Emmy’s Outstanding TV Movie category this year featured one traditional awards film, Barry Levinson’s harrowing WWII tale The Survivor for HBO, joined by four followups to canceled series, Disney+’s Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers, Showtime’s Ray Donovan: the Movie, Paramount+’s Reno 911!: the Hunt for QAnon and Roku’ Zoey’s Extraordinary Christmas.
In the end, it was the movie sequel to the oldest series in the bunch, the 1989-90 Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers, that took the trophy. The film, which mixes CGI and classic animation with live-action, became the first animated flick to win the stories TV movie category in its 56-year history. It also handed Disney+ its first Emmy.in a top program categories. The streamer previously won the Pre-recorded Special Emmy for Hamilton and Documentary or Non-fiction Series for Secrets Of the Whales last year.
Fellow streamer Netflix also first broke into the TV Movie category with wins for Black Mirror before landing Outstanding Drama and Outstanding Limited or Anthology Emmy Awards last year for The Crown and The Queen’s Gambit, respectively.
Unlike its counterparts in the category, Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers was developed and produced as a feature. It was originally put in development almost nine years ago. The process picked up speed in 2019 with Akiva Schaffer coming on board as new director. The film was announced as a Disney+ original the following year.