The Girl Who Was Death

This article is about the television episode. For the Devil Doll album, see The Girl Who Was... Death.
"The Girl Who Was Death"
The Prisoner episode
Episode no. Season 1
Episode 15
Directed by David Tomblin
Written by Terence Feely
Original air date 18 January 1968
Guest actors

Schnipps: Kenneth Griffith
Sonia: Justine Lord

"The Girl Who Was Death" is a comic episode of the English television series "The Prisoner" which originally aired in the UK on ITV 18 January 1968. According to several sources, including The Prisoner by Robert Fairclough, this episode was adapted from an unused, two-part script originally commissioned for Danger Man.

Plot summary

A cricket match ends in a player (Colonel Hawke) being assassinated with a bomb disguised as a cricket ball. Number Six is on an operational assignment, unknown as to whether it is "real time", pre-The Village, or possibly another induced hallucination. Secret messages are passed to him at a shoeshine box. In a record shop, he receives an assignment to find a Professor Schnipps who has been working on a rocket that will destroy all of London, it turns out that Colonel Hawke was investigating into the matter, which is why he was executed. He picks up where Colonel Hawke left off in another match, but manages to avoid the same fate. He finds a note to meet a mysterious person at the local pub, while there, he drinks from a glass that says You have just been poisoned. He then starts to drink numerous drinks to try and wash out the poison, when he goes to the restroom, he gets another message to meet at the Turkish bath. While he is relaxing, a mysterious figure places a plastic dome over his head and locks his stall. Avoiding death, he now gets another message to go to the carnival, to the local fight. Number Six dresses up in a Sherlock Holmes costume with deerstalker hat and cape, with moustache and mutton chop sideburns. At the fight, he is picked for the next match and told by his opponent to go to the Tunnel of love. He then hears the voice of a woman, which is a recording in his boat that is rigged with explosives. He tracks down, and is tracked by, a seductive woman called Sonia, alias "Death", They both leave the amusement park with Number 6 in pursuit.

They come to an abandoned village, where Sonia has set traps. He successfully evades all of them, he goes into a shed to avoid being shot and rides a bulldozer. Sonia destroys it with a rocket launcher and departs.

Eventually, after faking his death, Number Six tracks Sonia to a lighthouse where Schnipps (Dressed as Napoleon) and his associates are based, his lieutenants dressed in Grande Armée uniforms and representing an apparently anti-London alliance composed of Scottish, Welsh, Irish, and Northern (particularly Yorkshire) marshals. Number 6 sabotages their firearms and hand grenades, rigging them to backfire or malfunction. Captured, Number Six is tied up and left inside the lighthouse, which is revealed to be the rocket. As it is about to launch, he escapes and the rocket blows up without launching, killing his adversaries.

In the end, it turns out that the adventure was nothing but Number Six telling some children a bedtime story in the Village nursery. Number Two (who looks like Schnipps) and his assistant (who looks like Sonia) were hoping that he would drop his guard and allow some clue as to why he resigned. But Number Six, after putting the children to bed, turns to the hidden camera and cheekily wishes: "Good night, children... everywhere."

Additional guest cast

Locations

The cricket match shown at the start of the episode was filmed at the pitch on Meopham Green, Meopham, Kent on the A227 Gravesend to Tonbridge road.

Bibliography

External links