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Emmy experts analyze Limited Series race: Why ‘Adolescence' is ‘the one to beat' as voting begins
Is the Best Limited Series Emmy race over before it's even begun? With voting beginning Thursday, four top Emmy experts — Variety's Clayton Davis, The Hollywood Reporter's Scott Feinberg, Indiewire's Marcus Jones, Deadline's Pete Hammond — predict the race with moderator and Gold Derby editor-in-chief Debra Birnbaum in our latest slugfest (watch above).
"I can start and end with Adolescence," Hammond declares as the others laugh in agreement. "The race here we're going to talk about is for nominees two, three, four, and five. But I think [the eventual winner is] Adolescence for every reason you can imagine: its global reach, what it's talking about, the extraordinary acting, directing, writing. Everything about this is once in a generation. This thing is taking off and it isn't going to stop at nominations. This is the one to beat."
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Feinberg notes how it's actually "twice in a generation" because something similar happened last year with Baby Reindeer, which also aired on Netflix. He then singles out Monsters for "the whole conversation" it created throughout the country. "Whether you like it or not — and I'm annoyed by how much I think it's ridiculous talking about paroling the Menendez brothers — it's in the news every day."
Birnbaum mentions how Adolescence was a "binge drop" on Netflix that "nobody knew anything about," and then "built momentum" to become a global phenomenon. She notes, "And again, going back to my point about voters watching the thing that they know they have to talk about, this is it."
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Davis refers to The Penguin as "the one to beat before Adolescence showed up," adding, "But here's the thing: I maybe would have been a little hesitant, because genre superhero doesn't do that well at Emmys. Ask WandaVision [and its stars] Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, and Kathryn Hahn, who went home empty-handed. They just don't typically go for genre superhero stuff, but I think it's undoubtedly going to get in."
The pundits name-drop more limited series in the running for a nomination, including Dying for Sex, Zero Day, Black Mirror, Sirens, Apple Cider Vinegar, Disclaimer, Presumed Innocent, Dope Thief, Long Bright River, and Say Nothing. And TV movies up for some Emmy love include Rebel Ridge, Mountainhead, and Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy.
"I think we're bringing up a lot of shows that we're going to see represented in the acting categories," Jones says. "Say Nothing is that prestige pick that has picked up the Scripter and the Peabody, etc. I do think it's on people's radar, but is not probably going to get acting nominations, and so people can take all that passion toward making sure the show is nominated."
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