The Verisimilitude Problem.

This is the thing that happens when, because something resembles reality, we tend to assume that it actually is real, in its way, and not a metaphor for something. The original The Prisoner was an extended, surrealist metaphor, in which it didn’t matter whether or not any of the things happening on screen were real. In a sense, of course, it’s only sensible to conclude that everything happening onscreen wasn’t real, because of course it wasn’t real–it was a TV show.

Except, television has a high verisimilitude factor, and so watching it, we consciously or unconsciously demand that it operate according to the real living rules of the world with which we are familiar.

So, AMC decides on the remake, and in order to do it they say, “What’s actually happening here?” instead of “What does this mean?” Leaving them with an overly-literalized version of a surrealist piece that, consequently, doesn’t make any sense.

The original ending, “Fallout,” worked in it’s own baffling way because it managed to understand that it was an allegory for the human condition. As you accurately pointed out, Patrick McGoohan made him the vengeful, ruthless embodiment of the DOWN WITH THE MAN mentality that we so desperately need more of in this age of the Patriot Act.

Yet “Fallout” put a beautiful spin on his message: that the struggle for freedom of mind and spirit is perpetual. As anyone who has seen it knows, the series ends on a cyclical note, with a mirror of the exact same shot that opens every episode and with the doors of the land of his supposed escape opening automatically – just like the ones in The Village.

By contrast, watching the first episode of the remake, I couldn’t quite figure out what the overarching message is supposed to be. The editing and cinematography do their damnedest to get the mood of paranoia and surrealism right but the writing and performances by and large miss the heart of the original.

It’s almost as if they kinda knew the response would be poor, and said, “No, don’t worry! We were just kidding! Here, here’s what you wanted to watch, enjoy, with no commercial interruptions. Just don’t hurt us!”

The Village still looks exactly the same, as well.