The Year of the Slap: Pop culture moments in 2022

By JOCELYN NOVECK
AP National Writer

Taylor Swift was up. Elon Musk was in, out, in and maybe out again. Tom Cruise was back. BTS stepped aside, and so did Serena Williams, and Tom Brady too — oops, scratch that. But the slap? The slap was everywhere — that moment Will Smith smacked Chris Rock at the Oscars and a global audience said, “Wait, did that just happen?” That’s The Associated Press’ top pop culture moment of 2022, but there were so many more. Swift had a big year that kept getting bigger. In movies there were big comebacks: Wakanda and Avatar sequels, and of course Cruise, who turned 60 and had his biggest movie with “Top Gun: Maverick.”