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For the past three years, I’ve written an article pleading to the Academy to nominate more popular films, as a way to make the Oscars more relevant to more people. I’ve been studying this topic since 2019 and I even built a model to prove it!
Pre-2011, I wouldn’t have had to write articles like this, since the Oscars nominated popular films, including blockbusters, for Best Picture almost every year. Sadly, a few years after the Academy expanded the number of Best Picture nominees to ten spots (partially to make up for The Dark Knight not getting nominated), the Academy mostly stopped nominating popular films for Best Picture. And most of the films that were nominated weren’t even “average” films at the US box office, but often extremely obscure films that grossed less than $20 million. As a result, the viewership dropped.
Fortunately, over the last few years, some mega-blockbusters have gotten nominated for Best Picture (Top Gun: Maverick, Avatar: The Way of Water, Barbenheimer, Wicked) along with some very, very obscure films, but that still helped enough. And the model that I built back in 2019 has mostly predicted where the Oscar ratings will end up: Up!
Alas, this year, I debated even writing another update on the Oscars. The articles haven’t resonated with readers, I get a lot of bad faith responses, and I’m not sure I have any influence on what gets nominated anyway, hence why I didn’t rush to get this out on Monday. (Oscar nomination voting ends today!)
Luckily, this year, there’s big, big news: the Oscars’ telecast is moving to YouTube in three years! And they’re…making less money? What does this mean for viewership? What do I think of this decision strategically for both sides? Well, I have a ton of thoughts!
So that’s the plan today. First up, I’ll suggest what popular films I think should get nominated for Best Picture, then after the paywall, I’ll share all of my strategy thoughts on the Oscars heading to YouTube.
Let’s dive right in!
What Popular Films Should Get Nominated For Best Picture in 2025?
The pick, for the Academy to help their sagging viewership, is obvious:
Tron: Ares.
Kidding!
I often get feedback that I want to “dumb down” the Oscars, but this year, that complaint doesn’t really apply. I didn’t even have to reach outside of Gold Derby’s top fifteen most likely nominees to find genuinely popular films that were in contention for Best Picture. (Gold Derby, a website where experts predict award show results, tends to nail the Best Picture nominees each January.) And I mean a bunch of films. Several popular films are sitting in the top fifteen, including three genuine blockbusters (which I define as over $250 million at the US box office):
- Sinners ($279 million in the US, 84 on Metacritic, 7.5 on 352K reviews on IMDb, A Cinemascore)
- Wicked: For Good ($341 million in the US, 6.5 on 52K IMDb reviews, A Cinemascore)
- Avatar: Fire and Ash ($344 million in the US, 7.4 on 107K reviews on IMDb, A Cinemascore)
And three popular films (which I define as over $100 million at the US box office):
- F1 ($189 million in the US, 68 on Metacritic, 7.7 on 289K on IMDb, A Cinemascore)
- Weapons ($151 million in the US, 81 on Metacritic, 7.5 on 287K reviews on IMDb, A- Cinemascore, which is elite for a horror film)
- Frankenstein (I dubbed this straight-to-streaming film a “legitimate hit” after it crossed 20 million hours in its first week and 18 million, good for seventh place this year in the US. I’d call that popular. 78 on Metacritic, 7.5 on 231K reviews on IMDb)
If those six films get nominated, that would be the most popular Best Picture slate in over a decade! As someone who writes these articles yearly, I would be ecstatic. And if the viewership stays flat, it would prove that the audience for this show has permanently moved on, making the rest of this article a bit moot; regardless of where the telecast airs/streams, be it ABC, Hulu or YouTube, the cultural relevance isn’t coming back.
Now, I do have to make a distinction here, because the two most likely films to get nominated that many people think are popular are just…average? They haven’t actually crossed my $100 million threshold yet:
- Marty Supreme ($70 million in the US, 89 on Metacritic, 8.2 on 32K reviews)
- One Battle After Another (Also at $71 million in the US, 95 on Metacritic, 7.8 on 272K reviews)
A few years ago, I made an exception for Everything Everywhere All At Once, calling it popular even though it only grossed $77 million in the US, but that required lowering my standards. Looking back, I regret lowering the standard.
