Larry David — social assassin, four-eyed fuck, utmost respecter of wood — returns to HBO on Sunday with a new season of Curb Your Enthusiasm. It’s been six years since the last episode of Curb aired, and the extended hiatus has allowed us to contemplate some very important questions: Can you pause toast? Is the chat-and-cut a morally indefensible move? And, of course, what is the best episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm? Over the next four days, The Ringer hopes to answer those questions — well, at least the last one — by ranking 20 episodes a day for the rest of the week. On Tuesday, we covered the bottom 20; here’s the next group: from “Denise Handicap” to “good Hodgkins” to the birth of the schmohawk. Come back tomorrow for 40–21.

Season 5, Episode 8

The Ringer’s Curb Your Enthusiasm Rankings

Nos. 80-61

Nos. 60-41

Nos. 40-21

Nos. 20-1

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Plot Summary: Larry pretends to be an Orthodox Jew to improve the kidney-transplant prospects of Richard Lewis, whose at-home nurse is stealing valuable objects and hiding them in her “huge” vagina. Yep.

Episode MVP: Larry, who takes full advantage of the Tim Whatley rule to (poorly) impersonate an Orthodox Jew. This episode is an exquisite blend of slapstick, accents, and absurdity, and its disparate strands all tie together in a satisfying, Seinfeld-esque fashion. I will never not laugh at Larry’s vagina-size accusation, vaguely Yiddish-sounding gagging noises, and faux-outrage about missing milchig plates.

Best Larryism: “I’ll tell you what I’m driving at. I submit you took that baseball, stashed it in your unusually large vagina, and walked right on out of here.” — Ben Lindbergh

Season 2, Episode 1

Plot Summary: Larry tries to prove that he can be a successful car salesman, and promptly gets himself fired. Larry and Cheryl also buy a new house that is plagued by mysterious “house sounds.”

Episode MVP: Jason Alexander, who is tired of being seen only as George Costanza and repeatedly insults the real-life George Costanza himself, Larry David.

Best Larryism: “OK, the GTS is ‘guaranteed tremendous safety.’” — Lindsay Zoladz

Season 1, Episode 6

Plot Summary: Cheryl is on a mission to remove an ugly electrical wire from the backyard, a task that requires the signatures of their odd neighbors. The neighbors agree to cooperate in exchange for a meeting with Julia Louis-Dreyfus, but waffle after those encounters turn hostile. Meanwhile, Larry loses his ideas notebook, and burns through a series of rude late-night calls and house visits in his quest to find it.

Episode MVP: Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who stares straight into the camcorder of Larry’s neighbor and answers a question about Jerry Seinfeld with: “I gotta tell ya, I don’t have any fucking idea.”

Best Larryism: “Cut-off time is 10:30. Everybody knows that.” — Alyssa Bereznak

Season 7, Episode 3

Plot Summary: When the opportunity to do a Seinfeld reunion show comes up, Larry is unenthusiastic — until his ex-wife, Cheryl, expresses interest in playing a part on the show. Jerry Seinfeld is skeptical about a reunion, but he agrees, while also mentioning that Meg Ryan should play the part Larry created for Cheryl. Aside from that wrinkle, everything is moving along smoothly, but when the head of NBC gives Larry nosebleed seats to a Lakers game, Larry tells him to “go fuck himself.” The reunion show eventually gets back on track, but then Larry calls Jerry to tell him the show’s back on, and Jerry is with Meg Ryan, who has already agreed to take Cheryl’s role.

Episode MVP: Jerry Seinfeld, whose inquisition (and unintentional undermining) of his old friend is positively Larry-esque: “Get together? You’re not a ‘get together’ guy. You don’t like ‘together.’ You hate to get ‘together!’”

Best Larryism: “You don’t believe in tip coordination? Is that it?” — David Shoemaker

Season 1, Episode 9

Plot Summary: Lewis introduces Larry to his dermatologist, who is black. As he’s “trying to be affable,” Larry jokingly feigns surprise that Lewis would hire a black dermatologist despite affirmative action, which would seem to suggest that Lewis’s dermatologist is a subpar dermatologist. Of course, Larry lives to regret this joke for the rest of the episode.

Episode MVP: Lewis’s dermatologist, who has to be the butt of the affirmative action joke at the heart of all this.

