The Biggest Snubs and Surprises of the 2018 Emmys

Listen, if all the shows that people thought should win awards for being great actually won, we wouldn't even need awards shows, we'd just hand out trophies to everyone. But people have opinions and we feel the need to make declarative statements about what is the best, so when Monday's 70th Primetime Emmy Awards concluded, everyone who watched had at least one gripe or grievance with who walked away with a statuette.

While it's true that everyone has opinions, some of those opinions are just plain wrong and in the case of the Emmys, some deserving shows were left sitting at their table instead of thanking us all on stage. These snubbed shows may have been ripped off by the Emmys, but they won't go unnoticed by us. Likewise, some shows and actors we didn't think had a chance to win actually pulled it off, making their victories pleasant surprises!

This is all to say that there were definitely some snubs and surprises at this year's Emmys, so let's talk about them.

SNUBS

Donald Glover, Atlanta
After the Emmys (jokingly) touted that TV's diversity problem had been solved in its opening number, a bunch of white people won every single comedy award. That meant we were robbed of an acceptance speech by Atlanta's Donald Glover (Bill Hader won for Barry), who may or may not have been dressed as his Atlanta weirdo alter ego Teddy Perkins. (Glover was later seen in the audience as himself, making it the show's greatest mystery.)

David Harbour, Stranger Things
The best shot for Stranger Things to win an Emmy was David Harbour's soulful performance as Chief Hopper, but nope. The prize went to Peter Dinklage, who is probably tired from walking up to the Emmy's podium so many times (he tied Breaking Bad's Aaron Paul for the most supporting actor wins with three). This wasn't Tyrion's best season in Game of Thrones, but it most certainly was Hopper's, which makes this a big fat snub that we won't be over for a while. #JusticeForHarbour!

Sandra Oh, Killing Eve and Keri Russell, The Americans
The award for best actress in a drama went to Claire Foy for The Crown and she's great, but to be honest we were hoping for either Killing Eve's Sandra Oh or The Americans' Keri Russell to win. Oh already made history as the Emmys' first Asian-American nominee in a major acting category, and a win would have capped that story off perfectly. As for Russell, she's been fantastic in The Americans for six seasons but has no hardware to show for it.

The Americans
This was a pure snub. The FX drama finally broke through with some major wins (writing and best actor for Matthew Rhys) but couldn't pull in the big one in its final season. The big slap in the face is that it lost to Game of Thrones, which looked great but was criticized heavily for its writing in its latest season. An ice dragon is sweet, but did you all see the perfect series finale for The Americans?

Check out our complete Emmys coverage here

SURPRISES

Bill Hader, Barry
We loved Barry. It was a fantastic surprise. The story was wonderful. Anthony Carrigan was a breakout star. Henry Winkler deserved an Emmy and won it. Barry the character was pretty amazing. But Hader as an actor for a role that wasn't too "actory"? Over stiff competition from Atlanta's Donald Glover and The Good Place's Ted Danson? That is not what we were expecting.

That proposal!
After winning an Emmy for directing the Oscars, Glenn Weiss told a sad story about his mother dying just a few weeks ago in what was the evening's most sentimental moment at the point. But then he warmed the room by turning the attention to his girlfriend Jan Svendsen, and dropped to one knee to propose. She said yes. And everything else seemed to matter a little less.

Game of Thrones
It shouldn't be surprising that Game of Thrones won for best drama -- it won for its previous two seasons -- but after being ineligible at last year's Emmys and putting out what was considered a weak season with all kinds of inconsistencies (how fast can crows fly!?!?) this seemed like the season it could have stayed seated.

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel
We all knew it was a likely winner heading into the Emmys, but we had no idea it would win THIS MANY AWARDS. Amazon's period comedy won best comedy, best actress, best supporting actress, best directing and best writing, dominating the comedy category. In fact, only supporting actor nominee Tony Shalhoub -- whose closet is already full of Emmys for Monk -- didn't win for The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. All these wins came at heavy favorite Atlanta's expense, which went home with nothing.