Spider-Verse’s Shameik Moore admits to being a “sore loser” after Oscars

Studio Ghibli co-founder Hayao Miyazaki is one of the most talented and influential filmmakers in the history of film, but especially animation, and you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who wasn’t at least a little happy to see him win his second Best Animated Feature trophy at the Academy Awards last night for The Boy And The Heron. Well, not too hard-pressed, actually, since Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse star Shameik Moore tweeted the word “robbed” after The Boy And The Heron beat his movie at the Oscars.

So, not the biggest deal in the grand scheme of things, but people love Miyazaki (as they should) and it is considered a bit gauche for someone involved in an Oscar-nominated film to not be at least totally neutral when something other than their thing wins—that’s why nominees practice that little gracious smile in case they’re on camera after someone else’s name is called. This is, like, Awards 101. They cover it right after “thank The Academy” and “comment on how the trophy is heavier than it looks if you’re not sure what else to say.”

Anyway, Moore’s tweet received some backlash from other people who were on Twitter last night instead of just watching the Oscars in peace and making snide comments to people in the same room as them, and so he walked it back later in the evening by admitting that he was being a “sore loser,” but he also said that Spider-Verse “didn’t lose” because it still “impacted ALOT of lives” and that, while it didn’t get the trophy this year, “life goes on, and BEYOND.” (In other words, the Spider-Verse series will be competing for an Oscar again when the next one comes out.)

Moore tweeted a sort-of apology later and acknowledged that everyone else on the Spider-Verse team is “very professional,” but again, this isn’t exactly a national emergency. Why do we follow famous people on Twitter if not to see them occasionally go off script and post something they really feel? He’s allowed to think his movie was robbed and he’s allowed to say his movie was robbed. The vast majority of people in the history of the world will not know how it feels to be in an Oscar-nominated movie that did not win, so who are we to police this guy’s Twitter?