Emmy Nominations: Something for (Almost) Everyone

All of this has happened before and will happen again...and again...and again...and again...

Sympathy for the Robot 3000-21

To everyone: let's recall how the Emmy process works. For the nomination stage, they pick one single episode out of the season, and all the other work for the season is not (supposed to be) considered.

So sure, I am disappointed to not see Noble/McDonnell/etc., get a nomination, but ask yourself, what single episode of Fringe warrants Noble getting a nom? Maybe McDonnell might get one on the strength of the finale, but then the voters would have to shield their eyes from the rest of the episode. Etc.

Similarly, although I love to see FotC get some love, I think Bret McKenzie is the better actor - but could see why Clement would get a nod (probably based off the prostitute episode), due to Bret's charms being spread throughout many episodes.

No Shield love at all though? Shameful.

And I'm already grumpy that Williams wins over Chenoweth.

What did Dr. Horrible get nominated for? I saw something about it getting nominated but I looked through the list and didn't find it. Did I just miss it?

In general, not a terrible list of nominees

I was prepared for the usual BSG and FNL snubs, and I thought The Shield would probably get ignored for best drama. But the fact that Boston Legal has two actors in the supporting category and Walton Goggins didn't get nominated is the one that really irks me this year.

Emmys? Still dead to me. No Kyle Chandler, no Connie Britton, no Friday Night Lights, no Taylor Kitsch, no Matt Saracen. Just a nomination for outstanding casting for a drama series (explain how you can cast well, but not have best actors??)

I'm more offended by Entourage getting a comedy nod (over Chuck) than Family Guy, although I'd be happier with just about any other 2 comedies filling both slots.

Tony Shaloub, Charlie Sheen, Mariska Hargitay, and Jon Cryer should all decline their nominations.

I'd replace almost the entirely non-Mad Men slate of best lead actresses in a drama series -- where is Connie Britton? Mary McDonnell? Yvonne Strahovski (she's in a comedy in a way, but her role is more dramatic)? Hell, even Katherine Heigl brought it this year, playing the hell out of her cancer storyline.....none were nominated.

Love the supporting nominees in comedy selections....and even accept supporting actress in a drama (although Elizabeth Mitchell was ROBBED)...but Shatner and Espenson? What about Josh Holloway? Taylor Kitsch? Terry O'Quinn? The dude that plays Matt Saracen? The guy that played Felix Gaeta? John Noble?

Here's the problem -- until the Emmys is COMPLETELY overhauled into having voters actually WATCH a season of shows (as opposed to "highlight" episodes) it has no real legitimacy. We should just all agree to watch the TV Critic's Choice Awards, instead....at least they watch the WHOLE series, generally.....

The biggest snubs to me are the trio of Kyle Chandler, Connie Britton, and Matt Saracen (I know Zach Gilford's his real name, but his performance is so good that Matt Saracen seems more like a real person than any other character on TV)

James, can you post the nominations for best writing in both drama and comedy. I try to seek those episodes out online if I haven't seen them already. The voters are pretty good at identifying, if not the best episodes of TV each year, at least very good episodes.

[...] July 16, 2009 Emmys: “Family Guy” for best comedy, “True Blood” snubbed, 22 for “30 Rock” The best comedy category is getting new blood this year, with the addition of “Weeds,” “How I Met Your Mother,” “Flight of the Conchords” and “Family Guy (which became the first-ever animated series to be nominated for best comedy since “The Flintstones” in 1961). Meanwhile, “Lost” and “House” were the only network dramas nominated this year. And also noteworthy is the fact that “The Big Bang Theory” and “True Blood” failed to net a nomination in the best comedy and drama categories, respectively (though Emmy nominee announcer Jim Parsons has been nominated for best comedic actor). All in all, “30 Rock” led comedies with 22 nominations, while “Mad Men” was No. 1 among dramas with 16 nods. Check out the complete list of Emmy nominee Jeff Probst nominated, “Survivor” not nominated Sarah Silverman vs. Christina Applegate for best comedic actress “The Wire’s” David Simon should win for “Generation Kill” No “The Shield”!?!?; “SNL’s” Kristin Wiig for best supporting actress Best supporting actor, comedy: Tracy Morgan vs. Neil Patrick Harris vs. Jack MacBrayer Pointless “Lost” over brilliant “Shield”? Academy must’ve not been watching “Amazing” Phil Keoghan nominated for best reality host for 1st time The snubbed: “Battlestar,” January Jones, Kiefer Sutherland… “FNL” to “NCIS”: 12 dramas as good or better than the best drama nominees Jaw-dropping snubs: No “Jon & Kate, no Katherine Heigl, no “Two and a Half Men” Nominees react // Were “30 Rock” and “Mad Men” over-nominated? “24″ snubbed, but Kiefer Sutherland is up for “Redemption” Why nominate one “Conchord,” and not the other? Everybody’s happy: The Emmy wealth was spread around this year [...]

Flight of the Conchords, yes! Can we get a live performance of "Carol Brown" please?

I actually think the voters did a decent job this year; the only really egregious omission to me is The Shield (but this wasn't its best season and it was probably only the third- or fourth-best drama series, so it's like snubbing The Wire after its fourth season).

I have to say I don't really understand the FNL fanboys. The kid who plays Saracen is terrible -- I never bought into his performance and that's one of the reasons the show never worked for me. Kyle Chandler does a nice job but he's not on the level of Jon Hamm or Bryan Cranston.

