For some reason, my mind went to first episodes/pilots. Of these, I’d say that Suits and The OC are up there with some of the best.

As for the actual best episode, I’d go for My Lunch, the Scrubs episode where there’s a rabies outbreak amongst organ transplant patients. Alongside this, probably Tracy does Conan from 30 Rock, and the musical episode of IT Crowd.

I don’t know about my favorite ever, but the episode I rewatch and love the most from the last few years is the Jackie Daytona (On the Run) episode of What We Do In The Shadows. It’s just perfection from start to finish. It’s ridiculous, hilarious, it’s endlessly quotable, and it doesn’t matter how many times I have seen it- I will always be up for another rewatch. The show is great in it’s entirety but that episode was just pure gold!

I wouldn’t say this is my favorite TV episode ever, but my favorite episode from a specific show that I don’t see mentioned elsewhere: Corporate “Natural Beauty” (Season 2, Episode 3). It pokes fun at the different expectations, etc., that men and women face, particularly in the workplace.

The opening scene shows the female character going through her long morning routine, with occasional cuts to the male character repeatedly hitting the snooze button before rolling out of bed and spending 30 seconds getting dressed. When they each arrive at the office, he’s complimented on his appearance, and she’s told that she looks tired.

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The Tales of Ba Sing Se from S2E15 of Avatar: The Last Airbender.

It is an incredibly poignant, albeit beautiful tableau about the loss of a child in a filler episode of a Y-7 Nickelodeon show. On top of that, the voice actor whose character is at the center of this incredibly painful story was dying of esophageal cancer during the recording and the episode ends with his in memoriam.

I don’t know if it’s my favorite, but the first one to immediately come to mind is the episode of The Last of Us featuring Nick Offerman. It was just heartbreakingly beautiful.

“Blink” Episode 11, season 3, Sep 3, 2007 Doctor Who

Edge of your seat. It was so enjoyable.

Pick between the good place season 1, 3, 4 finales.

But I don’t really look at shows as by episode generally.

Ed, Edd, n Eddy

The Eds break reality

The episode focused on the Eds breaking physics by dismantling the perspective of certain objects. At one point Ed stands on what’s supposed to be a silhouette of a house far in the background, grabs the sun, and takes a bite out of it before putting it back in the sky. Eddy at one point grabs Jimmy’s outline and pulls it off causing him to melt and slip down a sewer grate.

It’s always stuck with me because that’s where my love of learning physics came from and it exemplified a lot of the tricks artists use to convey a 3d world in a 2d animation.

S05E14 of Breaking Bad - Ozymandias.

I vividly remember watching it for the first time. I’ve had emotional reactions to movies and shows in the past, but not like this. This is like the immediate aftermath of everything coming to a head, and everyone’s acting made the whole episode so immersive. I felt like I was there, and this was happening to my family.

::: spoiler Specifically the scene of Skylar sprinting down the street chasing Walt’s car after he kidnaps Holly… or shit, the scene where Walt is wrestling with Walt Jr. over the knife. Or shit, just the realization that Skylar and Walt Jr. have that Walt essentially killed Hank. Everything is just compounded with the immense grief of losing Hank in such a brutish, unceremonious way. :::

This is still one of my top 3 shows. I’m not good at picking favorites, but I know it’s up there.

Someone already mentioned my top favorite (Community - “Pillows and Blankets”). So I’ll have to go to my backup which is its equal.

Community - S3E04 - Remedial Chaos Theory.

Why? Because it’s the quintesential Community episode; goofiness, intelligence, absurdity, slapstick. and it all exists in one package)

'Allo 'Allo!: “The gateau from the chateau.”

I love jokes that are one huge setup. The series in general is great for that as each episode starts with an absurd but accurate recap.

I can’t remember the name, but for IT Crowd specifically, when one of their coworkers thought Jen died and became a vengeful ghost. I laugh whenever I watch that episode.

Over all, King of the Hill, “Pretty, Pretty dresses.” First off, hilarious, second, I found it strangely touching. Bill has good people around him, even if they don’t show it. Even Dale was coming around the corner in a dress to participate. I thought that was very kind. No matter how bad it gets, they don’t leave him, even if they don’t know how to help him.

Runner up: “Almost got 'em” from Batman the Animated Series. All the villains were talking about how they almost got Batman, only to find out Batman was there in disguise. He was disguised as Croc. I found that hysterical for some reason.

There’s an old comedy/parody of soap operas called SOAP. SOAP is the show Benson spun oft from. It starred, among others, Billy Crystal and Katherine Helmond. Absolutely amazing show that I can and will talk about for hours.

S1e9 has a scene in which Jessica (Helmond) discovers that her husband Chester is cheating on her.

She looks to her sister and says Oh, Mary, I would faint if I knew how

It’s one of the finest examples of writing, acting, direction… Everything. It’s a perfect scene, so much so that it inspired me to want to write, and is the reason I decided to go for a creative writing degree.

For anyone curious, SOAP was so hated by network execs, Christian right orgs and basically all of conservative America that by the end of it’s run all advertisers had pulled out except for vlassic pickles, and commercial breaks would just be pickle commercials over and over again during the break. You couldn’t watch it in most areas, because locals refused to run it. It featured the first openly gay character in a major network show, a trans story (which did not age as well as it could have, but was progressive for it’s time), a lesbian character, interracial relationships, suicide, race relations, crises of faith, extramarital affairs, divorce… In the 70s. It always punched up, and the black and gay characters were almost always the most clever, most witty and sharpest.