REVIEW: Misfits 5.1

I actually gave up on Misfits during series four. Astonishingly, for a series once so brave, uncompromising and unpredictable, Misfits had become terribly boring. The wit it once displayed had faded, and its creators were content to rely purely on the shock factor to keep people watching. So I came into this fifth and final series a little lost, having missed several important developments, but hoping to be proved wrong in my judgment of the series.

Oh, well.

Misfits' fifth series has proved no better than its fourth. It attempts to be shocking, but it's all so crushingly predictable. Alex, the handsome barman, has, through a lung transplant, received a new power. They've already done that, with a superpowered heart transplant back in series two. And what's his power? He can fuck the powers out of people. This so perfectly Misfits that it's slightly unbelievable that they haven't done it before. It leads to scenes of some poor woman whose power seems to be super-clumsiness begging Alex to fuck her. The scene in which she shows Alex her scars and bruises is one of the few effective parts of this, and engenders some real sympathy. However, it's all there merely to provide some more sex scenes and create more tension between Alex and Jess, already rocked by his cheating on her.

As Jess, Karla Crome is still one of the best things about the new Misfits, managing to be sexy, spiky and vulnerable all at once. Natasha O'Keefe might be just as good, but there's no way to tell on the strength of this; her character, Abbey, barely registers. Joseph Gielgun remains great as split-personality twat Rudy. I hadn't previously rated Nathan McMullen, but his performance here showed that he is far better than his annoying character Finn lets him be. The Satanic Scout Group provides some arresting imagery, and Finn's demonic possession allows McMullen to show his strengths as a tougher, more confident Finn.

This all has promise, but it's squandered on a boring, predictable runaround. There are some great moments, such as when a psychic pensioner who knits the future shows Rudy's better half his destiny in a jumper at a powers support group. But it all feels pointless, desperate to shock and failing to do so, because blood and death and sex is just what Misfits does and we've come to expect it.

The episode finally manages to shock with the, pardon the term, climactic scene, in which Alex saves the day by braining the demonic Finn, pinning him to a bed and fucking him in the arse to rid him of his possession. It is, of course, played for laughs. Once, Misfits managed a powerful episode dealing with date rape. Now, it's going for cheap laughs about forced sodomy. Of course, it's funny when it's male rape, isn't it? Try rewriting the story to substitute Jess for Finn and see how different the reaction would be.

I was willing to give the series another chance, but this really is it for me and Misfits. Fuck the lot of them.

Shut Up, Hitler! Part Two: Fucking Nazis

"Let's kill Hitler!" said the Doctor Who title sequence, back in August, then locked him in a cupboard and forgot all about him. Misfits, on the other hand, takes things much further, with an apparantly throwaway line back in the Christmas special leading to a full-blown Nazi-fest in the current series. Misfits whole raison-d'etre seems to be to take episode concepts as far as it possibly can, as one elderly, time-travelling Jew messes up his mission to assassinate Adolf, irrevocably changing history. The idea that the Nazis would have won WWII if they'd have got hold of more advanced technology from the future isn't a new one (Doctor Who did it, amongst others, although this was in the Big Finish audio range, not on telly). The moral of the story is: if you're going to go back in time to kill Hitler, take a proper plan and not your mobile phone.

Misfits has gone from strength to strength this year, each episode stronger than the last, and each with a different feel and atmosphere. The series is still missing Nathan, it's true, probably due to Rudy not making a major impact once his introduction was over. Yet the remaining characters are getting more focus now, whereas they were often overshadowed by Nathan in the second season. Curtis got an overdue chance to shine in episode two (played by both regular Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, and by guest star Kehinde Fadipe), while last week's ep brought Simon and Alisha's ongoing story back to the fore. However, I can't help but feel that Lauren Socha is the star of the show, making a bolshy, violent dropout like Kelly impossible not to love.

REVIEW: Misfits 3.1

Fantastic! While I may have a job that precludes any chance of taking in a party, and had to watch shop during the Brighton Zombie Walk for yet another year, this Hallowe'en still promises to be a good'un. I'm off to see Ghostbusters on the big screen for the first time tonight, but until then I've kept myself busy with some spooky classics (Poltergeist, H.P. Lovecraft short fiction and plenty of episodes of Trap Door) and the first in a new series of Misfits.

It's got a tough job this third run, with Robert Sheehan moving on to bigger and better paid things. Nathan, everyone's favourite foul-mouthed superhuman, is now gone, although fans can catch up with his exploits in Vegas in a special online short. It's a shame we couldn't have him back for a full farewell episode, but never mind. Replacing Nathan was never going to be easy, but creator and lead writer Howard Overman just about manages it with the new dropout Rudy. In some ways, he does come across as a Nathan stand-in: he's smutty, sex-obssessed, completely self-absorbed and the prime source of comedy in the show. Still, he's different enough to show promise as a successful character in his own right, with a vulnerability that Nathan rarely showed, something that could make him more likeable in the long run.

Two things make Rudy work. First is Joseph Gilgun's performance, at once swaggeringly offensive and surprisingly sympathetic. The other is the nature of his power, which sees him split into two individuals, representing the light and dark sides of his personality. Rather than going down the obvious 'evil twin' route, instead this gives us a larger-than-life version of Rudy with a positive attitude, and a depressive, restrained version who is both more sensitive and more given to self-loathing and self-pity. Combined with Rudy's past with Alisha, this promises some very interesting character exploration, with plenty of pussy gags thrown in for good measure.

Rudy's entrance pushes the remaining cast member into the background quite drastically, but that's a necessary sacrifice for a successful introduction. We've plenty of time to see how they're developing into their new powers. These mostly have potential - Simon has limited precognition, Alisha can step into other people's shoes, and Curtis can change sex - all of which could provide strong storylines and tell us something new about their characters. Kelly, on the other hand, gets a joke power: she's a rocket scientist, blessed with superior intelligence - but only for designing rockets. Still, with the mysterious power trading superhuman Seth set up to be a major recurring character, I wouldn't bet on any of these powers to stay the length of the series.

As a whole, the episode is pretty solid, although nothing special. The humour and dialogue doesn't seem as strong or fluid as before, but should improve as the new group dynamic develops. The freak-of-the-week is pretty good, a psychotic blonde with the ability to stall time, although she's dealt with pretty perfunctorily. The corpses continue to pile up, and surely that's got to start having some consequences soon. Hiding the murder of their probation officer was the main thrust of the first series' ongoing story; nowadays, the gang seem free to off as many people as they need to keep their lives conveniently mutant-free. It's important for the show to hold onto some semblance of reality; the whole thing could come crashing down if it descends too far into comicbook fantasy territory. On the basis of this episode, though, the future looks fucking brilliant.