Not a Blog

Hugo Thoughts: Best Novel

February 27, 2017 at 12:54 pm
Profile Pic

The Big One.

I read a lot of novels. I became a voracious reader as a kid, and very little has changed since… well, no, one thing has changed. I no longer feel an obsessive need to finish every book I start. Some just don’t hold my interest, and I find myself putting them aside and picking up something else. Sometimes I return to the books I’ve put aside and sometimes I don’t.

One of life’s greatest pleasures, for me, is finding a book that’s so bloody damn good that it won’t LET me put it aside. The kind of book that grabs me by the throat and will not let me go. Those sorts of books are not easy to find, but I treasure the authors who deliver them regularly.

Jack Vance had that effect on me, for decades. Bernard Cornwell still does. Stephen King too. Once I start a book by any of these worthies, I am hooked. I will keep reading till the end.

Recently I have had to add James S.A. Corey to that list. Which is annoying, because I know both halves of James S.A. Corey. One of them was a student of mine. The other was my proto-minion. How the hell did they get so damned good?

However they did it, it’s done. Now, I am sure there were lots of great SF and fantasy novels published during 2016 that I have not read yet (I read lots of books, like I said, but not all are SF or fantasy, I read lots of history and mystery and historical fiction and biographies and non-fiction as well, and I read older books too, not just stuff from the current awards year, so I’m always trying to catch up). Of all the SF novels from 2016 that I have read, however, this was the best:

For me, it wasn’t even close. I expect I will fill in all six slots on my Hugo nomination form with the titles of worthy contenders, but this will be the first one I write down.

I commend it to your attention. Jimmy Corey deserves his shot at The Big One.

((Which frosts my ass. Because if Jimmy actually WINS the Hugo, Ty will be unbearable.))

P.S. The EXPANSE tv series is amazing too. Have you guys been watching season two? I’m also going to be nominating “Leviathan Wakes,” the final episode of season one, for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form.

Hugo Thoughts: Best Professional Artist

January 30, 2017 at 1:23 pm
Profile Pic

Hugo nominations are now open. You will have until mid March to make your nominations… however, if you were not a member of MidAmericon II, you have only today and tomorrow left to sign up for either That Finnish Convention (this year’s worldcon) and/or ConJose II (next year’s worldcon) to earn the right to nominate. Act now, or forever hold your peace.

A few days ago I posted a few recommendations for the two Dramatic Presentation categories. Today I’d like to offer a couple of artists for your consideration, staggering talents who did some outstanding work in 2016, and are more than worthy of nomination.

The first of them is MICHAEL KOMARCK, who has been painting our Wild Cards covers ever since Tor revived the series. He’s done a bunch of other things too… check out his website… and he is doing the artwork for a Wild Cards graphic novel that is just going to blow your mind, but it’s his recent Wild Cards covers that make me want to get up and dance. Here’s some of his recent work.

Komarck has been nominated for the Hugo once before, but has never won. Here’s some of his older Wild Cards covers. Amazing work.

I had the honor to work with another wonderfully talented artist this year as well: the French artist DIDER GRAFFET, who illustrated the 2017 Ice & Fire calendar from Random House.

There’s lots more art in the calendar just as good. Grab and copy and see for yourself.

Of course, SF and fantasy are blessed with all sorts of extraordinary artists, many of whom have been Hugo winners or nominees in years past. John Picacio, Julie Dillon, Donato Giancola, Stephan Martiniere, and many more are worthy of your consideration as well. But any list of recommendations that does not include Komarck and Graffet is woefully incomplete, imnsho.

Hugo Thoughts: Dramatic Presentation

January 28, 2017 at 5:32 pm
Profile Pic

That Finnish Worldcon has opened Hugo nominations for 2016, and all over the internet the usual suspects are stirring and sharing their thoughts and recommendations. Being very suspicious my own self, I thought I’d chirp in with my own notions, as I have in years past.

First, the basics (forgive me if you have read this before, which most of you have):

To nominate, you need to be a member of at least one of these three worldcons:
— MidAmericon II, last year’s Kansas City worldcon,
— the current year’s worldcon, in Helsinki,
— the 2018 worldcon, ConJose II, in San Jose, California.

If you were a member of MAC II, you’re set. If not, you need to join one or the other of the forthcoming cons… and to secure nominating rights, you need to do that by January 31. Which means you have THREE MORE DAYS to join. Once you’ve signed up, though, you’ll have another six weeks or so to decide what you want to nominate. You do NOT have to attend to be able to nominate. Supporting Memberships are also available, at a much lower rate.

