Oscar Predictions: Best Sound Mixing and Sound Editing

It's time again for the Oscars. It's been a long Awards season as always. Guilds, Globes, BAFTAs, and critics have all made their picks  and I'm here to figure out what it all means. Yes, it's time again for my multi-part Oscar predictions.
I'm going to go through each category, tell you who has been nominated and won for what, give a context for what that means, and order the nominees from most to least likely to win on Oscar night. That doesn't mean I'll be right, but it does mean I'll be informed. Wish me luck.

Previously:
Nomination Reaction
Documentary, Animated, and Live-Action Short
Documentary Feature
Animated Feature 
Foreign Film
Visual Effects
Sound Mixing and Sound Editing
Makeup & Hairstyling 
Costume Design
Score and Song
Production Design
Cinematography
Film Editing
Adapted Screenplay
Original Screenplay
Supporting Actress
Supporting Actor
Lead Actress
Lead Actor
Director
Best Picture

Glossary:
BAFTA - British Academy of Film and Television Arts Awards
CAS - Cinema Audio Society Award

Best Sound Mixing

The sound awards are some of the toughest to pick.  There's a lot of strategies.
There's people voting for Mixing and Editing like they're the same thing (See: Gravity - 2013, Hugo - 2011, Inception - 2010, etc.). In total, 9 of the last 20 winners have been that.
Or, voters could go by my personal favorite strategy: "Mixing for music, Editing for war". Examples of that include Whiplash/American Sniper - 2014, Les Miserables/Zero Dark Thirty - 2012, and Dreamgirls/Letters to Iwo Jima - 2006. By my count, that's been the case for at least 5 of the last 20 years.
Before 2006, Sound Editing only had 2-3 nominees each year, so that's a tough comparison. That pretty much takes care of every other comparison year.

Sound Mixing is a bit easier to predict thanks to the Cinema Audio Society and the BAFTA. The Cinema Audio Society is the sound mixer's guild. Their sound mixing award is moderately reliable. They've called 12 of the last 20 Oscar winners and nominated the Oscar winner 19/20 times. The exception being last year, when Whiplash won the Oscar just last year. The BAFTA Sound award (which is sort of a mix of Sound Mixing and Editing but mostly Mixing, as far as I can tell), has matched the last 8 Oscar winners for Sound Mixing. The last 5 times that the CAS and BAFTA have agreed, that movie also won the Sound Mixing Oscar.

The Revenant
BAFTA - Sound - Winner
CAS - Sound Mixing - Winner
All that goes to say that The Revenant is looking pretty good to win. Everything is working for it. Double winner between the CAS and BAFTA. It's a juggernaut in the technical categories. Best of all, there's no musical movie in the Mixing field, since those tend to dominate.

Mad Max: Fury Road
BAFTA - Sound - Nominee
CAS - Sound Mixing - Nominee
Thankfully, the CAS and BAFTA didn't split winners, because that would've indicated a real free-for-all. When the nominations were first announced, I figured even a soft breeze was all it would take to shake up the pecking order. It's looking settled now. Given the number of total nominations, I assume Fury Road is ready to spoil any category for  the front runner.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens
BAFTA - Sound - Nominee
CAS - Sound Mixing - Nominee
We are decades past the days of Star Wars winning an Oscar being anything other than a surprise. I do wonder if that box office dominance sways any votes though.

Bridge Of Spies
BAFTA - Sound - Nominee
CAS - Sound Mixing - Nominee
Bridge of Spies is the most forgettable nominee in every category. Expect The Revenant to siphon off most of its votes.

The Martian
BAFTA - Sound - Nominee
While Bridge of Spies is the most forgettable nominee, The Martian is the most dismissed. In this case, it's neither the biggest box office hit nor the critical darling on the group.

Best Sound Editing

Sound Editing is a beast. Essentially everything is working against being able to call it. Most groups don't even bother recognizing it as a category. I've included the BAFTA Sound award, but that is more of a mixing award. They have a guild, the Motion Picture Sound Editors. They have an award ceremony. It's the night before the Oscars, which doesn't leave me much time to post this with the results. The MPSE also break up Sound Editing into numerous subcategories rather having an overall award. I try to avoid groups that break it down that much. That's also why my Visual Effects prep isn't great. Normally, I like to follow the warfare principle (i.e. whatever movie has a battle, preferably firing guns, gets the Oscar), but the best example of that, Sicario is actually the least likely to win. Also, all the other nominees have fighting and battles. I could easily see this going to any of the nominees with similar likelihood.

The Revenant
BAFTA - Sound - Winner
The double winner is much more common that a split field (Sound Editing and Mixing have 4 nominees in common, so there aren't many wildcards).

Mad Max: Fury Road
BAFTA - Sound - Nominee
My gut tells me that Fury Road is coming away with one of the sound awards. I just don't know which one.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens
BAFTA - Sound - Nominee
See Star Wars: Sound Mixing.

The Martian
BAFTA - Sound - Nominee
At least the BAFTA recognized The Martian.

Sicario
Had this come along with any major nominations (Best Picture, Lead Actress, or even Supporting Actor), I'd bump it to second on the list.