Best single episode in TV history

That's a terrible, terrible top pick (on the list).

 

The Cheers episode with John Cleese.

The sweet sixteen episode of Party Down.

The Chuck episode where Yvonne Strahovski fights Noureen DeWulf.

The X-Files episode where Mulder switches places with Michael McKean's character.

The Beeper King episode of 30 Rock.

 

As far as great non-serialized episodes from a serialized drama goes, I don't think any current show does self-contained episodes better than Doctor Who - Blink, The Girl in the Fireplace, and Vincent and the Doctor (among others) all legitimately deserve consideration.

Also, when it comes to serialized episodes, Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead from Doctor Who is interesting because it's an episode where it's significantly more important to know the future episodes than the past episodes. So going back and re-watching that double episode is actually better and better the longer the series goes on.

 

The finale of the Trinity season of Dexter. I guess it could stand on its own, but as part of the whole arc of the season, it was perfection.

 

It's funny, I was about to post a West Wing ep and a Cheers ep and I think what made them so great is that they didn't have to have something monumental happen (character dies etc.) to make a compelling episode.

The West Wing's "State Dinner" is my pick. Just the seventh episode. It introduces the First Lady, there is Ruby Ridge-like standoff, a pending trucker strike and a diplomatic deal that needs to happen. But the touchstone is the hurricane that changes course and imperils a carrier group "Hold on. Hold on."

 

The Punky Brewster episode that was "A Very Special Episode..." show about not playing in fridges.

OK, not really. But I will throw out "Eli's Coming" on SportsNight.

 

The Body was awesome, but I hate the idea that you have to be depressing to be great.

Buffy's Once More With Feeling was every bit as great. It was an audacious choice that they executed so perfectly. The replay value is immense. No. 1 or not, it's always my favorite.


I'll second Dr. Who's Blink for a nomination. Contractually, they could save money by only having the Doctor and main companions star in 12 episodes per season, so once a season they have to find a way to sneak in an episode without them. Fascinating that the episode of Doctor Who that most people reference when talking about the greatest has almost no Doctor in it.

If we're going with depressing/serious, what about the Scrubs episode where you are introduced to 3 patients and given the statistic that 1 in 3 patients die, then in the end all three die. The closing scenes get me every time.

I feel like Mash and Seinfeld should have some say in this discussion for their categories, but I can't decide on which episode I'd nominate for either.

 

For unserialized drama, one of my all-time favorites is "The Prophet" from the late-1960s "Dragnet" series.
Gannon and Friday go to check up on a suspected LSD dealer who is the leader of a psychedelic quote. The two cops and the cult leader then spend the entire epsiode debating the pros and cons of legalizing drugs. Both sides make some good points, and at the end Gannon and Friday leave without arresting the guy.
It's just a riveting 30 minutes of television. The amazing thing is, it's 45 years later and we're still debating the same issues with the same arguments. Definitely one of the high points of an outstanding series.

Here's a link to the full episode. Highly recommended:

http://www.imdb.com/video/hulu/vi2558656537/

 

I was going to mention Love's Labor Lost. To go back to the original post, and the idea of understanding the context, Greene makes this chain of errors, loses the mother, saves the baby, has to tell the baby's father that the mother is dead ... and this is all on top of the fact that Greene is in the middle of a divorce. His life is falling apart and right in the middle of that, he makes the worst mistake of his professional life. The moment I remember is at the end, after he's worked all night, Greene declines Lewis' invitation to breakfast, and he gets on the train and sits down and starts crying as the screen fades to black. That was devastating. I didn't watch ER on a regular basis until about midway through its run -- by which time everyone said it had declined. But somehow or another, I happened to see Love's Labor Lost when it first aired, and I knew it was a show I was going to need to find time to watch at some point.

Another one that stands out at me is the In the Shadow of Two Gunmen ... the opening episode of Season 2 of the West Wing. Phenomenally well-constructed. You were already engaged with those characters by that point, but that episode, with the flashbacks that showed how the staff came together, made them feel like family.

 

I actually think more highly of others, including a couple I mentioned, but since it's usually at the top of the list for modern day Doctor Who eps, I couldn't not include it.

 

Sherlock: A Scandal in Belgravia.
Easily the single-best episode of television I have ever in recent memory.

 

Wow, this list kinda sucks.

http://lamoltihalstein.wordpress.com/2009/06/28/tv-guides-100-best-episodes-of-all-time/

And this one is flawed as well, though not as much:

http://web.archive.org/web/20071028140448/http://members.aol.com/speaker606/jim/tv.html