Emmys 2026
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Colbert, Kimmel, and the Battle of Late Night
While covering the Academy Awards may have its challenges, the Emmys are a much bigger venture. Twenty-three awards will be handed out at the Primetime Emmys on September 14, honoring nominees across the comedy, drama, and limited series categories, plus variety and reality competition shows. Meanwhile, about 100 more Emmys are awarded in craft-focused categories (and, randomly, guest acting) at two Creative Arts Emmy ceremonies a week before the main show. If all of this weren’t enough to keep up with, the Television Academy’s ever-changing rules and regulations also mean its award categories are in constant flux. Take, for example, […]
by Tyler Coates on Jun 17, 2026 -
Hacks and The Comeback Beat the Odds
The Comeback always seems to coincide with a new existential crisis facing television. In 2005, the HBO comedy series—created by Michael Patrick King and Lisa Kudrow, and starring the then recent Friends actress as a former sitcom star desperate to return to the spotlight—was a cutting satire about reality TV, which threatened to cheapen the medium with its low costs and tabloid-friendly drama. The show’s initial limited run garnered a cult following, and HBO revived it in 2014 when reality TV had achieved a certain level of legitimacy—but the industry was on the cusp of an overhaul with the impending streaming wars, churning […]
by Tyler Coates on Jun 10, 2026 -
The Spinoff Comes of Age
Showrunner Bruce Miller admits that when he first read The Handmaid’s Tale, he thought the ending of Margaret Atwood’s dystopian novel was a little unsatisfying: “I was like, ‘Well, I hope there’s a sequel!’” Two decades later, Miller was at the helm of the Hulu series based on Atwood’s book. The show was an immediate hit—it premiered in 2017, during the first Trump administration, at a moment when its themes were particularly resonant. The evocative image of the red cape and white bonnet donned by star Elisabeth Moss and her fellow handmaids became not only an image of subjugation, but one […]
by Tyler Coates on Jun 3, 2026 -
Widow’s Bay and the Genre Jump Scare
In recent years, a trend has emerged in horror: auteurs have moved into the genre after first establishing themselves in sketch comedy. In 2018, Jordan Peele of Key & Peele won the Best Original Screenplay Oscar for Get Out, his feature directorial debut (which he would follow up with 2019’s Us and 2022’s Nope). This year, Amy Madigan won Best Supporting Actress for her devious turn in the horror film Weapons, the second feature from Zach Cregger (after 2022’s Barbarian), a founding member of the comedy troupe The Whitest Kids U’ Know. There’s clearly a connection between comedy and horror. Both genres succeed by getting a response—a laugh […]
by Tyler Coates on May 29, 2026 -
Ready or Not, the Emmys Are Coming
To quote Schitt’s Creek’s Moira Rose: My favorite season? Awards. And for some of us, it’s a year-round venture. Weeks before the Academy Awards took place on March 15, I began tracking the dozens of shows that would soon be campaigning for Emmys. The Emmys take place each year in September, but like its cinematic counterpart, the preparation begins many months earlier. After all, Oscar futures are currently being debated as Cannes rolls into its second week. Similarly, the Emmy luncheons, billboards, screenings, and Q&As have been in the works for a long time already. But we’re now in the […]
by Tyler Coates on May 20, 2026
