Oftentimes, when I find myself with an hour or two to kill, I scroll through Netflix, Hulu and various other online outlets, and am frozen with indecision, fraught with stress over what show I should watch next. Do I set aside my life for a few years and start Star Trek, in all its iterations, from the beginning? Should I catch up on Scandal or House of Cards, or did I already miss the boat on those shows? Do I open a book, like say Wheel of Time? Normally, I settle on merely catching up on a couple shows ongoing that I do watch, or switch gears to a movie, another potentially life-altering decision and a whole new can of worms. But sometimes, it feels good to be able to start and finish something in a short period of time, and not have to devote weekends, entire weeks, or months, to Binging media content.

Because I watch way too many things, I don’t get to binge through shows as fast as I’d like. It took me a year to watch all of the new Doctor Who. I’m in the middle of Broadchurch and probably will be for a couple months, even though it’s a 9 episode long BBC series.

Enter: IFC’s The Spoils of Babylon, a six episode long mini series, with each 23 minute episode spread out over two mid-afternoon writing breaks. It was glorious to watch a complete story in such a short period of time, a minor commitment, and it helped that it was the funniest show I’ve seen in 2014.

Written by SNL veterans Matt Piedmont (Funny Or Die Presents…) and Andrew Steele (Casa de mi Padre, The Ladies Man), and directed by Piedmont, the show is an unabashed parody of long, drawn out miniseries’ adapted from pulpy, generation spanning novels from the 1970’s and 80’s. It’s like an even less serious Dallas, though it takes itself just as seriously as all these event programming.

A great parody is one that loves and reveres its source material, and transcends it. It’s why Galaxy Quest was voted as the 7th best Star Trek film ever by fans (it should be #1). If there’s a Thorn Birds convention, they’d likely worship The Spoils of Babylon. 

Each episode is introduced by Eric Jonrosh, a caricature crafted after the lush, enormous version of Orson Welles, with a dash of Philip Roth, John Updike and writers of that ilk and ego. He is the writer of The Spoils of Babylon, a bestselling book that only HE could adapt, in painstaking fashion. Will Ferrell is the only choice for Eric Jonrosh, and you never want his hilarious, boozy over-the-top introductions to end. I’d watch an entire episode of The Spoils of Babylon even if it was him just trying to introduce said episode. Anchorman 2 caused me physical pain, but Ferrell’s act isn’t tired; that spark hasn’t gone away. It’s a reminder of his unparalleled comedic talent.

The Spoils of Babylon chronicles the love, murder, betrayal and incest that centers around the Morehouse family, one made rich and powerful thanks to striking oil in Texas under the guise of patriarch Jonas Morehouse (Tim Robbins). Jonas adopts orphan drifter Devon, who becomes his only son and heir to the Morehouse name and corporation.

Tobey Maguire plays Devon, and you might think that an interesting/odd/unfortunate choice depending on your opinion of Maguire, but trust me, it’s perfect. He’s never been better as the author/soldier/oceanographer Devon Morehouse. Tobey’s been pushed aside since the abhorrent Spider-Man 3, but I always think any criticism directed to his Peter Parker and Spider-Man is unwarranted and harsh. Even so, he admittedly seems pretty boring, the equivalent of ordering a plain burger with no cheese or pickles or onions when you can get the Sriracha Burger. But he erases any notions of that in The Spoils of Babylon, where Maguire is the best part, and that’s saying something, because the cast is ridiculous. He has a new wig, beard, mustache and career in every scene, and he clearly relishes a role that’s fun, weird, and deliciously over-the-top. Devon and the show itself is like a pinwheel of emotions.

He’s, naturally, in love with his sister Cynthia Morehouse, played by an always brilliant Kristen Wiig. She was born to play a nutty, corrupt CEO/oil tycoon and star-crossed lover of her brother, a love that threatens to doom and sully the vaunted Morehouse name.

When I said Will Ferrell was an unparalleled comedic talent, that was in a universe without Wiig, which thankfully we don’t have to live in. She’s wonderfully insane, with tremendous tantrums and loutish things to say throughout.

You have to watch Spoils of Babylon to witness the seeds of Haley Joel Osment’s comeback. He’s in Kevin Smith’s Tusk, has a role in the forthcoming Entourage movie and in Amazon’s Alpha House, and he’s gut-busting as the over-the-top, cackling Winston Morehouse, Cynthia’s only son, plotting to kill Devon and everyone he loves. It’s still startling to see a grown up Osment, and Spoils of Babylon takes advantage of your momentary pause by amping up Osment’s pure villainy. It’s glorious.

This is a show where Devon returns from war with a wife, and it’s a talking manikin (womanikin?) voiced by Carey Mulligan named Lady Anne York (see below). In the same scene, there’s a banner welcoming Darren home, which (duh) isn’t even Devon’s name. It’s never referenced, just the kind of subtle humor also on display in this comedy playground, and perhaps a nod to Arrested Development.

The miniseries also stars Val Kilmer, Steve Tom (best name ever?), Jessica Alba (as Marine Biologist/oceanographic enthusiast Dixie Melonworth), Molly Shannon, Michael Sheen and obviously, David Spade. You can’t really top that.

