I’m not even going to tell you that this article will be short. I know how I write and I know that I cannot stop when I started chatting about the Oscars. I will do my best to keep my tangents to a minimum and stick to the events of the season. Below is my unavoidably lengthy look at the 85th Academy Awards.

Every May, I begin looking towards the upcoming Oscar season and try to find films that seem like they would be Academy fodder. A combination of studio pressure, big-name directors and other factors leads to a list that has a lot strong prospects, but also a fair amount of filler. On May 1, I created my first Hopefuls list and, for an Oscar season that was characterized as heavily hectic and open to anything, a surprising six of the eventual nine Best Picture nominees were on my initial list (Argo, Django Unchained, Lincoln, Les Misérables, Silver Linings Playbook and Zero Dark Thirty; of which Argo and Django were question marks and were only hopefuls, not actual nomination predictions). So, if you examine the year that was, volatility was largely conjured by eager columnists hoping to play this as a wide-open season.

That’s not to say that the winners were known early. For the longest time, Lincoln and Les Misérables were considered the two frontrunners for the Oscars. Most felt Lincoln would be too crusty and historical to be a contender while doubts that Les Misérables could duplicate Chicago‘s success were widely circulated. Zero Dark Thirty was another film that was heavily touted early in the season as a possible Best Picture winner. And as the critics groups quickly lined up behind Kathryn Bigelow’s popular follow-up to her Best Picture Oscar winner The Hurt Locker. Then an interesting thing happened.

Just after the beginning of the year, a handful of critics groups started presenting awards to Argo for Best Picture. The two that should have been the best signs were the Online Film Critics Society and the Broadcast Film Critics Association. Both groups have large membership bodies, unlike most of the smaller critics groups, giving them the potential for recognizing consensus candidates in fields that are largely wide-open. One thing you shouldn’t let any other Oscar watcher tell you is that Argo‘s win was some sort of sympathy vote based on being snubbed by the Academy on nomination morning in the Best Director category. The tide had already begun to turn before that and in my Monday Oscar Preview article before the nominations announcement, I opined about Argo‘s sudden rise in expectations.

The OFCS which announced mere days before the Oscar nominations and the BFCA (presenters of the Critics Choice awards) gave the prize the evening of the nominations. Both groups had already completed voting before the Oscar nominations came out and so their awards should have been indicative of the shift, not some vain attempt to re-write the past and suggest Argo wasn’t already well on its way to winning Best Picture. The Golden Globes, whose ballots were due before the Oscar nominations, also furthered that line of thought with their awards the immediately following Sunday. Three large and prominent groups, uninfluenced by the Oscar nominations, gave their Best Picture prizes to Argo. That doesn’t sound like a sympathy play at all, since nearly everyone though Ben Affleck was a lock for a Best Director nomination.

After that, prize after prize flowed to Argo even with groups that wouldn’t have typically supported that type of film (like the Writers Guild of America). In the end, we know the result and it was exactly as we all expected, but it wasn’t some sympathy vote by the Academy. While that might have netted Affleck and his film a few votes, the tide had already begun to shift to Argo before the nominations and those are the facts.

Other categories were either more or less count-and-dry throughout the season Anne Hathaway was buzzed about as a potential Best Supporting Actress for Les Mis winner long before the first trailer for the film premiered. After that trailer, everyone was certain she would be the ultimate victor. While many tried in vain to point out her role was too small and insignificant to be considered for Oscar, even critics agreed hers was one of the best performances of the year. She ultimately picked up 19 total precursors before carrying home the Oscar. Few supporting performers have so handily dominated their category going into the Oscars, so her win was never really in doubt.

Only one other precursor season victor had more prizes than Hathaway and that was Daniel Day-Lewis, an actor who nearly always dominates the precursors leading up to his Oscar nominations. But like Gangs of New York, there is always the possibility the Academy will shrug and ignore him. That possibility was tickling many minds going into Oscar season simply because a history third Best Actor Oscar didn’t seem likely. Considering what some consider his chilly nature with cast and crew behind the scenes of his films where he stays in character 100% of the time, the chances of him being ignored were possible. Yet, as he steamrolled through the precursors and began playing the campaign circuit with finesse and charm, the inevitability of his win became one of the most locked-in races of the night.

