Time Trumpet

55.9 percent indecipherable to American viewers, Time Trumpet is admittedly most noteworthy for its conceptual brilliance and clockwork execution. (Though experts tell me that the numerous jokes hinging on impenetrable Anglo-centric minutia are, in fact, quite funny.) Ostensibly a somber BBC Two nostalgia program produced in the year 2031 and reflecting on life in the early 21st Century, Time Trumpet operates as a satirical extrapolation of foreboding current affairs, pop cultural trends and, most effectively, VH1-style fundits. "Devised and Directed" by Armando Iannucci, the writer/producer/comedian, one-time Visiting Professor at Oxford, regular Guardian columnist and arguably the reigning godfather of British comedy, the series melds "viral video" editing of found footage, expensive CGI effects, actors playing elderly versions of contemporary celebrities and dimwitted color commentators as played by obscure British comics into a dense artificial clip show format.

Though not the first mockumentary of its kind by Iannucci, who has previously produced two stand-alone specials "from the future" — Clinton: His Struggle With Dirt and 2004: The Stupid Version — Time Trumpet is still, by far, his most fully realized. The unknown actors playing today's notables do an exceptional job pre-creating their characters' actions two decades hence. Joint-US presidents Venus and Serena Williams confuse the name of Labor Party politician Jack Straw with some kind of "gay slang." And an "increasingly odd," elderly Tom Cruise engages his interviewer in brilliantly scripted, alpha male ramblings. ("Pound for pound I am the strongest man on this planet. Feel my bicep. Hey! Don't touch me or I'll break your fucking neck! [laughs] And I won't even have to touch you to do it!")

Time Trumpet's overall look comes courtesy of Iannucci's longtime collaborators at Framestore Design, who also did work for Nathan Barley. The futuristic series achieves a chilling level of credibility, imbuing its darker segments (including several vignettes from the "War on Terror") with an unsettling majesty. The show's hands-down best executed, most hilarious SFX set-piece is "news footage" of a 2013 para-military invasion of Denmark by Tesco, the 3rd largest grocery retailer in the world. Copenhagen is demolished by the chain's corporate attack helicopters and what look like machine gun mounted AT-ST walkers.

If there's a purpose to the series (apart from, you know, jokes) it's to offer a grave warning about cultural commentary's increased commoditization in the age of "user-gen content" websites and hypertrophied media spectacle. Nothing brings this point home more than one soundbite by Richard Ayoade — who puts on the same foppish buffoonery in Time Trumpet that made his appearances in Nathan Barley so memorable. Discussing the moral implications of Rape a Celebrity Ape (a spin-off of the BBC's 2010 hit reality series Rape an Ape; this time the ape is now actually a famous person in costume), Ayoade asks himself:

When someone like [retired BBC weatherman] Michael Fish dies of anal trauma in a hospital ward, you do think, "As good as that was … should I be watching this?" To which he immediately interjects: "I mean, 'yes,' because I have to take the pulse of the nation."