Oscars 2023: Best Animated Series Predictions
“Marcel with the Shell Shoes” will be a contender with Annie’s win, but this is still “Pinocchio” to lose.

We’ll be updating all of our Oscar predictions throughout the season, so stay tuned to IndieWire for the latest news on the 2023 Oscar race. The nomination round of voting will take place between January 12 and January 17, 2023, with the official Oscar nominations announced on January 24, 2023. The final vote will take place between March 2 and 7, 2023. Finally the 95. Oscar Award The telecast will air on Sunday, March 12th and live on ABC at 8:00 PM ET/ 5:00 PM PT.
Check out our first thoughts on what to expect at the 95th Academy Awards.
State of the species
“Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio” moved one step closer to winning the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature after leading the 50th Annual Annie Awards at ASIFA-Hollywood (Feb. 25 at UCLA’s Royce Hall). The stop-motion “Pinocchio” received the best film award from Netflix, as well as the feature film award for best character animation (Tucker Barrie), best direction (del Toro and Mark Gustafson), best music (Alexandre Desplat, Roeban Katz, del) category. Toro, Patrick McHale) and best production design (Curt Enderle, Guy Davis).
However, winning Best Indie Film at the Annies makes A24’s ‘Marcel the Shell with Shoes On’ a strong contender. The historic stop-motion/live-action hybrid also won Annies for best acting for co-creator Jenny Slate and best writing (directed by Dean Fleischer Camp, Slate, Nick Paley, Elisabeth Holm).
The other three Oscar nominees are Pixar’s “Turning Red,” DreamWorks’ “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” and Netflix’s “The Sea Beast.”
Del Toro’s first animated film, “Pinocchio,” was the front-runner from the start, enjoying the director’s auteur status. He will be the first Best Director winner (“The Shape of Water”) to also win Best Animated Feature. This poignant father-son musical drama and anti-fascist tale takes stop-motion (from the Portland division of “BoJack Horseman” studio ShadowMachine) in a more live-action direction with lighting, camera work and performances.
Meanwhile, the acclaimed “Marcel the Shell” made Oscar history as the first stop-motion/live-action nominee after qualifying as a unique hybrid. Fleischer Camp’s debut film (adapted from a series of shorts with Slate) follows a 1-inch anthropomorphic clam (voiced by Slate) on his journey to find his family, which becomes a viral sensation thanks to a docudrama (mostly played off-screen by Camp) and released on “60 Minutes.” The film was embraced for its charm, wit, unusually small-scale stop-motion (supervised by animator Kirsten Lepore) and its lovable breakout star.
Significantly, “Turning Red” and “Puss in Boots” are both CG standouts for pushing the 2D aesthetic in very different directions. Director Domee Shi paved the way as Pixar’s female visionary with “Turning Red” and its quirky, anime-inspired aesthetic that matched her comedic fantasy of a giant red panda as a metaphor for puberty.
The experimental “Into the Spider-Verse” look was heavily influenced by the picturesque fairy-book style of “Puss in Boots,” in which the fearless cat of the “Shrek” franchise (Antonio Banderas) fights death after burning through the first eight of nine. live Director Joel Crawford benefited from DreamWorks’ expanded toolbox and some psychedelic 2D looks for the battles between Puss and The Wolf (Wagner Moura).
The only surprise is “The Sea Beast,” a retro sea adventure directed by former Disney vet Chris Williams (Oscar-winning “Big Hero 6”) about an orphan wanderer (Zaris-Angel Hator), a sea monster hunter (Karl ). Urban), and a misunderstood Red Leviathan.
Below is a list of the candidates in order of probability of victory:
“Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio” (ShadowMachine/Netflix)
“Marcel the Shell with Shoes” (A24)
“Turning Red” (Pixar/Disney)
“Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” (DreamWorks/Universal)
“The Sea Beast” (Netflix)
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