So hop onboard, and revel in the show that IFC perfectly describes thusly:

Patriarch Jonas Morehouse shepherds his daughter Cynthia and adopted son Devon from meager beginnings in the oil fields of Texas to powerful boardrooms in New York City. Cynthia and Devon, entwined in undeniable love, stumble through war-torn battlefields, blazing mansions, filthy drug dens and velvet-sheeted bedrooms on their quest for power and influence. Despite Jonas’s best efforts to intervene, Cynthia and Devon’s merciless love sets into motion a wave of destruction that crashes down on Devon’s graceful wife Lady Anne, his daughter Marianne, his colleague and lover Dixie, Cynthia’s hen-pecked husband Chet, her evil son Winston, the scheming Generals and far beyond.

So what are you waiting for? It’ll literally take you less time to watch the entire series (138 minutes all told) than survive ANY one of the Transformers movies.

Kevin Smith and the elementary school bus taught me how to swear.

I was twelve years old when I stumbled upon a Red Band trailer for Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back online, and guffawed like an idiot at all the dick and fart jokes, pretending like I knew what half of the sex talk meant. I immediately researched Kevin Smith, and watched all of his movies in quick succession. While American Pie was the first R-rated movie with tits and sex talk in it that I watched, Kevin Smith’s films were the ones that changed my life.

While I’m probably guilty of some revisionist history, I credit X-Men with getting me into comic books and informing the nerdy pop-culture consumer that I am today. But, if it weren’t for Kevin Smith’s jaw-dropping and incredible “Quiver” arc on Green Arrow, a book I never would’ve got if not for knowing him from his movies, I might never have stuck with comic books, potentially robbing me of discovering some of the most essential facets of my personality and life.

I loved Clerks., even though almost all of the adult humor was over my head. Chasing Amy was boring and uncomfortable to me, until I watched it ten years later and it blew my mind. Mallrats may have made me laugh the most of all of his movies. Dogma only got better every time I watched it. Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is probably my favorite film to rewatch and quote. I really love Clerks 2, as it’s the only movie of his I watched at the correct age, and the emotional impact came in waves because of it. 

Each film I’ve anointed as Kevin Smith’s best at various portions of my life, as View Askew universe became the first film universe that I became obsessed with, before Marvel’s Cinematic Universe overshadowed everything else. Kevin Smith’s observations on life, Star Wars and his realistic dialogue spoke to me as a geek and a teen who didn’t know what the hell was going on, but loved jokes revolving around pussy, and people talking about pussy, before I was even close to sniffing some myself (pardon that image). In many ways, Kevin Smith’s movies replaced talking about girls with anyone, be it my friends or family or cool Uncle, as I wasn’t comfortable talking about them with anyone until I was well in high school. This likely explains a lot.

Kevin Smith’s unapologetic, uncensored brand of humor influenced my own. I wanted to talk like I didn’t give a shit, I wanted to swear, while also interspersing a morsel of truth and wisdom. I hate all the BS that comes out of people’s mouths. Smith’s characters spoke the truth, and their mind, no matter how idiotic.

Kevin Smith introduced me to dick jokes and to comic books, and that’s why some small part of me has never recovered from the Jersey Girl and Cop Out stage of Kevin Smith’s filmmaking career. Of course, until recently, neither had Kevin Smith.

Which is why I was so revitalized and delighted to see one of my heroes inspired again. At his annual Hall H panel, Kevin Smith regaled us all with stories (he’s one of the best storytellers we have; not many can be as hilarious with a mic in his hand) from his career and life, telling us all the gruesome details (I feel like I’ve heard about every sexual experience he’s ever had). He got me more jazzed for J.J. Abrams’ Star Wars: Episode VII than I thought I would ever be. Yes, Smith has a tendency to over-hype things (Affleck’s Batman suit), but he knows Star Wars, and the amount of joy he had at visiting the set speaks to how well Abrams has done in crafting the Star Wars universe, and I trust Kevin Smith’s opinion. He cried when he stepped on the deck of the Millenium Falcon, and became a kid again, and it seems like that foul-mouthed, enthusiastic kid is still inside Kevin Smith, and is ready to bring that brand back into cinemas.

He quit movies for awhile, disillusioned by the business, until stumbling upon the story of Tusk on his Smodcast. He was literally writing and creating the weird horror movie on air, as the creative process consumed him and Scott Mosher. Smith realized he needed to write and make this movie, and that all he needed was to make the small indie films that he made his name with again to be happy. The result is Tusk, a film that stars Michael Parks, Justin Long, Haley Joel Osment and Genesis Rodriguez, and according to Smith, is a super weird movie, but also the best one he’s ever done.

Smith’s already planning a True North trilogy of horror movies, which kicks off with Tusk, follows with a PG-13 movie called Yoga Hosers (with a female lead who kicks ass, something he’s wanted to do since having a daughter) and finishes with something called Moose Jaws. The latter is exactly what it sounds (Jaws with a moose), and had me giggling for hours after. I can’t say I wouldn’t rather see Smith do comedies, but I’m also intensely interested in this burgeoning micro-budget horror phase of his, precisely because he’s so absorbed and excited about it, and his enthusiasm is as infectious as a stink palm. Red State wasn’t bad, and a world where Kevin Smith is making horror movies involving walri and meese is a far better world than one without those things. Welcome back, Kevin Smith.

Toward the end of this rejuvenating evening with Kevin Smith, he unveiled the first trailer for Tusk (see below), coming September 19th. I’ll be there.