2021 Oscars goes well for pet-adjacent movies

The 2021 Oscars were….weird, which is not a surprise given the state of the world in a pandemic, but even so, this was a strange show.

They were held in a train station, for one thing, with a collection of small tables holding a total of several hundred people, with small lamps on each table competing awkwardly with the natural light coming in from the windows and the fancy chandelier-type things on the ceiling.

Since it was (mostly) all done live and in-person, there were unfortunately no pets crashing the proceedings via Zoom backgrounds like at this year’s Golden Globes.

Also, the camera placement was odd, with too much movement to feel firmly placed.

Anyway, pet-adjacent movies were doing pretty well, though they didn’t occupy much of a huge space, as is typical for Academy Awards history.

The 2021 Oscars saw pet-adjacent movies do fairly well.

Pixar’s Soul won Best Animated Feature, as it contains a very important cat named Mr Mittens in a key role. Also, Pixar’s second nominee in this category, Onward, also featured a pet in the dragon Blazey, who functions like a dog in the fantasy-inspired world of the film. Blazey has no real role in the plot, but the options of pet-adjacent were thin this year.

Wolfwalkers, an Apple TV Plus original based in Irish mythology about werewolves, was also a nominee in Best Animated Feature.

Soul also claimed victory in the category of Best Original Score, besting a bey of Best Picture nominees, and was nominated for Best Sound as well.

The One and Only Ivan was nominated for Best Visual Effects as well, losing to Christopher Nolan’s trippy Tenet.

Also, Amanda Seyfried, who starred in The Art of Racing in the Rain, was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for her role in the historical drama Mank, about the making of Citizen Kane. (Glenn Close, who played Cruella de Vil in the live-action 101 Dalmatians, was also a nominee in this category for Hillbilly Elegy.)

Finally, it was a bit odd to see the Pixar short Out not even be nominated for Best Animated Short Film.

For more on 2021 Oscars coverage, be sure to check out our FanSided Network sister site Culturess for more details.