After watching pieces of both the "60s" and "70s" documentaries, and enjoying them both, it made sense to give "The Eighties" a try as well. Though I'm not sure I liked the formula of this documentary quite as much, it still ends up being very informative and entertaining.
Unlike previous iterations, "The Eighties" doesn't just run the decade in chronological order. Instead, each episode focuses on a specific topic, such as...
-Television/Media -Reagan -AIDS -Berlin Wall -Technology -Music -Wall Street
With the exception of the Music & AIDS episodes, which I thought were a bit underwhelming and perhaps not deserving of a whole hour, all the other episodes are quite well done. Like I mentioned previously, it is a bit jarring to have the "story of the 80s" told in little snippets rather than "in order", but I can appreciate what the filmmakers were going for in this case.
One pet peeve about the experience? Perhaps this would have been far too difficult to accomplish, but I wish that the actual 80s footage could have been rendered a bit better (closer to, if not, HD quality). It was very noticeable for the doc to keep switching from the grainy footage to the crystal-clear commentary.
On the whole, though, I enjoyed "The Eighties" and could recommend it to fans of U.S. history in video format. It takes the specific approach instead of the mashup, but in some ways that allows for better focus too.