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The Prisoner
"Departure"
The Prisoner Book d
DC
Story by Dean Motter and Mark Askwith
Illustrated by Dean Motter
Colored by David Hornung and Richmond Lewis
1989 |
The final fate of the Village!
Read the
summary of the mini-series at Wikipedia
Characters appearing or mentioned in this issue
Thomas Drake
Meagan Drake
Director of Operations Ross
Martin Lake (deceased, mentioned only)
Colonel J
Haythornthwaite
Katie Clark (mentioned only)
The Clarks (Katie's parents, mentioned only)
Stormonth
Campbell
Miss Sherk (possibly the same secretary called Barb in
"Confrontation")
Mrs. Butterworth
Alice Drake
Taylor
Connolly
Racoff
Stafford
Lee West
Number 2
The new Colonel
Didja Know?
This study is of the fourth issue of the 4-issue mini-series
titled simply The Prisoner published by DC Comics
in1988-89, based on the 1967 TV series.
The trade paperback compilation was titled The Prisoner: Shattered Visage.
The individual issues of the mini-series
are labeled books a-d (rather than the typical numbering
convention). This may be a nod to the episode titled
"A. B. and C.".
The title of this concluding(?) chapter of
The Prisoner, "Departure", is simply the opposite of
the TV series' opening chapter,
"Arrival".
Didja Notice?
On page 4,
Director of Operations Ross comments that he believes several
recent incidents to be linked, including the death of President
Zia and the "Vincennes error". President Zia ul-Haq of Pakistan
was killed along with a number of his top military officials and
two American diplomats in a plane crash under mysterious
circumstances in 1988. The "Vincennes error" is likely a reference to
the U.S. Navy cruiser U.S.S. Vincennes, which (again in
1988) erroneously identified an Iranian civilian passenger jet
as an Iranian Air Force F14 Tomcat fighter making an attack run
against them and destroying it, killing all 290 passengers and
crew on board.
Page 12 reveals that Mrs. Butterworth's first name is Georgina.
On page 13, it appears the back cover of The Village Idiot is a
photo of Number 2 sitting in the spheroid chair behind the
crescent desk in Number 2's office in the Village.
Mrs. Butterworth is apparently killed on page 15.
On page 17, Ross seems to refer to the bell tower in the Village
as Telford Tower. In the real world village of Portmeirion,
where the Village exteriors were shot for the original TV
series, there is a Telford's Tower, but it is not the bell tower
(which is known simply as the Bell Tower or the Campanile). |
 |
 |
Bell Tower in Portmeirion (from
Ragged Robin's Nature Notes) |
Telford's Tower
in Portmeirion |
The shot of Number 2 in a hat on page 17 is based on his
appearance at the end of
"Fall Out", but with a beard added
(he had only a mustache in the episode).
On page 20, Lee uses the codename Chicken Little and the code
phrase "The sky is falling," to indicate to his operations team
that the Village is under siege. "Chicken
Little" is a character in the folk tale of the same name, a baby
chicken who believes the world is coming to an end when an acorn
drops on his head, prompting him to run around yelling, "The sky
is falling!"
On page 22, Thomas and Lee's team enter a tunnel under Number
2's office that is the same one lined with jukeboxes and which
ends at a large metal door with a sign reading "Well Come" seen
in "Fall Out". A Tomblin jukebox is
seen in panel 4; this is a fictitious company, likely named for
producer, writer, and director David
Tomblin, a prominent member of the production of the TV series.
On pages 23-24, Number 2 quotes from several of Number 6's
speeches from throughout the TV series.
Page 27 reveals that several nuclear missiles are hidden below
the Village. The implication is that the missile/rocket that
launched at the end of "Fall Out" was
a nuclear missile also.
On page 28, as Lee is explaining to Thomas what lies below the
Village, he remarks, "You've got to brush away all that rococo
crap and expose the truth!"
Much of the architectural design of the buildings of the Village
would be considered rococo.
On page 29, Lee remarks that one of the Village missiles can
deliver "one helluva pop!" "Pop" may be a reference to "Pop Goes
the Weasel" (music from the song is heard in several episodes
and the song was mentioned in "Confrontation"),
Number 6 saying "Pop. Pop. Pop," over and
over during the grueling psychological battle between he and
Number 2 in "Once Upon a Time",
and\or the word "POP" that fills the screen in white letters on
a red background at the end of the original, unused, edit of
"Arrival".
On page 30, Lee tells Thomas to "amscray". "Amscray" is Pig
Latin for "scram". Pig Latin is a simplistic way of modifying
English words to hide their meaning from those who aren't
familiar with the modification rules.
On page 33, notice that Number 2 skips the number "six" in his
countdown of the missile launch. In
"Once Upon a Time", Number 6
himself also refused to say "six" when Number 2 was trying to
get him to do so during their psychological duel.
On page 35, the Village is seemingly destroyed when the rumbling
of the missile engines triggers the explosives on seismographic
switches left in the scarecrows by Number 6.
In the bottom panel of page 35, notice that Alice's trimaran is
seen out on the ocean as the Village goes up in flames, with the
water wheel from the Village now rigged to the boat to aid in
propulsion as a paddle wheel.
On page 36, one of Ross's agents lists several U.S. intelligence
agencies: FBI (Federal
Bureau of Investigation), CIA (Central
Intelligence Agency), NSC (National
Security Council), NSA (National
Security Agency).
On page 40, after having been forced to resign, Ross is gassed
in his own home and taken away, by two men dressed as
undertakers, inside a casket via a hearse, very similar to what
happened to Number 6 in
"Arrival".
On page 42, Alice says "Au revoir" to Number 6. This is
French for "goodbye" or "until we meet again". She is
essentially saying, "Be seeing you."
On the double-page spread of pages 44-45 is what appears to be
an updated, modern version of Number 2's office, complete with a
crescent electronic desk with spheroid chair and giant
observation screens on the wall. We don't see who, if anyone, is
sitting in the chair. The screens are observing locations in the
London area, plus portions of the Village. But wasn't the
Village destroyed? Possibly, the Village images are old video;
but why would it be running now? Notice also that the display of
the Stone Boat appears to have a figure on it; who is it?
The very last page of the story is a distance view of the
skyline of the
Palace of Westminster, home of the Parliament of the United
Kingdom, just as the skyline of the Village was seen on the last
pages of the three previous chapters of the mini-series,
suggesting that this new office may be intended to spy on
government instead of the government spying on the people as in the Village.