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Emmy Nominations: It's Not HBO, It's TV

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The 2008 Emmy nominations were announced this morning, and I watched live, an experience mainly worthwhile for the experience of watching them flash a BREAKING NEWS title card on E!, as if it were a presidential assassination. I’m working on a print TIME review right now and I may have more to post later, but click on the jump for some of my first reactions—i.e., the usual critics’ whinging about who Emmy left out, and even a few words of praise:


* I haven’t taken the time to go back and check, but this has to be the first time HBO has been entirely shut out in the drama category since the dawn of The Sopranos era. On the other hand, maybe it’s more fitting that The Wire can go out with its purity of outrage and injustice intact. And at least an HBO-less drama category may be a little more interesting. Big cheers went up for Mad Men, to which announcer Kristin Chenoweth responded, “I know!” (Both she and co-presenter Neil Patrick Harris got supporting comedy noms.)

* However, that Big Love would not score a single actress nomination, except Ellen Burstyn for a guest spot, is a travesty.

* I’m a little surprised that Matthew Broderick didn’t get a guest comedy actor nod for 30 Rock, although I’m not 100% sure he was submitted.

* Tops in the it’s-an-honor-just-to-be-nominated category goes to Bryan Cranston, who deserved it for his absolutely stunning transformation in Breaking Bad; he shares the category with Gabriel Byrne, Michael C. Hall, Jon Hamm, Hugh Laurie, and the winner, James Spader.

* Good to see Pushing Daisies getting some acting love, though there could have been room for it in the comedy category. (Entourage? Really?) Not to mention the omitted Flight of the Conchords. But as for the best-comedy-actor category, Alec Baldwin had to have it sealed up from the second the honkies shot him, no?

* The miniseries category is testament to just how utterly weak the genre is right now outside pay cable. Two nominees—Tin Man and The Andromeda Strain—were among the worst shows I saw on TV last season, period. This enabled John Adams to make up for some of HBO’s lost ground in the drama category, reaping 23[!] nominations.

* After the season of the high-profile actress, Emmy obliged, backing up the nomination truck for Glenn Close, Kyra Sedgwick, Holly Hunter and Mary Louise Parker.

* Speaking of which, sorry to be a killjoy, but at some point we have to have a conversation about just how good best-drama nominee Damages really is. Would it be picking up any nominations if Close hadn’t been cast?

* And yes, for the record, I also would have liked to see Battlestar Galactica get the recognition it deserves. I’d also like to be six-foot-three.

The Emmy site has the complete list of nominations.