The Misfit

It's very unwise to critique a production after 3 or 4 decades particularly in the negative. THE MISFIT earned a deservedly loyal following during its original run with the two principle actors crafting likable and believable characters. With a budget mirroring the restraints of a then still cobwebbed nation and story lines designed to raise emotions & memories rather than hackles & questions it was a comedy-drama of a sort later termed 'gentle'. Okay, it was largely for those of 'a certain age' who were able to identify with the traumas of a known world somewhere lost and an unwelcome one somehow thrust upon them, but those viewers who today melt into the contemporary will no doubt tomorrow find themselves losing a battle to explain its attraction to a new generation.

Basil Allenby-Johnson has been living remotely out in the Far East since the end of World War 2. He returns to England at the tail end of the swinging sixties to find a world he no longer recognizes or understands, and consequently this leads him into some very comical situations. Starting out with a lively premise,the pace got slower and slower, so that by the end of the second and last series every body was falling asleep including the viewers.(Although to be fair the second series was subject to various union disputes which may have hindered the production) As the 'swinging sixties' were unrecognizable to Basil, then in the 21 century this series and its characters would be totally unrecognizable to virtually anyone living today, so could well be an historical curio?