TIME's 2022 Person of the Year Met With More Controversy

On Wednesday morning, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was named TIME's 2022 Person of the Year.

The 44-year-old president has received praise for the way he handled Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which started in February. The former comedian and actor has been seen on the front lines of the war, often inspiring his troops and the survivors of the horrific bombings that have been shared widely across social media.

However, the announcement was not without controversy.

In an article announcing the decision, TIME reporter Simon Shuster spent two hours on a private train ride discussing everything from Zelenskyy's history as an actor to his thoughts on the war.

“As I see it, it’s my duty to go there and show them that Ukraine has returned, that it supports them," Zelenskyy said of his desire to visit war-torn areas. "Maybe it will give them enough of a boost to last a few more days. But I’m not sure. I don’t lull myself with such illusions.”

Zelenskyy reflected on the shared cultural comedy that Ukraine and Russia shared as he was growing up, citing filmmakers like Leonid Gaidai. “These are the classics of my generation, but I’m incapable of watching them now,” he said. “They revolt me.”

Even his top advisors feel that Zelenskyy has a hardened quality to him since the war started. “There used to be this lightweight quality to him,” military adviser Oleksiy Arestovych said. “Quick movements, quick decisions, lots of talking, jokes. Now you see a kind of bruiser. He’s lost that actorly quality, and he’s turned into a boss.”

Now, instead of deciding what lines to improvise, Zelenskyy is focused on trying to reduce the human lives lost in the war. “We could have pushed into Kherson earlier, with greater force. But we understood how many people would have fallen,” Zelenskyy explained.

“That’s why a different tactic was chosen, and thank God it worked. I don’t think it was some genius move on our part," he continued. "It was reason winning out, wisdom winning out against speed and ambition.”

Fortunately, Zelenskyy is able to spend more time with his family now than he did last spring, when the war was only just beginning. During a recent visit with his 9-year-old son, Kyrylo, Zelenskyy admitted that he was surprised to see that his son was now interested in military matters.

“He studies it all. He looks it up online. He talks to the bodyguards,” Zelenskyy revealed. “He’s a fan of our armed forces, our army, and he knows deeply what our mission is, what we’re liberating, what weapons we have, and what we’re missing.”

When it comes to who might win the war, however, the Ukrainian President said he doesn't "want to weigh who has more tanks and armies." He called Russia, "a powerful state that is pathologically unwilling to let Ukraine go."

“They see the democracy and freedom of Ukraine as a question of their own survival," he continued, adding, “If they devour us, the sun in your sky will get dimmer.”

Although some users supported the decision to name Zelenskyy and the Spirit of Ukraine TIME’s 2022 Person of the Year, not everyone did. "Just a quick reminder that @time opinions on who should be man/person of the year are not always correct," one user replied to the tweet along with a photo of Hitler on the cover of TIME.

One user commented, “For the people with negative comments, how do you propose the war stops? It appears to me you want Zelensky to hand over his territory to end the war and not to seek support. Examine yourself for fairness. May God protect Ukraine.”

It's worth noting that Tesla CEO and new "Chief Twit" Elon Musk was TIME's 2021 Person of the Year, proving that, if nothing else, TIME's Person of the Year has a history of being controversial.