There were many things to love about the ‘50s: Drive-in movies, poodle skirts, and of course, I Love Lucy. The iconic comedy ran on CBS for a full six seasons, resulting in 180 episodes. While many of these were hillarious, there were definitely some fans liked better than others. Rather than picking our own top contenders, we decided to turn to the ranking system at IMDb.
The popular movie and TV show website has assigned every single episode of I Love Lucy a star rating on a scale of 1 to 10. These scores, which we’ll be using, are based on the votes of registered users. It’s also worth noting that because we’re limiting the number of episodes on this list, we’ll be preferencing the episodes with the highest number of votes. With the logistics out of the way, it’s time to let the laughs roll in. Here are the best episodes of I Love Lucy according to IMDb.
Ethel’s Hometown (9.0)
This Season 4 episode had Lucy and the gang visiting the hometown of her best friend, Ethel. Upon arriving in Albuquerque, New Mexico, however, Lucy is pulled into an elaborate lie in which she convinces the residents that she is to be the star of a Hollywood movie. As it turns out, her husband Ricky has actually been given the job.
Despite this early mix-up, Lucy and Ricky decide to team together. Their goal? To sabotage a giant performance that Ethel has planned.
Lucy And Harpo Marx (9.0)
Later in Season 4, Lucy appeared alongside Harpo Marx. This comedian and mime artist is known for being part of the famous Marx Brother comedy act, which existed between 1905 and 1949. In the 1933 film Duck Soup, Marx performed what is known as the Mirror Routine. However, in 1955, he recreated it with Lucy. This comes after Ricky and Fred tell Harpo Marx he needs to visit Lucy’s apartment.
Meanwhile, Lucy and Ethel try to convince their friend Carolyn (also spelled “Caroline” by some sources) that they know many popular celebrities. This leads Lucy to take on different personas for Carolyn when she is unable to find her glasses and see who it really is.
Lucy And Superman (9.0)
In this Season 6 episode, Lucy and Carolyn have a birthday war after they schedule parties on the same day.
Ricky tells Lucy that Superman is in the area, so Lucy tries to recruit him for Little Ricky’s Party in an attempt to draw a larger crowd. Unfortunately, this doesn’t work, and Ricky also fails to convince the hero to show up. This has Lucy taking the role upon herself. Thankfully, the real Superman eventually steps in.
The Freezer (9.2)
Lucy and Ethel decide they want to save a little extra cash in the Season 1 episode. How, you ask? By buying a walk-in freezer and filling it with beef to protect themselves from the ever-rising prices of meat.
The problem comes when the women order way more beef than they can handle and must figure out how to hide it all from their husbands. It also doesn’t help when Lucy ends up locking herself in the freezer and becoming encased in ice. Thankfully, this isn’t something an electric blanket and soup can’t fix.
Lucy And John Wayne (9.2)
Grauman’s Chinese Theater has a problem: John Wayne’s footprints have been stolen. Ricky has an even bigger problem: One of the suspects sounds exactly like his wife.
Ricky is told that if the footprints are returned, charges won’t be pressed. Therefore, he enlists John Wayne to make a new pair of footprints. Unfortunately, they continually get ruined when Lucy and Ehtel accidentally destroy them and Little Ricky plays in the still-drying cement.
The Great Train Robbery (9.3)
Lucy is enjoying a leisurely train ride back to New York. That is, it’s leisurely until she hears that there’s a jewel thief on board. When she finds that a man nearby her is in possession of lots of high-quality jewelry, she automatically assumes he’s the culprit. As it turns out, he’s just a jeweler.
The actual jewel thief tries to help her frame the jeweler and has Lucy stealing back some diamonds in the process.
Lucy’s Italian Movie (9.3)
Lucy gets lucky on a train ride to Rome when she is offered the role of an American tourist in a movie directed by Vittorio Felipe in Italy. The title of this film is Bitter Grapes, which Lucy takes quite literally. To prepare for her role, she goes off to a tiny town to learn the art of winemaking.
This leads to lots of good old-fashioned grape crushing. Unfortunately, Lucy’s purple stains cause her role to be transferred to Ethel.
Job Switching (9.5)
Ricky and Fred are done with Lucy and Ethel’s careless spending while the women are fed up with the boys for thinking taking care of a house is easy. This causes the gang to swap places for the week.
The ladies end up at a candy factory and work on a conveyor belt that gets out-of-control. The guys, meanwhile, destroy the kitchen. As it turns out, they all like their own roles much better.
Hollywood At Last (9.5)
Season 4’s “Hollywood, At Last” has the gang arriving in California. Hoping to spot celebrities, Lucy requests the Brown Derby for lunch where she spots the famous Bill Holden.
Star-struck, Lucy stares at the man only for him to flip-it-around and embarrass her. The real trouble comes when Ricky runs into him separately and, unaware of the earlier incident, invites him to meet Lucy. This causes her to engage in some serious stalling.
Lucy Does A TV Commercial (9.6)
This Season 1 episode is the highest-rated in the entire I Love Lucy catalog. Lucy has worked her way onto Ricky’s special as a pitch girl. Here, she is asked to show off a trendy medicine known as Vitameatavegamin.
Though Lucy believes this is some crazy health product, it’s actually a boozy drink. This causes her to get rather drunk on set, causing all sorts of chaos to follow.
