Yes, we’ve covered the Best TV of 2022, and we’ve covered the Most Anticipated TV of 2023 (and there may or may not be Best Performances, we’re running out of gas), but with such an amazing year of television— given the streaming age of #TooMuchContent has given us a massive overflow of TV— we couldn’t help, but try and highlight more deserving work with the Best Episodes of TV too.
READ MORE: The Best TV Shows & Mini-Series Of 2022
This list may be seen as highly subjective, and that’s ok, aren’t they all? Plus, we had to give some shout-outs to some of the slightly overlooked nooks and crannies of television in 2022 like arguably the year’s best miniseries “Station Eleven” (which was released in late 2021 but ended in early 2022 and got a little bit lost in the shuffle, though was still on our Best TV list), or HBO’s brilliantly searing “Industry” which might be doing for the anxiety-riddled investment banking world what “The Bear” is doing for the chaotic kitchen industry.
READ MORE: The 70 Most Anticipated TV Shows & Mini-Series Of 2023
There was an unbelievable amount of great television in 2023, with some directors just doing astonishing work, writers blowing-us away us with their bon-mots, and various actors doing some of the best work of their careers (looking at you, Amanda Seyfried and Elle Fanning). So perhaps this list, overall, is a big stew of that: trying to give various creators, performers, directors, writers, and more their flowers. Because 2023 gave us bouquets for days. Without further ado, our list of the Best TV Episodes Of 2022.
Follow along with all our Best Of 2022 coverage here.
15. “Tokyo Vice,” Episode 1, “The Test” (HBO Max)
About outsiders trying to penetrate a foreign world, “Tokyo Vice,” centers on an American journalist’s (Ansel Elgort) descent into the neon-soaked underbelly of Tokyo trying to find stories and stumbling upon the dark and dangerous world of the Japanese yakuza. ‘Vice’ certainly had its issues, the idea of a white savior or interloper being the star of a Japanese-set show and Elgort himself, mired in sexual assault allegations once, but now seemingly escaping consequences. Put that stuff aside, if you can, and there’s just no denying how alive, electric and urgent Michael Mann makes anything he directs. The way enveloping close shots accentuate the intensity and tension of every scene and make you feel like you are there in the moment; almost no one has an eye like him. “Tokyo Vice” was mostly intriguing throughout, but if it suffered from one major quality—aside from the other already-articulated issues— is that every other episode was directed by someone not called Michael Mann. (Our review)– RP
14. “Guillermo Del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities,” Episode 7, “The Viewing” (Netflix)
Guillermo Del Toro always has a lot of great ideas, and one of his most brilliant is creating anthology series where some of his favorite directors can help with episodes based on some of his wild and imaginative concepts. ‘Curiosities’ is filled with great directors, Jennifer Kent, Ana Lily Amirpour, David Prior, and more. But it’s “The Viewing,” directed by Canadian filmmaker Panos Cosmatos (known for the thrilling “Mandy,” with Nic Cage), that’s incredibly cinematic and super fascinating. Co-written by Cosmatos & Aaron Stewart-Ahn, the episode centers on a genius billionaire recluse, played by Peter Weller, who invites an elite group of people at the top of their fields— physicists, musicians, best-selling authors, psychics, and more (played by Eric André, Sofia Boutella, Charlyne Yi, Steve Agee, Michael Therriault, Saad Siddiqui)—to a mystery invite evening where they will witness something extraordinary. We won’t spoil it from there, but suffice it to say, even though it’s set mostly in one room, it looks visually ravishing and super cinematic, and once they get to “The Viewing,” it gets as wild and insane as all the Cosmatos work you love. (Our review) – RP
13. “The Girl From Plainville,” Episode 4, “Can’t Fight This Feeling Anymore” (Hulu)
About the infamous teen texting suicide case from 2014, Liz Hannah and Patrick Macmanus’ “The Girl From Plainville” had to walk a fine line between respect for the grave and somber material and veering away from exploiting a tragedy involving kids. Threading the needle of tone so brilliantly is Elle Fanning in the role of Michelle Carter, the young teen (ultimately convicted of manslaughter) seemingly living somewhere in a dream space of innocent, completely delusional, and manipulative (maybe a bit of all of the above with the show generally depicting a chilling complicated teen without really casting judgment on her). The show has bold moments too including the musical numbers that seemed to convey the scary theater-kid fantasy that Carter had about her relationship and perhaps her entire life. In Episode 4, Fanning stares into a mirror and, in a moment of strange dissociation after her “boyfriend” has committed suicide sings a version of Rachel Berry’s rendition of “Make You Feel My Love” from “Glee” (itself a Bob Dylan cover). But it’s the dreamy musical dance number to REO Speedwagon’s “I Can’t Fight This Feeling Anymore” that’s just dazzling and full of audacity (itself another nod to “Glee”). In her perfect verdant suburbs, Fanning and Colton Ryan (the boyfriend in the series who kills himself) do a little romantic dance number, circling each other in a melodramatic movement as the song swells to its emotional climax. It’s a figment of Carter’s imagination obviously, but given it takes place after the boyfriend has died, it seems to be an escape to reality, a retreat into the blissful abyss of a fiction that never really existed in the first place: the hopelessly romantic relationship that Carter insists occurred with this boy, that may be lost to time and her idea of subjective reality. A bold choice and one that deeply works. (Our review) – RP
12. “The Rehearsal,” Episode 6, “Pretend Daddy” (HBO Max)
Honestly, it’s hard to even describe the premise of Nathan Fielder’s genius docuseries, “The Rehearsal.” What starts as a simple reality show about one man’s quest to help people conquer anxiety through rehearsing confrontations (with extreme detail), the series slowly morphs into a case study about the unintended consequences of social experiments by showing the mental anguish Fielder’s unique brand of humor might cause his subjects. This is the focus of the final episode of the series, “Pretend Daddy,” which is surprising, funny, and also immensely sad. It’s a true testament to Fielder’s unmatched desire to pull back the curtain in “The Rehearsal” that he allows himself to be seen as the unintentional antagonist for the series, as we see witness the heartbreaking confusion and harm he has caused a young boy. By immersing his subjects in such elaborate, convincing ploys, the series’ star and director must reckon with the damage he causes in his quest for laughs. “Pretend Daddy” is the shocking end to one of the best, but confounding series of 2022. (Our review) – Charles Barfield
11. “Station Eleven,” Episode 10, “Unbroken Circle” (HBO Max)
Patrick Sommerville’s brilliant, insightful, moving “Station Eleven” blossomed as it went on and essentially subverted the entire idea of the post-apocalypse. Yes, dystopias are almost always bleak, and “Station Eleven” had those moments too. But the series, through its traveling troupe of performers essentially held onto the idea that despite calamities, crises, and cataclysms, global, personal, or otherwise, the show must and will go on, regardless (perhaps the show was the unintentional, “life finds a way” for the human race). In “Station Eleven,” which starts like a broken collage and slowly was pieced together, the big puzzle of it all comes together in a big symphonic, emotional crescendo, any potential contrivances of getting everyone back together smoothed over by a thoughtful, poignant show that was already talking about destiny and fate from Episode 1. In short, Jeevan Chaudhary (Himesh Patel)—the man who rescued the lost young girl Kirsten (Matilda Lawler) at a play, just as the pandemic of the story begins, essentially taking care of her for months, only to get devastatingly separated at one point— reunites with her 20 years later (now played by Mackenzie Davis), as all the other threads of the series coalesce too. If you weren’t in tears by the end of this soulful, beautiful episode, man, you’re just not alive to this sublime story of survival and the power of community. (Our review) – RP
