Avatar 2, Top Gun: Maverick & The Bear among AFI's Top 10 Films & TV Series of 2022

The Hollywood awards season is upon us and keeping with tradition, the American Film Institute has drawn out its annual Top 10 lists of best films and TV programs of the year 2022. The lists in the past have featured a blend of frontrunners for major awards like the Oscars and The Golden Globes along with a few surprise, lesser-known entries. 

AFI's 2022 year-ender lists see many mainstream films such as Steven Spielberg's The Fabelmans (Universal), the absurdist comedy-drama Everything Everywhere All at Once (A24), and the Tom Cruise-starring blockbuster Top Gun: Maverick (Paramount Pictures) break through. 2022 has been a particularly refreshing year for Hollywood with an almost even split between mainstream successes and those belonging to the arthouse.

Along with the aforementioned, AFI has also included Baz Luhrmann's dazzling portrait of the rock and roll legend Elvis Presley in the Austin Butler-starrer Elvis (Warner Bros.), James Cameron's magnum opus Avatar: The Way of Water (Disney), and also Todd Field's biographical drama Tár (Focus Features) starring Cate Blanchett and Nina Hoss.

Women Talking (United Artists) by Sarah Polley, who is being regarded as one of the top Oscars 2023 contenders for Best Director, too features in AFI's list along with Jordan Peele's horror sci-fi film Nope (Universal) and Maria Schrader's American debut directorial She Said (Universal).

Martin McDonagh's Banshees of Insherin (Searchlight Productions), which sees his In Bruges duo of Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farell reunite on screen, was given the AFI Special Award.

Here's the full list of American Film Institute's Top 10 Films of 2022:

• Avatar: The Way of Water
• Elvis
• Everything Everywhere All at Once
• The Fabelmans
• Nope
• She Said
• TÁR
• Top Gun: Maverick
• The Woman King
• Women Talking

As far as TV is concerned, AFI's picks gravitated mostly towards year's finest comedy-dramas like FX Productions' The Bear (on Hulu, Disney+ and Star+), ABC's mockumentary sitcom Abbott Elemantary, Mike White's The White Lotus, Somebody Somewhere by HBO, and the recently-concluded Better Call Saul. Dan Erickson created sci-fi thriller series Severance (starring Adam Scott and Zach Cherry and directed by Ben Stiller and Aoife McArdle) too made it to the list along with Netflix's Mo.

Here's the full list of American Film Institute's Top 10 TV Programs of 2022:

• Abbott Elemantary
• The Bear
• Better Call Saul
• Hacks
• Mo
• Pachinko
• Reservation Dogs
• Severance
• Somebody Somewhere
• The White Lotus