2024 Emmy Predictions: Best Limited Series
Heading into the 2024 Primetime Emmys, Netflix is poised to achieve its third Best Limited Series victory in four years. Most prognosticators are convinced that “Baby Reindeer” will easily emulate “The Queen’s Gambit” and “Beef,” but, even if it falters, its streaming platform has some insurance here since its “Ripley” also has a shot at the gold.
This year’s five Best Limited Series contenders boast between 10 and 19 nominations apiece, making for a collective total of 68. In addition to Apple TV+’s “Lessons in Chemistry,” the two Netflix programs’ challengers include the respective fourth and fifth iterations of the HBO and FX anthology series “True Detective” and “Fargo.”
In order to determine whether this is truly Netflix’s race to lose, let’s take a closer look at each nominee. Be sure to make your predictions in this and 24 other Primetime Emmy categories by September 15.
“Baby Reindeer” (Netflix)
Three of this series’ 11 nominations (acting, writing, producing) went to creator Richard Gadd, who adapted it from his one-man show of the same name. Over the course of seven episodes, the Scottish comedian plays a slightly fictionalized version of himself who, while grappling with some personal trauma, becomes a lonely woman’s stalking victim.
“Fargo” (FX)
This offbeat crime series has now earned a lifetime total of 70 Emmy nominations, with its first of four in this category having led to a win in 2014. Reverting to a contemporary setting after taking viewers back to the 1950s in season four, it stars “Ted Lasso” alum Juno Temple as a seemingly ordinary Minnesota housewife whose family’s lives are put in danger when a run-in with the police brings her unpleasant past to light.
“Lessons in Chemistry” (Apple TV+)
Apple TV+’s first program nomination for a miniseries or telefilm comes for this eight-part adaptation of Bonnie Garmus’s 2022 novel about a 1960s TV star who imbues her popular cooking show with educational elements. Although all five limited series contenders are also nominated for their directing, this is the only one without writing recognition.
“Ripley” (Netflix)
This marks the third instance of Netflix having double nominations in this category, after 2020 (“Unbelievable”; “Unorthodox”) and 2023 (“Beef”; “Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story”). Created, written, directed, and produced by Steven Zaillian (“The Night Of”), this adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 1955 novel “The Talented Mr. Ripley” faithfully recounts the tale of its titular con artist’s obsession with the enviably carefree heir to a shipbuilding fortune.
“True Detective: Night Country” (HBO)
This edition of “True Detective” is the most Emmy-nominated limited program of the year, with its 19 bids (at least eight more than any previous season) bringing its franchise’s total to 41. Following the 2014 iteration of the show as the second one to receive a program nomination, it tells the story of a police investigation into the disappearance of eight scientists stationed in Alaska.
So, what will win the 2024 Emmy for Best Limited Series? When it first entered this race right after premiering in mid-April, “Baby Reindeer” was faced with the daunting challenge of fending off FX’s “Shōgun,” but that pressure was alleviated when its rival was reclassified as a continuing series one month later. Since then, the massively popular Netflix production has been headed for seemingly inevitable triumphs in multiple major categories, with its support rate in Gold Derby’s simulation of the main contest presently standing at 87%.
High nomination counts aside, TV academy voters aren’t likely to start or go back to awarding “True Detective” or “Fargo” in this category now, and “Baby Reindeer’s” other challengers are even less likely to obtain their favor. As with “Beef” last year, it would be wisest to expect the Netflix series to clean up in most if not all of the 10 categories in which it is competing.
PREDICT the 2024 Emmy winners through September 15
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