This Is Us receives only 1 Emmy nomination for final season

Dan Snierson
·3 min read
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The final season of This Is Us may have been well-received by fans, but Emmy voters didn't show it much love on the way out the door.

NBC's hit drama received only one nomination in its final season — in the Original Music and Lyrics category.

The time-tripping, multigenerational family saga had previously been nominated in the Outstanding Drama Series category in every season but its fourth. Over its six-season run, This Is Us has earned 39 nominations and notched four victories, with Sterling K. Brown, Ron Cephas Jones, and Gerald McRaney picking up acting trophies.

Of particular surprise and outrage to fans was the lack of recognition for Mandy Moore, who earned high praise for her portrayal of Pearson matriarch Rebecca as she struggled with Alzheimer's. Moore had previously been nominated in 2019 and seemed to be positioned well for another nom, given the strength and depth of her work this season. The penultimate episode, "The Train," in which Rebecca passed into the afterlife with an elegant train metaphor, scored with critics and wet-eyed fans.

Moore did sing the song that received the show's lone Emmy nomination, "The Forever Now," but it was actually This Is Us composer Siddhartha Khosla and the song's co-writer, Moore's husband, Dawes frontman Taylor Goldsmith, who received the official nomination.

This Is Us creator Dan Fogelman addressed the snub on Twitter while creating his own awards show in the process. "The Emmy noms didn't break for #ThisIsUs today - if you're happy when they go your way, you've got to take it on the chin when they don't," he wrote. "That entire group wins a 'Danny' in my book. And so proud that my college roomie @SiddKhoslaMusic will be repping us with Taylor!" Moore quote-tweeted her former boss, writing, "So proud of @SiddKhoslaMusic and @dawestheband for their stunning song getting the recognition it deserves. No award can give or take away the legacy of what our show has meant to us and so many. Grateful. But I will take a "Danny" lol. #thisisus"

Brown spoke frequently this season about how Moore's performance deserved a trophy. "It's Emmy time," he told EW earlier this year. "The woman was absolutely extraordinary.... She owned it with confidence from beginning to end. The level of research that she put into folks going through dementia/Alzheimer's was real."

Another departing network series that has received many nominations over the years, ABC comedy black-ish, was also ignored in the key categories, earning nods in hairstyling and costuming.

Meanwhile, the other show that Fogleman exec produces, Hulu comedy Only Murders in the Building, had an impressive morning, scoring 17 nominations.

The Emmy Awards will air Monday, Sept. 12 at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT on NBC, and will be available to stream live and on demand on Peacock.

Check out more from EW's The Awardist, featuring exclusive interviews, analysis, and our podcast diving into all the highlights from the year's best in TV.

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