Can't get too worn out feeling bad about those I feel got left out. I have to either ignore that pit in my stomach or avoid the nominations all together.

But I'm really glad to see Jim Parsons get nominated -- especially as a series lead. Too often the "wacky" character is put in the supporting categories, even if their screen time and the show's focus means they should really be leads, which is particularly the case for Parsons. So glad he was recognized.

I try to be polite, but frankly Family Guy is terrible and so are its fans.

I'm glad Emerson got a nod but, as I'm rewatching the series, I think this was his weakest year. Maybe it's better to say he's amazing now but he was amazinger before. He should have a stack of them by now.

I think you can put Hugh Laurie into the nominated even after their dead category. I know it's based off of just one episode, but House got so bad this year that I stopped watching and doubt I'll go back.

And seriously, Family Guy over South Park. If there's any animated series that deserves the Best Comedy nod, it's South Park. Even the best of Family Guy gets nowhere near the worst episode of South Park.

And I'm thinking Unnatural Love was the FOTC show sent to the Emmys -- hence the Carol Brown nomination. And Jemaine got his best work in that one. And I've seen FOTC do Carol Brown live, and it would be fun to see them try and get that audience to participate as chorus of ex-girflriends like they do in concert.

[...] James Poniewozik- Time Magazine [...]

"Family meeting."

How The Shield got snubbed again is beyond me. This was an incredible season with incredible performances from Goggins and Chiklis. Maybe Shawn Ryan pissed off the right (wrong) people or something, but this is ludicrous.

I think Tom Shaw's got it backwards about how the nomination process works: During the nominating process, ATAS members vote for their peers on the basis of their work for the whole season -- the ballot, for instance, says "Bryan Cranston, 'Breaking Bad'", not "Bryan Cranston, 'Breaking Bad', Episode: 'ABQ'". (Except in cases like writing, where you do vote for individual episodes.) The only way that a show's producers can influence which episodes Emmy voters can see is in the selection of episodes in the freebie Emmy "for your consideration" schwag that's sent out to all voters. But shows can send as many or as few episodes as they like -- Showtime, for instance, has been pretty generous in the past about sending out DVDs of whole seasons of their shows, which probably accounts for the Emmy success of things like "Huff". But if you've watched the full season of "Friday Night Lights", it's not like you're supposed to ignore the other 12 episodes and only vote for Connie Britton's work in the season finale.

Once the nominees are chosen, that's when the voting panels are sent DVDs of individual episodes, and they're expected to make their decisions on the basis of those episodes alone. (For the "Best Series" nominations, shows submit 6 episodes to the Emmys; the Emmys then divvy them up into three groups of 2, and send each panel member a disc containing two episodes, so that the panel as a whole has collectively watched all 6 episodes, but any individual member has only watched two. Which probably helps explain why heavily serialized stuff really gets screwed.)

The Emmys and the Grammys seem to me to get by on star power despite their awards not really being connected to reality. Look at the Writing categories. 4 of the 5 writing nominations for comedy and drama, respectively, went to 30 Rock and Mad Men. Sure, both are legitimate choices for best of the year, but they're not that far ahead of the back. The Oscars are bigger than the Emmys because people genuinely think they reflect what the best movie was that year, at least a segment of the population does. Nobody thinks that about the Emmys

The big pleasant surprise for me here is "Family Guy". I'm under no illusions that it's the best show out there, and of course would vote for "30 Rock", "Flight of the Conchords", or "The Office" over it in a heartbeat, but considering the alternative was probably some horrible sitcom like "Two and a Half Men", it's a major step up for Emmy taste. I wish they'd nommed "South Park" instead, though.

Whoops -- just realized that what I posted above wasn't quite accurate. According to this article from last year:

http://theenvelope.latimes.com/awards/env-en-contention4-2008jun04,0,7376867.htmlstory

... while the initial nominating ballot for acting is for the work overall in a series, the acting categories then have a middle stage, where they're narrowed down to a shortlist, a panel then watches sample episodes and picks its favorites. The panel's list is then combined 50/50 with the wider initial vote.

Of course, that was last year. The Emmy folks might've found a way to further complicate things this year.

Ecstatic to see that Jim Parsons was nominated, though extremely disappointed that James Roday wasn't. Sigh.

Umm. . .kinda indifferent on most of the noms - I only watch about 4 of the shows they nominated.

@captainnoble re: The Shield -- "Maybe Shawn Ryan pissed off the right (wrong) people or something, but this is ludicrous"

Actually, Cap, that's a thought that never occurred to me. Shawn Ryan was one of the most vocal members of the the WGA negotiating committee back in 2007, and also wrote the famous e-mail that got a lot of showrunners to strike, not just for writing, but for all show duties. (He even had to miss the filming of the finale of The Shield to honor the strike. That's integrity.)

Heck, even the usual "serialization" curse isn't as relevant here -- "Possible Kill Screen" and "Family Meeting" were sheer juggernauts of storytelling.

I'd hate to think that the Emmy were being political and punitive instead of its usual lazy (that's their answer for ignoring The Wire), but the praise of the last phenomenal season of The Shield was so vocal that it's difficult to imagine such an egregous snub as not being deliberate.

[...] and (the sincerly missed) Pushing Daisies got nominations. Here’s what Time Magazine’s TV critic thinks of today’s nominees. And finally the emmy nominations by numbers. What shows do you [...]