We had two films release this past weekend with the potential for Oscar nominations.

Pacific Rim: Uprising

It might seem vanity to suggest that a sequel to a Guillermo del Toro film without him at the helm that wasn’t a previous Oscar nominee could even be considered as an Oscar contender, but here we are. Pacific Rim: Uprising is part of a breed of action films that rely heavily on big sounds and big effects to sell itself and, which might have been a major contender had it been made in the 1990s when such efforts were few and far between.

The film, about giant robots facing off against giant monsters, is heavy with visual effects and sound effects, though it’s not nearly as noisy as something from Michael Bay might have been. That might be a hindrance to the film’s chances in the Sound Mixing and Sound Editing categories, especially considering the creative music that starts off the film seems to blend too fully into the background as it progresses to be notable. That combined with the strange tendency to avoid the sound of buildings collapsing or being shattered in the collateral damage suggests a less boisterous soundscape than Academy voters typically reward.

Regarding the visual effects, they are impressive, but are they unique enough to be thought as anything more than derivative? I’m afraid not. While the effects are certainly convincing, the feeling of deja-vu is strong with them, suggesting that they’ll be easier to ignore come Oscar time. Unlike the Planet of the Apes films, which only incrementally improved their style, but were consistently rewarded, we’ve been bombarded with these types of effects from the Transformers films for so long, it would explain why the first film wasn’t an Oscar nominee and why this one would be a significant long shot as a result.

Isle of Dogs

While it took time for him to be considered, Wes Anderson is now in full-blown Oscar recognition mode. His last three films have all been Oscar nominees with his last, The Grand Budapest Hotel, being the most successful, garnering nine Oscar nominations four years ago, winning four for Original Score, Production Design, Costume Design, and Makeup & Hairstyling.

However, it’s not Grand Budapest we want to look at for inspiration. Isle of Dogs employs stop-motion animation, making it all but ineligible in a large number of categories. Instead, we must look at his only prior animated effort, Fantastic Mr. Fox, for inspiration. Released almost a decade ago, Mr. Fox was released to critical acclaim and the Academy took note of that nominating it not only for Animated Feature, but also for Original Score. Animated films are seldom multi-Oscar nominees, but a film of this quality, one with a healthy response from critics, should carry over to the Oscar nominations in Animated Feature with little problem and, if there isn’t anything else worthy of a win, it could become a frontrunner, watching out for Wreck-It Ralph 2 and Incredibles 2 as its nearest competition.

That said, can the film earn nominations beyond Animated Feature? This will be Alexandre Desplat’s third chance to earn an Oscar nomination for an Anderson film. He was the second nomination for Mr. Fox and was one of the four Grand Budapest winners. With his recent Oscar win for The Shape of Water, he’s certainly a contender this year. He does have other potential nominations as well, so it’s not a slam-dunk. As Kubo and the Two Strings proved, nominations outside of Animated Feature and the writing and music categories is incredibly possible. It was also nominated for Visual Effects. However, Isle of Dogs, apart from being stop-motion animation, doesn’t have a lot of special effects in it, which will hinder its chances. Further, Kubo was nominated by the Costume Designers Guild. Although that didn’t translate to an Oscar nomination, both Costume Design and Production Design could certainly be in play for the film.

In the end, I suspect an Animated Feature nomination might be the film’s best (and only) chance, but there are more opportunities should the film pick up a lot of consideration through Precursor season in December.