Monday, January 09, 2012

Miliband the misfit

The E4 show Misfits is about a bunch of teenagers doing community service who acquire superpowers, which they use to fight crime, have sex and learn valuable life lessons.

(Spoiler alert.)

One of them is an awkward boy called Simon. A major part of series 2 and 3 is that a version of him from the future travels back in time. He’s far more self-assured and capable than the earlier version, and one of the other characters – a girl called Alisha – falls in love with him. Alas, he (future Simon) dies saving her life.

The earlier version of Simon is also impressed by his future self, and vows to become more like him so that eventually he can go back and save Alisha – who he has now fallen for, and who transfers her affections over to him.

Simon gradually develops the skills, courage and self-confidence of his future self, but then another tragedy strikes; he sees Alisha killed in front of him and is unable to help. He decides then to travel back in time to be with her again, creating a doomed temporal loop in which he inspires himself to discover his inner strength, wins his love and then fails her.

I only mention this because Ed Miliband said at the weekend:

You discover things about yourself in this job, which is that I am someone of real steel and grit, which is why I stood for the job in the first place.

Simon the self-inspiring Misfit. Not to be confused with his brother David.

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