Counter Culture

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Reviewed by Pat Harrington

Misfits starts with five teenagers, Alisha (Antonia Thomas), Kelly (Lauren Socha), Curtis (Nathan Stewart-Jarrett), Simon (Iwan Rheon) and Nathan (Robert Sheehan) who are all being forced to attend a ‘Community Payback’ scheme at a local community centre. Just as they are checking each other out and we are finding out about them there is a dramatically shocking, freak storm. The storm changes both them and others. The Misfits develop strange superpowers and others around them start to behave oddly, even violently. Only Nathan is left wondering whether he has a power and what this might be. There are some great comic moments as Nathan experiments to try and find out! Generally Nathan manages to irritate and amuse at the same time.

I enjoyed all six episodes, there is enough suspense to keep you hooked but there is also a lot of humour. Misfits is funny and dark. I found Simon particularly interesting, he kept reminding me of Ian Curtis of Joy Division. Maybe it was his darkness as well as his dress style? Special mention also for the soundtrack which is great (80s post punk influenced). I hope they release it. A fair bit of swearing and sex but those into Skins will be used to that! I’m not surprised that the second series has already been commissioned. If you haven’t yet seen it, give it a go!

When Broadcast Misfits used social networking a lot with each character tweeting and facebook support. They also did a game on their web page. This kind of support is more akin to a film release than a series generally. Full marks to the team behind that.

The DVD features over an hour of extra material including behind the scenes videos with cast & crew, the making of Misfits and ‘Simon’s films’ – 4 videos Simon took on his phone of the other group members.