That said, at least Marty Supreme and One Battle After Another aren’t cultural blank spots like most of the other films that probably will get nominated. There’s a gap between films that earn between $50 and $100 million in the US, which I’d call “average”, and the smaller prestige films that gross less than $20 million. (Or, even worse, less than $10 or $5 million, which is truly obscure.) I doubt that 99% of Americans know what The Secret Agent or Sentimental Value even are.
By the way, I’m still having an internal debate on labeling Frankenstein popular. In some ways, a “popular” streaming film that isn’t a huge hit, like KPop Demon Hunters or Happy Gilmore 2, is really an “average” film in popular culture.
But here’s the thing:
I don’t think the Academy is going to nominate four or five blockbusters/popular films.
Only Sinners, Marty Supreme, One Battle After Another and Frankenstein have top ten odds to get a Best Picture nomination. If that happens, that would mean only one theatrical blockbuster, and maybe only one other popular film will get nominated, if you count Frankenstein as popular. That’s not a great sign for the Oscars’ ratings.
What Other Film Would I Nominate?
If I’m in the Academy, I would nominate the six popular films above and be pretty happy. But I love to throw old wildcards out there, and I have one I’d add to the list, a streaming film that both dominated the cultural conversation and, ironically, also did well in theaters.
- KPop Demon Hunters (77 on Metacritic, might become the biggest streaming film of all time in America, 7.5 on 111K reviews on IMDb).
Critically and aesthetically, few films in 2025 had a more original style and voice. And it obviously resonated with millions and millions of young kids across the country. That’s hard to pull off! Plus, if you want the Oscar ceremony viewers to get younger, this is how you do it.
If I had to cut a film, Wicked: For Good boasts a paltry 58 on Metacritic and 65 on IMDb; it clearly didn’t resonate like other potential nominees. Perhaps you could make the same case for Avatar: Fire and Ash (61 on Metacritic) but I would nominate it like every Lord of the Rings film got a Best Picture nomination, and it has a much better IMDb score. (Personally, I think Zootopia 2 did well too, but I’m realistic that it has no shot.)
In short, if the Academy wants to increase viewership, it has to nominate more blockbusters and popular films for Best Picture. (And more popular songs, which hopefully should happen this year.) There’s a wealth of films (at least five) that both viewers and critics loved, in terms of box office, critical reviews, IMDb, and Cinemascores. (But those films don’t include Marty Supreme or One Battle After Another yet, but at least they’re not unpopular.)
Unfortunately, if I had to make a prediction, I’d guess that this doesn’t happen. We’ll probably get one popular film (maybe Frankenstein) and one blockbuster (Sinners), and viewership stays flat for another year.
Who Wins When the Oscars Go to YouTube?
Of course, if we’re talking Oscars in 2026, we gotta talk about the huge news that the ceremony will leave its historic TV home (ABC) for YouTube.
A framework I probably don’t use enough is the “win/win, lose/lose, win/lose or somewhere in-between” look. A lot of deals can be good for one side, but bad for the other. For example, I think the NBA made a great deal in 2024, but their broadcast partners? Not so much. On the flip side, I think F1 made a bad deal (they just won’t get enough exposure) but it will probably be “fine” for Apple.
With that note, let’s talk about the Oscars going to YouTube. Is this one of those elusive “win/win” deals where each side makes out okay, or did one group concretely win?
Let’s start with the Academy’s perspective…
We’re just getting started with this issue, but the rest is for paid subscribers of the Entertainment Strategy Guy, so if you’d like to find out…
- …whether this deal is a “win/win” or “lose/lose”….
- …why it may not help the Oscars actually boost their awareness…
- …all the open questions about this confusing deal…
- …whether I think the ratings will actually go up…
- …the “global scenario” that likely enticed Academy leadership…
- And a lot more…
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