6 Shows and Episodes That Blew Up the Group Chat in 2022

Editors' Picks: TV Guide already ranked the Best Shows of 2022, but as the year comes to a close, individual editors share their personal favorites for your enjoyment — and to argue about over the internet. Happy New Year, and happy watching!

Society's dependence on our smart phones has a lot of drawbacks, but a cool side effect is that it has turned watching TV into a more of a social experience than ever. The best TV makes us feel so much and helps us be seen, but that experience is enhanced when you're able to share it with your favorite people, whether they are actually in the room with your or just a set of all caps and emojis on your digital appendage.

While shows like Stranger Things, Wednesday, and The Boys took over the pop culture zeitgest and the collective internet group chat that is Twitter, for my 2022 Editor's Picks, I wanted to reflect on the shows that made my personal group chats freak the 'eff out. By the nature of my job, I spend more of my day talking about TV than not, but these are the shows (and their pivotal episodes) that had me and the besties screaming. 

This Is Us

Group Chat: The Big Three
Screaming/Crying/Throwing Up Episode: "The Train" (Season 6, Episode 17) 

At some point after This Is Us' mega-popular first season, it became "uncool" to enjoy the NBC drama that made a habit of bringing its core fans to tears. It's not unusual for shows that enjoy instant success to receive a backlash, but the critical tendency to shun This Is Us meant the series' stellar final season was overlooked. Well, not in this house. As you can tell by the name of this particular group chat, there's a circle of us who were ride-or-die for the Pearsons from our first introduction to them in 2016 until the bittersweet end.

This Is Us' final episodes forced the Pearsons, and the fans, to say goodbye to the beloved matriarch Rebecca (Mandy Moore) as she succumbed to Alzheimer's Disease. The penultimate episode, titled "The Train," was the epitome of what This Is Us did so well over the course of six seasons. Rebecca traveled through a moving train car, saying goodbye to the most monumental people and moments of her life as she prepared for the next chapter. The fact that series creator Dan Fogelman never saw a writing nomination for the series, and especially for this episode, is egregious, and I will stay forever mad that Mandy Moore didn't get the flowers she deserved for the stunning performance she laid down. But please rest assured that The Big Three group chat, made up of fellow This Is Us beat reporters, could have filled an ocean with our salty tears over the final season of This Is Us, and Rebecca's last hurrah especially. 

The White Lotus

Group Chat: Don Cuoco's Trio
Screaming/Crying/Throwing Up Episode: "Arrivederci" (Season 2, Episode 7) 

Okay, this one was also a collective Twitter freakout, but my group chat went absolutely wild for The White Lotus Season 2 finale for one very specific reason: Meghann Fahy. The Bold Type hive was THRIVING the day after the finale aired, all due to 30 astounding seconds in the season's final episode. While we all knew how talented and capable Meghann was thanks to her stunning and multi-faceted turn on the Freeform drama, the world (and maybe, hopefully, probably Emmy voters) saw that as well when Fahy's character Daphne was confronted with the idea her husband had slept with her new BFF Harper (Aubrey Plaza). Over the course of mere seconds, Daphne hears the information, processes it, and decides on a cunning course of action without a word. It all plays out over Fahy's face, and it was remarkable to watch. 

Don Cuoco's is the restaurant where this group chat meets up once a month to drink margaritas and talk about work. We were all massive fans of The Bold Type, and you can best believe that the group chat and the subsequent round of margs were spent planning out Fahy's Emmy acceptance speech. 

High School Musical: The Musical: The Series 

Group Chat: Wildcats 
Screaming/Crying/Throwing Up Episode: "Let It Go" (Season 3, Episode 8) 

Full disclosure: My HSMTMTS chat is less of a chat and more of a private convo between me and my friend Avery yelling in all caps "OH MY GOD. OH MY GODDDDDD. DID YOU SEE? I CAN'T BELIEVE. TIM FEDERLE IS A GENIUS AHHHH MY RINA HEART." The passion we both possess for HSMTMTS knows no bounds, but it exploded with the show's most meta season yet as the East High Wildcats went to theater camp and made a Disney+ series about performing Frozen: The Musical. It was not only the most self-referential season, but the most mature as EJ (Matt Cornett) faced an existential crisis about his post-high school life, and Gina (Sofia Wylie) and Ricky (Joshua Bassett) found it harder and harder to deny their growing feelings for each other. Anxieties were battled, insecurities were faced, and new sexual identities were found as the group went through a transformative two weeks at camp. The final moments of the finale though featured a jaw-dropping time jump that had us actually screaming for Season 4 to be injected into our veins immediately. I will be convincing the rest of my friends to get on our level before the next premiere if it is the last thing I do. 

