If recent television history has taught us anything, it’s that almost any show—no matter how tawdry and insipid—can be ripe for a reboot. Oh, admittedly, some need a bit more refurbishing than others to make them shiny and new again. Or, in the case of CW’s new version of the 1980s drama Dynasty, a little more lather in the soap.
Let me introduce you to the Carrington family, an Atlanta-based clan that makes the Kardashians look quiet and understated.
Paterfamilias Blake Carrington built his fortune on fossil fuels. Some say he’s a bit of a fossil himself. Solar power? Pish. Wind turbines? Ha! No, what the world needs now, Blake believes, is crude, sweet crude. Oil, that is, and fracked if at all possible. Not that he’s against renewable energy—as long as it energizes his bottom line.
The only thing Blake likes more than money is, apparently, nepotism. His new wife, Cristal, was the company’s new chief operating officer until she passed away at the end of Season One. Blake’s ruthlessly ambitious daughter, Fallon, was the company’s VP of acquisitions before she, briefly, left in a huff—jealous, it would seem, of her new stepmom’s power. But don’t worry, she’s back again to regain control. And son Steven (who’s soon to be a father) … well, he and his pops don’t see eye to eye on much. But that doesn’t keep Blake and Stevie from partnering from time to time when it’s mutually beneficial.
And in a world in which most companies vet top execs for 18 months or so, Carrington Corp. is liable to see churn at the top every commercial break or two. You never know when a second cousin or blackmailing ne’er-do-well is going to need a seven-figure job, after all. Fallon could return to the company, then leave it, then return to it again by the time you finish reading this sentence.
But for all of the conspicuous cash the Carringtons might throw around, Dynasty is far more concerned with what happens in the bedroom than the boardroom. Most business deals here aren’t cemented with a handshake, but a little wrestling between a pair of 1,000 thread count sheets.
ABC’s original Dynasty was, of course, certainly not prone to blush at the hint of sexual calisthenics, and its lovers changed hands more often than mid-grade major league relief pitchers. But, boy howdy, what a difference a few decades makes in how all that sex shows up on the small screen.
When Fallon and Steven walk in on Blake performing an, um, transaction during the opening episode, no one so much as blinks. Nor does the camera seem particularly embarrassed when Fallon’s fiancé-slash-chauffer performs oral sex on her in the back seat of the limo. Or when Steven, who’s gay, entwines with his new male paramour and, eventually, marries him. This being broadcast television, we don’t actually see anything critical. But still, so much sex, people. So much. And scandal, too. Skeletons fill every closet in the Carrington mansion, and they’re all pounding on the doors to get out.
There’s a certain irony that television soap operas (so named because many were originally sponsored by detergent companies) have always been so dirty. But with this Dynasty reboot, CW has gone a step beyond creating a generically trashy prime time soaper: It’s almost aggressively dumb—so much so that it makes the original Dynasty feel like a genteel Jane Austin novel.
It is, at least in its early episodes, completely and actively devoid of anything good: good behavior, good characters, good writing, good acting. It’s almost as if the writers, when they accidentally came up with a bit of believable dialogue or positive character development, were summarily sent to CW’s secret underground laboratories, never to be seen again, and immediately replaced with cast members from Jersey Shore.
Prime time soap operas are sometimes referred to as “guilty pleasures,” and that’s what CW has tried to create here. But this soap—what with its obsession with sex and its ruthless eschewing of merit—has successfully washed away any hint of pleasure here, leaving just the guilt behind.
Dominique (Blake’s half-sister) plots to launch her stepdaughter Vanessa’s music career. Blake helps his new(est) wife cover up an attempted murder while his ex-wife, ironically, covers up an attempted murder of her own. Fallon realizes she does have a maternal instinct after babysitting her fiancé’s son.
A couple kisses. Another couple snuggles in bed (His shirt is open and she wears a revealing nightgown). Women wear tight outfits with cleavage. People talk about the consequences of a leaked sex tape (which a child overhears by accident). People joke about sex and lingerie.
After a man insists on taking a holistic approach to recovering from brain trauma, his wife slips an illegal prescription into his champagne. He collapses from the effect. People drink alcoholic beverages. A man is put on morphine after surviving an explosion. Someone jokes about chloroform.
A boy runs away from his babysitter after she accidentally lets it slip that his mom abandoned him. He later falls out of a tree and nearly drowns before his father and another man save him. Someone performs the Heimlich when a man is choking. Vanessa throws a croissant at her stepmother.
We hear several uses of “h—” as well as “b–ch” and “d—it.” God’s name is misused a handful of times. People make off-color jokes about shrinks and cancer. They also lie, manipulate and steal to get what they want.
When her brother is choking, a woman prays to God to save him in panic.