While you can’t really say this was Harvey Weinstein’s year, he managed three Oscars for his films including two acting prizes and a screenwriting prize. Not since the early studio days has someone had so much influence over Oscar voters and even when they know they’re being played, they can’t help but lap up his expert strategies. Silver Linings Playbook ran through precursor season largely ignored except for several prizes for lead actress Jennifer Lawrence. The movie was seldom seen and with no minor wide release until Christmas, it was beginning to look like he might have faded. Then, the Oscar nominations came out and not only did he nab several key nominations, he pulled off a feat not seen in more than 30 years: four actors nominated in each of the four acting categories. The film then began to look like a potential threat. I had seen its potential early in my forecasts, largely based on the combined factors of Weinstein plus respected director David O. Russell. Even after its performance at the nominations, the film still didn’t seem like much of a player even with its screenwriting win at the British Academy Awards.

Several pundits saw the victory of French actress Emmanuelle Riva at the BAFTA ceremony as a sign that the veteran actress could earn a surprise victory at the Oscars over the then-leading Lawrence. However, the prevailing winds and Oscar history itself favored the hot young actress. While not playing against type like so many of her predecessors (like Charlize Theron and Halle Berry), Lawrence not only had a prior Oscar nomination for a serious dramatic effort to back up her chances, but many critics consider her one of the finest young actresses working today. That combination of factors assured Lawrence a win and should enable her to demand any role she wants for the foreseeable future.

Two other top categories seemed like they could go any direction late in the game. Early in 2013, it seemed like Steven Spielberg was running strong for a third Oscar for Lincoln. Yet, the critics groups didn’t see it that way. Until the beginning of the year, the only director dominating the prizes was Kathryn Bigelow. Some thought that the Academy might recognize her a second time just to avoid sounding like they were only picking her for The Hurt Locker because she would be the first woman to win a Best Director prize, not because she actually deserved it. Unfortunately, her failure to pick up an Oscar nomination along with Affleck’s absence from the race through the race wide open with Spielberg again becoming the favorite.

However, Spielberg’s checkered past with the Academy likely contributed to his ultimate loss. Lincoln peaked early in spite of the universally positive reviews the film received. Michael Haneke’s film performed better than some of us expected, but ultimately a foreign language winner needs to be someone whose oeuvre is much more Academy friendly, which Haneke’s is decidedly not. Benh Zeitlin’s nomination may have seemed like a shock, but considering past indicators, the likelihood of him obtaining a nomination even in a five Best Picture field was still pretty strong. Think of Lee Daniels for Precious. That left the Weinstein-backed auteur David O. Russell who has had a successful career in films and the director who took the purportedly unfilmable book Life of Pi and turned it into a Best Picture nominee with eleven total nominations.

Some thought Lee would be hampered by his prior victory for Brokeback Mountain believing the Academy wouldn’t give him the award without also a Best Picture trophy. Yet, as the film’s strong down-ballot nomination total proved, the creative branches may not have individual strength of numbers, but combined they can push a technically proficient director over the top. Lee’s win put him in the record books, but it’s the standing ovation he received that shows you the immense level of respect Hollywood has for him and how I suspect he may be one of the few directors in history to pick up a third Best Director trophy in the future.

Best Supporting Actor was always going to be competitive. The list of contenders that didn’t make the list is about as long as the contenders who did. Philip Seymour Hoffman’s performance in The Master was an early favorite for a nomination and possibly even a win, but many expected it to be a hard-fought race against someone like Russell Crowe in Les Misérables (before they saw the film), Jude Law in Anna Karenina (before they saw the film) or Leonardo DiCaprio for Django Unchained. There were many possibilities and absolutely no real frontrunners going into precursor season. Hoffman did what was expected, picking up several key awards, but it was Tommy Lee Jones and Matthew McConaughey who came out of the critics period with the most forward momentum.

Ultimately, McConaughey wasn’t nominated, but Jones was and as he slowly accrued enough awards to compare favorably with Hoffman, the Oscar nominations were announced and a few things happened. A first-time list of prior Oscar winners filled each of the year’s five Supporting Actor slots. That fact made us wonder aloud which of the five actors was more likely to pick up a second Oscar (or a third in the case of Robert De Niro). Jones seemed like the perfect candidate and his win at the Screen Actors Guild awards made that seem like the most attractive option. Yet, his stone-faced appearance at the Golden Globes (which later became a Grumpy Cat-style meme) got many talking about whether his steely personality would affect his chances with the Oscars. The fact that he didn’t campaign for himself contributed to the possibility he wasn’t going to get picked. Two other names on the list seemed unlikely to repeat.

