This week, the nominations for the 91st Academy Awards were announced. Amongst the various films that appeared on the nominations lists was Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.

Into the Spider-Verse is currently in the running for the title of Best Animated Feature – but will it win?

Hmm…

The nominees for Best Animated Feature are as follows:

  • Incredibles 2
  • Isle of Dogs
  • Mirai
  • Ralph Breaks the Internet
  • Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

A pretty strong set of contenders, I’m sure you’ll agree. All could take the award, but only one will.

Will it be Spidey?

At present, Into the Spider-Verse has picked up 12 awards, from 12 different awards ceremonies, including the Golden Globe Awards. Of those 12, every single award the movie has won has been in the category of Best Animated Feature.

Pretty impressive stuff, right?

Yep – but that doesn’t mean it’s a shoe-in to pick up an Oscar.

Into the Spider-Verse‘s strongest competition is Isle of Dogs – Wes Anderson’s quirky stop-motion movie which to date has won 16 awards – ten of which were in the category of Best Animated Feature/Best Animation. If there was one movie that I felt could best Spidey, it’s this one.

Incredibles 2 is perhaps the next strongest contender. While it hasn’t won as many awards as Into the Spider-Verse or Isle of Dogs, Incredibles 2 has already picked up four accolades, including Best Animated Film at the National Board of Review.

It should also be noted that Incredibles 2 was one of the big financial success stories of the year, accumulating $1,242,786,014 at the worldwide box office. This figure ensured the film was the fourth highest grossing movie of 2018.

The final two movies are Ralph Breaks the Internet and Mirai. If I was to rank the likelihood of these two winning Best Animated Feature, I’d place them towards the bottom of the list – but don’t rule them out.

Mirai has been a big hit with critics (it currently has a Rotten Tomatoes score of 92%), so it has the credentials to win big. Ralph Breaks the Internet is the outsider, but it has received mostly positive reviews (88% on Rotten Tomatoes) so it could become the left field choice on the night.

  • Image: ©Fox Searchlight

  • Image: ©Disney-Pixar
  • Image: ©Toho

  • Image: ©Walt Disney

If I was to put money on the winner of Best Animated Feature, it would be Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. In addition to the 12 awards it has already won, plus the Academy Award nomination, Into the Spider-Verse is in the running for a lot more awards – this to me is a good sign.

In fact, Into the Spider-Verse has been nominated for so many awards that at some point, in the not too distant future, I will come back to this subject as part of a follow-up post.

I guess, in less than a month’s time we’ll know for sure whether Into the Spider-Verse took the award or had to be gracious in defeat. I’m hopeful it wins big.