Emmys 2025: Aussies overlooked, Severance soars and more Emmy snubs and surprises

Australia Broadcast Center

16-07-2025

Bet you thought the Oscars were the last you'd see of awards season this year, right? But move over film — it's TV's time to shine!
This year's Emmy nominations dropped in the early hours of the morning (for we Australians), acknowledging shows that aired between June 1, 2024 and May 31, 2025.
We won't know who's going to take home the shiny awards until the ceremony in September, but let's dive into the successes, snubs and shocks from today's nominations.
In a win for Apple+, spooky workplace drama Severance has come out on top of today's nominations, scoring a massive 27 nods.
The show's second season unravelled just enough about the mysterious Lumon Industries to grab pretty much all of their main cast at least one nomination, in addition to multiple writing and directing nominations.
Just quietly, John Turturro deserves his flowers just for the way he delivers the four words that turned the whole season on its head.
Unfortunately, Aussie Dichen Lachman — who blew audiences away at the end of this season as Ms Casey — missed out. But hey, there's always season three (we might just have to wait a year or three).
Imagine you're Patrick Schwarzenegger, aching to step out of your father's towering shadow, and you take a part in one of the hottest TV anthologies that has led to many, many awards. Your actually quite-nuanced performance is overshadowed by a salacious incest plot, but it's OK because people are tweeting about how much pathos you were able to convey in a single look.
Then the 2025 Emmy nominations come out. White Lotus: Thailand has 23 nominations, and seven of your co-stars have grabbed one for acting. Your name is nowhere to be seen.
That's the risk you take when you check into the talent-over-stuffed White Lotus. At least you have the perfect reaction image.
Pedro Pascal has been nominated for Best Actor in a drama, and this is a problem.
Look, we all love Pedro Pascal. We all love his performance in The Last of Us as Joel, the ultimate father and Daddy. We all crashed out when he met a brutal, bloody death in episode two of the show's highly anticipated second season (no spoilers warning, the game has been out for five years, suck it up).
But a handful of episodes does not make a leading performance! It's barely a guest performance!
It's a shock, but not all that surprising from a body that has been insisting for years that 30-minute-panic-attack-masquerading-as-a-show The Bear is a comedy (they did it again this year.)
This one is for every person who tried to explain to a friend why they needed to watch Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg's hilariously cutting Hollywood satire.
The Studio walked away with a whopping 23 nominations today, matching a record for most comedy nominations set by The Bear last year. In a testament to the show's crazy celebs-playing-themselves cameos, five out of the six Best Guest in a Comedy nominations are held by Studio players.
This includes the first ever Emmy acting nominations for beloved directors Martin Scorsese and Ron Howard. Francesca Scorsese shared an adorable screenshot of her dad finding out the good news.
Now, go and watch The Studio!
Considering Netflix's airy crack at eat-the-rich drama only juuuuuussstt made it into the eligibility window, it was a surprise to see Meghann Fahy snap up a Best Actress nod for her turn as mess-up-turned-amateur-sleuth Devon.
If only that love could have been extended to rising star Aussie Milly Alcock, who steals the show as Devon's wealthy wannabe sister, Simone. Fahy will face off against Cate Blanchett — the only Australian to nab a major nomination — in September, but it would have been nice to see two locals in the mix.
Lucky for us, Milly is booked and busy being James Gunn's Supergirl.
It's really hard to make terminal cancer funny. It's even harder to make it uplifting. It's even HARDER to make it lip-quiveringly sexy. Yet, somehow, limited series Dying For Sex manages all that and more.
The incredibly poignant rumination on dying and living set critics keyboard's alight, but didn't quite get a look in audience-wise. Which is why it was such a happy shock to see the Emmys lavish Dying For Sex with many nominations. Michelle Williams nabbed a very-well-deserved nod for her vulnerable performance of a woman processing her death sentence, while Jenny Slate also picked one up for playing the scattered best friend desperate to help.
All up, Dying For Sex managed six nominations; here's hoping it doesn't get crashed in an Adolescence tidal wave.
It could be two years in a row that a shocking Netflix limited series ends up sweeping awards ceremonies. Last year, it was Richard Gadd's Baby Reindeer. In 2025, it's Adolescence's turn. Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham's arresting look at the consequences of the online 'manosphere' rustled up 13 nominations.
Eyes will be on Brit Owen Cooper, the first-time actor who blew audiences away as 13-year-old accused murderer Jamie Miller. Cooper took home the Gotham Award for his performance earlier in the year; if he takes the Emmy too, he'll become the youngest male Emmy winner ever.
The final season of Handmaid's Tale came and went with little fanfare in May. Maybe it was the three-year gap between seasons five and six, maybe the audience bailed after the dystopian series started to resemble reality a little too much. Whatever the case, the drop-off has translated into a muted 2025 reception for a series that has won 15 Emmys over its lifetime.
It managed to grab just one nomination, and it wasn't for lead Elisabeth Moss — the nod went to Cherry Jones for Best Guest Actress. Not quite the swan song expected for a show that was once essential viewing.
Somebody Somewhere is not a flashy show. There are no death games or mushroom zombies. Just a loving, hilarious and utterly unique portrayal of life in your 40s in a small town. The Emmys have been reluctant to acknowledge Somebody Somewhere's flawless seasons (each rating 100 per cent on Rotten Tomatoes), but that all changes today.
Not only did star Bridget Everett and her sublime writers nab a writing nod, but Jeff Hiller — who plays the sweet and supportive best friend to Everett — squeaked into the Best Actor in a Comedy list.
Maybe everything is going to be OK (which, incidentally, is the exact feeling that watching Somebody Somewhere elicits.)