Misfits

Yay! Nathan!

Hang on...Did they ever actually take that picture?

I did watch this very late last night, so more prone to confusion perhaps but I can't work out when the Vegas picture was meant to be taken.

The final episode pre-dates the Vegas trip I assumed, and then he has to go back in order to save Alisha again, and then they progress to the point she has her throat slit, and then I assume they're on a loop.

But surely that can't work because by saving her, he dies ergo cannot go back again.

Or are we meant to assume that they went to Vegas around the time that Nathan was apprehended there, but in the third series, they didn't reflect on their trip at all.

So far I'm a little baffled as to whether they'll call it quits here, or whether there are loose ends they will look to tie up.

Thoroughly enjoyed it, but confused by the time travel, and how they will get to the stanley blade scene if he goes back and dies in the locker rooms.

Him dying in the 2nd series wont affect him being able to go back in this, since that's the current/future him that's dying, not the past, still invisible him that'll still be alive when he dies. It's a loop yes. But involving two hims. Sort of.

I also assumed the Vegas thing was probably taken around the time of Nathan's thing, but if so you'd imagine they'd have made a little nod to it somewhere..Unless Overman thought that might give the game away re-Alesia dying this season.

photo was taken between seasons 2 and 3. The Vegas trip was briefly mentioned in the premier i think, plus the tie in twitter accounts for Nathan and Simon talked about it i think.

Bit surprised that Simon and Alesha won't be back next season, how ever i guess it's open for them to come back at any time. It will be interesting to see who they bring in as replacements. Bit disappointed they went though, would of hoped Nathan, who is boring as shit, would go.

Why couldn't Simon just go back in time and make sure Alisha didn't get her throat cut?

As I said before, it's a predestinational paradox, which is essentially a loop in time which has been created by time travel. It's a theory of why time cannot be changed although in this series it is forced: simon says (lol?) "I have to do everything just as I did before" I guess that is the get out clause for the writers and they have already shown that time can be changed.

A good example of a PDP is a man who loses his family in a bush fire. He creates a time machine to go back and save them, he finds the source of the fire, a paraffin lamp in a wood shed, he then goes back in time to get to the wood shed to extinguish the lamp so the fire cannot start. He gets to the wood shed door, trips, knocks the door open and the lamp to the floor.... which starts the bush fire.

Basically I can't see how they could break the loop as it has already happened twice, if they go back again in the future that would have been reflected in the past.... if that makes sense? The only thing they could do successfully is go back to the time after each died and bring them back to life and back to the future... all of which I think is a little too complex for this light entertainment show to go into.

So why couldn't Simon just go back in time and make sure Alisha didn't get her throat cut?

Because as we have seen by the Hitler episode, if you go back in time and change things, history changes. If he went back and saved her, he wouldn't go back in time and change himself into what he became and Alisha wouldn't be in love with him in the changed time. So yes, he could go back and save her but they wouldn't be together and time wouldn't be as it should be. He valued their short time together more than he valued not being together.

Also.... the rules of a PDP mean that it isn't how time would pan out so it was impossible for him to do that because that is just how things have to happen. He was incapable of going back and doing that because that is what time dictates happens.

The hitler scenario is a PDP aswell. If you imagine time as a straight line, with a loop attached to it, although the Hitler scenario didn't happen to the regular observer.... it did happen off the usual time line and everyone involved knew it happened because they observed it happening.

Time travel stories tend to confuse me, especially when it gets to the point of discussing any possible flaws. Because obviously it's an imaginary scenario with no real basis. So bear with me. It's just that I'm not quite sure on why exactly Simon had to go back to the beginning this time.

There are two versions of Simon that we have seen. There is "future" Simon, who travelled back in time, because in his version of reality, Alisha had been shot. So he came back as Super Hoodie and he saved Alisha, dying in the process.

So then we have "our" Simon, who saw his future self come back in time and save Alisha, who became his girlfriend. In our Simon's version of reality, Alisha didn't get shot and they were happy. Until she got her thoat slit.

As far as I can see it, our Simon doesn't have to go back to the start to save Alisha, because in his reality, she has already been saved by his future self. The future Simon needed to go back and change that moment in time, when she was shot, because Alisha died at that point in his reality, but she didn't die in our Simon's reality, so he has nothing to change. Maybe he'll go back and stop Alisha from being shot and help her fall in love with him. But the only Alisha he'll be saving, and the only Simon he'll be helping, are the versions that he's created by him going back in time.

In his reality, Alisha lived. So all he needs to do is go back and stop Alisha from getting her throat slit. That's how she died in his reality, not getting shot.

Does that make sense?

My argument here basically centred around the assumption that Alisha had in fact died in "future" Simon's reality, and he'd come back in time to stop it from happening again. But I'm guessing this isn't the case? I'm guessing that future Simon lived the same life "our" Simon lived. So in his reality, another future Simon had saved his Alisha and he'd lived happily with her until she got her throat slit, at which point he went back in time to save Alisha. Just like the Simon that had saved the Alisha in his timeline, had also been through the same life, he'd been visited by yet another future Simon, who'd also lived that life, etc to infinity.

