Pals, TV lovers, fans of justice and equality, I strongly advise you against watching the latest episode of Misfits, episode 2 of series 4.
The episode’s main plot has to do with new character Finn, who has his girlfriend Sadie tied up and gagged in his flat to stop her from using her power on him- the power to control his behaviour. My deep discomfort with the episode had to do equally with the notion of this woman being held captive for her own good and the good of others, and the characterisation of her as a castrating banshee. Finn gives a misogynist diatribe half way through the episode to explain himself to the other characters, and I have carefully transcribed it for you all using my own superpower, rage-induced computerised telekenesis:
“I know it looks bad, keeping someone prisoner like that and tying them up and making them shit in a bucket. But it’s not what you think- she’s my girlfriend. She’s got a power. She can make me into a perfect boyfriend. Whatever she said, whatever she told me to do, I did it. I stopped drinking. I stopped going out with my mates. All I cared about was making her happy. Endless presents and flowers and pampering… the conversations, we had to discuss everything, my jaw physically ached from all the talking. That and the hours of cunnilingus. I practically lived with my face between her thighs. Some days I felt like I didn’t see the sun. A few weeks ago she went to Ibiza with her friends, leaving me to deep clean the flat. With her being away her hold over me faded and I realised what she was doing- and I did the only thing I could do. I tied her up and gagged her, to stop her using her power.”
I know. It’s so horrible. This superpower that she has is so obviously gendered- she’s a classic sexist stereotype, the shrill, domineering woman, only she was bitten by a radioactive spider. She’s like a turbocharged Amy Pond. The writers adapted the plot of this episode from a comic book written by an angry and romantically unsuccessful man during his toilet breaks. It’s called My Nagging Wife Made Me Hoover So I Fucking Killed Her. The last two sentences are not true.
I felt a slight sense of relief when Sadie is untied and appears to be quite a normal person with reasonable expectations of Finn; I thought the episode might turn a corner and focus on Finn being a misogynist jerk who had his girlfriend tied up for no reason. That’s not how it went, though- back on the loose, Sadie turns back into a sexist caricature of the girlfriend from hell, supermanipulating Finn into buying her flowers and going down on her. Turns out, he was right to have her bound and gagged for all those weeks! She’s a nightmare! These are the conclusions reached by Finn’s new friends at the community centre- at first they were maybe a bit perturbed by the kidnap, but once they realised how awful his girlfriend was they had nothing but sympathy. The phrase pussy-whipped was used a lot. Like, a lot a lot.
As the only steady female character in a show whose humour now seems to rely heavily on rape jokes, new kid Jess has a lot of weight to carry in offsetting the hilarious (not hilarious) and deliberate sexism of the other characters. Unfortunately this means that she doesn’t get to do anything else- instead of having fun and going on capers like the rest of them, she just stands forlornly at the back of scenes, pointing out that other people are being sexist. She’s basically me.
With Lauren Socha (Kelly) and Antonia Thomas (Alisha) gone, the show has lost two tough, cool women and replaced them with, well, nothing.I used to really enjoy Misfits, but that will be the last time I watch it.
i made this image with the help of my rage-induced computerised telekenesis
