Oscars 2021: The Biggest Takeaways From the 93rd Academy Awards Nominations

Image via MARK RALSTON/AFP via Getty Images

It’s honestly exhausting to say this is the “first time” someone gets nominated in any category. There shouldn’t be any more “firsts” in 2021, especially for women, yet here we are.

Women created some of the best work in Hollywood this year, and they are getting the recognition they worked hard for and rightfully deserved. Chloé Zhao (Nomadland) and Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman) are nominated, making this the first time in Oscars history that more than one woman is up for Best Director in the same year. The first time. Zhao is also now the first woman of color to be nominated in the category.

So far, Kathryn Bigelow remains the first and only woman to date to win the Best Director’s statue when she won for The Hurt Locker in 2009. According to Entertainment Weekly, The Academy has only recognized five women in the category in its long history: 

• Lina Wermüller was the first woman to be nominated for Seven Beauties in 1976.


• Jane Campion received a nomination nearly 20 years later for her 1993 movie The Piano.


• Sofia Coppola received a nomination for Lost in Translation in 2004,


• as did Greta Gerwig in 2018 for Lady Bird.

Women make up half of the population, yet we receive less credit and not enough praise for our work. Maybe after this year, women will be even more inspired to continue creating masterpieces behind the scenes that The Academy will recognize and celebrate. It’s only right. —Karla Rodriguez

While the Golden Globes decided to nominate Zhao, Fennell, and Regina King (director of Amazon Prime’s One Night in Miami...), the Oscars snubbed King for the Best Director nom. Why? Who knows. The film, which tells the story of a fictional meet-up between Malcolm X, Cassius Clay (before he decided to become Muhammad Ali), Jim Brown, and Sam Cooke in a hotel room to discuss the Black community and their roles within it, received three Oscar nominations (Best Song, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Supporting Actor, for Leslie Odom Jr.’s performance as Sam Cooke), so it’s not like the Academy is hating on it. It’s just interesting that King’s feature-length directorial debut wasn’t recognized as well. The Golden Globe nomination was dope; many figured the film would’ve gotten the same nomination for King as well. Maybe next time? —khal

It feels damn good to be able to call LaKeith Stanfield an Oscar-nominated actor. It would feel even better to say he got nominated in the Best Lead Actor category for his stellar performance in Judas and the Black Messiah. Instead, Stanfield appears alongside his costar Daniel Kaluuya in the Best Supporting Actor category, which makes us wonder, who was the lead? The actors are both equally billed on the movie’s posters and are both titular roles. The film tells the story of when Bill O’Neal (Stanfield) infiltrated the Black Panther Party under instructions from FBI Agent Mitchell and J. Edgar Hoover, intending to take down the chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party, Fred Hampton (Kaluuya). Other movies have received two nominations in the Best Actress/Actor category, like Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon did for 1991’s Thelma & Louise. In this case, Kaluuya and Stanfield are up against each other for the supporting actor award.

There are no concrete rules on what makes an actor the lead in a film. The eligibility for either the lead or supporting actor or actress categories is not determined by the amount of time an actor spends on screen or whether they are the first or last character shown. The studio behind the movie decides which category an actor or actress has the best chance at winning. They then launch a “For Your Consideration” campaign for that particular actor or actress in either whichever category they see fit. But regardless of the studios’ campaigning, the voters get the final say. 

“A performance by an actor or actress in any role shall be eligible for nomination either for the leading role or supporting role categories,” The Academy’s rules state. “The determination as to whether a role is a leading or supporting role shall be made individually by members of the branch at the time of balloting.” The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences also honored Judas with six Oscar nominations, including Best Picture.

Stanfield received some criticism for how well he played an FBI informant after the movie’s release. The actor said portraying such a hated figure in history also took a toll on his mental health, and he had to go to therapy to help him deal with his panic attacks. That type of emotional and physical devotion to the role should’ve landed him in the Best Actor category. —Karla Rodriguez

What went wrong with Malcolm & Marie? It seemed as if movie fans and critics alike were awaiting the release of the Sam Levinson film since it was announced last year. It created a buzz for being the first feature film to complete production during the pandemic, but it was also Zendaya’s first project since winning an Emmy for her role in Euphoria. But instead of praise, it received mixed reviews when it was released on Netflix in January.