To join the Helsinki con, go to:
http://www.worldcon.fi/

To join for San Jose, the address is:
http://www.worldcon76.org/

Once you’ve signed up, you will be sent your own personalized link to the nominations page, which will allow you to nominate the books, stories, movies, television shows, artists, fans, and editors whose work most wowed you this past year.

The Hugo Awards were first given in 1953, and remain our field’s most prestigious, important, and meaningful awards. The list of Hugo winners is a Who’s Who in science fiction and fantasy, and you can have a voice in determining which names are added to that distinguished roster besides those of Alfred Bester, Robert A. Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, Roger Zelazny, Ursula K. Le Guin, Jack Vance, Connie Willis, Samuel R. Delany, N.K. Jemisin, James Tiptree Jr, Harlan Ellison, Robert Silverberg, Gardner Dozois, Lois McMaster Bujold, Orson Scott Card, Poul Anderson, Frank Herbert, Anne Leckie, Anne McCaffery, and so many many more.

Today I thought I’d ruminate a bit on the Dramatic Presentation Hugos. There are two of those: Long Form and Short Form. For all practical purposes, Long Form means “feature films” and Short Form means “television episodes,” though the rules actually allow all sorts of other things to be nominated (live theatre, radio plays, easter eggs, slide shows, albums, once even an acceptance speech from the previous year, which was kind of the height of stupidity). But the only real hard and fast criterion here is running time.

This year’s Long Form race is going to be dominated by two movies, I have no doubt. ROGUE ONE is a Star Wars film, and a pretty good one at that (the best since THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK, imnsho); it has to be the odds on favorite going in. ARRIVAL, however, could give it some tough competition; a brilliant, powerful adaptation of a Ted Chiang story, relentlessly intelligent, well filmed, well acted (how Amy Adams did not get an Oscar nod I will never understand).

If we presume that ROGUE ONE and ARRIVAL are shoe-ins, though, the question remains as to what will occupy the other four slots on the final ballot. Certainly there were other genre movies released last year. DR. STRANGE, INDEPENDENCE DAY: RESURGENCE, PASSENGERS, A MONSTER CALLS, THE JUNGLE BOOK, GHOSTBUSTERS, X-MEN, STAR TREK, yadda yadda yadda. Myself, I liked some of these a lot, other less, and still others I have yet to see. Some may make my ballot.

There’s another option, however: television series. And it’s an option well worth considering.

See, the rules allow a television show to be nominated in two different ways. You can nominate an individual episode of a series in Short Form, so long as it is under ninety minutes, or you can nominate an entire season as a whole in Long Form. (You can actually do both if you really like a show, but the Hugo administrators will then make the showrunners chose which nomination to accept, so the same show cannot appear simultaneous in both categories). Most recently, it happened to GAME OF THRONES. At the Chicago worldcon, GAME OF THRONES season one won the rocket in Long Form, ahead of several feature films. (In subsequent years, however, GOT won in Short Form, for individual episodes).

In today’s television world, there are two different sorts of shows: episodic series, where every week tells a self-contained story with a beginning, middle, and an end, and serial shows, where the entire season is one story, one continuous dramatic arc, with no resolution until the final episode (if then). LAW & ORDER is its various incarnations is an example of the former, HBO’s recent brilliant courtroom drama THE NIGHT OF an instance of the latter. In the not-too-distant past, episodic shows used to dominate television drama, but in recent years that has definitely changed. These days we have a real mix, though to my mind the best shows are almost all serials. The longer format allows you to do so much more.

This is truly the Golden Age for science fiction and fantasy on television, with more interesting series than ever before… most of them serial dramas. WESTWORLD, for instance. Terrific show. But the entire season is one story. To me, it makes no sense to pick an episode at random and nominate it in Short Form, when every episode depended so much on what had come before and what was to follow. I will be nominating WESTWORLD season one in Long Form, and I urge other WESTWORLD fans to do the same. Then we have STRANGER THINGS, recent Golden Globe nominee, another cool new genre show… I loved the series, but looking back, did I love one episode? No, I loved the whole story, so I’d nominate STRANGER THINGS, season one. Ditto for PENNY DREADFUL, the final season, which wrapped up in fine style last year. You could also make a case for MR. ROBOT, if you consider that sf.

