Oscars 2022: Five things to look forward to this award ceremony

Could the new fan favourite category mean Spider-Man gets some Oscar recognition?

The movie world's biggest and most important awards, the Oscars, return on Sunday 27 March.

The 94th Academy Awards - as they more formally known - will celebrate the year's best films at a big ceremony in Los Angeles, USA.

This year, Covid restrictions have eased and the ceremony is returning to normal.

So the organisers of the Oscars are pulling out all the stops in an effort to make sure the award show's TV viewing figures bounce back after a few bad years.

So, what can fans look forward to at this year's ceremony?

Best Animated film nominations

The Mitchells vs the Machines is nominated

One of the top categories to watch out for is Best Animated Feature.

It'll be a close-call this year with some huge films nominated, including Disney's Encanto.

Sony's Mitchells vs the Machines is also up for the award, as well as Disney Pixar's Luca, and Disney's Raya and the Last Dragon.

With such huge movies competing to win, it'll be exciting to see who comes out on top!

Encanto cast set to perform live

Fans will be able to talk about little else after We Don't Talk About Bruno makes its live debut

One of the biggest worldwide chart hits of the past year was from the Disney movie, Encanto.

We Don't Talk About Bruno even spent seven weeks at number 1 in the UK charts.

So the Oscars are going all in, announcing that the cast of Encanto will perform the smash hit song live for the first time during the ceremony.

A different track from Encanto - Dos Oruguitas - is the one actually nominated for best original song.

Encanto is also nominated for best animated feature and best original score.

The 'fan favourite' award

The most interesting new addition this year is the fan favourite prize - an attempt to reward more successful blockbuster films during the ceremony.

Without this new prize, some of 2021's biggest hits, including Spider-Man: No Way Home and No Time To Die, would not have had any nominations in the major categories.

Meryl Johnson, the Academy's vice president of digital marketing, said the introduction of fan favourite would "help build an engaged and excited digital audience leading up to this year's ceremony".

Camila Cabello's Cinderella was not loved by film critics, but the popstar's dedicated fans could help it win an Oscar

Voting was opened to the public for two weeks.

However, people could vote up to 20 times a day, which meant the voting process could be overrun by organised fan groups. Which, by the looks of things, is exactly what happened.

Although Spider-Man still has a good shot, the Camila Cabello-starring Cinderella musical could end up being recognised at the Oscars instead.

Billie Eilish and Beyoncé singing up a storm

The Oscars is going all out with live performances this year, and has not one, but two huge pop icons performing live at the ceremony.

Billie will be singing her No Time To Die theme song, which has been nominated for an award in the Best Original Song category.

Beyoncé will be singing her song Be Alive from the movie King Richard - about the father of Serena and Venus Williams - which is also nominated for Best Original Song.

The amazing outfits

Singer Bjork's swan dress and Billy Porter's tuxedo dress had fans in awe!

Something that fans can also look forward to at the Oscars awards is the incredible outfits.

It's not quite Met Gala levels of fashion, but attendees will be wearing some of their fanciest and best outfits to celebrate the occasion on the Oscars red carpet.

Incredible past outfits include Billy Porter's tuxedo dress, and singer Bjork's swan dress.

Keep your peepers peeled for some eye-stopping looks this year!