This year's staid and congratulatory awards season is now a distant memory, but there's still one awards show left, one that self-consciously defies the pomp and circumstance of the Oscars and the like.  The MTV Movie Awards don't take themselves too seriously, as demonstrated by categories such as "Best Fight," "Best Kiss," and "Best On-Screen Dirtbag."  Nominations for the summer's awards have been announced, with The Hunger Games and Bridesmaids racking up eight apiece.

“Catches thieves just like flies.”

That’s how one of the most anticipated panels and presentations this year at WonderCon 2012 opened, spoken by the Sony Pictures Panel moderator in a room brimming with people, young and old. The quote pertains to the Spider-Man reboot, The Amazing Spider-Man helmed by director Marc Webb ((500) Days of Summer), and distributed by Sony Films.

It is a complete re-imagining of the Spider-Man movie franchise, because Andrew Garfield (The Social Network) plays Peter Parker, Martin Sheen plays Uncle Ben, and MJ is not the love interest. In fact, Emma Stone (The Help) plays Gwen Stacy, Peter’s love interest, who as it turns out, is wildly different than MJ. More importantly, the driving motivator differs from the emotional catalyst put forth by the Raimi trilogy. In all, this story takes a different approach to telling the story of what compels Peter to try to make the world a little bit safer and better.

At WonderCon 2012 in Anaheim, California on Saturday, actress Emma Stone (The Help) and director Marc Webb ((500) Days of Summer) appeared in front of a Ballroom full of fans to discuss their upcoming Spider-Man reboot The Amazing Spider-Man, which stars Andrew Garfield as the web-slinger. 

IAR's Managing Editor Jami Philbrick had a chance to speak with both Emma Stone, and Marc Webb before their panel on Saturday about the upcoming film. Webb discussed why his movie will be different than other Spider-man films, and what exactly the teased "Untold Story" really is, while Stone talked about playing the iconic role of Gwen Stacey. 

Los Angelinos may have noticed the Gooodyear Blimp and a bunch of media helicopters circling around the Kodak Theater in Hollywood today.  These aerial vehicles were, oddly, covering an event that that takes place entirely indoors: the 84th Annual Academy Awards.  Hosted for the ninth non-consecutive time by Billy Crystal after Eddie Murphy bowed out months ago, the Oscars went down almost exactly as you'd expect: Harvey Weinstein once again proved his ability to win awards with The Artist, which took home awards for Best Actor, Best Director, and Best Picture, amongst others.

With Oscar ballots due earlier this week, and only a few days to go until the Oscars on Sunday, February 26th, here is how things stand in the race for the gold... 

In a month, awards season will be no more than a memory.  A memory of ecstatic accolades, tuxedo-sporting actors, and actresses clad in dresses so beautiful they'll melt your face off while inspiring impoverished people the world over to weep diamond tears.  Right now, though, we are very much in the middle of awards season.  The latest news comes from the Screen Actors Guild, which has just handed out its annual awards.

The awards given out by professional guilds certainly add to the undeniable and ongoing hoopla of awards season, but they don't necessarily have that teleprompter-reading, what-are-you-wearing public spectacle of the Oscars or the Golden Globes.  Instead, they often provide an opportunity for the sort of work that doesn't get recognized at the big ceremonies to feel special.

The freshly-announced nominees for excellence in wardrobe as chosen by the Costume Designers Guild are good examples.  The nominations are divided into three categories separating period, fantasy, and contemporary films.  While the nominees include movies that are sure to be on the list for Best Picture, such as The Artist and The Descendants, there's also room for the outstanding work of Sammy Sheldon on X-Men: First Class, Jany Temime on Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and Erin Benach on Drive. 

As awards season continues to ceaselessly pummel us all with official nominations, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts has issued their nominees for the 2012 Orange British Academy Film Awards.  These potential BAFTA Awards winners include plenty of the ringers we've been seeing on pretty much every list of Stateside nominations, especially The Artist with a whopping twelve nods, but the Brits have also shown some love for films largely getting lost in the shuffle over here.

Tonight, the Beverly Hilton was the location for the 69th Annual Golden Globe Awards, with British comedian and The Office co-creator Ricky Gervais hosting for the third consecutive year.  Before last year's ceremony, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, the 300-member body throwing the shindig, was the subject a lawsuit from their former publicist, the latest in a long string of allegations regarding Globes-based corruption.  This year, though, it's all red carpet pomp and what have you, as well as Gervais doing his job by making fun of people.

Though the Globes are largely accepted as irrelevant (what with corruption and all that),  they're nonetheless the most publicly popular awards, and they also get people all hyphy for the Oscars the following month.  And in that spirit, let's check out the winners at this year's Golden Globes, including Christopher Plummer's continued domination of the awards season for his supporting performance in Beginners, Martin Scorsese's win for Hugo, Octavia Spencer getting love for The Help, and Alexander Payne's The Descendants taking the big prize for a dramatic film.

The awards-speculation winds are blowing up a gale today.  The windy months of accolades and formal awarding is just a part of awards season, though, and we're about to move from the nomination phase into the actual business of handing out statues and the like.  With most of the major guild nominations announced, the Golden Globes take place this weekend, but the Critics Choice Awards went ahead and got the drop on the most feverish part of this interminable season.

The Critics Choice Awards went down last night, and the recipients largely support the general discussion we've been hearing throughout the last couple of months.  Silent film homage The Artist took home prizes for Best Picture and Best Director, so any bookie with a mind to take Oscar bets is probably marking Michel Hazanavicius's film as a definite favorite.  George Clooney, meanwhile, won Best Actor for his work in The Descendants and Viola Davis of The Help won Best Actress.  She increasingly seems like a sure thing, and her co-star Octavia Spencer could pull out an Oscar win for the same film.  Christopher Plummer, meanwhile, continued to march through several months that will see him deservedly winning every Best Supporting Actor prize he can get his hands on.