And, of course, there’s GAME OF THRONES. Our sixth season won an unprecedented number of Emmys, setting an all-time record. And there are individual episodes that won Emmy acclaim: David Benioff and D.B. Weiss won for writing for “Battle of the Bastards,” Miguel Sapochnik took the directing Emmy for the same episode, and “The Door” also earned a directing nomination for Jack Bender. But it was the season as a whole that won for Best Drama, and for me, at least, it makes the most sense to nominate GAME OF THRONES, season six, in Long Form.

When I look at the other movies eligible this year, aside from the Big Two, I see some good work, for sure… but nothing that stands head and shoulders above shows like WESTWORLD, STRANGER THINGS, PENNY DREADFUL, and GOT. I think the time has come for serial television drama to have more of a presence in the Long Form category.

And what about Short Form, you ask?

There are still plenty of episodic shows left, more than enough to fill that category. GRIMM and ORPHAN BLACK and FLASH have all been nominated in recent years, and their fans will likely have favorite episodes again this year. And then there are the anthology shows, the most outstanding of which is BLACK MIRROR. As with TWILIGHT ZONE and OUTER LIMITS in days of yore, every episode of BLACK MIRROR is self-contained, and many of them are brilliant. (Dark as hell, disturbing, but masterfully done). Your favorite BLACK MIRROR episodes should definitely be nominated here; so far, the show has been criminally overlooked in the Hugos. Of course, there’s DR. WHO as well. I don’t know which episodes will be nominated this year, but there will surely be one. Or two. Or three. Or four. For GOT fans who reject my Long Form argument, or prefer to nominate in both categories, “The Door” and “Battle of the Bastards” are the likely contenders.

And then there is the interesting case of THE EXPANSE. You could make a good argument for nominating the entire first season of THE EXPANSE in Long Form, as with WESTWORLD or GAME OF THRONES or STRANGER THINGS, since it is one continuous story. However, the airing dates of THE EXPANSE season one straddled the calendar year, so half of the episodes came out in 2015. Not sure what that does to the show’s eligibilty. (Two of those early episodes did garner considerable support last year, and would likely have made the ballot if not for the Puppies). In light of that complication, I think EXPANSE fans (like me) should probably nominate their favorite episode in Short Form. My pick would be the season finale, “Leviathan Wakes.” Originally broadcast on February 2, 2016, it is clearly eligible, whereas the earlier episodes are not.

Those are my thoughts on the Drama categories in this year’s Hugo Awards. You’re welcome to share your own. (As ever, please stay ON TOPIC or your comments will be nuked).

No matter which shows and movies you chose to nominate… NOMINATE. Surely the events of 2016 have demonstrated the importance of voter turnout.

Hugo Time

January 17, 2017 at 3:55 pm
Profile Pic

It’s that time again. Another year has ended, another worldcon is on the horizon (The Finnish Convention, this August, in Helsinki), and nominations are once again open for the Hugo Awards for the best science fiction and fantasy of 2016.

To nominate, you need to be a member of at least one of these three worldcons:
— MidAmericon II, last year’s Kansas City worldcon,
— the current year’s worldcon, in Helsinki,
— the 2018 worldcon, ConJose II, in San Jose, California.

Unless you’ve got a time machine, it’s too late to join MidAmericon II, but signing up for Helsinki and San Jose is easy enough… and the sooner you do it, the less you’ll be spending, since the cost of membership rises as we get nearer to the con. You do NOT have to attend to be able to nominate. Supporting Memberships are also available, at a much lower rate.

To join the Helsinki con, go to:
http://www.worldcon.fi/

To join for San Jose, the address is:
http://www.worldcon76.org/

Join one, join the other, join both. Come if you can, but nominate even if you can’t.

Once you’ve signed up, you will be sent your own personalized link to the nominations page, which will allow you to nominate the books, stories, movies, television shows, artists, fans, and editors whose work most wowed you this past year.

The Hugo Awards were first given in 1953, and remain our field’s most prestigious, important, and meaningful awards. The list of Hugo winners is a Who’s Who in science fiction and fantasy, and you can have a voice in determining which names are added to that distinguished roster besides those of Alfred Bester, Robert A. Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, Roger Zelazny, Ursula K. Le Guin, Jack Vance, Connie Willis, Samuel R. Delany, N.K. Jemisin, James Tiptree Jr, Harlan Ellison, Robert Silverberg, Gardner Dozois, Lois McMaster Bujold, Orson Scott Card, Poul Anderson, Frank Herbert, Anne Leckie, Anne McCaffery, and so many many more.

