'Curb' Countdown: The 5 Best Episodes of 'Curb Your Enthusiasm'

You could count down the hours to the season eight premiere of "Curb Your Enthusiasm," that's how close it is. This new season promises a lot more of the usual Larry David antics, plus a load of guest stars. But to truly appreciate the awkwardness to come, we need to take a look back at the awkwardness that has been. Here's a list of the five best "Curb Your Enthusiasm" episodes thus far.

5. "The Car Pool Lane" (S4E6)

Anyone who has been stuck in traffic on the 101 in Los Angeles has thought about hiring a prostitute so that they can use the carpool lane. Haven't they? Well, Larry David has, and that's the main focus of this ridiculous but hilarious episode. The best part is how chummy Larry and the hooker get during the ride and later at the Dodgers game that Larry was headed to. The episode really highlights how Larry is a pragmatic person to a fault: when he sees a problem, he fixes it in the way that he thinks is best, and that's was inevitably gets him into trouble.

4. "Opening Night" (S4E10)

Not only does "Opening Night" have the wonderfully awkward and funny moment when Larry forgets his lines and goes off on his tangent (the actor's nightmare realized), but the layers on this episode are almost impossible to sort through. You see, Larry is set to perform in one of the lead roles of "The Producers," which is about a couple of Broadway producers who write a terrible show and cast a terrible actor to make sure it's a flop, but it turns out to be a hit. This is the same setup that Larry is in, as he was hired by Mel Brooks himself to make people hate the show, but the plan backfires. It's so self-reflexive and meta that you would think you're watching an episode of "Community."

3. "Krazee Eyes Killa" (S3E8)

Larry David often finds himself in his awkward situations because of race issues, and his interactions with Wanda's rapper boyfriend Krazee Eyes Killa show it. The scene that has Krazee Eyes approaching Larry about ideas for his lyrics is one situation where Larry, in spite of himself, actually manages to get out mostly unscathed. The conversation is hilarious (and too dirty to reprint here), but even funnier are Larry's attempts at Krazee's handshakes.

2. "The End" (S5E10)

This one was so epic and so funny that it had a lot of people thinking that it would be the last episode of "Curb" ever, and not just a season finale. The season-long questions about Larry's possibly adopted upbringing and the Richard Lewis kidney bit wrapped up in the episode, but some of the best moments came when Larry got to heaven. After all, rarely can you go wrong when you put Dustin Hoffman and Sacha Baron Cohen in the same scene. Along with Larry David, that's one big boatload of funny.

1. "The Special Section" (S3E6)

Perhaps no other episode of "Curb" encapsulates what the show is all about better than this one. It's a perfect mess of surreal shock and social immorality. When Larry returns from shooting a Scorsese film, he finds out that his mother is dead, and has been for weeks...the ultimate Jewish mother, she didn't want anyone to tell Larry so he wouldn't be bothered. That's funny enough, but things get kicked up a notch when Larry starts exploiting his mother's death as an excuse to get out of things he doesn't want to do. That's classic "Curb Your Enthusiasm."

What's your favorite episode of "Curb Your Enthusiasm"? Let us know in the comments.