The 2018 animated film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was full of surprises. One of the many of them is Spider-Man Noir. Voiced by Nicolas Cage, his black-and-white grizzled detective stole the show. In fact, it helped greenlight his own show. Earlier this year, Amazon premiered Spider-Noir to strong critical reviews. That was substantiated with several Emmy nominations. Then, over the last weekend, it was announced that Spider-Noir was cancelled… And then it went on to win 5 Emmy Awards.
Spider-Noir & the Streaming Age
The cancellation came as a bit of a shock. It was a high-profile project that met with a seemingly strong degree of success. Of course, it’s hard to tell how much success it actually had in today’s streaming age. Ratings aren’t as readily available, and expectations of performance can range widely from streamer to streamer. Sony and Amazon had partnered to deliver the series. That partnership is continuing despite this show ending. It could be the case that the highly stylized production and paycheck for Cage were just too much. Or better to say, too much with a lower return than expected.
Over the weekend of September 5th and 6th, the Creative Arts Emmys took place. These are the awards that aren’t deemed important enough for broadcast television. That sounds a bit harsh, but hey, it’s not us saying that; it’s the Academy. In fairness, there are a LOT of Emmy categories, and they couldn’t all fit in one broadcast or ceremony. Within the Creative Arts Emmy ceremony, though, Spider-Noir won in several categories. Stunt coordination for comedy programming, sound editing for a one-hour comedy or drama series, title design, special visual effects in a single episode, and cinematography for a series.
The Emmys Ain’t What They Used to Be
There was a time when awards prestige could help carry a show to renewal. Back in the early ’80s, Cheers was famously renewed despite being last in the ratings. It did well at the Emmys, and that was enough to help assure NBC executives that the show was worth continuing with. Clearly that’s not the case with Spider-Noir. Awards don’t have the same level of impact that they used to. The war for winning people’s screen time is far more intense now as well. Tis a shame, but at least the show pretty much wrapped up its storyline to be a concise, closed-off season.
Here’s to you, Spider-Noir. We hardly knew ye, but at least you went out on top.