8:04

Watch Now

The Afterparty 

Group Chat: Greg Heads
Screaming/Crying/Throwing Up Episode: "Yasper" (Season 1, Episode 3)

My introduction to Apple TV+ comedy The Afterparty went something like this – 

My friend Jean: Meggo, you really need to watch The Afterparty.
Me: I have so many screeners to get through. Who has the time?? 
Jean: The Ben Schwartz episode is a musical. 
Me: Oh look at that, my schedule has suddenly been cleared. 

How would we survive peak TV without the help of good friends, you know? Jean's push led to one of my absolute favorite watches of 2022. Do you know what it takes for a show to premiere in January and remain in this pop-culture-adled brain until December? It is a monumental compliment that I am still thinking about (and recommending!) this show to anyone I find who hasn't watched. Each episode is a different genre as Det. Danner (Tiffany Hadish) tries to solve the case of pop star Xander's (Dave Franco) death during the afterparty for his 15-year high school reunion. It has a stellar cast, and the group chat could not get over how clever every episode was. And yes, the Yasper (Schwartz) episode earned the "Screaming/Crying/Throwing Up" distinction because he is my well-documented favorite, and that episode was a perfect mix of ear worms and ridiculousness. It's hard to say more without giving away the brilliant twists of the show, and the group chat and I want you to have as pure of a time enjoying the show as we did. 

Run BTS 

Group Chat: Palm Springs Assemble
Screaming/Crying/Throwing Up Episode: "Flying Yoga Part. 2" (Special Episode)

If you thought I was making it through a personal recommendation list without any BTS content, then you obviously haven't been following me on Twitter. Even if that is the case, I am going to assume you are aware that it's been a really rough time for ARMYs as the boys have started to depart for their mandatory Korean military enlistment. It's a situation we've been trying to emotionally prepare for for a few years now, but now that the time has finally come, it's been hard to process. Enter Run BTS, the variety show where all seven members put themselves through complicated game concepts and physical feats for the enjoyment of each other and their fans. The group took a 10-month hiatus from the show in late 2021 but returned in the fall of 2022 with six special episodes. Everything BTS does is with a purpose, so it was probably no coincidence that they dropped these bundles of joy mere weeks before the official military announcement.

Each episode has its own unique charm, but the one that had my K-pop group chat howling the most was "Flying Yoga Part 2." It had all of the hallmarks of a great Run BTS episode — Taehyung using flattery to get out of performing the actual task at hand, Jungkook being a wild child, Hobi's signature laugh (and picture taking), and so much more. It also featured a few twists, like who had Namjoon pegged as being one of the top performers at Flying Yoga?? ARMYs are facing over two years without OT7 content, but it's episodes of Run BTS just like this one that are going to get us through it.

Interview with the Vampire

Group Chat: Legitimately all of them 
Screaming/Crying/Throwing Up Episode: "In Throes of Increasing Wonder" (Season 1, Episode 1)

I'm going to be real with you, I was on full bot-behavior when it comes to this show. I told every single person that I know that they needed to watch it, and then I requested they live-text me their reactions, and fam, we had a 95 percent "loved it!!" rate. This show proved that adaptations can still be innovative and important and not just a way for studios to bank on beloved intellectual property. Every change that the producers made to the Anne Rice novel and iconic early '90s film made the AMC series feel more relevant and gave new layers to a beloved story. Casting Jacob Anderson as Louis and moving the timeline up to the early 20th century inserted a fresh layer of tension between Louis and Lestat (Sam Reid). The show also ditched all ambiguity around the sexual nature of their relationship. It's dramatic and full of camp, and the Tumblr fans' wet dream of what an Interview with the Vampire adaptation should be. All of the group chats agreed that each episode brought unexpected drama and an excitement to watch week-to-week that is so treasured when watching TV is legitimately your job.

5:22

Watch Now

Check out TV Guide's official ranking of the Best Shows of 2022, as well as the Best Episodes and Best Performances.