Sunday was potentially a big night for Star Trek with multiple nominations for three different series at two different award shows. Unfortunately, the franchise came away from the evening empty.
Picard and Strange New Worlds lose out at the Emmys
Sunday was the second of two nights the Television Academy handed out awards for the Creative Arts Emmys in Los Angeles. Star Trek went into the night with a total of five nominations. Up for contention was the second season of Picard with four nominations and the first season of Strange New Worlds with one nomination.
Both Picard and Strange New Worlds lost out for Outstanding Sound Editing For A Comedy Or Drama Series (One Hour) to Stranger Things. Picard also lost Outstanding Prosthetic Makeup to Stranger Things, Outstanding Period And/Or Character Makeup (Non-Prosthetic) to Pam & Tommy, and Outstanding Fantasy/Sci-Fi Costumes to What We Do In The Shadows.
This is the first time since 2018 that Star Trek has not won a single Emmy award.
Lower Decks doesn’t pick up Hugo
A nice surprise this year was Lower Decks picking up its first Hugo Award nomination. The episode “wej Duj” was nominated for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form with some stiff competition (as the World Science Fiction Society doesn’t separate animated and live-action). And at the award ceremony held at the World Science Fiction Convention in Chicago on Sunday Lower Decks lost out to The Expanse. This was only the second Hugo nomination for the Trek franchise in the last decade, and Star Trek hasn’t had a Hugo win since 1995 (for TNG’s “All Good Things”).
Star Trek still has a chance for some awards in 2022 as Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Lower Decks, And Discovery are up for a total of six Saturn Awards. Winners will be announced on October 25.
Keep up with all the Star Trek Universe at TrekMovie.com.
Wow! I had hoped Strange New Worlds would win.
I can’t imagine how SNW could win in any of the technical categories, sound least of all. I don’t know which episode Paramount submitted for nominations, but the Emmy sound technical voters would have reviewed every episode.
Just the dialogue by the actor playing the Doctor alone would ensure a pass by the voters. I don’t know if it’s the actor or the production manager, but I’ve never seen in 1 show so much unintelligible dialog – where his line just drops away or turns into mumbling – dialog that could, should, and would be picked up in post ADR with a showrunner, producers, and UPM that actually know what they’re doing.
I’m really surprised that SNW could even get nominated in this category – – papering your show with sound effects does not demonstrate skill and artfulness…
Almost without exception this is a soundstage based show, there’s no excuse for the unrelenting wave of amateur production mistakes and I’m sure the voters felt the same way – especially up against shows with so many sequences shot in the wild.
Dude, I think you might need a better sound system and/or streaming device them. I had no such issues with my (admittedly high-end) AV set up with my AppleTV4K streaming device and 7.1 Atmos system.
And/or, you may be confusing Babs raspy voice with sound quality issues…again, he sounds fine on my set-up, but his raspy voice takes some getting used to (if you don’t believe, me, play back his scenes from Dune Part 1 (which I doubt you would claim to be a movie with poor sound quality) and you will see that part of this is just the way he talks.
Agree with you 100%, I assume he is watching the show using his television’s built in crappy speakers. I have a lower end sound system than you: 7 year old Onkyo receiver, only 5.1, can’t do atmos, but I have never had an issue with the sound in SNW. Everything from sound effects to voices are crystal clear and not at all muffled or trailing.
Babs has a unique voice for sure and that could play into Bee Dee’s issue. But I’ve also never had a problem understanding the dialogue, and frankly, I love his voice and delivery.
Don’t mind me, I’m just peeling some grapes so I can do a little foley later for the sound of my eyes rolling.
Oh well better to have been nominated and lost to not have been nominated at all! ;)
It’s really quite lovely that Lower Decks was recognized with a Hugo nod.
So true! Very proud of Lower Decks! :)
EXACTLY!
Shucks!
I mean… it’s not like Picard ever really stood a chance.
True. Picard sucked hard.
I myself love Strange New Worlds, Prodigy and Lower Decks more than Picard and Discovery combined, to be honest, but hey, to each their own, right?
Well, it was for sound editing and makeup…. Not story.
True! And yeah those were fine at least.
Yes. Crappy story or not what they did with the prosthetics and makeup for the OG Borg Queen was great.
Well this really isn’t about story quality in these categories tho right?
Next Year:”PICARD WAS ROBBED!”
Next Year: Picard wins several awards. (fingers crossed for season 3)
Not exactly a shocker in PIC’s case. The editing wasn’t impressive, and costume didn’t have a chance to do anything particularly eye-catching in a 21st century setting (though the dystopian outfits were pretty spiffy). I would have thought the Borg queen would have been a good bet for make-up, though. Maybe it’s not as impressive after you’ve done it a few times?
Lower Decks versus The Expanse? Seriously?
LMFAO^2 ;-)
Lower Decks is worthy competition to the Expanse, unlike Disco or Picard.