Alan Arkin had gone decades between his second and third Oscar nominations suggesting his win for Little Miss Sunshine may have been a one-off event. Christoph Waltz’s work outside of Tarantino’s films was largely considered negligible. Neither really seemed like two-time Oscar winners, though the momentum of Argo led some to believe that Arkin could surprise. Yet, it was the British Academy that ultimately turned the tide.

In 2007, Amy Ryan racked up 14 precursor awards for Best Supporting Actress for Gone Baby Gone. Everyone I knew was predicting Ryan for the win. As the season progressed, I never felt as if she was a real frontrunner. Her trajectory seemed off somehow, but I couldn’t find a viable alternative. Most of her competitors seemed unlikely to triumph with the Academy. Along came BAFTA. They gave their Supporting Actress prize to respected film actress Tilda Swinton. It was her win then that convinced me I had found my silver bullet for the Ryan win and ultimately that’s what happened. Waltz took the BAFTA prize, his second such victory at BAFTA and I realized that if he could win a more refined group of voters than the Oscars (the two organizations do share a significant number of members), then an Oscar certainly wouldn’t be unexpected and that alone is where everyone should have been convinced that Jones wasn’t going to make it.

The preponderance of precursors in these categories make them the easiest to find comparative analyses. I could also go into detail about the Animated Feature and screenwriting categories and perhaps a few below-the-line ones, but much of the year’s heavy competition and interesting turns of events happened above the line. In the end, the uneven nature of the Oscar season was adequately reflected in the Oscar ceremony itself.

The red carpet love-fest was largely unnecessary as it is every year, but the Academy wants to dominate all things Oscar and the various groups that had live red carpet specials were doomed to have competition. While some of the interesting interviews from other networks have often been more creative, the sheer production value of the Academy’s special makes up for it. This was probably one of the best produced pre-shows to date even if it still paled in comparison to the show itself.

The bizarre choices for the 85th Academy Awards began the day Seth MacFarlane was announced as host of the Oscars. MacFarlane, whose biggest claims to fame were the raunchy Fox cartoon The Family Guy and the raunchy box office smash Ted. While his love and admiration for all these television is evident, hosting a major industry telecast seemed like a bit of a grasping stretch for ratings attention. Hiring Broadway producers was also a trifle strange, but that’s not unusual for a big spectacle like the Oscars.

Yet, it was the producers and not the host that did the most damage to the Oscars. Two major announcements seemed to sound like interesting ideas and were designed to draw attention to the telecast and hopefully pull in viewers. The first was the decision to recognize the 50th anniversary of the James Bond franchise by reuniting the Bond actors as well doing a tribute to the franchise and even the music. The second was in attempting to celebrate the revitalization of the musical genre, by highlighting only three of the successful musicals of the last decade. This latter decision was easily attributed to the professional associate the telecast producers had with the production of Chicago.

The Bond tribute was a true celebration of cinema and had it been done well, it could have been one of those lasting tributes the Academy has managed to put together in the past. Yet, the refusal of Sean Connery to participate, the failure to nab any of the great Bond theme singers other than Shirley Bassey and the lame video montage from the film made for one of the most disappointing tributes in Oscar history. I will grant you that the Bassey performance of “Goldfinger” was the biggest highlight of the evening, it was a small compensation for a stroke of disappointment.

Chicago, Dreamgirls and Les Misérables are fine musicals, but highlighting only three of the productions of the last decade and ignoring some of the more popular ones like Moulin Rouge, Hairspray and Mamma Mia! seems a bit disrespectful and reductive. I’ll grant you that Hairspray and Mamma Mia! weren’t Oscar nominees and weren’t likely to be, Moulin Rouge beat Chicago to the punch by one year and scored several Oscar nominations. Leaving it out of the list suggests that only stage-to-screen adaptations are worthy of respect. Even had they included Moulin Rouge, the execution of the four-song tribute was horrendous.

While the sexy background dancers of the “All That Jazz” number from Chicago distracted the audience from the somewhat notable lip-syncing Catherine Zeta-Jones was doing, the number suffered from bad sound mixing. Jennifer Hudson still has pipes but even she can’t overcome a severely-mutilated version of the classic “And I Am Telling You” number from Dreamgirls. Struggling over the poor sound mix, she ended up screaming most of the song, but even then she was still better voiced than Zeta-Jones. Then, when Hugh Jackman stepped out on stage to sing a snippet from the Oscar-nominated “Suddenly,” it seemed like we were going to be in for a rough segment. Then, Anne Hathaway joined Jackman to sing “Do You Hear the People Sing” and it began to pick up. As the rest of the cast and several background singers walked out on stage, we ended the musical tribute section on a strong note with the amazing vocals of Samantha Barks overshadowing all others.

