out more about Harmony by his new role. It's almost as if finding out what's going on and intervening where he has to is the point of everything he does, not any desire to go on holiday and be left alone.

Living in Harmony actually takes the scenario that Number 6 is investigating and the only one who is able to do anything about the situation, a step further. This happens at the point where the man approaches him and tells him they have decided to clean up the town but the townsmen and Number 6 can't do it without helping each other. Up to now in the series the help he has apparently been offered has tended to revolve around escaping or sabotaging. I think sorting it out would be far more up Number 6's street.

I wouldn't go to the stake for this idea, but I think there is another hint as to the end of the show in the judge's indication that Number 6 works for him and he'll kill Number 6 before he goes to work for another outfit. Immediately after he says that Number 6 tries to strange him only to find out that he is strangling a paper cut out and find himself back in the Village. This suggests that the authority figures that Number 6 spends the series fighting against aren't real or don't have real authority and the real authority is him. This episode continually refers everything back to Number 6 himself, and from that reality there really is no escape.

The only real difficulty I would suggest is that it is not possible to fit the details of this episode to the plant theory given that so much that happens isn't real. However, this difficulty may be avoided by assuming the episode is all allegorical pointing to a reality in which Number 6 is a plant. You may consider this a fatal flaw to the idea, of course.

To my surprise I am going to conclude that it is very easy to fit the hallucinatory events of Living in Harmony to the 'plant' theory, because it continues all the other themes of the series when seen in this light.

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