And yes, come to worldcon if you can. The best place to meet and hang with your favorite writers. Including me…

Doom, Despair, Defeat

January 9, 2017 at 4:16 pm
Profile Pic

So far, the new year is off to a terrific start. Not.

Yesterday mostly sucked.

All the playoff games sucked, actually. The four wild card teams all lost, the four home teams all won, and every game ended in a rout. Most of them were over long before the fourth quarter rolled around. Of course, for me personally the worst of them was the last, when the Green Bay Packers routed my Giants. That one was actually a game for the first three quarters. The Giants defense came out loaded for bear, and stuffed the Packers and their bad man for most of the first half… but the Giants offense could not seem to take advantage, which (sadly) has been true most of the season. The running game, which had shown signs of life last week against the Skins, lay down and died again, and the passing game was erratic at best, with both Odell Beckham Junior and Sterling Shepard both dropping sure touchdown passes. OBJ dropped a number of other passes as well. Not his finest hour. In fact, it may well have been the worst game I have ever seen him play. Eli was pretty sharp for the most part, but when the receivers keep dropping balls delivered right into their hands, that does not count for much.

The result was that a quarter and a half of total Giant dominance yielded only two field goals and a paltry 6-0 lead. I knew that would not hold up (you cannot stop a qb as talented as Rodgers forever), and of course it didn’t. The Packers took the lead for good late in the second quarter with a solid drive that made it 7-6, and then tacked on another touchdown with an insane hail mary pass just as time was running out, to take a 14-6 lead into the half.

The Giants defense did have one more great stop left in them, turning back the Packers on a 3rd and 1 and then a 4th and 1 at midfield, then taking the ball and scoring their only TD of the game on a beautiful long pass from Eli to Tavaris King, who actually caught the ball and made it 14-13. That was the high water mark, however. After that, Rodgers could not be stopped. Big Blue’s D was plainly winded by then, and the offense gave them no help at all with a series of 3-and-outs and punts. Bad punts, too. For whatever reason, the Packer punter had a much better day, so much so that the Giants seemed to lose twenty yards of field position with every exchange. In the second half, Eli was repeatedly starting from inside his ten, Rodgers from midfield.

So: season over, Big Blue is done, the Packers go on. Here’s hoping they crush the Cowboys. And yes, it’s true, Aaron Rodgers is a baaaaaaaaaddddd man.

All in all, a pretty good season for the Giants. But I never really believed this was their year. The defense started slow but ended as one of the best in the league, but the offense never came alive. Next year, maybe, Big Blue can make another run, but first we need to (1) improve the offensive line, and (2) get ourselves a running game. A great young tight end would help as well. Will Tye is okay, but Mark Bavaro he’s not. He’s not even Jeremy Shockey.

All the teams I cared about having been eliminated, I am now rooting for Whoever Plays the Cowboys and Whoever Plays the Patriots. And if we wind up with a Cowboy/ Patriot SuperBowl, I will be rooting for A Giant Asteroid Strikes Houston.

Of course, the weekend was not all about football. Last night we also had the Golden Globes. Where Lena Headey lost, and GAME OF THRONES lost, and WESTWORLD and its two amazing actresses lost as well. Pfui. That was disappointing, but not unexpected. The Hollywood Foreign Press Association surprised me this year by nominating three genre shows — GOT, WESTWORLD, and STRANGER THINGS — for Best Drama, but in the end they reverted to form and passed over all of them in favor of the safe choice, the ‘prestige’ historical drama THE CROWN. (Which I did enjoy, mind you, even though I went away thinking that while it may have been good to be the king in the Middle Ages, it really sucked to be the queen in the 1950s). So: no Globes for us.

The highlight of the Globes — and the day — was Meryl Streep’s speech.

A Damned Good Read

December 24, 2016 at 5:27 pm
Profile Pic

Let me get the taste of this week’s football out of my mouth and turn to a more pleasant subject — the latest volume in the Expanse series, BABYLON’S ASHES, which I just finished reading a few days ago.

You know, for a voracious reader like myself, life has few pleasures that compare to finding a really good book, the sort that grabs you from page one and won’t let go, so you find yourself late at night, wanting to sleep but thinking, “Just one more chapter, just one more chapter,” until dawn breaks and you’ve read the whole damned thing.

