Golden Globes nominees: TV nods demonstrate changing TV landscape

When the Golden Globes nominations arrived, the TV major categories demonstrated just how much the TV landscape has changed. 

All of the nominees for the best comedy series Golden Globe are for cable or streaming shows. Broadcast networks were completely shut out. And only one show (Fox’s “Empire”) made the cut for the best TV drama Golden Globe, with all the rest coming from cable networks or streaming. 

The best comedy series nominees are Hulu’s “Casual,” Netflix’s “Orange Is the New Black,” Amazon’s “Mozart in the Jungle” and “Transparent,” and HBO’s “Veep” and "Silicon Valley." The other drama nominees besides “Empire” are Starz’s “Outlander,” Netflix’s “Narcos,” USA’s “Mr. Robot,” and HBO’s “Game of Thrones.”

This is in contrast to the ceremony five years ago, when four of the six nominees for the best comedy prize came from broadcast TV. Only two, Showtime’s “Nurse Jackie” and HBO’s “The Big C,” were from cable. Streaming was pretty much a nonentity (Netflix’s first streaming original show, “House of Cards,” wouldn’t debut until 2013). 

The change was already beginning to be seen in the 2011 drama category, though, where only one show (CBS’s “The Good Wife”) was from broadcast TV. The rest were all from cable.

This current roster of nominees exemplifies the changing TV landscape. Cable networks and streaming services are increasingly known as a place to find quality television, with some of the most acclaimed programs of the last several years coming from places like cable network AMC (“Mad Men,” “Breaking Bad”) or Netflix (“House of Cards,” “Orange Is the New Black”). 

Broadcast networks, of course, are still the home of high-profile events like the Super Bowl and the Oscars. In some ways, the big channels are still at the center of our lives.

But in other ways, they’re struggling to find what works in the new TV world. They have had some found successes – “Empire,” for example, which became a huge hit. 

But the AMC hit “The Walking Dead” has surpassed even the ratings powerhouse “Sunday Night Football” multiple times. 

The list of nominees for the major Golden Globe prizes demonstrates that cable and streaming shows are continuing to shake up the TV landscape in a profound way.