The 20 Best New TV Shows of 2022

by Jason Dietz, Metacritic Features Editor – December 27, 2022

In the gallery on this page are the highest-scoring first-year TV series (including limited series) debuting in the United States between January 1, 2022 and December 31, 2022. Shows are ranked by Metascore (an average of grades from top professional critics on a 0-100 scale) prior to rounding based on scores as of December 23, 2022, and any programs with fewer than 7 reviews are excluded. One-off TV specials and made-for TV movies are also excluded (though the best of these is revealed at the end of the gallery, along with a list of the year's highest-scoring returning shows).

5 of 23 photo by Paul Schiraldi/HBO

83 We Own This City (HBO)

(#16) If you find The Wire tough to revisit because of its (semi-)embrace of (some) cops as heroes, consider this a corrective. Not a single Baltimore cop gets a positive portrayal in the true-story HBO miniseries We Own This City, David Simon's return to the streets of Baltimore that he previously explored in both The Wire and The Corner.

Directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green (King Richard) and co-created by novelist George Pelecanos, and adapted from the nonfiction book by Baltimore Sun journalist Justin Fenton, the six-episode series chronicles the rise and fall of the Baltimore Police Department's Gun Trace Task Force, a rogue and corrupt division that was eventually the target of a federal investigation. Jon Bernthal heads a cast that also includes Wunmi Mosaku, Josh Charles, McKinley Belcher III, Dagmara Domińczyk, Treat Williams, and some familiar faces for Wire fans including Jamie Hector, Darrell Britt-Gibson, Domenick Lombardozzi, and Anwan Glover.

“Sparked by a jittery live-wire performance from Jon Bernthal and anchored by incredibly smart dialogue, 'We Own This City' is a stand-out mini-series in one of the most crowded periods of 'Prestige Drama' in years.” —Brian Tallerico, RogerEbert.com

Watch it on HBO Max (6 episodes)

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