The Biggest Snubs and Surprises From the 2025 Oscar Nominations

An unpredictable Oscars season is at last nearing its end as this year’s Academy Awards—set to broadcast live on Sunday, March 2—sharpen into focus. What has thus far been a largely wide-open awards race, as predicted, yielded several shocks when the 2025 Oscar nominations were announced this morning. Here are our picks for the biggest snubs and surprises of the day.

Snub: Danielle Deadwyler was denied a spot in the Best Supporting Actress category.

Danielle Deadwyler is one of the finest actresses of her time. After the 2023 Oscars snubbed her remarkable performance in Till, that pattern sadly continued with her equally impressive showcase in 2024’s The Piano Lesson.

Surprise: Monica Barbaro ascends.

When it came to A Complete Unknown’s odds this awards season, Timothée Chalamet dominated the conversation for his spot-on portrayal of Bob Dylan; but his co-star Monica Barbaro, who was snubbed from Golden Globe nominations, is at last getting the recognition she deserves, too. She squeezed her way into the Best Supporting Actress category for her performance as Joan Baez.

Snub and surprise: Sebastian Stan snags a spot for The Apprentice rather than A Different Man.

Sebastian Stan is a worthy nominee for Best Actor this year, but he earned the nod for his role as a young Donald Trump in The Apprentice rather than as Edward in A Different Man, his Golden Globe-winning performance, which is arguably the more compelling of the two.

Snub: Pamela Anderson and The Last Showgirl are ignored.

Anderson has enjoyed a momentous press run around the release of Gia Coppola’s The Last Showgirl, but the praise wasn’t enough to win over Oscars voters: Both Anderson and the film itself were snubbed this year, including Miley Cyrus’s original song.

Surprise(ish): Karla Sofía Gascón makes history.

Going into today’s nominations announcement, there was some question amongst fans and awards analysts whether Karla Sofía Gascón would indeed earn her long-expected spot in a heavily debated lead actress race. They needn’t have wondered: The Emilia Peréz star actress made history this morning as the first transgender woman to be nominated for Best Actress. She told ELLE in November 2024, “Honestly, I’m a little bit tired of women in movies always being shown as weak or suffering or having a ton of problems they’re unable to overcome. Movies have these male leads like Harrison Ford and Brad Pitt and people want to be like them. And why not women? Why can’t women have this type of work and portray these types of characters that people see themselves in?” As a former cartel boss-turned-nonprofit founder who undergoes gender-affirming surgery in Emilia Peréz, Gascón clearly proved to Academy voters that her performance was anything but “weak.”

Snub: Zendaya is denied a Best Actress nod.

Zendaya was honored with a nomination at the Golden Globes for her performance in Dune: Part Two, but a Best Actress race full of twists and turns pushed her out at the Oscars. Here’s hoping she still attends the ceremony—if only so we get another red-carpet appearance from her engagement ring.

Snub: Jon M. Chu won’t compete for Best Director.

He might have helmed one of the most talked-about films from 2024, but Jon M. Chu’s directing efforts for Wicked—with its live singing, dancing, and 9 million live tulips—went unrecognized by the Academy. (The movie musical did get a Best Picture nod and multiple other nominations, however.)

Snub: Angelina Jolie is pushed out.

Angelina Jolie did months of opera training to play Maria Callas, but it wasn’t enough to get this year’s Best Actress nomination (25 years after her win for Girl, Interrupted). She was recently shut out of the SAG nominations, too.

Snub: Selena Gomez, too.

Although Emilia Pérez walked away with 13 nominations, including Best Picture, Selena Gomez was unable to clinch a nod for supporting actress (though she did get one for the Golden Globes). Her co-star, Zoe Saldaña, however, was basically a shoo-in for the category.

Snub: Nicole Kidman’s beloved Babygirl is skipped over.

Pour out a glass of milk for Nicole Kidman. Her daring performance in Babygirl, as a powerful CEO who starts an affair with an intern, earned a Golden Globe nod, but none from the SAGs, Critics Choice Awards, or now the Oscars.

Snub: Clarence Maclin doesn’t get his due for Sing Sing.

Best Actor nominee Colman Domingo might have been the star of Sing Sing, but his co-star Clarence Maclin was a highlight, and an actual alum of the Rehabilitation Through the Arts prison program on which the film focuses. He also contributed to the screenplay. (The film is nominated in the adapted category.)

Snub: Marianne Jean-Baptiste couldn’t stir up momentum for Hard Truths.

Marianne Jean-Baptiste, and the film she stars in—Mike Leigh’s Hard Truths—have not been as prominent in mainstream conversations about the Oscar race, but the English actress has been wowing critics. She earned BAFTA and Critics Choice attention for her performance as the bitter Pansy; but sadly, none from the Academy.

Snub: The Academy fails to appreciate the Challengers original score.

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross turned the theater into a club with Challengers’ electronic score. And though they won the Golden Globe for this category, they missed out on a nomination for the Oscars, which instead gave nods to films like The Brutalist and Emilia Pérez in this category.

Snub: Voters were not entertained by Denzel.

Gladiator II fell behind in the awards race, but if there was one standout from the Ridley Scott sequel, it was the one and only Denzel Washington. After the film hit theaters in November, he earned deserved buzz (as the two-time Oscar winner always does) for his role as the villainous trader Macrinus, but it wasn’t enough to get a nod from the Academy.

Snub: Margaret Qualley didn’t pump up the Academy.

While The Substance is nominated for Best Picture, Directing (Coralie Fargeat), and Best Actress (Demi Moore), an integral piece of the film, portrayed by Margaret Qualley, is missing. Though she was nominated for Critics Choice and Golden Globe awards for her role as Moore’s younger counterpart, she was unable to get one for the Oscars.

This story has been updated.