The only streaming drama to triumph was Netflix’s Apple Cider Vinegar, which won the best miniseries or telemovie category. The shows it beat – Critical Incident (Stan*), Fake (Paramount+) and How to Make Gravy (Binge), Plum (ABC) and Human Error (Nine) – were all mainly on streamers (so no ratings data) or were less flashy free-to-air dramas.
So, while it is not as simple as ABC good/Netflix bad, it is as simple as the ABC won because it produced high-quality shows that were critical and popular hits and the ABC’s audience was engaged enough to then back those shows with votes.
Anna Torv as Emily Lawson and Philippa Northeast as her daughter, Susie, in Territory.
The same can be said for McGranger winning the Silver Logie for best lead actress in a drama. McGranger won because she survived 33 years as Irene Roberts in Summer Bay. She won because Home and Away’s audience love her, watch her and vote for her. In this case, the expert vote didn’t matter a jot.
And this is where it gets tricky, again. The issue is not McGranger herself, who is an engaging and popular performer, and a lovely lunch date. Rather, things get complicated because the Logies have bastardised the word “best” in pursuit of an ideal that has turned out more like an algorithm. And a bad one at that. And that is not McGranger’s fault, it’s the fault of the new Logies voting system.
The ratings and popular components of the vote also explain the other night’s real head-scratcher: the ABC’s cosy crime drama Return to Paradise beating the ABC’s critically acclaimed The Newsreader. One is, quite clearly, the best – as in critically acclaimed – the other is Return to Paradise, which won on ratings and the popular vote.
The “best” awards are Frankenstein’s monster-esque, a stitched together creation that looks and sounds human but has no heart. Previously, the awards were divided into “popular” and “outstanding” categories, which essentially meant the popular kids and the nerds went home happy, satisfied they had been recognised in their corner of the school yard.
Now, to use a technical term, they are a complete schemozzle.
It is easy to write off the Logies as bogan or pointless, a relic of the days when free-to-air television was all we had. But they do matter. They are the only dedicated awards we have for our television industry.
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They give our talent a platform to be recognised, which is incredibly important when so much content – and god, that word makes my skin crawl – is fed to us via overseas streamers or overseas broadcasters. They are our history on screen. Our childhood. Our memories. But the Logies, as they stand, are also broken.
Does it matter? Only if you believe in a fair playing field. There is room enough to recognise both popular and outstanding performances and shows. If the Logies want to truly represent today’s Australian TV landscape they have some work to do.
Stan is owned by Nine, the publisher of this masthead.
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