By Bella Holt

“And the Emmy goes to… Shōgun!” was a phrase uttered a total of 18 times at the 76th Emmy Awards, making the “Outstanding Drama Series” a record-breaker in Japanese language shows. Beloved comedy The Bear didn’t trail far behind, amassing 23 nominations and 11 wins at the awards ceremony. Interestingly, Hulu’s Only Murders in the Building only won in 3 categories despite its whopping 21 nominations. In the limited series category, Netflix’s Baby Reindeer rose up as it won 6 of their 11 nominations but at the cost of its competitor’s limited number of wins. Out of all the shows that were nominated for drama, comedy, and limited series awards, why is there such a defined “winner” of each genre?

Regardless of membership status to the Television Academy, anyone can enter or be entered for an Emmy nomination. From there, the nearly 22,000 members of the Television Academy vote on “the entries they feel exemplify excellence in their categories,” an incredibly subjective qualification. These facts bring up a key question: is there an objective measure that decides the “excellence” of a TV show?

Let’s examine one of these “winner” shows. Despite its 96% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, The Bear is an incredibly controversial “comedy” nominated this year due to its intense plot material. Mina Feldman ’25 describes this tactic as a “hack” for receiving awards. “If you put a drama in competition with a bunch of comedies,” she describes, “the drama will win because it’s perceived as more substantial.” The genre of comedy is one rarely treated with the same level of respect that is offered to its drama counterparts due to its lighthearted nature, which is therefore interpreted as insignificance and a lack of meaning in contrast to serious, “deep” drama series. Matilda Fletcher ’25 adds that “the main catalyst [of the issue] is the fact that [The Bear] has won so many awards,” and therefore “people feel like it’s taking up space in an area that it doesn’t really deserve”. 

Taking into consideration that all three of the aforementioned “winner” shows—those being The Bear, Shōgun, and Baby Reindeer—share the same dark tone and subject matter, it seems safe to assume that part of an Emmy win is judged by the respectability of a show’s acting style and genre. That being said, the quality of these shows should not be disregarded simply because they win awards. As Fletcher points out, “it’s a common trap to fall into disliking something just because it’s popular”, a fact that is not limited to TV shows. However, the appreciation of dramas over comedies is not an invisible one, and should be given further consideration in order for future award shows to sustain their values of uplifting quality movies and TV shows.