Two other superstars (Photo by Marc Piscotty/Getty Images)

Remember back in the early days of the pandemic?

Beyond re-educating ourselves on how to cook and eat meals at home, and other unfamiliar tasks like spending epic, quality time together as families, Covid-19 also seemed to mandate a re-discovery and mega-prioritization of TV entertainment.

Specifically, back in the early spring, televisions array of high-quality, new documentaries suddenly available provided much-needed escape in the time of sheltering-in-place.

Tiger King, featuring now imprisoned Joe Exotic (aka Joseph Allen Schreibvogel), premiered on NETFLIX NFLX just as Covid-19 began to roar through the U.S.Its tales of the colorful folks who are drawn to big cats seemed to provide the perfect distraction from the terror and anxiety we were all experiencing in real time, in the face of the worlds first pandemic in 100 years.

The documentary series not only shattered records for NETFLIX, but it also scored the most nominations for any documentary series at this years Emmy nominations ceremony.

Given its notoriety and multiple Emmy nominations, normally Tiger King would be considered the Emmy favorite.

But 2020 has been far from normal.

Soon after Tiger King rose to rule entertainment and pop cultures jungle, ESPN and NETFLIX brought forth The Last Dance, the 10 episode account of The Chicago Bulls 1998 pursuit of an unprecedented sixth NBA championship.

Another king of the jungle (Photo by John Biever/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

The Last Dance not only provided nostalgic highlights of that historic run, but more significantly, it offered first-ever archival footage along with recent interviews with the teams leader and reclusive star player, Michael Jordan.Jordan personally shared insights about his teams challenges, but more revealingly, what he himself was thinking and feeling since he began his historic basketball career, going all the way back to his days at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

If Tiger King was a non-fiction carnival ride, designed to give the viewer an escape into outrageous environments populated by equally bizarre personalities, The Last Dance was an utterly immersive transport back to the late 90s and earlier, featuring a central figure so extraordinary, so excellent and so intriguing, that we not only learned how the Bulls won so many titles, but at a much deeper and more gratifying depth, we were allowed to finally peer behind Supermans cape and learn what makes Michael Jordan the Greatest Of All Time.

These two documentary epics gave all of us something fresh and different to talk about, as opposed to spending our days wondering for the umpteenth time if scientists will ever find a Covid-19 cure, or if wed be able to predict when life might return to normal - - whatever that is or will be.

Other noteworthy documentary series were also nominated and thus will be competing against Tiger King and The Last Dance.

Another NETFLIX entry, Hillary, about the former first ladys near presidential win in 2016 received an Emmy nod, as well as HBOs McMillions a fun and surprising profile of the con artists and thieves involved in rigging McDonalds MCD popular Monopoly game.

Finally, PBS venerable 33 years-running stalwart, American Masters, earned the last Emmy nomination entry.

While Hillary, McMillions and American Masters all certainly have a shot, the buzz is around Tiger King and The Last Dance.

Maybe its because both performed with out-sized numbers and captured the countrys imagination in the face of an unbearable scare.

Perhaps its because they each served up equal amounts of fascination and wonder.

At the end of the day, as a fan of all of the documentary series nominated, my guess is that The Last Dance will emerge victorious, not only because Michael Jordan has an inevitable way of winning that most of us can only dream about.

The Last Dance is co-produced by NETFLIX, just as Tiger King and Hillary both are.

And these days, when it comes to debating whos winning, the answer seems to always come back to a different kind of champion - - NETFLIX, with 160 Emmy nominations (more than all of the networks combined) and winner, three of the last four years, in the documentary category.

In many ways, NETFLIX has already been crowned The Emmy King.

The top of the Emmy food chain (Photo Illustration by Mateusz Slodkowski/SOPA Images/LightRocket via ... [+] Getty Images)

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Joe Exotic Versus Michael Jordan - - Who Will Be Crowned Emmy King? - Forbes