The Prisoner Classic Series The Prisoner

The recap below contains plot spoilers about Episode 6, "The General." If you haven't seen "The General" yet, you can watch the full episode online.

With the aid of an unseen General, a professor develops a subliminal process for educating the population of The Village. No. 6 must discover the identity of the General and prove that knowledge is not wisdom.

No. 6 (Patrick McGoohan) is the only member of The Village community to rebel against the latest orders from No. 2 (Colin Gordon).

The orders are to attend sensational lecture classes introducing a new kind of schooling that promises a university-level degree in three minutes. Success is guaranteed, and the classes are held by the professor.

No. 6 has one ally, a young man who apparently sympathizes with his point of view. He is No. 12 (John Castle). But can he be trusted?

The crash-course method, No. 6 discovers, is a marriage of science and mass communication, using a subliminal process by which information is projected through a "subliminator” at a speed thousands of times faster than the eye can record. It is imposed directly onto the cortex of the brain. Whatever the tutor chooses to teach can therefore be mastered, and remembered, by his pupils in a matter of moments.

No. 6 sees the danger of this. It is a new way of controlling men's minds. They will gain knowledge but lose the ability to think for themselves.

No. 6 discovers through the professor's wife (Betty McDowall) that the professor himself is rebelling, but his attempts to escape are thwarted. His knowledge is being used, but the controlling power is a mysterious, unseen general. The whole scheme is controlled by the general. But who is he and where is he?

In a daring attempt to get at the identity of this unknown figure, No. 6 breaks into a session being held by No. 2 and his assistants. No. 2 is on a hotline to the general, and the Prisoner demands to see him.

No. 2 assures him that the general can answer anything, and No. 6 forces him to the point of being allowed to put one question. Just one question. It is, he believes, the one and only question the General will be unable to answer.