This week, we lay out the guidelines for the upcoming several weeks of polls to face-off one Oscar winner against another.

Taking the first ninety years of Oscar (the 2018 Oscars will not be included), we will pit winners against one another across a series of rounds. Before we begin those rounds, an explanation of them would be appropriate.

Round Zero: Data Collection – This initial round will be done prior to the start of Round One next week. Taking the current 24 categories, we start by eliminating documentary and short film categories. The remaining twenty categories are then pulled together with every winner the category has generated. Some categories have more winners (Original Screenplay) than others (Animated Feature). Behind the scenes, I will collect all of the winners and determine how many films will fit into each bracket for each category. For example, Best Picture has had a total of 91 winners (if you count Unique and Artist Production, which will count for this particular designation). 64 films will compete leaving 27 to be eliminated. Then there’s animated feature, which has had only 17 winners. We only need to eliminate 1 to get down to a manageable bracket of 16. 16, 32, 64, and 128 will be the bracket sizes. Most of the categories appear to shrink to 64, though there is at least one category with each bracket size.

Round One: Eliminations – Once all of this is done, we will begin a weekly elimination round. each category will be broken down across each of Oscar’s nine decades. Voters will then be able to select seven of the ten winners in most categories to preserve for the competition. Some categories, such as Original Screenplay and Original Score will have significantly more winners in a decade, so these will take a bit longer to narrow and will feature several sets of ten. In cases where it’s not possible to divide the number of winners in all categories evenly by ten, there will be a few polls of 11 or 12 titles. In the case of 11, you will still select 7. In the case of 12, you will select 8. In some cases, there may be fewer than ten selections. Whenever that is the case, the number of selections will be as close to 70% as possible. Once all of these polls have been completed, the lowest vote-getters in each category will be eliminated. The number to remove will be determined during Round Zero. Should there be ties for the final spots, a final round of tie-breaking will be conducted to choose them.

Round Two: Winners Bracket – Across the span of several weeks, we will conduct individual face-offs placing films into the brackets in the date of awarding such that 1934 will compete against 1935 and so forth. The winners is the film with the most votes. Ties will be broken in favor of the higher vote tally from Round One. Should the tie persist, both winners will be submitted to a round of comparative voting where each will be ranked on a scale of 1 to 5 with 1 being highest.

Round Three: Losers Bracket – Getting eliminated in Round Two will not be the end of the road for a film. The losers of Round Two will be put into their own bracket to compete similarly for reprieve. Once a winner has been eliminated twice, they are out of the competition for good.

We will go back and forth between Round Two and Round Three until winners of both the Winners Bracket and Losers Bracket have been determined. Going back and forth allows extra time for voting for later selections.

Once this is all completed, we will have a definitive list of winners. Each week, we will post around ten polls, each of different categories in order to ensure that all categories get equal air time.

Those are the rules. We will see you all in one week with our first batch of Round One polls.