'Spider-Man: No Way Home' Super Snubbed With No Oscar Best Picture Nomination For Blockbuster

[Dial H For Hero]

https://deadline.com/2022/02/spider-man-no-way-home-oscar-nominations-snub-1234928247/

Despite the presence of a troika of web slingers past and present and a bonanza box office, Spider-Man: No Way Home was (basically) nowhere to be found amidst today’s Oscar nominations unveiling.

Even with a vigorous campaign to try to win over the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Tom Holland, Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire starrer just wasn’t able to overcome the enduring bias against superhero movies among voting members. Instead, the mandatory 10 movie Best Picture category will see Belfast, CODA, Don’t Look Up, Drive My Car, Dune, King Richard, Licorice Pizza, Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog and West Side Story battling it out for the big win at the 94th Academy Awards on March 27.

Released on December 17 last year, the Sony-distributed and Jon Watts-directed No Way Home proved a double threat. First of all, the movie was much more widely praised by critics than the usual superpowered Hollywood effort. Additionally, ending the cinema drought that encompassed the past 18 months, the Spidey flick drew audiences back into theaters and smashed pandemic box office records to hit a worldwide haul of nearly $1.8 billion. A result that saw No Way Home swing up to the heights of being the top movie of 2021 and the sixth highest-grossing film ever.

Propelled by its acclaim and surging bottom line, the Zendaya and Benedict Cumberbatch co-starring Spider-Man: No Way Home had looked like a fair bet to replicate the Best Picture perch that fellow Marvel Cinematic Universe flick Black Panther achieved in 2019. However, unlike the multiverse themed latest Spider-Man film, the Ryan Coogler-directed tale of the late Chadwick Boseman portrayed T’Challa centered on crucial issues of racism, colonialism and geopolitics, to name a few.

(Excerpt)

[Chautauquas]

1. Yet another comic book movie

Hollywood seems to be entirely dependent on super-hero movies to make their money.

[Demsrule86]

2. It was actually really good...and the fact that it didn't receive any recognition is why I do not

watch the Oscars or most of the movies nominated. Most of them are super pretentious and often boring. I like being entertained. I think the last time I bothered was when Crash was involved... Crash was not a good movie. Cinderella man which was snubbed was a great movie... so I guess I continue to ignore and the Oscar People can nominate all the obscure boring movies they choose.

[Dial H For Hero]

5. It's been almost 20 years since a popular film won best picture.

The Return of the King (2003).

[Volaris]

14. That's only because there is no category for

'Nobody thought this was possible, but you fuckin lunatics pulled it off.'

RotK was NOT better than Fellowship.

[lagomorph777]

3. Yeah, I just don't get it.

No reason to go to the theatre, COVID or not.

[obamanut2012]

4. It was an outstanding movie and deserves several Oscars

Including for acting.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

6. It's just another genre. They go in and out of favor and can be done well or poorly.

I can't see automatically judging them more harshly than westerns, detective movies, swashbucklers, rom-coms, etc.

[Cuthbert Allgood]

20. There are incredibly talented writers writing comic books right now (and in the past).

But if you makes you feel better to dismiss comic books as literature, have at it, I guess.

[TheBlackAdder]

7. My kids took me to see Spiderman on Christmas night. I pissed off an anti-masker family there.

.

They mom, dad and three bratty kids tried to sit next to me. I got up and moved and they were pissed the whole movie. My kids stayed there and I moved the row in front away from them, and they said the mom kept complaining about me.


Anywho, the movie was pretty good, but the Dr. Strange scenes where the multiverse exposed and the buildings were collapsing went over the top with CGI overload.

Not sure it it was Oscar worthy.

.

[Dr. Strange]

8. Spider-Man was a great film.

But it's probably not Oscar worthy. That's for films that are a little deeper.

Like Dune Part I.

Yeah, that's right, I said it.

[Volaris]

15. Tend to agree with this. Infinity War won best visual effects, but really should

have been nominated for best film.

I say this, because that's the only film I've seen in my entire life where a packed theatre was utterly fucking SILENT for the last 30 minutes of the film.

It was...eerie. And has never been accomplished before or since.
THATS art, done correctly.

[uponit7771]

17. +1

[hurple]

9. The Oscars is not a popularity contest

It is filmmakers honoring other filmmakers.

The new Spider-Man flick was fun but not Oscar-worthy.

The People's Choice Awards is the popularity contest awards show.

[Calculating]

10. The Oscars have always been like this

I feel like the critics want to nominate artsy movies rather than actual fun stuff the mainstream audience like to watch.

[TheRealNorth]

11. I enjoyed No Way Home....

But when I look at other films that won like Titantic, Dances with Wolves, Gladiator, Forrest Gump, or Braveheart, I don't think No Way Home has the staying power of those films.

Of course, it also depends on the competition. I have also seen, "Don't Look Up", and I probably liked that film a little more, if for nothing else that it was a little more engaging.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

12. Who is surprised by this?

The Oscars do not like blockbusters. I was amused at some weak films in the best picture nominees

[Sympthsical]

13. And Don't Look Up got nominated

Which is

That's just one of those, "We liked the message!" nominations.

NWH was pretty good, though.

[Cuthbert Allgood]

18. Don't Look Up is a masterclass in satire.

And that it was written and started pre-pandemic just proves how good of satire it is.

[pecosbob]

16. Perhaps I never understood the the spirit of the award,

but I find it difficult to compare films like The Grapes of Wrath or Lawrence of Arabia with Spiderman - Whatever.

[ruet]

19. I Enjoyed It Well Enough.

I don't think it's even the best, proper, Spiderman film though. Spider-Verse and Spiderman II are superior IMO. That being said, I've only seen one of the movies nominated for BP. ...Dune. IMO that's superior to SM:NWH too.

[Ron Obvious]

21. If I remember correctly, they snubbed Star Wars for Annie Hall too

And were IMO right to do so.

Blockbusters are mostly empty calories these days, Comic Book movies especially so.

[jmowreader]

22. I'm going to make a prediction

The top three will be Drive My Car, Belfast and Licorice Pizza. They’re the kind of film the Academy seems to like: moody, introspective art pieces that lost big money because the uncultured moviegoer doesn’t go to films like that.

[BGBD]

23. Poor spiderman...

I guess they'll just have to find consolation in the multi billions they are going to rake in while whoever wins Best Picture lives on as a jeopardy question one day.

[GreatShakes66]

24. If the person who wrote the article is seriously arguing....

that fan service and huge box office should determine, or at least be a factor in Oscar worthiness, I would strongly disagree. I haven't watched this due to severe superhero movie burnout, so I can't offer an opinion as to whether 'No Way Home' is otherwise worthy, but in my opinion few superhero movies I've seen have been worthy of more than technical category Oscars.

[The Revolution]

25. Two things

1) These awards are really just a marketing tool for the movie industry. So let's not get too carried away about what is "Oscar worthy" or not. The more artsy movies likely benefit a lot more from this additional promotion than a movie that already raked in well over a billion dollars.

2) Like it or not, the film industry is largely associated with liberalism and the left in the public consciousness. This refusal to even nominate the movies that people actually watch helps reinforce this idea that the "left" is full of out of touch elites who don't understand the lives of common, working-class people. Which is really unfortunate.