Inverse - 📺 The 25 best TV shows of 2022

Thursday

Dec 16 2022

It’s been a great year for TV fans. Vince Gilligan proved Breaking Bad wasn’t a fluke with a pitch-perfect Better Call Saul finale. HBO defied expectations with an epic Game of Thrones prequel. Marvel and Lucasfilm finally hit their stride on Disney+ with a pair of unexpected bangers. Even Stranger Things was good again!

With all that in mind, ranking the best TV of the year was particularly hard in 2022, To quote a once-great lawyer, “If I had to do it all over again, I would maybe do some things differently.”

Check out the full list below, along with the oral history of I Am Legend, the latest on that huge nuclear fusion breakthrough everyone’s talking about, and more.

What's New

Inverse Awards

Entertainment

The 25 best TV shows of 2022

For a few weeks in early Autumn 2022, trying to keep up with sci-fi and fantasy TV was a bit like trying to take down The Boys’ super-powered, psychopathic antagonist, Homelander: equal parts near-impossible and irresistible.

Between dueling fantasy prequels in House of the Dragon and The Rings of Power, the arrival of Andor, and yet another Marvel streaming series (remember She-Hulk?), there was enough genre TV to keep even the most scathing fans happy and satisfied. For critics like us, it was exhausting enough just trying to keep track of all those Targaryens. But in a year full of incredible television, it was inevitable that some of the best stuff would overlap.

From incredible encore performances like The Boys Season 3 and What We Do in the Shadows Season 4 to brilliant debuts like Severance and Outer Range, here are the 25 best TV shows of 2022, according to the Inverse Entertainment staff and some of our favorite freelance writers.

See the full list

15th anniversary

Movies

The oral history of I Am Legend

I Am Legend was ahead of its time. Like, way ahead of its time.

Not only did the Will Smith tour de force depict Times Square emptied by a global epidemic more than two decades before the exact same thing happened IRL, but it also managed to predict DC’s plans for a Batman versus Superman live-action movie.

On the movie’s 15th anniversary, Inverse presents an oral history of I Am Legend according to the people who made the film.

Inverse Awards

Gear

5 pivotal moments that changed EVs in 2022

For years now, industry gurus have been predicting that the year 2022 would be a big one for EVs. And you know what? For once they got it right. When it came to news and developments, 2022 did not disappoint.

Public awareness of EVs skyrocketed, as did market penetration and charger availability. Electric cars even became a hotbed political issue in a year that had no shortage of other governmental intrigue and distractions.

Given all that, it's hard to pick just five key moments to focus on, but there were indeed a few threads that stood out. And so, here are the biggest storylines that shaped the EV world in 2022.

GOING NUCLEAR

Innovation

Nuclear fusion breakthrough: A physicist answers three vital questions

On December 5, scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory took the first step toward harnessing a new abundant, clean form of energy. For the first time, they harnessed extra power from nuclear fusion, a reactionin which hydrogen is heated up to extremely high temperatures and converted into helium — the process that keeps stars like the Sun glowing above us.

To replicate this phenomenon on Earth, the team blasted 192 laser beams at an eraser-sized gold cylinder and triggered an implosion that released 3.15 MJ of energy. Their successful experiment marked the first time that researchers have been able to create excess energy through nuclear fusion, or, a simpler way to look at it: get more juice than they put in.

To parse through what the future of fusion holds, Inverse spoke with Stephanie Hansen, a physicist and senior scientist at Sandia National Labs who studies laser-powered fusion.

Inverse Awards

Gear

The best gaming hardware of 2022

Years with new console launches are always the most exciting for gamers. There’s so much hype and spectacle to take in at the time. But the years after a release can be just as momentous.

Distanced from the newness of shiny hardware with time, the must-play games and gaming gear start to roll in and showcase the medium to its fullest. 2022 blessed us with two terrific handhelds and some rock-solid gaming gear.

See the full list

Meanwhile...

This year's flu season is the worst we've had in years

50 years ago, one space mission crushed hopes for life around Earth's twin planet

7 things you need to remember about 'Avatar' before seeing 'The Way of Water'

33 years ago, James Cameron made his best movie ever

About this newsletter: Do you think it can be improved? Have a story idea? Send those thoughts and more to us by emailing newsletter@inverse.com.

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