The Spoils of Babylon: Sweetly Satirizing ’80s Television

From Geek Goes Rogue TV Editor Zach W. Lorton, as told to by the worn paperback copy of Roots he left in his high school locker…

When I was growing up in the glorious 1980s, there was a lot about the decade I missed, because I turned double digits during the latter half.  Much of the pop culture of the day went over my head, or I wasn’t old enough to appreciate it.  My wife and I even had a discussion about what decade we would go back to if we had a time machine, and I chose the ’80s, because I would like to experience that decade as an adult.

One thing I didn’t miss during the ’80s, however, was the wide array of television available to us.  Knight Rider, Alf, Airwolf, The Real GhostBusters, M.A.S.K., and of course, TransFormers and Voltron were mainstays of most young boys between 8 and 13.  But since I was the youngest of three, and estrogen outweighed testosterone in my family, I was subjected to a staple of the 1980s viewing experience — the mini-series.

Works of fiction by John Jakes, Danielle Steele, Herman Wouk, and other authors of insanely huge books were turned over, in seemingly endless fashion, throughout the decade.  These mini-series were often epic portraits of specific periods, and perhaps the most melodramatic and star-studded were the two miniseries based on the North and South books by John Jakes.  Many notable stars, including Patrick Swayze, Kirstie Alley, Gene Kelly, Forest Whitaker, and even Jonathan Frakes featured in this sprawling mini-series, the first two installments of which spanned 6 nights each.

Cable channel IFC, home to hipster comedy wunderkind shows Portlandia and Comedy Bang! Bang!, are once again flexing their comedy muscle and making satire out of these romantically sweeping epics from the 1980s in their new series The Spoils of Babylon.

As the program beings, we see Eric Jonrosh (Will Ferrell), author of Spoils, addressing the camera.  He’s helping us set the scene, you see, and the scene is absurd.  Filmed in Breath-Take-O-Scope 93 millimeter, this abbreviated version of the originally 22-hour epic begins with a shot…

…of a model town.  Already, I’m hooked.

Granted, the backstory of the legend is that the mini-series was originally filmed in the 1970s, but let’s face it, it would have aired in the next decade.  Watching children eat squirrel stew… from a can… with bits of tail in it, no less… one might think this wasn’t a serious work of art.  However, I have to admit, there is a lot of great filmmaking in this farce.

We look back at the life of Devon Moorehouse (Tobey Maguire), how he came to be part of the house of Moorehouse, and how he began his climb to the top of the oil business.  Lighting, shot composition, and filtering all create a sense that this comes from a time before, a reality that isn’t quite true, but could be in another time.

The jokes run throughout — some with the speed of a finely-tuned comedy sketch, some lingering long enough to drive the joke home — and hold up a mirror to the melodrama and epic self-indulgence of those mini-series of the 1980s.  The inscription in the compass bit is absolutely priceless, so keep your eyes open for that.

Some of what’s presented is messed up, let’s be honest.  Devon is adopted, picked up by Jonas Moorehouse (Tim Robbins) and his daughter Cynthia (Kristin Wiig) while he was walking along a desert road, and a romance develops between Devon and Cynthia from a young age.  This is only episode one, folks.

I’m going to keep from ruining anything else, because what features in this series from IFC is so sublime, so supremely outside the norm of modern comedy that viewers younger than 35 might not understand the poke that IFC is taking at this overblown television artform from the ’80s.  My hope is that interest in this show continues past the six episodes already done, as there is a lot of potential for this to become the new face of satire on television in the coming years.

Zach W. Lorton is a media producer and professional DJ/MC by trade, and a comedian, actor, and musician by default.  His debut music project is set to begin recording in 2014, and will likely take the world by storm, possibly in the form of a Sharknado.