The Golden Globe nominations came down this morning and you guys, who is going to tell the HFPA that they forgot about Atlanta? It’s a lot, I know, there is SO much television. It’s impossible to watch everything and hard to keep up with new episodes, but even with all the clamoring competition, Atlanta stands out, so is this oversight is just plain forgetfulness on the part of the HFPA? Well, they did nominate Donald Glover for Best Actor in a comedy series, so they do remember that Atlanta exists. So they didn’t forget Atlanta, one of the absolute best shows on television, they just…didn’t nominate it. Look, I love The Good Place, but this was not their best year. Yet Atlanta pulled out Teddy Perkins and the award-granting bodies are just shrugging like that wasn’t totally brilliant.
I don’t want to say that Atlanta—or Black-ish or Bojack Horseman or any show—was snubbed, because there is just so much competition, it is inevitable that someone will get left out. But when nominations come out and one of the best shows, let alone best comedies, on TV isn’t nominated, I’m not sure what to call that. The HFPA loves to anoint new shows, but this year, Barry is the only new comedy that really blew the doors off. Kidding is a great Jim Carrey performance trapped in uneven execution, and The Kominsky Method is merely okay, and if it didn’t star Alan Arkin and Michael Douglas we wouldn’t even be talking about it.
It is so like the HFPA to throw a nod to Donald Glover—ensuring he shows up for the photo ops—while ignoring the overall brilliance of Atlanta. It did win Best Comedy Series last year, so they’re not totally clueless about Atlanta’s value, but this is the uneasy balance of the television categories, where you can have the same nominees every year for year after year (see also: Veep). How do you balance newcomers against shows into their second, third, fourth seasons that continue to get better? It gets boring when a show is nominated five times in a row, but then, when a show does something as excellent as Atlanta did in its second season, and then gets ignored, it’s a little hard to swallow. I don’t know what the fix is, how to strike the balance between making room for newcomers while still recognizing outstanding work from established shows, but I do know that Atlanta had a brilliant second season and we’re already taking it for granted. Also, no Insecure?
See the complete list of nominees here.
