When you’re stuck doing community service in a dull neighborhood in London, there’s not much to stop you from hooking up with your fellow societal disruptors. Not even getting cool super powers in a freak geo-storm changes that sort of human behavior. Misfits, the popular British series that wondered what would happen if ordinary reprobates suddenly gained superhuman abilities, ran for five seasons and proved a welcome respite to the ordinarily upbeat superhero shows on television.
It’s premise and at times depressing atmosphere was made accessible by the strength of its young leads, each responsible for moments of great tenderness, black comedy, and gripping drama. As they all dealt with their powers in different ways, they also developed feelings for one another. Here are the 5 best, and 5 worst couples of the series. It’s available to stream on Hulu.
BEST: SIMON AND ALISHA
While they might seem like complete opposites on the outside (Simon is a lonely introvert, and Alisha is a beautiful social butterfly), what make them different from one another also make them complementary. Alisha helps Simon become more confident in his abilities, and he keeps Alisha grounded and practical.
Simon treats Alisha as more than a pretty face, and she makes Simon realize he is worthy enough to be noticed. Simon begins the series with the power of invisibility, but later changes it to clairvoyance. Alisha began with the ability to make anyone sexually desire her, and traded it to be able to see through another person’s eyes. Unfortunately, their relationship is doomed once they experience a tragic time loop.
WORST: SIMON AND SALLY
Simon and Sally’s “relationship” was unfortunate from start to finish. It began with the two of them meeting at the community center where Sally was the new probation worker. Simon and the gang had no idea she was secretly gathering information as the disappearance of their previous probation worker, who happened to be her fiance.
She manipulates Simon from the beginning, appearing as a lonely girl online for him to speak to in a chatroom, as well as using her feigned empathy to his antisocial behaviors in real life to get close to him. After he discovers what she’s been up to one of their dates, he’s forced to kill her. She would come back as a ghost later to cause trouble for him and Alisha.
BEST: ALISHA AND CURTIS
One of the first pairings to occur on the show, Alisha and Curtis seemed like the perfect match. Alisha was popular because of her good looks and vivacious personality, while Curtis was a previously famous track star with a lot of potential outside of community service.
Unfortunately, due to Alisha’s powerful affect, they couldn’t be intimate, which strained them in ways they didn’t anticipate. Eventually, it was her realizing her feelings for Sam that drove a wedge between them that Curtis could sent, resulting in them calling it quits.
WORST: NATHAN AND MARNIE
While Nathan never exhibited any indication he was going to end up with a real winner, some random pregnant girl he meets in the corridors of the community center requires a little mental gymnastics to accept. They’re virtual strangers, but before long he’s introducing her to the rest of the crew and then later delivering her baby.
Why Nathan would suddenly care about anyone other than himself, going so far as to sell his power (immortality, a Class A power) for a measly two thousand pounds for someone he barely knows, is a struggle to believe. Nathan does a 180 in personality without any character development, and promptly leaves the show with Marnie.
BEST: KELLY AND BRUNO
She was a girl. He was a gorilla turned into a boy. Their meeting was by chance, but it turned into one of the most meaningful romantic moments in the series. She could read his thoughts, and knew that the way he felt about her was different than other boys her age.
Unfortunately, she didn’t find out that the kind, hulking boy she met had formerly been a gorilla before the geo-storm, whose only wish was to be human and find a nice human girl. He’s shot and killed by police, and he dies in Kelly’s arms, telling her it was worth being human just to meet and be with her.
WORST: CURTIS AND NIKKI
We didn’t get to know Nikki long enough to decide if she was the best for Curtis or not, because a stray bullet takes her out in a robbery that should never have happened. Before that though, her and Curtis were planning on traveling the world with the money they’d made selling their powers.
Nikki came into Curtis’s life when he was still trying to determine how he felt about Alisha, and her very presence seemed to make that decision for him. He ultimately decided to see where things would go with Nikki, and she always seemed like a rebound, without any real personality.
BEST: KELLY AND SETH
One of the best couples of the series was Kelly and Seth, probably because they were the most successful and ended up lasting the longest. Even fan favorites Simon and Alisha had temporal anomalies get in the way of their relationship, dooming them to a tragic time loop forever.
While Simon and Alisha were doomed to save each other and die for each other perpetually, Seth and Kelly formed an unlikely bond. Seth liked Kelly’s unapologetic attitude, and Kelly liked Seth’s grounded practicality. Not even his resurrected zombie girlfriend could tear them apart.
WORST: RUDY AND JESS
When Rudy appeared on the show, he took the place of fan favorite Nathan, who starred in the first two seasons and then left for greener pastures (catch the actor in The Umbrella Academy). This left a hole for a rowdy, foul-mouthed rogue, and Rudy fit that times two. Literally, because his power meant he had two (and at one point) three versions of himself.
When he finally curbed his lecherous ways to be with Jess, it seemed forced. Jess, a new addition to the cast in Season 3, didn’t begin to fully develop as a character until Season 4, and her power to see through solid objects revealed to her many times what a lout Rudy was, making their relationship very awkward.
BEST: JESS AND ALEX
Alex joined the cast as a regular in Season 4, and was nothing more than a barman with Curtis at the local pub when Jess first set her eyes on him. Reserved and distant at first, Jess assumed he didn’t like her, but he was really under the control of someone else’s power despite having none of his own.
When he received a lung transplant from a victim of the storm, he gained the ability to take powers from others by being intimate with them, and in Season 5 heroically saves Jess by breaking into the community center when a possessed Finn is attacking her. It’s a shame she would actually end up with Rudy.
WORST: CURTIS AND LOLA
Lola mesmerized Curtis from the moment he laid eyes on her - she was striking, with dark hair and pale skin, and often wore vintage inspired clothing that evoked a femme fatale aesthetic. She was in fact a black widow, turned into the character she was auditioning for at her community theater when the storm struck.
She lured Curtis into a relationship, and made him kill her ex, a man who knew how she really treated men. When Curtis resurrected him to learn the truth about her, Curtis was bitten, sealing his fate on the series as a zombie that would need to be eventually killed off.
