How many Oscars did Sinners win? It led a huge night for horror

Horror had a big night at Sunday night’s 98th Academy Awards — and no film embodied a shift in tastes more than the gushing love voters showed for Sinners.

Ryan Coogler’s vampire drama entered the ceremony with a historic 16 nominations, the most ever for a single film. That kind of haul can often lead to a letdown in terms of actual wins (Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman or last year’s Emilia Perez come to mind). While Sinners ultimately fell short of Best Picture, which went to One Battle After Another, Sinners’ key players walked away from the ceremony with major wins.

The biggest victory of the night went to Michael B. Jordan, who won Best Actor on his first nomination for his dual performance as twin brothers Smoke and Stack. Coogler also took home his first Oscar, winning Best Original Screenplay. The filmmaker, previously nominated for his work on Black Panther, is now the first person to win the trophy for penning an extended explanation of why vampires can’t walk into a house uninvited.

Coogler’s regular collaborator, Autumn Durald Arkapaw, also made history with her win for Best Cinematography, becoming the first woman ever to take home the award. The film’s fourth win came from composer Ludwig Göransson, who earned Best Original Score. The award marked Göransson’s third Oscar overall and his second for a collaboration with Coogler. Both Arkapaw and Göransson professed a love for Coogler’s way of working and his passion for the material. (And thankfully for us sickos, that material involves sexy vampires and Tommy gun shootouts.)

The 2026 Oscars’ similarities to the Fangoria Chainsaw Awards didn’t end with Sinners’ triumphs. Amy Madigan won Best Supporting Actress for her creepy-as-hell work in Weapons, setting a record for the longest gap between nominations before a win — 40 years after her first nomination for Twice in a Lifetime. Guillermo del Toro’s gothic spectacle Frankenstein won three craft awards, including Costume Design, Makeup and Hairstyling, and Production Design. Meanwhile, Netflix’s zeitgeist-obliterating KPop Demon Hunters won Best Animated Feature, while its song “Golden” became the first K-pop track ever to win Best Original Song. (And if you don’t think the movie is horror, ask my kids what they thought of the demons the first time around.)

In 2018, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences floated the idea of a “Popular Film” Oscar to recognize blockbuster hits. This Sunday’s Academy Awards feels like the ultimate rebuke to the proposal — genre movies don’t need a separate lane if they’re made seriously and taken seriously.