Best Larryism: “I tend to say stupid things to black people sometimes.” — Justin Charity

Season 7, Episode 5

Plot Summary: Larry strikes up a conversation with a woman who is sitting a table over from him at a coffee shop, and he eventually gets her to agree to go on a date with him — something he instantly regrets when she rolls her wheelchair over to hand him her number. After he fails to pleasure her in the bedroom and can’t figure out if it’s his lack of skill or her condition, he decides to break up with her. But then they go to dinner one more time, Larry notices what he sees as perks that come with being with a handicapped person, and decides that an unorthodox sex life is worth enduring if it means front-row parking, not waiting for tables at restaurants, and the get-out-of-jail-free card he can use on friends who think he’s an asshole. The relationship falls to pieces, though, when Larry loses his BlackBerry and has no way of getting a hold of his girlfriend, who he had saved in his phone only as “Denise Handicap.”

Episode MVP: Rosie O’Donnell kicks Larry’s ass two different times (and has a third attempt prematurely broken up), which is plenty to earn MVP status in my book.

Best Larryism: “All I’m wondering is this: If you took an American kid who has never used chopsticks before and a Chinese kid who has never used chopsticks before, would the Chinese kid do better?” — Mark Titus

Season 4, Episode 4

Plot Summary: Photographic evidence of Larry’s horrible dental hygiene terrifies everyone around him. Meanwhile, Larry wages war on a weatherman — a friend of the dentist, naturally — he thinks is purposely predicting bad weather so that he can have the golf course to himself.

Episode MVP: An inexplicably barefoot Russian who, as with all the best things on Curb, seems to exist only to torment Larry.

Best Larryism: “I’m not saying it’s a great Hodgkin’s. It’s a good Hodgkin’s.” — Claire McNear

Season 1, Episode 1

Plot Summary: In the first episode of the series, Larry goes to the movies with Cheryl’s friend Nancy, and because he is wearing an awkwardly cut pair of pants, Nancy believes that she has caused Larry to get an erection. This is also the one where Larry offends Jeff’s parents by making a Hitler joke about Cheryl, not realizing he’s on speakerphone.

Episode MVP: Nancy (played by, fun fact, Mike Myers’s ex-wife Robin Ruzan), who isn’t buying the “pants tent” excuse for a second.

Best Larryism: [Discussing Richard’s new girlfriend’s breasts] “They’re not breasts; they’re just big, chemical balls, OK?” — Zoladz

Season 6, Episode 8

Plot Summary: Larry’s lack of control over his manhood after five seconds leads to a disgraceful misunderstanding with Auntie Rae that only gets worse when she sees him massaging a painful groin as instructed by his love interest, Dr. Flomm. But that’s far from the worst miscommunication for Larry: After overhearing a man telling a racist story, Larry’s attempts to relay it to others end consistently badly — especially for Jeff, who finally sees why Larry complains about bald discrimination. (It’s Susie who is the real victim of medical malpractice, though: “He had a beautiful head full of hair that I loved, a mane!” she screams at Larry about her newly shorn husband. “And now he looks like you!”) Larry’s bizarre medical dates with Dr. Flomm come to a disappointing end after an offended pharmacist hands him the wrong prescription.

Episode MVP: The pharmacist, because he alone has the power to decipher Dr. Flomm’s chicken-scratch love note — but also because he alone has the power to stymie Larry’s usually ol’ reliable “five-Mississippi” erection.

Best Larryism: [Shaking his head, terrified, and refusing to speak] — Baker

Season 6, Episode 4

Plot Summary: Larry gets Richard’s girlfriend, Cha Cha (Tia Carrere), a job as the receptionist at his office. But with her desk positioned next to the men’s room — and in prime position to monitor Larry’s frequent lavatorial habits — Larry begins to regret the favor.

Episode MVP: Daviday (Taylor Negron), the waiter who refuses to allow Susie to take home leftovers for her dog (and gets revenge when she does so anyway).

Best Larryism: “I don’t need her bowel concern!” — McNear

Season 6, Episode 10

Plot Summary: After being convinced by Leon to stop being such a mopey dick over Cheryl, Larry gets out of bed and learns of a gerbil on the loose in his house. He also visits a gastroenterologist to see about the “tickle in his anus,” meets a mysterious woman in the waiting room, and asks her out on a date. Elsewhere, impressed by the moxie of a line-cutter at the movies who pretends to be disabled, Larry tries to use the same trick to ward off a man who is looking to rent the unoccupied office across the hall. The plan backfires when “rec-o-mmen-ded” director Matt Tessler is offended by the act and spreads a rumor about the gerbil that Larry tries to clear up via a speech at Sammi’s bat mitzvah.