So if that's the case, then Simon does actually need to go back and play the part of "future" Simon, right? He needs to go back and stop Alisha getting shot. He can't just live the rest of his life never going back, because he did go back and save her. So presumably, if he lives the rest of his life, never travelling back in time, that means he never went back and saved her, which means she died in his past... But she didn't, because she was saved in his past? But again surely if he doesn't go back, he doesn't save her and she dies? Hmmmm...

This is why stories like this shouldn't be used as such a central plot, because they never make sense. Then there's the Hitler paradox people like to use. You go back to shoot Hitler as a kid, because he became a very bad man. But then if he died, that means that in your reality, he didn't become a bad man, meaning you have no reason to go back in time. But if you don't go back in time, you don't kill Hitler, which means he lives. And becomes a bad man. Who you need to go back and kill... Same with this, if Simon goes back in time and saves Alisha, the next Simon will do the same. But if he does nothing, she'll die, which will make him go back and change that. Which the next Simon will also do. Either way, it never ends.

My problem with that, is that it seems like "our" Simon is going to go back and do exactly the same thing "future" Simon did. He's going to die stopping Alisha from being shot, then she's going to live happliy with her Simon, until she gets her throat slit and that Simon then goes back in time to again do exactly the same thing. So basically, every Simon that goes back, knows the exact same thing, that she's going to get her throat slit anyway. But none of them seem to have any interest dealing with that situation. They stop her from getting shot, knowing she'll die later. So in fact, they're not saving her at all, they're letting her die, knowingly. Just at a later date.

Surely if they wanted to save her, in the sense of giving her a full life, they'd stop her getting shot then say "Oh by the way, don't get stabbed". Otherwise stopping her from getting shot served little purpose.

I see what you are saying but that's why I think they had the Hitler episode. To show that if you change something in the past the future changes. So had Simon gone back in his new reality although he would still be aware of what has happened in his observation, because he didn't go back, the past would change and Alisha would no longer be aware of anything as would anyone else. It's all about being an "observer". If everyone started time travelling then the fabric of time would be twisted and torn in order to keep everything relevant to each individual observers which is where separate dimensions come into play.


It's hard to explain! Anyway mate, hows tricks with you, long time no speak! Been a few years I think?

So, what will the actor and actress playing Simon and Alisha be up to now? Movies like "Nathan"?

I see exactly what you are saying but I think the key thing is that it happens because it does happen. As stupid as that sounds?!

So basically... it happens because every event that had happened leading up to Simon going back was identical to every event that had happened that lead future Simon to go back. Because they are exactly the same person, with every single atom that had ever existed around them, reacting in exactly the same way as it had every single time it happened and will happen again..... it lead to Simon having the same train of thought and doing exactly the same thing. From our point of view "he could change things..." from his point of view he cannot because that is exactly how things must happen and by that I don't mean from his perspective, I mean from a Universe perspective. It must happen like that because that is how it has already happened.

You see, I do get where you're coming from there, and I agree that this must be the way they're dealing with it. It's the only way to answer the seeming holes that I mentioned. I'll be honest, I was set to come back with the argument that, in reality, you wouldn't keep making the same decisions. Because we all learn from mistakes and make progress. So each time he goes back, he would do things differently, since each past self would have experienced how things went for their past self, which would in turn affect their decisions. Then their actions would affect what the next Simon sees and experiences, which would alter his actions when he goes back... But then I remembered that Simon never saw his future self saving Alesha, in fact he didn't see much of him at all, to learn from where he went wrong.

But still, it just seems too illogical that any sane person would go back and save his girlfriend, knowing he's letting her die later and setting the same events in motion. He'd do something to change it, surely? I mean, Simon isn't a complete idiot, and only an idiot would do nothing about her getting her throat slit, when that was the actual thing that made him go back in time in the first place.

I think the key phrase, that he kept mentioning is that "everything has to happen the way it's supposed to"

So sure he can go back in time to a different point, and stop her throat being cut, but if her throat wasn't cut, he wouldn't of had to go back in time, and if he didn't go back in time, she wouldn't of fallen in love with him. Even if he saw this all happen with his power, he wouldn't of been able to change it.

If he had Curtis's version of time travel, he could pop back, have her fall in love with him, save her throat being cut, and then pop back and everything would be dandy. But because he can only go back once, he's stuck in this loop.

Another thing about him seeing into the future. I think it only happened at random times, to be fair. His, Alisha and Kelly's powers were complete rubbish, Curtis and Ruddy's powers helped drive the character really.

The key thing is that Simon and Alisha treasured everything exactly how they had it. It's a soppy love story at the end of the day.

it was clever how is split personality gave you a side to him you could sympathise with and make his character less annoying and more loveable. It's exactly what they do in a lot of films and TV shows but obviously not with physical representations of another personality.

I'm still a little hazed as to what to make of the end of series 3 having rewatched it.

Not sure where they'll go with this now having lost Alisha and Simon. I agree that they did well to replace Natrhan with Rudy, but not sure what angle the new series will pick up from.

They won't be adding any more main characters, which seems a bit mental.