‘Top Gun: Maverick’, ‘The Last of Us’ and ‘Stranger Things’ Lead 2023 MTV Movie & TV Award Nominees

A celebration of entertainment, action, drama, horror, and romance is just around the corner thanks to the upcoming 2023 MTV Movie & TV Awards. The full list of nominees via Deadline has Top Gun: Maverick leading the film category with six nominations, while The Last of Us and Stranger Things lead the way with six nominations in scripted television categories. For the second year running, the MTV Movie & TV Awards will combine scripted and unscripted television into one glorious event and a whole host of unscripted shows are fighting for supremacy in a tightly contested battleground. Jersey Shore Family Vacation, RuPaul’s Drag Race, The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, and Vanderpump Rules.

Leading the way in the cinematic categories is the aforementioned Top Gun: Maverick, one of the highest-grossing films in 2022 and a nominee for Best Picture at the 2023 Oscars. Its MTV nominations come in Best Movie, Best Performance in a Movie (Tom Cruise), Best Hero (Cruise), Best Song (for Lady Gaga‘s power ballad ‘Hold My Hand’), and two further nominations in the Best Duo category (for Cruise and Miles Teller). In 2022, the top awards of Best Movie and Best Show went out to Spider-Man: No Way Home and HBO’s Euphoria respectively, and this year’s awards include nominees from a plethora of genres in each major category. In Best Movie, Top Gun: Maverick is rubbing shoulders with fellow blockbuster Avatar: The Way of Water, horrors such as Scream VI, and biopics like Elvis. In Best Show, the leading The Last of Us and Stranger Things will compete with the likes of HBO’s scandalous drama The White Lotus and Netflix hits such as Wednesday.

The 2023 MTV Movie & TV Awards has plenty of originality to keep audiences intrigued this year, thanks to two brand-new categories, Best Reality On-Screen Team and Best Kick-Ass Cast. Kick-Ass Cast will be celebrating some of the greatest ensembles to grace cinema and television screens in the past year, including nominees Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and Outer Banks. As well as this, this year’s nominees list is packed to the brim with first-timers, from Austin Butler to Bella Ramsey and Bad Bunny to Courtney Cox. Part of the attraction of the MTV Movie & TV Awards experience is that there are countless categories that celebrate the wonders of storytelling. Fight scenes, romantic kisses, dastardly villains and characters in horror-filled distress are all part of what makes cinematic and televisual stories special for audiences, and these type of moments and more have their own categories to celebrate, from Best Kiss to Most Frightened Performance.

RELATED: ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ Named Rotten Tomatoes’ Best Film of the Year

When Are The 2023 MTV Movie & TV Awards?

The 2023 MTV Movie and Tv Awards will air live on MTV on May 7, with Drew Barrymore hosting the event. The MTV Movie & TV Awards are doubly special as fans have the power and voting for each category opens today and closes on April 17 at 6 p.m. ET.

Check out the full list of nominees below:

