The Primetime Emmy Awards air this Sunday night. It has kind of snuck up on you, hasn't it? The biggest award of the night is probably the one for Best Drama.
The Sopranos, Lost, 24 – all recent winners of the Best Drama. This year's batch of nominees is diverse and highly-acclaimed –
Damages, Dexter, Lost, Boston Legal, House and
Mad Men. Who will win? We take a look at which of the series have the best chance to win, and which don't, in our preview of the Emmys Best Drama category below.
The Long-Shots
Damages
Deserved nomination or not, no one has really heard of
Damages. It was on F/X, critically well-regarded, but if you asked the average person on the street what the series is about, they wouldn't be able to tell you.
Ted Danson,
Glenn Close, and
Rose Byrne are the big names of
Damages, and Close probably has a better chance of taking home gold this Sunday than the series does of winning Best Drama.
Dexter
As great as
Dexter is, it's probably too extreme to win a big mainstream award. This probably isn't
Dexter's last nomination either, and maybe it will get a win sometime in the future if the series picks up in popularity. But, as it stands right now,
Dexter doesn't have the name recognition. Without the press, I don't see Academy voters opting for an extremely graphic show like
Dexter over more mass-friendly fare.
The Dark Horse
Lost
You never know with
Lost. It wins, it doesn't get nominated, the voters hate it, the voters love it.
Lost, despite being one of my favorite shows on television, isn't a series that I can imagine voters getting behind. For anything in the fourth season to make sense to a voter, they would have had to been a fan since the beginning. Since we can assume that most Emmy voters aren't
Lost fanatics, I think it's safe to also assume that
Lost's chances of winning the Best Drama award are low. But, you never know.
The Contenders
Boston Legal
Boston Legal, according to my colleague John Kubicek, has some great stand-out episodes this season that the voters will have watched prior to casting their ballots. It's a long-running show, full of pedigree, the kind of thing that voters like.
Boston Legal would be a safe choice for Best Drama, though I think the sheen is too far gone from the series to make it a favorite.
House
Some people think that this may be
House's year. They could be right. However, recent years haven't been kind to procedurals in the Best Drama category, and although
House isn't your typical procedural, it lacks the long story arcs that have become popular in the last decade.
Hugh Laurie is a favorite of just about everyone, and his star power could turn the tide in House's favor, but I'm putting my money elsewhere.
The Favorite
Mad Men
And, so we come to
Mad Men. Mad Men is the new kid on the block, the universally beloved, critically acclaimed period piece. It comes form one of the writers of
The Sopranos, boasts an incredible cast, and is the type of ensemble drama that Emmy voters love.
Mad Men is exactly the kind of series that wins Best Drama for its first season, and it will come away with the award on Sunday.
What will win Best Drama?
-Oscar Dahl, BuddyTV Senior W.iter
(Image Courtesy of AMC)