‘Black Mirror: USS Callister’ Wins Emmy for Outstanding TV Movie
“Black Mirror: USS Callister” has won the Emmy for Outstanding TV Movie, making it two years in a row the Netflix anthology series has submitted an episode as a movie and won the category.
“USS Callister” is the feature-length first episode of “Black Mirror” Season 4. Written by series creator Charlie Brooker and William Bridges, the movie tracks Robert Daly (Jesse Plemons), the Chief Technical Officer of a video game company by day and Captain of the USS Callister by night — inside the game he created. Soon, his virtual colleagues start to show signs of life, and the science-fiction adventure takes off from there.
“USS Callister” is nominated for seven Emmys, including writing, editing, and Plemons is up for lead actor. It’s won three Emmys in 2018 so far, including TV Movie, Sound Editing, and Single-Camera Picture Editing. Last year, “Black Mirror: San Junipero” won two Emmys — for Outstanding TV Movie and Writing.
Most prognosticators considered the category — which included “Black Mirror: USS Callister,” “The Tale,” “Fahrenheit 451,” “Flint,” and “Paterno” — to be a two-way race between Jennifer Fox’s HBO film and the defending champion from Netflix. Some voiced objections to Netflix submitting an episode of an anthology series in a category meant for standalone films; after all, biases created from past seasons or other episodes could’ve swayed voting. But the rules have yet to be adjusted, affiliations exist for all nominees, and the dearth in high-quality eligible films doesn’t serve as much motivation to restrict eligibility.
The Creative Arts Emmy Awards are handed out Saturday, September 8 (starting at 5 p.m. PT) and Sunday, September 9 (starting at 4 p.m. PT) at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, CA. The Creative Arts Emmys honor outstanding artistic and technical achievement in a variety of television program genres, guest performances in weekly series, as well as exceptional work in the animation, reality and documentary categories.
This is the first year the TV Academy presented the award for TV Movie at the Creative Arts ceremony instead of the Primetime Emmys. More than 50 trophies are given out over the two-day period, and FXX will air a condensed version of the ceremony on September 15 at 8 p.m. ET.
The 70th Primetime Emmys will air Monday, September 17 at 8 p.m. ET on NBC. Check out IndieWire’s Emmy predictions to see what series and which stars are expected to walk away with the gold, and keep checking IndieWire for the most accurate power rankings out there. Follow IndieWire on Twitter and Facebook for all the latest Emmys news, including live updates as the awards air Monday night.
