Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster “Oppenheimer,” starring Cillian Murphy, was a top winner at this year’s Golden Globe Awards. (photo courtesy of Universal Pictures)

By now, Jo Koy’s hosting abilities have been discussed to death, his “Barbie” and Taylor Swift comments bothering folks the most. Yikes. Curse of hosting these shows lives on, especially when the Hollywood Foreign Press gave the guy only 10 days to throw it all together.

Despite this bit of bad press, the Globes enjoyed a big ratings boost by almost 50% compared to the 2023 ceremony, the result of various strategies: airing Sunday night after a football game and streaming on Paramount+ as well. Of course insiders might have you believe it also has to do with the organization’s facelift following previous controversies.

Most folks know little about the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, often accusing it of unsavory practices like favoring Netflix’s “Emily in Paris” once the show’s promotors flew some HFP reporters abroad. Or the general anonymity of its 95 members for some time. Then it added 215 new members, completely changing voter demographics. So how did this new and allegedly improved Foreign Press approach the lofty role of gatekeeping the big and small screens? About the same, it turns out.

The Globes elate at Chris Nolan’s “Oppenheimer,” Hulu’s “The Bear,” Netflix’s “Beef,” HBO’s “Succession” and “Poor Things” more than “Barbie.” The Golden Globes often serve as a microcosm for all the award-season hiccups to come.

Take the category “Best Motion Picture – Animated,” given to Hayao Miyazaki’s “The Boy and the Heron.” To start, “Wish” and “Elemental” had no business on that list, especially when groundbreaking contributions like “Nimona” and “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem” got snubbed. They probably weren’t even on the Foreign Press’ radar. A punk rock queer allegory packaged as a futuristic medieval fantasy romp likely didn’t even get seen. And hell no, a “Ninja Turtle” flick wasn’t gonna pass.

So what about “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” the only real competition here? The choice seemed easy: Miyazaki is retiring, and this is the Golden Globes’ last chance to honor him. After all, that animation category didn’t debut until 2006 and only acknowledged one film “The Wind Rises” in the Best Foreign Language Film category, an odd choice considering the animated offerings including mediocre, and quite lesser, competition like “The Croods” and “Despicable Me 2.” To honor “The Boy and the Heron,” a fascinating but hardly incredible film, is a corrective to the Globes’ general silence on one of the world’s greatest animators. Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily, but it’s business as usual for these winners: Some win because they earned it, others because they’re long overdue.

Pitting a film like “The Wind Rises” against live-action competition is entirely unfair. It never stood a chance to win. That seems to be the case with “Barbie” once the Globes added the new category Cinematic and Box Office Achievement. If “Barbie” wins here, it doesn’t need a comedy award, despite it being an actually funny film, something rare for that best comedy or musical category (and it’s got plenty of musical numbers too, but the Foreign Press ain’t counting).

Further, what does that even mean when nominee “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning, Part One,” didn’t recoup its budget and marketing costs? This reeks of the same pandering the Academy attempted with 2022’s Fan Favorite and Cheer Moment, determined by Twitter users. Whelp, the Oscars got trolled by bots and “Army of the Dead,” a terribly dull film, took fan fav, while Flash entering the speed force in the “Justice League” Snyder cut earned that “cheer moment.”

The snubbing of “Barbie” and lackluster interest in series like “The Last of Us,” which just earned eight Creative Arts Emmys and another five noms for the Primetime Emmys this Sunday, seems like the Golden Globes as usual. It just seems like the Foreign Press can’t handle popular or nerdy media.

But don’t worry, as awards season continues, more shenanigans are on the way. Apparently the Academy thinks “Barbie” belongs in the adapted screenplay category since it’s based on a toy. The entire lack of a Barbie story doesn’t matter. That’s a peculiar precedent when you note that films based on true stories are not inherently deemed adapted features unless they are based on a specific work (book, article, etc.). So a toy with no story is offered less grace. That seems trivial, but it means voters will, once again, ignore “Barbie” in that category, instead favoring a “pure” adapted screenplay.

The most optimistic outcome is an elevated interest in cinema. Perhaps that will translate into some degree of renewed interest in moviegoing once more. But that requires better writing, not a popular film category. Please stop that.

Hayao Miyazaki’s “The Boy and the Heron” received Golden Globe Awards for Best Animated Feature and Original Score. (photo courtesy of Studio Ghibli)