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31. The Prisoner: Cult TV Remakes

290 31 The Prisoner Cult TV Remakes Matt Hills Abstract: Two television trends that have grown more prominent in recent years are American remakes of foreign series and the popularity of cult TV. Matt Hills examines an example of both, the American remake of 1960s British “cult classic” The Prisoner, and suggests why such “neocult” programs can fail to capture the appeal of the original and alienate cult fandoms. How should we analyse TV shows that have taken on cult status? Often science fiction/fantasy, these programs typically have devoted fan followings. Perhaps, then, it is important to consider not only the textual qualities that may have incited a cult following, but also the activities of dedicated fans. However, viewed from a contemporary perspective, cult television is not something created by audience activity alone. It is a label, and a phenomenon, with a televisual history stretching back at least to the 1960s. For example, Sue Short has suggested that British series The Prisoner (ITC, 1967–1968) “serves as a . . . precursor to the cult telefantasy shows we see today, by dint of its visual detail and narrative intricacy, [and] its ongoing mysteries,” which were “pioneering strategies that would find their way into many subsequent shows.”1 Over time, “cult” has therefore become an identifiable grouping of TV series with a number of shared textual attributes, meaning that programs can be designed to generate cults. Since the 1980s, cult audiences have become an identifiable group, in turn meaning that generations of fans can now be targeted by TV professionals. Far from being accidental successes triggered by challenging, innovative programming, by the 2000s, cult TV had become one industrial strategy for reaching audiences. Contemporary cult TV is therefore dialogic: producers can use storytelling techniques and genres to target fans, whilst fans can evaluate shows and share their views via social media, either assenting to their industrial targeting or The Prisoner 291 rejecting it. Appealing to a built-in, loyal audience helps explain why cult shows with established fandoms have frequently been remade, rebooted, or “reimagined .” Star Trek: The Next Generation (syndicated, 1987–1994) was perhaps the first major example of this phenomenon, thereby indicating that self-conscious cult television was marketable by the late 1980s. But the process of remaking or rebooting has accelerated in recent years, with the likes of Battlestar Galactica (ABC, 1978–1979; Sci-Fi, 2003–2009) reborn on the Sci-Fi Channel; Doctor Who (BBC, 1963–1989, 2005–present) revitalised by BBC Wales; The Bionic Woman (ABC, 1976–1977; NBC, 1977–1978, 2007) and Wonder Woman (ABC, 1975–1977; CBS, 1977–1979) short lived or not making it past pilot stage as U.S. network TV shows; as well as relatively unsuccessful Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) (ITV, 1969–1970; BBC, 2000–2001) for the BBC, and The Prisoner (2009) remade by U.S. cable channel AMC in partnership with the U.K. commercial producer and broadcaster ITV. What this list demonstrates is that self-conscious cult TV designed to generate passionate audience engagement does not always win the affection of established fan-bases. Remaking cult TV in some ways reduces the program-maker’s level of risk by offering an established show that already has some brand recognition, but also introduces a different type of risk wherein fans may judge the new version to be an inauthentic imitation of their beloved series. Illuminating this process, the 2009 remake of The Prisoner can be taken as an example of what might be called “metacult”—that is, a “cult about cult,” or “selfconscious cultism.”2 However, what The Prisoner remake does is slightly more complicated: like BBC Wales’ Doctor Who, it uses cult as one of many modes to target audiences, so the term “neocult” would be more accurate. This term suggests that drawing on cult attributes and speaking to cult audiences, for instance, does not rule out “mainstream” audience targeting at the same time. Rather than a focusing on a metacult niche, neocult seeks to combine cult targeting with other, differentiated audience addresses. Shawn Shimpach has recently argued that contemporary TV shows tend to be designed to be highly “translatable” in that they contain composite elements likely to appeal across national borders and across different audience taste cultures. The results are TV dramas that appear on the face of it to have “universal” appeal, whereas in actuality they are carefully crafted to bring together fragmented, differentiated audiences.3 Considered in this light, neocult combines an appeal to historical, established cult...