The 10 best episodes of “Lost”, ranked

For the 20th anniversary of the legendary ABC drama's premiere, we have to go back!

It's been 20 years since Oceanic flight 815 crash landed on a mysterious island, and TV has never been the same. Cue the blurry title card, because it's time to celebrate two decades of Lost.

When the ABC drama premiered Sept. 22, 2004, it introduced a large ensemble of compelling characters and intriguing mysteries portrayed cinematically in ways that had never been attempted before on TV. And as the series continued for six seasons, it raised more questions than it answered as the mythology got more and more complex — flashbacks became flash forwards and then flash sideways, and don't even get us started on the frozen donkey wheel. Debates still rage amongst fans about whether the castaways were dead the whole time, what was up with those cursed numbers, and what the island really was.

But regardless of the lingering questions and controversial ending, Lost cemented its status as one of the best TV shows of all time over and over again by delivering smart, philosophical, emotional, and overall impressively entertaining episodes. So in honor of the show's 20th anniversary, Entertainment Weekly ranked the 10 best episodes of Lost.

See you in another life, brotha.

10. "LaFleur" (season 5, episode 8)

Our 10th pick marks the most thrilling moment in one of Lost's most underrated (and conceptually bananas) storylines: season 5’s time travel arc. After several episodes of uncontrollably flashing through numerous disparate time periods in the island's mysterious history, several of the survivors finally settled into a new status quo... as members of the DHARMA Initiative in the 1970s. The most shocking revelations here are that Sawyer (Josh Holloway), who's suddenly much softer around the edges, had fallen in love with Juliet (Elizabeth Mitchell) over the course of several unseen years, and that Jin (Daniel Dae Kim) now spoke English fluently. It's the episode where season 5 really hit its stride, fully transitioning DHARMA's presence in the show from mysterious antagonists to a groovy and complex — yet surprisingly mundane — community that re-contextualized the characters. The episode also concluded with a highly anticipated reunion, as Jack (Matthew Fox), Kate (Evangeline Lilly), and Hurley (Jorge Garcia) finally met up with the rest of the islanders after their time on the mainland. — Wesley Stenzel

Related: How Sun and Jin's relationship went from problematic to transcendent on Lost

9. "House of the Rising Sun" (season 1, episode 6)

There’s a reason why EW ranked Sun (Yunjin Kim) and Jin as the best TV couple of all time, and their first flashback episode at the beginning of the series expertly laid the groundwork for what would become a nuanced, gorgeous, yet ultimately tragic love story spanning all six seasons. Before this episode, they seemed to be minor characters who only spoke Korean and furthered problematic Asian stereotypes, but the revelation that Sun was secretly fluent in English and had planned to leave Jin before getting on the doomed Oceanic 815 flight changed everything. The island timeline also introduced an intriguing mystery that would dangle until late in the final season — where did the "Adam and Eve" corpses come from?! — as well as split the survivors into two camps, one at the beach and one at the newly-discovered caves, creating more tension as some of the castaways started accepting that the island was their new home while others clung to the belief their rescue would happen any time. — Sydney Bucksbaum

8. "There's No Place Like Home" (season 4, episodes 12-14)

Following an entire season of flash-forward segments showing some of the characters' futures on the mainland, season 4’s supersized three-part finale finally revealed how the Oceanic Six — Jack, Kate, Hurley, Sun, Sayid (Naveen Andrews), and baby Aaron — escaped the island. The three-episode runtime allowed for maximum drama in other plot threads as well: Michael (Harold Perrineau) died when the freighter explodes after Ben (Michael Emerson) killed Keamy (Kevin Durand), Sayid found Nadia (Andrea Gabriel), Jack eulogized his dad and discovered that Claire (Emilie de Ravin) is his sister, Desmond (Henry Ian Cusick) reunited with Penny (Sonya Walger), Ben moved the island by spinning an underground frozen donkey wheel, and Locke (Terry O'Quinn) was revealed to be the mysterious (and dead!) Jeremy Bentham. It's a perfect encapsulation of everything Lost can do at its best: moving melodrama fused with confounding, ever-evolving sci-fi/fantasy mythos, all presented with gripping tension and dazzling non-linear storytelling. — WS

7. "Numbers" (season 1, episode 18)

Lost's penchant for dark humor is perhaps best exemplified in "Numbers," the first episode dedicated to Hugo "Hurley" Reyes. The flashback sequences revealed Hurley's troubled past as a lottery winner, haunted by the recurring numbers (4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42) that sent him into a spiral of paranoia as his loved ones were struck by absurd misfortune. The episode further exposed the fragility and pain lurking under Hurley's surface, brilliantly conveyed by Garcia's sensitive, vulnerable performance. "Numbers" is also one of the episodes that most strongly connected its flashback and present-day material, as the numbers came into play on the island as the mysteries of Rousseau (Mira Furlan) and the hatch continued to unfurl. — WS

Related: Lost: 30 key deaths

6. "Do No Harm" (season 1 episode 20)

