My older sister strong armed me into being a movie fan real early – holding me hostage to watch the Oscars like they were vitally important every year (along with yearly mandatory showings of Gone with the Wind) since I was old enough to say “I’d like to thank the Academy.” Eventually, I got a bit feistier and ripped free of her epics and engenues to form my own darker/weirder/quirkier taste in movies, befitting of the spooky-goth-teen (yes that’s my senior picture) I had become, but the Oscars still had me.

Every. Goddamn. Year.

But instead of my early assumption that they were the gold standard mark of Hollywood quality, I started to see the insidious underbelly of old white people with bad taste that was truly at work and became increasingly cranky about it every subsequent year. I’ve been hate-watching the Oscars for decades now (refer back to this ancient 2010 blog post about my plans for a Reverse Oscars telecast), and here’s why it’s still worth it:

1. A reason to see a whole bunch of movies outside of my standard preferred genres – which occasionally are even good.
2. The street cred to have real loud opinions on the generally bullshittery of the Academy and their garbage choices.
3. A yearly reminder of the lack of representation of people of color and women in mainstream Hollywood and how it’s still not time for us to stop screaming about it.

The rules of the Oscar Sprint™ are simple – Make a list of every single film nominated in every single televised category and try to watch them all between the nomination announcements and the actual broadcast. The Oscars are trash, so let’s talk about them. Ready. Set. GO.