The Spoils of Babylon
IFC | Release Date: January 9, 2014
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
69
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 26 Critic Reviews
Positive:
19
Mixed:
6
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Uncle BarkyEd BarkJan 8, 2014
Season 1 Review: These first two episodes are gut-busting, non-stop fun. Read full review
88
RedEyeCurt WagnerJan 7, 2014
Season 1 Review: The Spoils of Babylon is an entertaining and spot-on spoof of the overdone potboiler miniseries of the 1970s and '80s. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyMelissa MaerzJan 3, 2014
Season 1 Review: The real laughs come from seeing so many famous people in absurd situations waxing nostalgic for the age of the melodrama, hen the romance was good, the green screens were bad, and the fashion was even worse. [10 Jan 2013, p.67] Read full review
80
The WrapTim MolloyJan 15, 2014
Season 1 Review: This is silliness for its own wonderfully ridiculous sake. Read full review
80
The Daily BeastMarlow SternJan 10, 2014
Season 1 Review: While Episode 1 is a bit of a bore, the second episode is flat-out hilarious. Read full review
80
SlateWilla PaskinJan 9, 2014
Season 1 Review: [A strange, zany, funny, and very star-studded six-episode series. Read full review
80
Zap2it (Inside the Box)Terri SchwartzJan 9, 2014
Season 1 Review: The new comedy delivers on its crazy promise. Read full review
80
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteRob OwenJan 8, 2014
Season 1 Review: If the first two installments are any indication, Spoils of Babylon will be a short-lived but entertaining hoot, an ideal addition to the IFC "Always On. Slightly Off" comedy brand that includes "Portlandia," "The Birthday Boys" and "Maron." Read full review
75
New York PostMichael StarrJan 9, 2014
Season 1 Review: It’s all in good fun, lets us in on the joke and--save for one dumb plot device--is well done and believable in its contextual universe. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleDavid WiegandJan 8, 2014
Season 1 Review: The show has enough originality and sheer wackiness to maintain viewer interest, not to mention ridiculous effects that are anything but special. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubErik AdamsJan 8, 2014
Season 1 Review: Reproduction isn’t The Spoils Of Babylon’s comic strong suit, absurdity is. Crummy special effects are cute, but the miniseries finds its voice by bursting Jonrosh’s bubble, illuminating his shortcomings as a filmmaker through mealy mouthed dialogue, incomprehensible blocking, and continuity errors. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineChuck BowenJan 7, 2014
Season 1 Review: The Spoils of Babylon is a dada high-wire act presided over by quasi-satirical nutters, and the chaos they invoke is oddly life-affirming. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesLori RacklJan 7, 2014
Season 1 Review: The Spoils of Babylon is a star-studded, droll spoof of television miniseries from the ’80s. Read full review
75
People WeeklyTom GliattoJan 2, 2014
Season 1 Review: This parody of bad vintage miniseries is asinine--it's supposed to be--and from time to time hilarious. [13 Jan 2014, p.49] Read full review
70
RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoFeb 20, 2014
Season 1 Review: Smaller tastings of silliness should make for a nice Thursday night alternative this winter. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterAllison KeeneJan 9, 2014
Season 1 Review: The comedy is at its best when Babylon behaves like a real melodrama--with tropes taken to exaggerated extremes — rather than relying too much on the visual gags of a bygone era. Read full review
70
Boston GlobeChristopher MutherJan 8, 2014
Season 1 Review: It’s a brave, and at times uneven, experiment. It’s also a reminder of a time when television was a much simpler and campier place. Read full review
70
The New York TimesNeil GenzlingerJan 8, 2014
Season 1 Review: It’s good for some dumb laughs, and--important in this age when complex television dramas consume so many of our brain cells--it doesn’t demand much of a mental commitment. Read full review
70
VarietyBrian LowryJan 7, 2014
Season 1 Review: The casting should be a modest draw, though again, the nature of the exercise feels better suited to Web shorts than even half-hour episodes. That said, the show is fitfully funny, and while perhaps unworthy of Jonrosh’s full daylong opus, as ways of idly killing time go, hey, it beats dying. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsDavid HinckleyJan 9, 2014
Season 1 Review: Over six episodes, almost no cliche of TV epics is left unlampooned. In the end, ironically, Spoils of Babylon creates some excess of its own. Read full review
60
Philadelphia InquirerDavid HiltbrandJan 9, 2014
Season 1 Review: As enjoyable as it is to watch, it seems at the same time ridiculously far to go for a joke. You can't escape the feeling that an extraordinary amount of time, money, and talent have been spent on a thin premise. Read full review
58
NewsdayDiane WertsJan 8, 2014
Season 1 Review: The first two episodes prove as tiresomely pleased-with-themselves as my run-on sentences. A half-hour is too much of not enough. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesMary McNamaraJan 9, 2014
Season 1 Review: Some of these bits work very well, albeit as free-floating shards of comedy.... But parody works best when its subject is either truly iconic or still relatively fresh in the minds of the audience and, mercifully, the B-list miniseries of yesteryear are neither. Read full review
50
TV Guide MagazineMatt RoushJan 9, 2014
Season 1 Review: Some of the stylistic touches are amusing, including a bombastic theme song belted by Steve Lawrence, but the strain shows as Babylon's sketchy premise is elongated to miniseries length. Read full review
40
New York Magazine (Vulture)Matt Zoller SeitzJan 9, 2014
Season 1 Review: The behind-the-scenes story that Jonrosh lays out for us is, alas, more amusing, even sight-unseen, than anything in the story proper.... What we do see is curiously tone-deaf and rarely pays off as you hope it will. Read full review
25
Washington PostHank StueverJan 3, 2014
Season 1 Review: Part of the joke is that The Spoils of Babylon was utterly unwatchable, and that’s why the network never showed it; it seems they achieved that goal a little too well. Read full review
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