The 20 Best New TV Shows of 2022 So Far
Which newcomers on the small screen have impressed reviewers the most during the first half of the year? In the gallery on this page, we rank the highest-scoring first-year TV shows (including limited series and specials) debuting between January 1, 2022 and June 30, 2022. Only shows with at least 7 reviews from professional critics are included.
While we await delivery of our Music Dance Experience, let us tell you about one of the most fascinating new shows in recent memory. Clearly indebted to everything from Lost to The Stanley Parable to The Matrix to Being John Malkovich—but simulatenously fresh and unlike anything else on TV—the twisty, darkly comedic sci-fi workplace thriller Severance is set in a near future in which a tech company called Lumon Industries offers a procedure that provides its employees a unique take on the concept of work/life balance: While at work, they have no memories of their personal lives, and while home, they cannot remember any aspect of their work lives. But what happens at work (waffle parties aside) doesn't fully stay at work—especially when Lumon Industries HQ is one of TV's all-time creepiest and weirdest workplaces.
Worth watching even just for the production design alone, the collaboration between producer/director Ben Stiller and first-time writer/creator Dan Erickson also boasts a stellar cast including Adam Scott, Patricia Arquette, John Turturro, Christopher Walken, Dichen Lachman, Zach Cherry, Michael Chernus, Jen Tullock, and Britt Lower. And don't worry about that cliffhanger ending: A second season has been ordered.
“Viewers looking for all the answers by season’s end will be disappointed. But put aside those qualms and the mercurial, affirming Severance is in contention for the best new series of 2022.” —Roxana Hadadi, Vulture
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