Yep, LDS is awesome!! 👍
Discovery and Picard, eh, not so much. 😕
In regards to wins of Oscars/Emmys, Saturn and Hugo awards, for the three Kelvin movies to date versus the full two seasons of Lower Decks, JJ Abrams Trek series is blowing out LDS 3-0.
Moreover, DSC won the Saturn last year for best sf series, and that would have been in the year that also had LDS Season 1 in qualification for Saturn, but it did not garner a Saturn. Heck, DSC won another Saturn besides that one last year, and so did Picard. These Saturns aren’t really all that hard for a quality Trek series to win, but they do depend on people outside of core Trek fans to vote for them, and so that means that you get a more objective view on the true quality of these shows/movies versus a bunch of well meaning fan opinions.
The last two seasons of The Expanse weren’t very good. Lower Decks was better.
Frankly I’d be shocked if it finished in the top three in that Hugo category given For all Mankind and Arcane are vastly superior. Comparing LDS to Ron Moore’s For All mankind is freaking laughable. And Here’s a prediction: Arcane is going to wipe the floor with Lower Decks for best animated sf series at the Saturns. Arcane is on a whole other level in terms of how great a animated genre series can be. It’s good that a lot of fans enjoy this series, but I wouldn’t get your hopes up in terms of any Emmy, Hugo or Saturn awards anytime soon.
Well, at least Lower Decks got nominated for a Hugo award even if it didn’t win in the end. You may notice that Discovery and Picard didn’t even manage to get nominated. In fact, Lower Decks is the first Star Trek production since 2018 to get a Hugo nomination. And DSC didn’t win back then, either.
Congrats on that nomination. Incidentally, Trek 2009 also received a Hugo nomination — so a Kelvin movie got one!
How about we continue this discussion when LDS wins any award of significance (i.e. Emmy, Saturn, Hugo)? DSC and Picard’s “trophy case” is respectable at least, while LDS’s is embarrassingly empty given all the hype and supposed high quality of the series.
Talk is cheap. Let’s see some results here.
Just a reminder that DS9 only got 4 creative Emmys (tied with Enterprise and fewer than Voyager) over its lifetime, never won any Saturn awards on its own (Voyager won 2), and was only nominated for 2 Hugos (also tied with Enterprise, but the competition back then included motion pictures). So I think one has to take any awards with a grain of salt and lots of context while celebrating nominations.
Good example. DS9 was nominated for Emmy Awards every year of its run, including for makeup, cinematography, art direction, special effects, hairstyling, music (direction and composition), and costumes. Of these, it won two for makeup (for “Captive Pursuit” and “Distant Voices”), one for special visual effects (for “Emissary”), and one for its main title theme music (by composer Dennis McCarthy). It was also nominated for two Hugo Awards in the category of Best Dramatic Presentation for “The Visitor” and “Trials and Tribble-ations”.
Trying to suggest this (and I am not saying you are) has some form of equivalency with LDS’s single Hugo nomination is incredulous.
How about we have this conversation again when LDS actually wins something?
Maybe we just take a measured view of things? DS9 didn’t get the awards love it deserved, LD has gotten a Hugo nod after only 2 seasons and it’s not even a live action drama (and as an animated series it’s never going to be up for as many awards as Disco or Picard can be)…
…but awards are also highly subjective and easily taken out of context so it’s a rather silly thing for us to get worked up about. “Threshold” won an Emmy the year “The Visitor” was shut out.
I hadn’t watched Lower Decks at all as the premise just didn’t particularly interest me. On a lark I decided to watch the first episode of season 3 today and made it thru about 10 minutes before switching it off. I know it’s supposed to be a comedy but Mariner was annoyingly grating from the first second I saw her. And while I like an easter egg as much as the next guy, the sheer inundation of references and callbacks just in that first 10 minutes was so overwhelming as to be a total distraction.
Prodigy ended up being quite a watchable show as I found the characters and writing interesting but this just wasn’t for me.
Well said!
I love Star Trek and Stranger Things equally, to be honest. Congrats to the cast and crew of the latter on the win and those of the former on their noiminations.
I love Stranger Things, I really do, but it’s a nice little standalone show and nothing to compare with an actual uberfranchise like Trek. Trek is my #1 and Stranger Things is my #11 (pun intended)… Yes 007 is #7 :-)
Stranger Things has morphed into shock-value fantasy now — not much science fiction left…my opinion
I sometimes get the sense that the hardcore scifi world doesn’t consider Trek “real” sci-fi.
Maybe that’s because it got really stupid. E.g. the dumbest thing I ever saw on Television was the flying turbo lift… and it was on Star Trek… *shake head* and *external shame for who ever decided this*.
I think it’s the exact opposite tbh. I think shows like Stranger Things and the like, while SciFi by definition are considered more artistic by award shows and Trek is considered still to be not real award contention. Not for the actor awards anyways.
Exactly!
