Except that BFCA trend is pretty irrelevant. Sure, it’s a trend but BFCA doesn’t have major bearing on how the academy will vote.
Missing an easy SAG nod (especially when Big Sick could easily have traded for Shape of Water) is a bigger issue imo than missing a BFCA win or even missing a BAFTA nod.
I do think missing the BAFTA nod is a troubling sign, but there’s more precedence of movies missing a BAFTA nod and winning then SAG. Plus, more SAG voters are academy voters than BAFTA voters.
Plus, something to consider with PGA. You can’t tell how close those preferential ballots won. It could be a 2015 case where Big Short likely barey edged out a win. If the full PGA is behind SoW then it’s a big factor, but if it’s only a slim majority (through the perefential ballot too, at that) then it’s not a secure spot for it. I think we’ll be able to gage more if SoW picks up a few big wins like BAFTA, DGA (which I’m betting on, but wouldn’t say is a guarantee), WGA or ACE. It probably needs at least two more ‘big’ wins to be in a frontrunner position.
That being said, I wouldn’t count out either four, and I wouldn’t say any of them are in a comfortable win position.