“The General” is episode six of The Prisoner.
Number Six is drinking and watching the helicopter coming in to land and a man, Number Twelve, is watching Six. The tannoy says there’s an announcement from the General’s department. Students of the history course return to their dwellings immediately. The Professor will start in 30 minutes. Everyone but Six dashes off. He’s told that the place is now closed. And you’re never too old to learn.
Six is reading a poster and Twelve asks if he doesn’t believe it; a university-level degree in 3 minutes. Six says it’s improbable. But not impossible, Twelve queries. Nothing is impossible here. Twelve tells Six he should enrol; the Professor has an extraordinary range of knowledge. The only thing Six is interested in is how to get away. Twelve’s point. Twelve says he’s merely a cog in the machine. The helicopter takes off and a car heads out on the beach. Six wonders who they are after. Twelve thinks the Professor.
A man is running with many after him. Six is watching, then steps on something in the sand. A tape recorder, which when played says the Professor has an urgent message. Six hides it as the car arrives. The running man, the Professor, has collapsed. Six is offered a lift back. Six wonders if the Professor will make it back for his lecture. The driver does.
Back at his dwelling, the television comes on. SpeedLearn will start shortly. The Professor’s wife then apologises for the delay. Her husband is completing his notes. The Professor is now ready and is praising SpeedLearn. A 3-year course in 3 minutes. Impossible. Until the Professor was introduced to the General. The course will be Europe since Napoleon. A six-month study in 15 seconds. Six watches the screen as there’s a combination of a man’s photo and a green light in his eye. Six drops his glass.
Number Two arrives, with a man with a scanner. They’re looking for the Professor’s recorder with all his notes. Two asks Six if he enjoyed the lecture. Six says history isn’t his subject. Two asks him some questions on history, which Six answers. Two ends up joining in word for word. Once Number Two has gone, Number Six picks up the phone and asks the same questions to the man on the end. The other gives exactly the same answers.
Six heads to the beach to find the recorder, but it’s gone. He hears a crack and grabs Twelve. Twelve says if Six wants to get out of the Village, here’s his passport, handing over the recorder. Six doesn’t trust Twelve, Two or the Professor. He trusts himself. Twelve tells him to join the club. Twelve asks a slightly different history question; Six answers with a date and Twelve points out that wasn’t the question.
The Professor on his recorder says that they’ve been tricked. SpeedLearn is an abomination. Slavery. The only way to be free is to destroy the General.
Number Two is on the phone saying that everything is going well. After hanging up, he comments that this is probably the most important experiment they’ve conducted and the other is treating it like a military exercise. Twelve enters; he thinks they’re going the wrong way. They indulge the Professor’s idiocies too much. The man is a crank and should be treated as such. He’s a troublemaker and attracts troublemakers. Number Two recommends Twelve guard his opinions.
SpeedLearn is a way of filling a brain with facts very quickly (which does have potential benefits; naturally, it’s not being used in such a way). Number Six must find out how to destroy the General. But he doesn’t know who the General is.