I don’t think the current shows are really giving their actors anything truly meaty where it’s a great injustice they they’ve not been nominated for more things. I think they’re lucky to have had as many nods for acting from the Saturn Awards as they’ve gotten.
There’s a wealth of craft awards which Discovery has been a heavyweight for, deservedly.
Which of course explains why the hard science fiction masterpiece, Stranger Things wins so many of those awards. /s
Whoops! LOL :-))
To be fair, Lower Decks was really the only one that had a shot.
Actually Picard and SNW had much better shots in their categories — probably finishing second or third in those categories, while I would be shocked if LDS finished above #4 for that Hugo. It’s too bad we can get the voting totals on all of these.
There was no way LDS can win when competing against The Expanse or Arcane. I love Lower Decks, but I’ll be pissed if the Expanse didn’t win.
It may be disappointing, but I wouldn’t be too put out. There can be lots of deserving shows but only one winner; being nominated but not winning is better than not being nominated at all. And while I haven’t seen all the nominees, I will attest the winners I’ve seen have excellent work in those categories, and are every bit as deserving as the Trek shows.
Society is literally awash in broadcast content these days, that these shows stood out enough to be considered for a nomination is an achievement in and of itself. Will these Trek productions need to step up their game to win? Of course. It’s sufficient to congratulate the winners, and move on.
— adapted from coaches speeches to all teams that ever lost in the first round of the playoffs. ;-)
Not surprising, especially since Lower Decks was up for a Drama award. Stranger Things certainly deserves its wins.
I liked the Expanse through Season 3, maybe some of season 4, but 5 and 6 were pretty bad with unbearable characters and dull storytelling.
I guess I shouldn’t feel bad for not watching past season 3 of the Expanse then. ;)
I love LDS, but Stranger Things definitely deserves the win. And LDS has probably many years to come.
I’m not surprised that SNW lost to Stranger Things, they just have a higher budget and a wider appeal. Stranger Things won for their incredible makeup for Vecna, nothing in SNW came close to what ST makeup department did. And this is coming from someone who loved SNW s1, it’s up there with DS9 as one of my favorites.
SNW was nominated for sound editing, not makeup. Picard was nominated for makeup and lost out to Stranger Things.
As Sarek would say, “They need to take the lesson.”
That is, they need to figure out what’s holding them back across the board.
Budget. Trek just doesn’t have it. Then again the way Netflix is going these days I’m not sure other shows will for that much longer either.
Yet DSC and Picard just won three Saturns last year, plus DSC has two freaking Emmy Awards in it’s portfolio?
There is nothing holding them back here other than you can’t win every year.
Now, for Lower Decks, I just don’t think that objectively it’s perceived as that great a series outside of core Trek fans, so I think it’s unrealistic to expect that it’s going to win any major awards anytime soon.
But I think SNW is headed for multiple awards in the next several years.
Fans on comments sections are insanely biased against Discovery and Picard. For the record, Picard and Discovery had as much streaming demand, if not more than, SNW. They are often in the top ten streaming-only shows in the US while they were being aired. Out of the three live action shows, Discovery has the highest production value and unique takes.
Lower Decks, meanwhile, often only had about half the audience demand. It’s apparent in all engagement analytics across the board, from YouTube views, social media engagement, Parrot Analytics, and even the number of discussions on this very blog. Don’t get me wrong – I love the show, but it’s not as popular as some fans believe it to be.
The Orville wasn’t even on the radar of anything until it was on Disney Plus with the fan petition campaigns jacking up the numbers artificially.
Yep! 100% correct!
This is a weird argument as I remember reading that one of the biggest reasons for Trek going to streaming was for it to have a bigger budget. Now the question can then be asked is if that isn’t the case then why the heck did it go to streaming in the first place and why the heck doesn’t it get the supposed big budgets?
I think Trek as a whole has a high budget. But with so many shows in production I can only imagine that the various shows are going to have to share the wealth so to speak. Trek isn’t ever going to pull in Stranger Things numbers and typically the budgets are edited to reflect that. Now with SNW being so successful this year I would be more than happy to be totally wrong.
Trek does have a very high budget. It’s always going to be highly competitive in the creative Emmys for certain categories. But competition is higher now, they can’t simply do a story set in the 1920s and expect hair and makeup nods automatically.
If they want to get more notices in general, the writing needs to step up. But the acting and technical side of things has been fortified for that eventuality.
Very simple: “empty” due to a glut of Trek stuff.
Message to P+: quantity does not equal quality.
So?
Not surprised at all. As good as Nu-Trek is at times, it’s still not at the caliber of the best of Berman, Bennet, or Roddenberry Era Treks.
You know that Trek has never won that many Emmys outside the craft ones right?
Good point
Truncated by Amazon, I found the last season of “The Expanse” to be very rushed and a real letdown — yet another often great genre series that didn’t stick the landing (sigh).
That said, it was still better SF than most of modern Trek.
Strange New Worlds don’t need no Emmys.