I wanted to but couldn't!

Great Film overall

It's funny watching the elements come together in this complicated scam. On one hand, the set-up isn't quite as complex as it seems, but there's an easy sense of fun in every exchange.

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

The first rule of satire is that satire must be more self conscious than the material being satirized. The slipshod production of Spoils is far worse than any actual 70s mini-series. What Garth Marenghi's Darkplace has that this does not is it reveals the syntax of shoddiness: what bad, lazy, pompous film looks like, revealed by nuanced, subtle, detailed observation. The average 70s miniseries is much better made than this show. If you liked the concept of this show, but hated the lazy, stupid, derivative execution, I would recommend Danger 5, and Garth Marenghi's Darkplace as similar ideas done earlier and infinitely better.

This show had such promise; promise to be a great stupid comedy, the first great stupid comedy. At first, it was working well. The Eric Jonrosh intros/outros were on the beat and the over the top funny or die style humor of the acting and plot points were eliciting real laughs.However, the ridiculousness of the frame story (not the Jonrosh bookends, but the Devon Morehouse framing) and overemphasized jokes soon wear on the nerves. By episode 3 I was no longer laughing. I stuck it out through all 6 episodes in the hope that it would improve, but beyond a chuckle here and there at jokes that somehow managed to be funny it never really did.The funny or die format may work for 3 minute shorts, but extended out into a 3 hour miniseries it becomes tedious.

I've never been a fan of the romance genre, it's probably because most of the time it's done wrong more than right, like an undercooked meal. This is another under the radar gem that to me is one of the better parodies out of most recent ones that have been just one big line of disappointment. This mini series is a parody on romance novels from Harlequin, Danalle Steel, and any others you can think of. As well as the day or nighttime soaps like "Dallas" some of the plot line of that show is similar to the story in the parody; let alone the fact the parody genre is parodying on the romance genre which is something that hasn't been done much or at all. This parody I feel captures all the yuck and clichés we had to endure or forced to endure whenever we had to sit though a bad romance comedy with our girlfriend or our mom watched a soap.I really like how the mini series has sort of a low budget and poor production value feel and it shows, which makes the mini series almost a character of it's own because you feel this was made by a person that didn't know what the hell he was doing. But most importantly creates a lot of visual humor. From the noticeable miniatures, model cars, screens, even set pieces it's all there. One of my favorite sequences is in episode 2 "The War Within" (not kidding that's the title) where Devon is in a fighter plane and is in a fight. I couldn't help but crack up in that sequence because you can easily tell it's not a cockpit but that he's sitting on a couch, the commutation device is a mike and not a radio, the joystick isn't a joystick, there's a table in front of him, and also the fact that he's able to take out a picture of water and a glass as his plane is going down, which was also really funny because it's so random.Or one other visual gag is when a mannequin is trying to be passed off as a character. It's a parody on the typical generic significant other that pops in out of nowhere in the story for the main characters, whom by their nature are really just a filler device. But also it was also to show either the director couldn't afford another actress or just wanted to save money, probably one of the reasons why the production value on the mini seems off.The pacing is good, there is a certain sense of intrigue as the show goes along you really do want to know what happens next. Or in other words you want to see how much worse the mini series really is.But to me what really powers this parody are in the verbal humor and the cast that delivers it. The dialog in this mini series is fraking hilarious because it's so deliciously bad, it might take more than one watch to get it all.The supporting cast is great, Val Kilmer has a small role as an army general but he says one great quote about the price of gasoline that just cracked me up because to me that price would be a dream come true. Will Ferrell is hilarious as an Orson Welles like creator of the Falux miniseries based on the Falux book he wrote; the dialog he has is just hilarious because you can tell the guy is clearly mad due to how delusional he is, in his mind he's a great writer but really a hack. He also has a great quote "This miniseries never made it to TV because it was too good for it.", wonder if he ever thought it was too bad.The main cast is great, Toby Maguire is surprisingly funny as playing the typical tragic protagonist Devon Morehouse, he has some great lines one of my favorites is the speech he gives as his plane is going down, which is a parody on a speech just coming in out of nowhere usually at the most dramatic moment. But my favorite is comedic actress Kristen Wiig as Cynthia Morehouse, she is just fraking hilarious she's a real show stealer. I like that she's made to look kinda like actress Morgan Fairchild, she's the typical villain factor, a character that just wants everything no matter how she gets it. The rivalry and romance between both Devon and her is almost like the rivalry between both J.R. and Patrick Duffy's character (forgot his name) in Dallas, both compete for success while trying to destroy each other personally and conflicted with their feelings. She has some great lines but I just love how Kristen's over melodramatic performance which made me crack up, like the clichéd cry of "nooooo!" Overall, "The Spoils of Babylon" is like any spoil a real reward.Rating: 3 and a half stars

Don't waste your time watching this crap I was looking forward to this and was BITTERLY DISAPPOINTED with the level of garbage that this show is. I would give it a negative score if it would let me. I have never seen these actors in such awful shows and will never look at them the same again ......stupid, ......childish, ......unadulterated crap ......and then they throw in the inference of incest ....that was enough for me to delete it. I really don't get the American humour. School kids could probably do better. I hope they didn't spend too much money making this tripe. Please excuse me now while I go and scoop my eyeballs and brain out with a melon-baller to try and remove this garbage from my memory.