Blake Carrington suffers a midlife crisis and threatens to take each of his children out of his will. Fallon Carrington and a wealthy heir pretend to be engaged to control their respective families’ financial accounts. Monica Colby (Fallon’s on-again, off-again best friend) teams up with her brother, Jeff, to open up their own nightclub. Steven Carrington prepares to have a baby with a former female one-night stand, but his husband and mother think his baby mama is lying about her pregnancy.
A woman formely exiled for attempted arson ruins a nightclub opening, viciously attacks another woman and is later arrested. A man nearly breaks his arm in a fit of rage. An elderly man suffers a heart attack. A couple attends a meditation class.
Couples kiss and use sex as a weapon to deceive and manipulate. Brief converations are heard about things such as oral sex, noises in the bedroom, exposed female body parts and two men engaging in sexual acts. A gay man prepares to have a baby with a woman he slept with as part of a business transaction. Two people discuss a woman’s former same-sex relationship. An engaged woman kisses and seduces other men. A woman is propositioned for sex by a much older man. (That same woman hires a female escort instead of performing any sexual acts herself). Women are seen in lingerie and other revealing outfits and dance provocatively. A woman’s dress is violently ripped off her body, revealing her bra.
People drink champagne, wine and hard liquor. A woman says she takes sleeping pills. Multiple uses of “b–ch,” “h—,” “a–,” “b-lls” and “d–n” are uttered. God’s name is misused a few times. Women are referred to as “tramps” and “whores”, and a man is called an “imbicile.”
Blake Carrington, head of a massive energy company, calls his children, Steven and Fallon, home to Atlanta. Fallon hopes this means that her dad’s giving her a promotion to chief operating officer. But alas, she learns that her father just wanted them to meet their new mom, Cristal. Alas for Cristal, that is.
Before heading home, Fallon and her chauffer, Michael, engage in oral sex in the back of Fallon’s limousine. Both remain mostly clothed, though Michael unbuttons Fallon’s blouse. (When Fallon later demeans his job, telling him that he just drives “an old white guy around,” Michael reminds her that that old guy “pays me $200k a year, and I’m banging his daughter.”) When she and Steven arrive at the mansion, they discover Blake and Cristal having sex on Blake’s desk, both partly undressed and disheveled. (We see Cristal’s bra.) Fallon quips that there’s no reason for either to be embarrassed: “Stop acting as if you don’t bang all your girlfriends in front of us,” she says. (We later see Blake and Cristal in bed together again, apparently post-coitus.)
Steven, who’s gay, says that his father “stopped bragging about his girlfriends when he realized it wouldn’t make me any straighter.” Blake encourages him to make a connection with a potential business partner—hoping that their mutual homosexuality might increase the odds of a successful deal. But Steven doesn’t respond when that mogul brushes his knee, and he instead finds another partner. The two kiss passionately in an elevator, and we see the men unclothed (but mostly covered) in bed. Steven momentarily straddles his lover on the way to the bathroom. The lover—who turns out to be Cristal’s nephew—then steals several hundred dollars in cash from Steven’s pants pocket. When they meet later and the lover tries to apologize, Steven admits he didn’t even notice: That’s just how rich he and his family are.
There are hints of dark secrets in Cristal’s past. She says goodbye to a former lover (who’s married), and he kisses her on the forehead. She lies to Blake. Both she and Fallon wear body-hugging clothing. We hear a reference to a sex toy as well as some suggestive double entendres. People kiss. We see a flashback of Fallon, as a little girl, rapping—telling her audience to “come and get some” (and referencing her hips and thighs). A truck explodes, severely injuring two men. One man, his body covered in blood, watches as a propeller from a wind turbine falls. (It presumably kills him.)
During a wedding, there’s a superstitious reference to ringing bells to scare away the devil. People drink champagne—sometimes a lot of it. Martinis are imbibed, too. Characters say “b–ch,” “a–” and “h—.” God’s name is also misused. There are references to “Blake f-ing Carrington.”
Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.
Emily studied film and writing when she was in college. And when she isn’t being way too competitive while playing board games, she enjoys food, sleep, and geeking out with her husband indulging in their “nerdoms,” which is the collective fan cultures of everything they love, such as Star Wars, Star Trek, Stargate and Lord of the Rings.
Kristin Smith joined the Plugged In team in 2017. Formerly a Spanish and English teacher, Kristin loves reading literature and eating authentic Mexican tacos. She and her husband, Eddy, love raising their children Judah and Selah. Kristin also has a deep affection for coffee, music, her dog (Cali) and cat (Aslan).
An elf mage contemplates on connection and regret as she watches her human friends grow old and pass away.
Netflix takes a classic sitcom, Good Times, and turns it into a vulgar, violent, sexually-charged TV-MA show.
