Are the Oscars headed for the trash can?

I’m just going to say it: The Oscars kind of suck.

Every year, we sit down, full of hope, only to be reminded that the Academy doesn’t actually care about what we care about. The ceremony has morphed into an annual exercise in confusion, where people turn to each other and say, “No, I haven’t heard of that one either.”

Bill Maher nailed it when he called the Oscars a national rite of television watching where we collectively pretend to know the nominees. And honestly, he’s right. Maybe that’s why viewership this year was down for the first time in 4 years, from dropping to 18.1 million, a 7% decline from 2024.

It wouldn’t be the Oscars without at least one jaw-dropping snub.

This year? Demi Moore and Timothée Chalamet were robbed, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Every year, fan-favourite performances and films get left out, making it feel like the Academy is playing some cryptic game where real cultural impact doesn’t matter. It’s like they go out of their way to ignore what people actually watched and loved.

And let’s not forget the categories that consistently disrespect entire genres. Horror? Comedy? Blockbusters? Unless you’re Get Out or Everything Everywhere All at Once, don’t even bother hoping for recognition. The Academy still seems to think that “serious” cinema has to be slow, brooding, and preferably 5 hours long.

You’d think the biggest night in film would be about, you know, films.

But every year, it’s the drama that takes centre stage. Whether it’s envelope mix-ups (La La Land vs. Moonlight), shock slaps (Will Smith vs. Chris Rock), or cringe-worthy speeches that feel like a mix of self-congratulation and a hostage situation, the Oscars can’t help but create mess.

And let’s not even start on the politics. Every year, there’s scandal about lack of diversity, outdated voting practices, or baffling choices that make it clear just how out of touch the Academy still is.

Are we watching the Oscars die in real time?

The ratings tell the story. Year after year, fewer people tune in. At this point, the Oscars feel less like a must-watch event and more like a niche industry party being forced onto the public. The prestige is fading. And streaming platforms, TikTok, and Twitter discourse are proving that awards aren’t the ultimate marker of quality anymore.

So, is there a way to save the Oscars from total irrelevance? Maybe. But it would take a major overhaul—recognising actual popular films, embracing the way modern audiences consume media, and, for the love of cinema, cutting the runtime down to something digestible.

Until then, the real entertainment will always be the memes that come out of the chaos, not the awards themselves.

-Sophie, Writer