Straight Nonsense: Industry's Emmys snub is a crime

In the column Straight Nonsense, columnist Moises Mendez II takes a queer eye to the insanity of straight culture.

I’m never really surprised by the Emmy nominations. There are so few prestige shows that get recognized, and when the Television Academy really likes a show, they shower it with nods — take Hacks, for example, which came out of the list of nominees this year with 24 noms for its fifth and final season. The usual suspects were also deservedly recognized — The Pitt, Abbott Elementary, Pluribus, and more. But there’s one show that keeps getting overlooked by the Academy, inciting a seething rage in my chest, and that’s Industry. The HBO thriller, which follows a group of recent graduates as they enter London's cutthroat banking world, had a spectacular fourth season, and it wasn’t given a single nomination, which not only breaks my heart but also enrages me.

Television Academy, I know you’re reading this — I give recommendations for a living; it’s quite literally my job, so you can trust me. Give Industry a shot, watch the first episode, and see how you feel. I promise you that you’re gonna love it. It’s stressful, sensual, psychosexual, at many points funny, and a bit confusing at times. When I interviewed the cocreators and writers, Konrad Kay and Mickey Down, for Time back in 2022, they said they know the average Joe won’t understand the financial jargon, but you can still enjoy it regardless. Inkoo Kang, the television critic at The New Yorker, is quoted as saying that the Industry is “probably the best on TV,” highlighting the incredibly layered performances from its stars, Myha’la (Harper Stern), Marisa Abel (Yasmin Kara-Hanani), and Kit Harrington (Henry Muck) — all of whom were overlooked by the Emmys voting body.

I remember when I first watched the show in 2020 — I viewed the first season twice because I was just so enamored with how well it dealt with tension and uncertainty. I’m not really the type to rewatch shows because there’s something new to watch almost every week, and I don’t want to miss out on what could be my next favorite show that I make my personality. It’s one of those shows that is admittedly a bit harder to follow with all of the financial jargon being tossed around on screen at a rapid pace, but that doesn’t take away from the quality of writing Kay and Down are delivering season after season. After season 2, it becomes less focused on banking as a whole and more on how money changes people — what people do when they have it, what they’ll do to get it, and how those in charge hoard it.

In this most recent season, Abela and Myha’la are firing on all cylinders as they portray their radically complex characters — friends whose often toxic relationship is the core of Industry. But one of the standouts of the entire series is Ken Leung, who plays the deeply troubled financier Eric Tao. Over the course of four seasons, audiences teetered between hating this character’s guts and rooting for him because we deeply understand his motives and see him become a stand-in father figure to Harper. If there were anyone deserving of a nomination this year, it’s without a doubt Leung.

With that being said, I am interested to see how this year's awards ceremony plays out because, as I predicted, exactly what I feared would happen happened: the Emmys will have to decide between two legends, Jean Smart and Lisa Kudrow, as they duke it out for an award for the final season of their respective shows. There are so many nail-biting races this season that I wish my darling, Industry, were a part of.

The Television Academy has one more chance to get it right, as HBO announced that Industry is getting one final season that will begin filming later this summer, and we can hope will be released within the Emmys eligibility window next year. The Brits are giving us some of the best television to ever grace HBO Max, but we keep letting them down, year after year.

So this message is for the Television Academy: Binge the show and correct your mistakes because you can't tell me you felt Ryan Murphy's hodgepodge pseudo-feminist mess, All's Fair, deserved two noms (one for hairstyling and one for makeup) — and a show that's received universal critical acclaim goes home with zero. Emmys, fix it!

Moises Mendez II is a freelance culture journalist. Follow him on Instagram @moisesfenty.

Opinion is dedicated to featuring a wide range of inspiring personal stories and impactful opinions from the LGBTQ+ community and its allies. Visit Out.com/submit to learn more about submission guidelines. We welcome your thoughts and feedback on any of our stories. Email us at voices@equalpride.com. Views expressed in Opinion stories are those of the guest writers, columnists, and editors, and do not directly represent the views of Out or our parent company, equalpride.