Many viewers applauded Zendaya for her acting chops, especially during the scene when Marie is wielding a knife, while others expressed their displeasure for the way Malcolm (John David Washington) aggressively devoured Kraft macaroni and cheese. Some fans deeply related to the couple’s dysfunction, while some couldn’t comprehend being in a relationship as “toxic” as theirs. Levinson also received his fair share of criticism in regards to his film with people saying that the Netflix project was a self-indulgent project where he used a Black man as a mouthpiece to vent about his frustrations regarding movie critics.

Malcolm & Marie was an ambitious movie to put together on the fly, and they did their best to portray what love might look like to some people, but it wasn’t enough. Zendaya received a nod from the Critics’ Choice Movie Award for Best Actress, but the film ended up getting no love from The Academy. —Karla Rodriguez

The absolute biggest contender of this year’s Oscars is Mank, David Fincher’s Netflix Original about the man behind Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane. We knew this was going to be Oscars bait—it’s Fincher’s first since 2014’s Gone Girl, and it’s a film about Hollywood, featuring everyone from the mighty Gary Oldman to Amanda Seyfried, who gave a critically-acclaimed performance. With 10 nominations—including Best Picture, Best Actor and Actress for Oldman and Seyfried, respectfully, and Best Director—Mank leads all. (There were six films that scored six nominations apiece: The Father, Judas and the Black Messiah, Minari, Nomadland, Sound of Metal, and The Trial of the Chicago 7. Promising Young Woman pulled in five noms as well.) It also highlights how Netflix has moved into the AWARDS SZN space—don’t forget, the ensemble courtroom drama The Trial of the Chicago 7 is theirs as well. This year, Netflix received 35 Oscar nominations. 

What does this say for the future of streaming services in the AWRDS SZN space? That’s hard to say. Netflix will surely continue to press on, gunning for more hardware. The same isn’t always said for services like Hulu or Disney+ (although Soul, Disney’s Mulan, and The One and Only Ivan helped give Disney+ its first Oscar nominations). Will a service like HBO Max, who is dropping a lot of original content, ever plan on dropping a Max exclusive with eyes on the prize? Could Hulu rally the troops and get in the firefight? Find out next time on Dragon Ball Z! —khal

Minari received six well-deserved Oscar nominations. The recognition comes after being left out of the main categories at the Golden Globes and only winning Best Foreign Film, which caused controversy over the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s eligibility rules. (The film, which was produced in the United States, was excluded from the Best Picture category because more than 50 percent of the dialogue is in a language other than English.) The Academy was sure to include the film and its stars in the main categories, though, including Lee Isaac Chung for Best Director, Steven Yeun for Best Actor, Youn Yuh-Jung for Best Supporting Actress, as well as a nomination in the Best Picture category. It also landed noms for Best Original Screenplay and Best Original Score.

Minari centers around a Korean-American family moving to Arkansas from California to start fresh. Sure, the Yi family are immigrants, but the story is as American as they come. It’s about a man, Jacob, having a dream of having his own farm, and sacrificing it all to make it a reality and create a better life for himself, his wife, and his two children. Viewers get to watch a family adjusting to a new way of life, taking care of each other, and making sacrifices together for the greater good. There’s nothing foreign about that, except for them being bilingual...but so are 20% of people living in the United States.

With this recognition, Yeun has become the first Asian-American ever nominated in the Best Actor category. After a long, respected career that can be compared to Meryl Streep’s, Yuh-Jung is getting her much-deserved recognition from The Acadamy at age 73. Minari has as much of a chance at winning in these categories as its contenders. As for me, I want to see any of them win, not only because the story stayed with me but also because I want to watch how young Alan Kim reacts to the movie and his castmates taking home a few trophies—if it’s anything like how he reacted at the Critics Choice Awards, it’s bound to be adorable. —Karla Rodriguez

The nine actors who received Oscar nominations are a part of history, setting a record for being the most diverse nomination class ever at the Oscars. That includes Riz Ahmed, who received a Best Actor nom for Sound of Metal; Ahmed (The Night Of) has become the first actor of Pakastani descent to ever receive any kind of acting Oscar nomination. That category has made history, as this class is the first year that the Best Actor category wasn’t predominately white. An added note: Chadwick Boseman’s posthumous Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom nomination makes him the first actor of color to ever receive a nom after passing away.

While this is great to see—and exactly what we ask for when we talk about #OscarsSoWhite—it’s still insane to think that nine acting nominations for people of color is a record...in 2021. Progress is progress, and in the very near future, with real work and determination, this conversation can be a thing of the past. “Change doesn’t happen overnight” and all that jazz. I just long for a time where this is the norm...or more diverse. —khal