When it rains, it pours, and Lost put the castaways through absolute hell in this gut-wrenching episode as Jack’s hero complex got pushed past its limits by multiple medical emergencies, perfectly balanced with a backstory that revealed why he can’t ever let go. After Locke lied about how Boone (Ian Somerhalder) got critically injured, Jack worked overtime to desperately save Shannon's (Maggie Grace) well-intentioned but naive step-brother. Yet nothing he tried — not even a self-administered blood transfusion or almost amputating the crushed leg — could save Boone. It took a barely-conscious Boone to finally convince Jack to let him go, as Lost delivered the first major death of the series ... and it was absolutely devastating. Watching Shannon from afar as the ignorant bliss of her perfect first date with Sayid was shattered by the news of Boone’s fate felt downright traumatic and voyeuristic. And with Jack out of commission, Kate and Charlie (Dominic Monaghan) — and Jin! — were forced to step up and deliver Claire’s baby in the middle of the jungle. Like we said, when it rains, it pours. — SB

5. "Man of Science, Man of Faith" (season 2, episode 1)

An unknown man suddenly opened his eyes. He hopped out of a shadowy bunk and plugged away at a keyboard. He threw on Cass Elliot's "Make Your Own Kind of Music" and went about his day: dishes, workout, shower, laundry, smoothie. Are we on the wrong channel? What the hell does this have to do with Lost? So began one of the all-time great season premieres, which introduced one of the show's best characters: Desmond Hume, soulfully played in both past and present by Cusick. It's a thrilling follow-up to the cliffhanger at the end of the previous season —  the opening of the inexplicable hatch in the middle of the jungle — and further solidified the opposing leadership philosophies of Jack and Locke. And the flashbacks chronicled the dramatic beginning of Jack's failed marriage to Sarah (Julie Bowen) as she landed in his emergency room after a car accident.  — WS

4. "Pilot" (season 1, episode 1-2)

From the very first moment Jack opened an eye in the middle of a mysterious jungle up to the final seconds with Charlie’s iconic and chilling delivery of, “Guys, where are we?,” Lost debuted a pitch-perfect TV pilot. Introducing an ensemble this large and a mystery this complex in only two episodes of broadcast TV should have been impossible. But J.J. Abrams and Damon Lindelof hooked viewers immediately — and ultimately changed the TV landscape forever. The Emmy-winning episode featured juicy, head-scratching twists (An unseen, but definitely heard, violent monster! A polar bear in the tropical jungle! A French distress call looped for 16 years!) and continued to raise the intense stakes as the survivors learned help may not be coming at all ... because they crashed over 1,000 miles off-course, so any rescue attempt would be looking in the wrong place. The flashbacks also subverted expectations as viewers learned the castaways aren’t who they first appeared to be with the reveal that it was actually leading lady Kate who was the handcuffed prisoner onboard the flight. Like the survivors, we truly had no idea what was in store from the rest of the series after these two episodes, but the premiere instantly made it clear that this was no ordinary sci-fi/fantasy thriller. — SB

3. "Walkabout" (season 1, episode 4)

Everyone thought they knew what a Lost plot twist looked like after the first three episodes until "Walkabout" blew it all up in a stroke of genius that would shape the rest of the series. John Locke's backstory delivered the first real plot twist of the series in a stunning revelation more than 40 minutes into the episode, as viewers learned he was paralyzed and in a wheelchair until the plane crash magically healed him. Now it became clear why Locke was so invested in the island’s emerging mysteries and mysticism — the plane crash was the worst moment of everyone else’s life, but it was the best of his. And thus, the diametrically contradicting philosophies of Locke and Jack were born. — SB

Related: 'The Constant' turns 10: Revisiting the great Lost time-twist episode a decade later

2. "Through the Looking Glass" (season 3, episodes 22-23)

In a series full of wild season finales, season 3’s two-parter stands above the rest. "Through the Looking Glass" sees the survivors' conflict with the Others come to a head as a mysterious freighter arrives on the island. The finale encapsulates how deftly Lost balances different approaches to culmination and payoff — there's long-anticipated catharsis (the reunion between Rousseau and her daughter Alex [Tania Raymonde]), heartbreaking finality (the tragic, heroic death of Charlie), and amped-up mystery (the reappearance of Walt [Malcolm David Kelley]). And the off-island flash sequences are among the most memorable in the show's history — a bearded, depressed Jack wanders through a miserable series of unfortunate events, only to meet up with Kate in the final sequence that reveals we've actually been flashing forward, not backward, for the entire episode, brilliantly upending fan expectations and building to one of the show's most iconic lines: "We have to go back!" — WS

1. "The Constant" (season 4, episode 5)

This isn’t just the best episode of Lost — it’s one of the best episodes of TV. As Desmond and Sayid were flown to the freighter anchored just off the coast of the island, Desmond began to suffer a unique side effect from the electromagnetism as his consciousness jumped back and forth between 1996 and 2004, and amnesia erased all memory of his time on the island. The extremely complex time travel aspects of the story were shockingly easy to digest, because the episode proved Lost’s thesis statement that, above all else, love is what’s most important (a crucial theme that steered the show for the rest of its run). The surprising break from the usual story followed Desmond as he raced against the clock to make a connection in both timelines with his “constant,” a.k.a. Penny, the love of his life who he lost before ending up on the island. The combination of the epic music, Cusick’s heart-rending performance as a man "unstuck" in time, and satisfying romantic conclusion resulted in a breathtaking, transcendent, emotional, and unexpectedly hopeful hour of TV that catered to every fan of the series, regardless of whether you tuned in for the sci-fi mythology, character arcs, or romance. "The Constant" had it all. — SB

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