BENJAMONSTER AWARDS 2022: Outstanding Technical Design of a Drama Series

Today's award is Outstanding Technical Design of a Drama Series!

Check out past results from 2020 and 2021!

This year's nominees are...

EUPHORIA (HBO)

THE GILDED AGE (HBO)

LOKI (Disney+)

PACHINKO (Apple TV+)

SEVERANCE (Apple TV+)

WINNING TIME: THE RISE OF THE LAKERS DYNASTY (HBO)

YELLOWJACKETS (Showtime)

And the Winner Is...

PACHINKO

Apple TV+

Apple TV+'s sprawling epic story Pachinko is told in multiple languages, set in multiple countries and across decades. It's very ambitious and while they don't always nail it from a storytelling perspective but they do from a technical perspective. The series is gorgeous to look at with stunning shots that make it feel very epic. In various time periods from Korea in 1915 to Japan in the late 1980s, the series captured each location and point in time in a very specific way. The Korean countryside scenes were beautiful to watch, the 1980s Tokyo scenes captured an era where Tokyo was becoming a global power. The seventh episode was shot entirely in black and white and showed the devastation of an earthquake. This also might be the place to mention that Pachinko definitely has the best opening theme of the 2021-22 season.

Thoughts on the Rest of the Nominees:

2020's winner Euphoria was back as a nominee and very much in the mix to win. It's moody way of storytelling and visual style turns the show from a potentially trashy teen show to something that's far more interesting. This category is the only nomination for both The Gilded Age and Loki, which were both impressive visually. The costumes were stunning on The Gilded Age while Loki had very interesting retro styles mixed with sci-fi and futuristic elements. Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty had a very interesting filming style that played up its setting of the late 1970s. I loved that but it wasn't used with consistency and there didn't seem to be a rhyme or reason for that which is one reason it didn't win. Yellowjackets very effectively navigated two extremely different settings and had some great visual surprises. While a lot of these nominees got nominated for their sprawling and big visual styles, Severance got nominated for its cold and simplistic visual style and set that certainly contributed to the mood of the show.

Tomorrow: Outstanding Technical Design of a Comedy Series!