Free at last

Actor Patrick McGoohan died Tuesday, and I've been avoiding online discussion of the final episode of The Prisoner all day as I have yet to see it.

Incidentally, AMC has all the original Prisoner episodes available on its Web site in anticipation of its new miniseries. But I may just have to spring for the DVDs. I've seen about half of the original 17 episodes, and they are indeed weird and awesome.

As he himself has said, he'll always be best known as "Number Six" from that series, but he was pretty great any time I saw him. I especially liked him as the warden in Escape from Alcatraz, and as Longshanks in Braveheart. He also won two Emmys for his work on Columbo. Pretty much any Columbo episode is good times, but those I saw those episodes in syndication many years ago and they definitely stood out.

R.I.P Number Six.

UPDATE: AV Club's Zack Handlen posted a good write-up on McGoohan, which linked to another blogger's reaction. Interesting reads.