Episode MVP: The gastroenterologist’s receptionist, who, despite having “no formal education” not only puts up with Larry’s badgering over the patient list but also gives him fair warning about the mysterious woman “just there for a checkup,” whom he takes on a rather uncomfortable double date.

Best Larryism: “You calling him Ben Ladin or Bin Laden? Ben, that’s almost like a Jewish name.” — Baker

Season 8, Episode 6

Plot Summary: Larry trips over his shoelaces and tackles a belligerent man who is accosting a flight attendant, leaving the passengers on the plane thinking that he is a hero. A woman sitting next to Larry named Donna, who had previously turned down his advances, suddenly warms up to him. During a party, a guest (played by Chris Parnell) trips over his shoelaces and bumps into Ricky Gervais, prompting Susie to mention that that’s exactly how Larry stopped the drunk man on the plane. Upon hearing the truth, Donna is no longer interested in Larry and instead starts seeing Gervais. At episode’s end, Larry follows Donna and Gervais onto a subway, where the two of them get mugged until Larry intervenes and beats the robber with a loaf of bread.

Episode MVP: Ricky Gervais dunks all over Larry for the entirety of this episode. He picks out the most expensive bottle of wine on the menu when Larry offers to buy him one. He says he loves the laugh track on Seinfeld because “it reminds you when to laugh.” He gets to sit at the cool kids’ table at the dinner party while Larry gets sent to be with the losers, he roasts Larry for not only bringing bread to a party but for bringing the hardest loaf of bread imaginable, and he makes Larry pay $200 for tickets to see his play. Then he steals Larry’s girl.

Best Larryism: “Everybody brings wine. I bring bread.” — Titus

Season 7, Episode 8

Plot Summary: Susie finds panties in Jeff’s glove box, and the explanation Jeff comes up with is that they belong to Larry. Jeff then relays his alibi to Larry, who starts behaving more feminine around Susie. He oversells it, and Susie starts to suspect that her intuition was right all along. So Larry devises a brilliant plan — involving a kids’ subpar lemonade stand, a police officer named Krupke, and a pair of khakis from Banana Republic — to prove once and for all that he does, in fact, wear women’s panties.

Episode MVP: Jeff is a forgettable idiot in this episode and wouldn’t be the MVP under any other circumstances, but I’m giving it to him solely because it’s an all-time classic Curb moment when he shows up at Larry’s front door with a neck brace on and says, “You gotta tell Susie I was in a car accident.”

Best Larryism: “As far as I know, there are only two ways you can injure your neck: One is a car accident. The other is cunnilingus.” — Titus

Season 2, Episode 5

Plot Summary: On the advice of his therapist, Larry takes Cheryl to the beach. While there, he spots his therapist wearing a thong bathing suit, which makes him extremely uncomfortable. He tells Richard Lewis, who is also a patient, and they both decide to leave the therapist. Elsewhere, Larry is recruited by Rob Reiner to auction himself off as a lunch date as part of a charity event for “Groat’s syndrome.” During the ensuing lunch, Larry gets into a heated argument with the winner because he refuses to wait for the man’s lunch to arrive before he starts eating.

Episode MVP: Larry David, for having relatable sentiments with regards to the beach and waiting to eat until the other person’s food arrives.

Best Larryism: “You ever catch your parents having sex? No, me either. You know they did … but you wonder when.” — Sean Yoo

Season 2, Episode 2

Plot Summary: Basically, Larry accidentally incites the rage of professional wrestler Thor Olsen when he makes finger guns at his children while driving.

Episode MVP: Thor (Deron McBee), and if you suggest otherwise, he will slash your tires.

Best Larryism: “Anybody know how to change a tire? I never took a shop class and I need a little help. OK, I’m just coming flat out and saying help me, that’s … anybody wanna help me, semi-retarded individual change a tire? Twenty-five, 30 dollars to change a tire. OK, $35 to change this tire for me right now. I’ll give you $10 for a response! Anybody wanna make $10 and respond verbally?” — Zoladz

Season 4, Episode 2

Plot Summary: Larry reencounters the blind man he helped move in Season 1 (“The Bracelet”) and informs him that his girlfriend is not as attractive as she claims to be — leading to their breakup. Ben Stiller throws a late birthday party with the directive “No gifts!” but Larry is the only one who takes this literally. Midway through the party, he insults Susie by poo-pooing the designs of her new bedazzled T-shirt business. He later refuses to sing “Happy Birthday” and then accidentally stabs Ben’s eye with an hors d’oeuvre skewer. In a double-play apology tour, he buys one of Susie’s sweaters to give to Ben, a gesture that backfires after a series of regiftings.

