Name the best and worst episodes in any TV series

[MagicMurderBag7]

Futurama:

Best - Lethal Inspection. Great origin story for both Bender and Hermes, and just one of those episodes that tugs at your heart strings (though not as much as Jurassic Bark).

Worst - That's Lobstertainment. Zoidberg heavy episodes are never good. He really works best as a background character.

[SheSaidSheSaid]

House

Best - "Three Stories" This episode didn't win an Emmy on a fluke. Funny, edgy, and with a storyline structure that makes your head hurt if you try to make sense of it - so don't! It also reveals some crucial details of how House came to be the man he is. An absolutely indispensable episode.

Worst - Lots of good candidates, particularly from the later seasons, but I'm going to go with "Body and Soul." Absolutely nothing about this episode was original in the slightest. The tired old House vs. God memes, claims of a supernatural element in the patient's affliction, even the final diagnosis itself - all of them retreads. And with this episode being the series' fifth-from-last, you kinda figure they'd be past the treading water stage.

[Der_Lex]

As good as "Three Stories" was (and it's a top three episode for me for sure), my vote would have to go to "House's Head/Wilson's Heart" instead. It was both clever and absolutely gut-wrenching.

[FujiSkunk]

"The X Files"

Best episode: War of the Coprophages
In this single episode we have everything that made "The X Files" great. Mulder's undying belief. Skully's skepticism. Gross-out horror. Awesome comedy. And just when you think Mulder's going to get the proof he needs... nope, all gone. Oh, and Bambi. Her name is Bambi.

Worst episode: Redux II
I know this is an odd pick, but in retrospect, I can point to this episode as the beginning of the end of my interest in "The X Files." In fact, I can point to a single scene in this episode: the appearance of Mulder's apparent "sister." This is when I started to realize, there are always going to be new twists and new kinks, there's never going to be any really satisfying ending, and at some point the show is just going to cave in on itself and all its conspiracies. Maybe I'm over-dramatizing my reaction somewhat, but really, that is pretty much what eventually happened. There were a few good episodes after this, including the well-done Christmas Carol, but at this point the magic was gone.



"Picket Fences"

Best episode: Freezer Burn
"Picket Fences" is, by far, my most favorite television show. Ever. As created by David E. Kelley before he did "Ally McBeal" and "The Practice," "Picket Fences" had an awesome cast, excellent writing, and the then-novel idea of every episode, even the apparent stand-alones, becoming pieces of a larger puzzle. Nowadays pretty much every 1-hour drama prides itself on being a series of season-long movies broadcast in 20-something parts, but back in the mid '90s it was a fresh approach to TV storytelling, and "Picket Fences" was one of the best out of the gate. Part of that success was in the fact you didn't necessarily have to have seen every previous episode to appreciate what was going on the current week, but it made it that much better if you did. "Freezer Burn" is a prime example. By itself it's funny, quirky, and will leave you scratching your head (in a good way) at the end. But if you've seen everything leading up to this, and you know the significance of bodies found in freezers and Lawson getting his just desserts, your jaw will be on the floor (in a good way) at the end. I might not be able to really justify calling this the best of the show, especially when it's up against episodes like Terms of Estrangement guest-starring Louis Gosset, Jr., but Freezer Burn remains my personal favorite.

Worst episode: Buried Alive
I hesitate to call any "Picket Fences" episode bad, but Buried Alive can be safely skipped without taking away from the show's quality. That's because nothing really happens in this episode. Instead of FBI agents assisting their gay lovers in serial killing, or sick jazz singers getting pigs' livers to survive, or cops dating twins, or mayors spontaneously combusting, or Santa Claus taking the sheriff's office hostage, we just have... a family bickering over dinner. Again, it's not bad, it's just... there.

[SheSaidSheSaid]

So sorry, but pet peeve.....you italicize the longer work and put quotes around the shorter one. A TV series name gets italics, an episode gets quotes. An album name gets italics, a song title gets quotes. A movie gets italics, a scene or sequence (not commonly given names, but it does happen) gets quotes.

[exhale]

Okay, carry on

[topperharley]

There were a few good episodes after this, including the well-done "Christmas Carol"

At first I thought you were referring to that dreadful episode with Ed Asner and Lily Tomlin. But that's a different episode.

[RockBandRocker]

I don't understand the picks for worst LOST episode.

I thought the worst one was the "how Jack got his tattoos" episode (so terrible, I can't even remember the title). I nominate Season 3.5 and all of Season 4 for worst episodes of the show (although I think the problem with Season 4 was the effect the WGA strike had on it).

[FujiSkunk]

So sorry, but pet peeve.....you italicize the longer work and put quotes around the shorter one.

It's a pet peeve for me too, and that's not how I was taught. I was taught a single, stand-alone entity gets italics, while a collection of works, or a single piece of a stand-alone work, gets quotes. A movie is a single, stand-alone entity. An album, so I was taught, is a single entity while a song from that album is a piece of that work.

But what is a TV show? Is the series the stand-alone work and episodes are parts of that work, or is the series a collection of works while each episode is a stand-alone work?

Shows like "The Outer Limits" and "Twilight Zone" easily are collections of individual works. Shows like "24" and "Lost" are easily single works made up of multiple parts. Shows like "Married... with Children" and "Friends," where you always see the same characters but the episodes are self-contained and can be watched pretty much in any order, can be considered either way.

For the sake of consistency, and because I've seen articles in the past quote the show title while italicizing the episode title, I opted for that approach to all TV shows.

[topperharley]

Firefly

Best: Our Mrs. Reynolds. So much good dialogue in this one. And Vera. And, of course, Christina Hendricks as Saffron.

Worst: The Message. Yes, it has Jayne's hat, and there are few good moments, but the show understandably focuses on Private Tracey, who's such an unlikeable douche that it makes me not want to rewatch the episode, even to see the better parts.

I thought the worst one was the "how Jack got his tattoos" episode (so terrible, I can't even remember the title).

That's the "Stranger in a Strange Land" episode.

[SheSaidSheSaid]

I don't understand the picks for worst LOST episode.

I thought the worst one was the "how Jack got his tattoos" episode (so terrible, I can't even remember the title).

That would be "Stranger in a Strange Land"