BEST MOVIE

• Avatar: The Way of Water

• Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

• Elvis

• Nope

• Scream VI

• Smile

• Top Gun: Maverick

BEST SHOW

• Stranger Things

• The Last of Us

• The White Lotus

• Wednesday

• Wolf Pack

• Yellowstone

• Yellowjackets

BEST PERFORMANCE IN A MOVIE

• Austin Butler — Elvis

• Florence Pugh — Don’t Worry Darling

• KeKe Palmer — Nope

• Michael B. Jordan — Creed III

• Tom Cruise — Top Gun: Maverick

BEST PERFORMANCE IN A SHOW

• Aubrey Plaza — The White Lotus

• Christina Ricci — Yellowjackets

• Jenna Ortega — Wednesday

• Riley Keough — Daisy Jones & The Six

• Sadie Sink — Stranger Things

• Selena Gomez — Only Murders in the Building

BEST HERO

• Diego Luna — Andor

• Jenna Ortega — Wednesday

• Paul Rudd — Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania

• Pedro Pascal — The Last Of Us

• Tom Cruise — Top Gun: Maverick

BEST VILLAIN

• Elizabeth Olsen — Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

• Harry Styles – Don’t Worry Darling

• Jamie Campbell Bower — Stranger Things

• M3GAN – M3GAN

• The Bear — Cocaine Bear

BEST KISS

• Anna Torv + Philip Prajoux – The Last Of Us

• Harry Styles + David Dawson – My Policeman

• Madison Bailey + Rudy Pankow – Outer Banks

• Riley Keough + Sam Claflin – Daisy Jones & The Six

• Selena Gomez + Cara Delevingne – Only Murders in the Building

BEST COMEDIC PERFORMANCE

• Adam Sandler – Murder Mystery 2

• Dylan O’Brien – Not Okay

• Jennifer Coolidge – Shotgun Wedding

• KeKe Palmer – Nope

• Quinta Brunson – Abbott Elementary

BREAKTHROUGH PERFORMANCE

• Bad Bunny – Bullet Train

• Bella Ramsey – The Last Of Us

• Emma D’Arcy – House of the Dragon

• Joseph Quinn – Stranger Things

• Rachel Sennott – Bodies Bodies Bodies

BEST FIGHT

• Brad Pitt (Ladybug) vs. Bad Bunny (The Wolf) – Bullet Train

• Courteney Cox (Gale Weathers) vs. Ghostface – Scream VI

• Jamie Campbell Bower (Vecna) vs. Millie Bobby Brown (Eleven) – Stranger Things

• Keanu Reeves (John Wick) vs. Everyone – John Wick 4

• Escape from Narkina 5- Andor

MOST FRIGHTENED PERFORMANCE

• Jennifer Coolidge – The White Lotus

• Jesse Tyler Ferguson – Cocaine Bear

• Justin Long – Barbarian

• Rachel Sennott – Bodies Bodies Bodies

• Sosie Bacon – Smile

BEST DUO

• Camila Mendes + Maya Hawke – Do Revenge

• Jenna Ortega + Thing – Wednesday

• Pedro Pascal + Bella Ramsey – The Last Of Us

• Simona Tabasco + Beatrice Grannò – The White Lotus

• Tom Cruise + Miles Teller – Top Gun: Maverick

BEST KICK-ASS CAST

• Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania

• Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

• Outer Banks

• Stranger Things

• Teen Wolf: The Movie

BEST SONG

• Demi Lovato – Still Alive (Scream VI)

• Doja Cat – Vegas (Elvis)

• Lady Gaga – Hold My Hand (Top Gun: Maverick)

• OneRepublic – I Ain’t Worried (Top Gun: Maverick)

• Rihanna – Lift Me Up (Black Panther: Wakanda Forever)

• Taylor Swift – Carolina (Where The Crawdads Sing)

BEST DOCU-REALITY SERIES

• Jersey Shore Family Vacation

• The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills

• Family Reunion: Love & Hip Hop Edition

• The Kardashians

• Vanderpump Rules

BEST COMPETITION SERIES

• All-Star Shore

• Big Brother

• RuPaul’s Drag Race: All-Stars

• The Challenge: USA

• The Traitors

BEST HOST

• Drew Barrymore – The Drew Barrymore Show

• Joel Madden – Ink Master

• Nick Cannon – The Masked Singer

• RuPaul – RuPaul’s Drag Race

• Kelly Clarkson – The Kelly Clarkson Show

BEST REALITY ON-SCREEN TEAM

• Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino, Vinny Guadagnino, Pauly D (MVP) – Jersey Shore Family Vacation

• Tori Deal and Devin Walker – The Challenge: Ride or Dies

• RuPaul Charles and Michelle Visage – RuPaul’s Drag Race

• Ariana Madix, Katie Maloney, Scheana Shay, LaLa Kent – Vanderpump Rules

• Garcelle Beauvais and Sutton Stracke – The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills

BEST MUSIC DOCUMENTARY

• Halftime

• Love, Lizzo

• Selena Gomez: My Mind & Me

• Sheryl

• The Day the Music Died: The Story of Don McLean’s American Pie