That’s BABYLON’S ASHES. The Expanse series has been terrific from the beginning, but it went to a new level with the last volume, NEMESIS GAMES, which should have been a Hugo finalist last year. This new one is just as good. It will definitely be one of the books on my own nominating ballot. Jimmy Corey (who is really Ty Franck and Daniel Abraham in a two-man pantomime horse costume) just keeps getting better.

It also occurs to me that BABYLON’S ASHES would make a very worthy nominee for the new awards that Atlanta’s Dragoncon has started, the Dragon Awards. The Dragons, given for the first time last year, aspire to be the People’s Choice Awards of SF and fantasy… and could well achieve that if they can get sufficient participation from all sectors of fandom. Unlike the Hugo Awards, the Dragons have no short fiction categories, but they do give a number of awards for novel: best sf, best fantasy, best horror, best military SF, etc. “Military SF” has become popular enough to be regarded as its own category these days, it would seem. (Which was not formerly the case. Heinlein’s STARSHIP TROOPERS and Haldeman’s FOREVER WAR both won Hugo Awards simply as Best Novel back in the day, and — together perhaps with Gordy Dickson’s Dorsai series — pretty much defined what is known as ‘Milsf’ today).

One of the joys of the Expanse series is the way Jimmy Corey dances between subgenres. The series is certainly science fiction, no doubt of that, but assigning it to any particular sub-genre is more more difficult. Some parts read like space opera, some parts strike me as hard SF. The first book, LEVIATHAN WAKES, had some pretty strong horror elements with its vomit zombies, and also a real noir-ish mystery feel in the Miller chapters. With BABYLON’S ASHES, however, the war comes center stage, and we are definitely in the realm of Military SF. Lots of action, lots of tension, lots of battle… with some great world-building and characters you really care about. So I’m thinking, if we are going to have special awards for Mil-SF, I cannot think of a more worthy contender than the new Corey. So… Hugo, Dragon, or whatever, I commend BABYLON’S ASHES to your consideration. I think you’ll like it. I sure did.

Oh, and speaking of THE EXPANSE… there’s a second season of the TV show coming at us as well. Here’s a trailer for it.

<lj-embed id=”867″/>

GAMES OF THRONES Competes For Golden Globe

December 14, 2016 at 4:29 pm
Profile Pic

The Golden Globe nominations are out for 2016, and HBO’s sixth season of GAME OF THRONES has made the shortlist once again. GOT will be competing for the Globe for best drama with WESTWORLD, STRANGER THINGS, THIS IS US, and THE CROWN.

My congratulations to David Benioff, Dan Weiss, Bryan Cogman, and the rest of our amazing cast and crew… and especially to Lena Headey, who earned a Globe nomination of her own for Best Supporting Actress.

The full list of this year’s nominees can be found here: http://variety.com/2016/film/news/golden-globe-nominations-2017-nominees-full-list-1201938375/

Being an HBO guy, I’m thrilled that to see that both GAME OF THRONES and WESTWORLD have been nominated for the big prize… though WESTWORLD is going to be some tough competition. (In fact, I would figure WW for the favorite). And as an science fiction and fantasy geek, I am also delighted to see that STRANGER THINGS made the list. Three out of five finalists being genre shows… and during this golden age of television… is another sign of just how far we’ve come.

My thanks to the members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.

The winners will be announced in LA on Sunday, January 8.

Speaking of Awards…

December 5, 2016 at 6:15 pm
Profile Pic

As I was saying, 2016 was not a great year. It was not even a good year.

But that is not to say that some good things did not happen.

Worldcon is always one of the highlights of the year for me, and has been since I attended my very first in 1971. One of my favorite worldcons of all time was MidAmericon, the Kansas City worldcon in 1976 (you know how up to date they are in Kansas City, they’ve gone about as far as they can go). This year’s worldcon, MidAmericon II, was alas, not even close to that legendary innovative gathering in ’76… but we saw friends, ate barbeque, signed books, enjoyed panels and readings, and had fun in all the ways fans always do when they gather.

In 1976, I lost two Hugo Awards, and held the first Hugo Losers Party in my room (with the help of Gardner Dozois, my fellow loser). That was one of the highlights of the con, beyond a doubt.

As it happens, I reclaimed the Hugo Losers Party last year in Spokane, so I held one once again at Big Mac II. Since my old room in the Muehlebach was no longer available (that whole wing having been demolished in the interim), I rented the Midland Theatre instead and had the bash there. And once again, it was one of my favorite parts of the con.

