There’s nothing like an award show to get the blogging fingers twitching, and this Saturday, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson will be hosting the 2009 Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards, from UCLA. In keeping with the voting theme Eric and I have had going on the site for a while, I thought I’d share my thoughts about some of this years nominees.

The Good

Two of the yellowest icons in cartoon history go head-to-head this time; SpongeBob SquarePants and The Simpsons. SpongeBob won the Favorite Cartoon award for five years running, before losing out for the first time to Avatar: The Last Airbender last year. We’ll see if the little fella’s got his game back this time around, but don’t count out competition from The Fairly OddParents and Phineas & Ferb.

The live action television nominations the year feature usual suspects, Hannah Montana and The Suite Life of Zack and Cody as well as, surprisingly, Zoey 101, which ceased production back in May of last year. I’m hoping iCarly gets the nod. It’s a genuinely funny, and charming show which has more intelligence than other offerings aimed at the same demographic. Of course I’m biased towards anything that involves a cross-platform element, and iCarly achieves this well.

The Bad

“Hey Kids! As responsible adults with an understanding of how media influences your little lives, we all know you’re familiar with the crrrazy antics of Batman and Robin back in the 60’s. This is why we’re sure you can totally identify the difference between that retro rascal, The Joker and his modern interpretation – you know, the little scamp with a penchant for sticking knives in people’s mouths? BAZAM!”

I’m not going to go off on a tangent about what’s suitable for kids to watch or not, but seriously, someone forgot what the first letter of KCA stands for. Just be sure to cover your ears if Christian Bale has to give an acceptance speech. KAPOW!

The Interactive

Kid-voters essentially get two choices this year – plumbers or rockers, because two Mario games are going up against melodic mashers, Guitar Hero and Rock Band. Interestingly, perhaps even expectedly, the Nintendo presence is unmistakable. Two of the games are Wii exclusives, and the other two are both strong sellers on the Nintendo console. I admit, there’s a lot of competition between the pair of music games, but two Mario games as well is a touch too much. Mario Super Sluggers – really? What about Little Big Planet?

This leaves me wondering; why do the KCA’s have no award category for websites or online games? I’m not suggesting the big brands throw their massive sites into the mix, but smaller, quirkier, new innovative websites could create some buzz. In England, BAFTA has had an award category for online/multimedia content since 2002 – I should know, we had their award statues all over the place when I worked at CBBC. The Internet is every bit a part of kid’s lives, if not more so, than television and video games, so it’s a no-brainer to give some recognition to the online medium. Come to think of it, I’d be more than happy to submit some suggestions for next year. Hmmm…