The sound problems also plagued Adele’s performance of “Skyfall” and Norah Jones’ performance of “Everybody Needs a Best Friend.” Part of this could have been the absolutely idiotic decision to move the orchestra to another building altogether and pipe in their performance, but the sound designers deserve equal admonition for their painful and poorly constructed sound mixture.

Yet, these musical interludes and the Bond tribute contributed only a fraction of the show’s running time, which is a bit surprising all things considered. The show itself flowed fairly smoothly, presenting the creative categories in pairs helped move things along well even if it seemed a tad bit disrespectful to the craftsmen who make movies possible.

Seth MacFarlane was an affable host and did a fantastic job keeping the show moving, appearing regularly throughout the proceedings to introduce presenters and even to announce the upcoming events that would follow the commercial breaks. It was here that you could really see his admiration for television coming through. That undying interesting also provided some rather frustrating segments.

While Star Trek does have a notable history with the big screen, bringing in William Shatner as Captain Kirk felt like a largely selfish tribute to television. Shatner came from the future to warn MacFarlane of the bad press he would receive for hosting the Oscars. The bit, while somewhat clever, went on far too long, gave critics too much ammunition and ultimately faltered. I will admit that the opening musical number “I Saw Your Boobs” was one of the most entertaining segments I’ve seen on the Oscars since Hugh Jackman hosted; however, the entire concept is utterly inappropriate for the Academy Awards. It’s a tacky bit that appeals to the part of me that loves The Family Guy, but realizes it just wasn’t the right setting. This did lead into the best part of the opening, a beautiful dance featuring Channing Tatum and Charlize Theron. Their fluid dancing skills were one of the highlights of the night even if it felt as out of place as the rest of the opening.

The song-and-dance number with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Daniel Radcliffe while a showcase a talent, didn’t work very well. Forced and chintzy, the number shouldn’t have “boosted” his future popularity the way it was portrayed. The rest of the bits of the overlong opening blend into my mind and I cannot recall specific instances, which may contribute to why it felt like a failure.

MacFarlane didn’t play safe with jokes taking jabs at George Clooney, Jews in Hollywood and even the assassination of Lincoln by John Wilkes Booth. None of his bits came off very egregious, but they were picked apart by outside forces after the telecast for largely unnecessary reasons. They may not have been classics-in-the-making, but a lot of the ruffled feathers seemed to be misinterpretations rather than valid concerns. It was clear going into the festivities that MacFarlane was going to be a polarizing figure and while I found his failures to be more glaring than his successes, he was ultimately not an awful host. I leave that distinction to James Franco and David Letterman.

In the end, I didn’t hate the show, nor did I think it was the best show ever done. The post-Best Picture loser song was in poor taste and nearly all of the poor decisions made were on the part of the producers and not the host. As uneven as MacFarlane was, it was the responsibility of the producers to reign him in and approve anything he did or wanted to do. That failure mixed with all of the other decisions that can easily be faulted with the producers point to behind-the-scenes issues, not from the man in front of the camera, even if he ends up taking the brunt of the blame. He’s an easy scapegoat, but shouldn’t be.

Another Rob Lowe-Snow White debacle this wasn’t, nor was it a pinnacle of success like the 81st Academy Awards. That was the year when grace and style were returned to the Oscars at the hands of Bill Condon and Laurence Mark. Coincidentally, one of my favorite Oscar hosts came out of that ceremony: Hugh Jackman. In the future, the Academy should look at that show for inspiration on how to do it right or at least better and stop trying to be something it isn’t. You will never earn the respect of a new generation of moviegoers while trying to hold onto the last vestiges of your older days. You can combine the two, but be careful…it isn’t an easy task as MacFarlane learned this year. Could he be better with more seasoning? Perhaps. But after this, none one will give him another shot.

The 85th Academy Awards season will go down as one of the most complex and volatile seasons in recent history even if a lot of the final results feel predictable in hindsight. Whether you admire, love or despise this year’s selection, you can’t deny that it wasn’t one hell of a ride. A competitive year will do more for interest in the Oscars than foregone conclusions, but finding those competitions is tough. Expanding your Best Picture slate, finding younger and hipper hosts, and moving your awards earlier are not the answer. Quality product will always win out. We can hope that this year was the beginning of a trend, but like with the Academy Awards, never bet against tradition and predictability. More often than not records are not broken, they’re nudged.