In 1976, Hugo losers got nothing at the party but a lusty cheer, some cheap booze, and maybe a few cheez puffs. In 2016, however, at least a few of the lucky losers got Alfie Awards. (Which of course did not exist in 1976, since I just made them up last year). They’re made of old hood ornaments (as some early Hugos were), polished and replated by Tyler Eugene Smith.

Turns out most of the 2016 Alfie presentation was recorded, and has now been uploaded to YouTube. So for all of you who were not able to attend the Hugo Losers Party, here ’tis.

(Do note that the early part of my talk, where I explain the awards and talk about Alfie Bester and the first Hugo, is missing).

<lj-embed id=”861″/>

Congrats once more to all the Alfie winners… and to losers everywhere.

Some Hugo Picks

December 5, 2016 at 4:07 pm
Profile Pic

December has come, and the end of 2016 (thank god, what a bloody awful year) will be upon us in a few more weeks. Which means, inevitably, that people will soon be drawing up lists of the year’s best books, stories, television shows, and movies… for the Hugo Awards, the Emmys, the Oscars, the Dragons, the Tiptrees, the Nebulas, the World Fantasy Awards… or just for the fun of it.

For my part, I already know what two of my Hugo nominations for Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form will be.

ARRIVAL, to start with. Terrific adaptation of a classic story by Ted Chiang. Brilliant performance from Amy Adams. (She is always great, I think, but this was her best role to date). A real science fiction story, not a western in space. Intelligent, thought-provoking, with some wonderfully alien aliens.

And WESTWORLD, season one, from HBO. Of course, as with GAME OF THRONES, one can nominate individual episodes of this one in Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form… but for me it makes more sense to nominate the entire season in Long Form. (GAME OF THRONES season one was nominated in this fashion at Chicago, and won). It really is one very long, complex, wonderfully rich story, with great acting, writing, and directing, and the usual spectacular HBO production values. Like ARRIVAL, this is one that bears repeated re-viewing, and requires some thought. The Academy will likely nominate WESTWORLD for a shelf full of Emmys. I hope fandom recognizes its brilliance as well. This is a story about the nature of sentience and the cost of being human, a commentary on our society and (especially) on the ways we choose to entertain ourselves, full of twists and turns and gut punches and reveals and surprises, all masterfully delivered by Jonah Nolan and Lisa Joy.

(GAME OF THRONES is also eligible for Hugo nomination this year, of course. The entire sixth season in Long Form, or individual episodes of same in Short Form. However, because of the air dates and eligibility periods, GOT will not be in the running for the Emmy Awards this year, so WESTWORLD will have a clear run at those… contending, of course, with BETTER CALL SAUL, OUTLANDER, and all of the other terrific dramas out there).

There were other good movies and television shows released in 2016, and I have no doubt that some of them will find places on my own personal Hugo ballot as well… but honestly, I cannot imagine that I will like any of them as well as I liked ARRIVAL and WESTWORLD.

Emmys, Emmys, Emmys

September 13, 2016 at 6:20 pm
Profile Pic

GAME OF THRONES kicked ass and took names last weekend in LA, at the Creative Arts Emmys, racking up nine victories, way more than any other show.

“Dominates,” the Hollywood press is saying. Hey, cool, I will go with that.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/creative-arts-emmys-game-thrones-927671

GAME OF THRONES took home the Emmys for casting, for makeup (non-prosthetic), for makeup (prosthetic).

Also for production design, for costuming, and for sound mixing.

And for editing, for stunt coordination, and for special visual effects (that was the fifth consecutive win for our SFX guys)

I’d say “eight is enough, and nine is even better,” but we also lost some… so instead I will just say congratulations to all our winners, and condolences to all our losers, and to all the other nominees as well. Hugo, Nebula, Oscar, or Emmy, it IS an honor just to be nominated.

With these nine wins, GAME OF THRONES has now taken home more Emmy Awards than any other drama in the entire history of television. That is a tribute to HBO, which truly has no rivals when it comes to production quality, and to David Benioff and Dan Weiss and the outrageously talented cast and crew they assembled to bring the Seven Kingdoms and their people to life. I have been thrilled to be a part of this.

And who knows? There are more Emmys Awards this weekend, so we may not be done making television history quite yet. Tune in on Sunday night to find out.