Five Emmy Nominees Who Must Win If We Expect To Maintain Order In The Universe

Two things are true about most big award shows like the Emmys. The first is that they’re very silly on a macro level. Art is a subjective thing and trying to select an objective winner from a field that contains thousands of options on hundreds of channels and streaming channels is an exercise in lunacy. It’s impossible. Even just narrowing it all down to a list of a few nominees is a process that should take teams of experts many years and burn through dozens and dozens of spreadsheets. We should all recognize this as madness and treat it as such.

The second true thing is that, once the nominations are announced, I will promptly toss all that rational thought straight into the nearest toilet and develop strong beliefs about who should win and why. I will get heated. I will get mad about it. It happened again today, literally moments after the nominees were announced. It’s not a healthy way to live, recognizing something as utter hooey and deciding to get furious about it anyway. But here we are. I feel okay about it.

Below, I have listed the five nominees I am most passionate about in this moment, as well as various threats I may or may not follow through with should they not be recognized. For legal reasons, let’s say this is all in jest.

I won’t really do any of this.

Unless you disregard my demands.

Haha.

But really.

Pay attention.

DO IT

Nominee: Jean Smart
Nominated For: Outstanding Comedy Actress (Hacks), Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Limited Series (Mare of Easttown)
What I Will Do If She Does Not Win: Seize control of the oceans and send floods of salty wet chaos through the streets of Hollywood

It is extremely cool that Jean Smart is having this huge career resurgence here in 2021, in part because she deserves it on the merits and in part because she’s just cool, in general. The best way to cap it all off is to open the Emmys by handing her a trophy and then just continuing to hand her trophies until her knees start to buckle under the weight of all the awkwardly shaped hunks of gold, or until she asks us to stop. But that seems a little unlikely at this point, as she was only nominated for these two, one for comedy and one for drama. That’s still pretty cool, though, to be recognized in two different styles of acting on two different shows in the same year. I hope she wins both. I suppose I will settle for one. But I will have my trident by my side all night just in case.

COME ON

Nominee: Brett Goldstein
Nominated For: Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series (Ted Lasso)
What I Will Do If He Does Not Win: Upend every full trash can on my street for the next four weeks

The tricky thing here is the competition. The field is just loaded, and loaded specifically with his Ted Lasso co-stars. That’s why my threat is less severe. Because, while it is very important to me on a personal level that the man responsible for bringing Roy Kent to the world be recognized for doing so, I don’t see how I can stay angry for too long if the award goes to Brendan Hunt for playing Coach Beard or to Nick Mohammed for playing Nate, or even to Kenan Thompson or Bowen Yang for their work on SNL. How has Kenan not won an Emmy for acting yet? That’s infuriating, too. I might just knock over those trash cans regardless of the outcome at this point. Someone is getting hosed here. Give them all a trophy.

No. No. We stick with Roy. The man says the f-word better than anyone else on television. And look at how he reacted to this nomination.

Has to count for something.

LISTEN TO ME

Nominee: Rosie Perez
Nominated For: Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series (The Flight Attendant)
What I Will Do If She Does Not Win: Drive across the country switching the weird orange shredded cheese and the carrots in random salad bars

Rosie Perez is the best and has been the best for a few decades now. She was so good in The Flight Attendant, and one of the main reasons the show became more than just the fizzy and fun flight of fancy it could have been. She provided the menace, the stakes, the level of real concern that helps to elevate a stylish murder mystery into something more. She did exactly what one needs to do in a supporting role: carried a handful of small scenes, shaded in the areas around the bright colors, and stole a few little moments here and there. It was great. Rosie Perez is great. And I really want to hear her give an acceptance speech when she’s done, because Rosie Perez is the coolest.

I SWEAR TO GOD

Nominee: WandaVision
Nominated For: Outstanding Original Music And Lyrics (“Agatha All Along”)
What I Will Do If It Does Not Win: Bees

I suppose this one is a long shot because it is up against Bo Burnham. I could absolutely see voters looking at his nomination and checking that box because his special, Inside, was deep and groundbreaking and introspective and dealt with the emotions we all worked through over a year of being largely stuck inside too, and that’s fair. It was all of those things. But please do not look at that and discount “Agatha All Along” as light superhero fluff. It was so good. And funny. And actually important to the plot of a surprisingly good and fun show. And it gave Kathryn Hahn an excuse to go just as huge as she wanted with it, which is not something we should ever discount. Because if you do…

Bees.

But again, I’m just joking.

Unless I’m not.

Disregard the buzzing you hear.

MOFF GIDEON

Nominee: Giancarlo Esposito
Nominated For: Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Drama Series (The Mandalorian)
What I Will Do If He Does Not Win: Send a strongly worded letter to my congressperson

Three things worth noting here:

• Giancarlo Esposito has somehow never won an Emmy for playing Gus Fring across two excellent shows over a period of like 10 years, which is madness
• We should give him an Emmy
• I would like it a lot if someone won a prestigious award for playing a character named “Moff Gideon”

There. It’s settled.