When Milk wins the Oscar for Original Screenplay on February 22, it will be the first biopic to take the award in 26 years. Back then Gandhi faced some stiff competition, including two fellow Best Picture nominees, Tootsie and E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial, as well as An Officer and a Gentleman and Diner. And three of these opposing titles were 1982’s three top grossing films. Gandhi’s main obstacle, though, was not one of the other nominees. It was the difficulty of winning a category that’s typically associated with originality. Plenty of movies based on true stories have been nominated for Original Screenplay, but that “based on” factor can be a drawback, and the Academy tends to favor scripts born completely out of the imagination here.

Unfortunately for Milk, that Academy disfavor has been strong for the past three decades, passing over such ‘nonfiction’ films as The Queen, Shine, Nixon, Braveheart, Bugsy, Hotel Rwanda, Erin Brockovich, The Aviator and Good Night, and Good Luck for more “creative” efforts like Little Miss Sunshine. But this year, the ‘fiction’ films nominated for Original Screenplay are not strong candidates, whether for critical, commercial or political reasons. So fortunately for Milk, screenwriter Dustin Lance Black will partly win the Oscar by default. Not all voters will be choosing Milk in a process of elimination, though. Some will actually see that Black has penned a great “original” biopic and that it is indeed the most deserving of the nominated screenplays.

Over the weekend, Milk received an award for Best Original Screenplay from the Writers Guild of America, though this is hardly an indicator that it’s on track to win the Oscar. For one thing, the other four WGA Award nominees were all completely different than Milk’s Academy Award rivals. Yet on the plus side, the WGA isn’t typically any more favorable to true stories than the Oscars are. In fact, 26 years ago, both Tootsie and E.T. won WGA Awards (they had separate categories for original comedy and original drama then), while Gandhi did not. Though it didn’t matter when Braveheart won the WGA Award (it lost the Oscar to non-WGA-nominee The Usual Suspects), the rare instance of honoring a biopic this year could extend to the Academy.

Also over the weekend, Milk lost the BAFTA Award for Best Original Screenplay to In Bruges, which is now potentially considered Milk’s strongest competition. But In Bruges is certainly more well known and more popular in Britain than here; plus, the BAFTA Awards seem to disfavor biopics the most, even when they’re focused on British history, as Gandhi, Braveheart and The Queen are (actually it kind of makes sense for them not to favor the first two). In Bruges is the closest thing in this year’s bunch to The Usual Suspects, but it’s also unfortunate in that respect as it feels like a ‘90s leftover. Also, for all its wit and “writerly” edge, it’s just not quite clever enough to be viewed as revolutionary screenwriting. Nor is it familiar enough to have that zeitgeist advantage that tends to benefit non-groundbreaking yet easily iconic films with quotable dialogue and parody-ready characters (yes, Juno and Good Will Hunting, we’re looking at you two).

The other nominee believed to be a strong candidate is WALL-E, which is by far the most commercial and most critically acclaimed of the five contenders. But never mind the theory that the Academy has a thing against science fiction. There’s also the matter of WALL-E being an animated film, one with very little dialogue, which will be ignored by voters who believe it will have its deserved glory in the Best Animated Feature category (though since Kung Fu Panda has recently proven to be a great challenger for that award, WALL-E could very well garner only a sole Oscar for Best Original Song, if anything at all). Most importantly, WALL-E’s screenplay is relatively preachy, whether Pixar intended for it to be political or not, and older members of the Academy may be turned off by this. Milk is also political, but it’s not nearly as insulting or daunting in its address of its message.

The best shot for Happy-Go-Lucky is the combination of apologetic votes making up for the snub of Sally Hawkins for Best Actress and sympathy votes making up for Mike Leigh’s past Oscar losses, even if he’s more overdue for a Best Director win than a Screenplay honor. Holding Leigh back, of course, is his reputation for not exactly writing complete scripts. As for Milk’s final rival, Frozen River is the biggest surprise among the nominees and is considered to have the lowest chance at winning. It’s therefore not even worth noting its favors, of which there are few.

Like Gandhi, Milk is a hopeful and inspiring biopic, but despite what Milk’s detractors believe, the film is hardly working with a cardboard cutout of a screenplay. Sure, one can point out the familiar elements, particularly those Milk shares with Gandhi, including the idea of opening with the subject’s assassination, the ignoring of the subject’s early life and, coincidentally, an initial life-changing moment involving a rail station. But Milk is more than a film that goes through the motions to portray the life of a historical figure. It’s primarily structured as a film about the struggle to simultaneously maintain a romantic relationship and a political campaign. And its most interesting angle is Harvey Milk’s sacrifice of his own romantic interests in order to fight for a cause that will, in part, benefit other people’s romantic freedom and happiness. In a way, this still makes Milk comparable to Gandhi, which also features a significantly sacrificial campaign. But Black’s concentration on the love story element of Milk makes it a more focused, more entertaining and better-written film.

Many writers have declared the Original Screenplay category to have the only interesting race left in this year’s seemingly highly predictable Oscars. But the only reason for Milk to be ignored as the certain frontrunner is the hope for a lesser-known film to receive the spotlight. That would make sense if Milk were another Little Miss Sunshine or Juno, both of them pop culture phenomenon undeserving of the accolades bestowed upon them, but Milk doesn’t deserve any dismissal for being more popular or more accessible, because it is in fact the best original screenplay in the bunch, and Black will take home the Oscar in appreciation of that fact.