Episode MVP: Susie. No one can mouth “fucking asshole” across the room like that woman.

Best Larryism: “Thursday I have a Klan meeting, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to make it.” — Bereznak

Season 4, Episode 7

Plot Summary: Perhaps the most racially charged half-hour in the show’s run, “The Surrogate” includes disquisitions on interracial relationships, biracial identity, the crisis of surrogacy, linguistic coding, road rage, and waiting-room reading material. In short, Larry must pass a physical to perform in The Producers, but doing so requires more than just a simple test.

Episode MVP: Muggsy Bogues. David Schwimmer. Melissa McCarthy. Richard Lewis. Garcelle Beauvais. Mel Brooks. Wanda Sykes. Take your pick, this is one of the most loaded episodes in show history. For Ringer purposes, let’s go with Muggsy, who is, er, sized up by Larry and Richard Lewis at a bathroom urinal and nearly clocks LD in the face before he weasels out of it with a fake heart attack. (This show is real and spectacular.)

Best Larryism: “It’s a mulatto. … … … … No good?” — Sean Fennessey

Season 8, Episode 10

Plot Summary: Larry spends an episode befuddled by Michael J. Fox because he can’t tell if the actor is lashing out against him or if he’s merely living with Parkinson’s. Did Fox shake his head in disdain of Larry, or was it a “Parkinson’s shake”? Was Fox clomping around in boots late at night to keep Larry up, or was he just relieving Parkinson’s-related cramps? Did Fox shake up a can of Coke as an act of revenge, or, you know. Elsewhere, Larry gets into trouble with his girlfriend because he buys her 7-year-old son, Greg, a sewing machine after assuming the child is gay. The kid loves the gift so much that he knits Susie a pillow sham adorned with a swastika — a symbol Larry introduced him to.

Episode MVP: As fun as it is to see Michael J. Fox, the MVP here is Eddie Schweighardt, the kid who plays the flamboyant, swastika-loving Greg. His response to Larry explaining how Jewish people don’t like Hitler — “Get a life, Jews!” — is the biggest laugh of the episode.

Best Larryism: “He will be gay; he’s just — he’s pre-gay!” — Andrew Gruttadaro

Season 5, Episode 7

Plot Summary: Cheryl decides to host Passover seder for Larry’s father, and, in typical Curb fashion, things do not go well. Larry befriends a sex offender played by Rob Corddry, and, after he helps fix Larry’s golf swing, Larry invites him to seder. There, Larry asks his neighbor Ethel to see if she recognizes anyone at the party, hoping that she identifies Mark (Rob Huebel) as the man stealing his newspapers. Instead, she recognizes the sex offender and faints. The episode ends with Jeff and Susie’s daughter choking, with only the sex offender able to save her.

Episode MVP: Rob Corddry, for being the nicest, creepiest, and most helpful sex offender in the neighborhood.

Best Larryism: [After Cheryl finds out Larry invited the sex offender and promptly freaks out] “Cheryl, what would Jesus do?” — Yoo

Season 6, Episode 1

Plot Summary: The season premiere of Season 6 is a classic “full-circle” Curb episode. The episode starts with Larry destroying a smoke alarm with a baseball bat. He then chats with Jeff and Richard and cooks up a plan to avoid going to two parties in two nights. The plan ends up being a total disaster both nights, leaving Cheryl unhappy. Larry’s only solution is to allow a family displaced by Hurricane Edna to stay at his house. The Blacks arrive, and the Davids host a party, which ends thanks to a penis-shaped cake from Marty Funkhouser’s go-to erotic bakery. The episode ends with Larry eating some penis cake and then telling Loretta Black (Vivica A. Fox) that she can’t smoke indoors. Larry throws out the cigarette in a trash can under the destroyed smoke alarm and ends up causing a house fire, which displaces the Blacks and the Davids.

Episode MVP: Larry David, who introduces us to the term “schmohawk” and gives us a solid “pretty, pretty, good” and plenty of penis jokes.

Best Larryism: “Funkhouser, he knowingly served us penis. What is wrong with that guy?” — Yoo

Come back Thursday to see the next 20 episodes on our Curb Your Enthusiasm countdown.

Disclosure: HBO is an initial investor in The Ringer.

The Ringer Staff