Ted made the jump from the big screen to the small screen after two feature film hits, and the first season of the Peacock streaming series is much better than any fans might have given it credit for. Although franchise creator Seth MacFarlane might be more well known thanks to creating animated shows like Family Guy, the creator made even more waves with Ted’s movie debut back in 2012. But this was such a fun idea that MacFarlane quickly expanded on it further.
This eventually led to a brand new TV series that first made its streaming debut with Peacock back in 2024, and it’s coming back for a second season. With Ted Season 2 on the way, it’s now a perfect time to go back through the first season of episodes and see just how great it’s been so far. It really has been a strong season, and that makes this ranking a little more difficult. Read on below for Ted Season 1 episodes ranked from least best to best.
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7). Ejectile Dysfunction
What makes Ted so fun overall is that it really is just a bunch of teenage shenanigans between two best friends. Many of the episodes get John (Max Burkholder) and Ted (Seth MacFarlane) into wild situations thanks to mistakes they make as a result of being dumb teens, and “Ejectile Dysfuction” is a perfectly self-contained example of it. John wants to watch pornography for the first time, and after going through hoops to rent a tape with a fake ID, he and Ted end up getting it stuck in the VCR. But that’s just the beginning.
The real meat of the episode is how each of the family members react to the situation. The mother Susan (Alanna Ubach) believes it to be a secret tape her husband Matty (Scott Grimes) is hiding, John and Ted hope to sneak into school and switch it out with a working VCR, and Matty and Susan try and connect on a more physical level. It’s a great episode that’s just full of wacky fun where it all works out for everyone.
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6). Subways, Bicycles and Automobiles
Blaire (Giorga Whigham) is undoubtedly one of the best additions to the Ted TV series dynamic as she offers a more progressive stance for John and Ted to bounce off of, but clearly loves the two of them. Blaire and Ted’s changing relationship is one of the best scene to see develop through the first season, and the two of them spend the most time here over the course of a wild Halloween evening. They go through some very weird circumstances (including a teacher who’s too obsessed with Ted), and it’s fun to see them grow closer as a result.
Meanwhile, John has a very weird standout side story where his mother tries to set him up with a new friend, only to find that he’s a nearly 40 year adult with some odd habits. It’s probably the overall wackiest episode in the season in terms of how much actually happens, but hits hard all the same.
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5). He’s Gotta Have It
John’s main story through the season is about how much he feels like a loser compared to everyone else. He’s got Ted by his side, but this episode seems him discover that literally everyone in school has already lost their virginity. As the final episode of the first season, it’s a return to basics for the sitcom that sees the 1990s vibe come back in full. John’s focused on getting to prom and going out with a girl who likes him back, but it ultimately doesn’t work out the way he expects.
What really makes this a lot of fun, however, is the special Ted charm that only it can get away with. John’s interrupted by the O.J. Simpson chase on TV, he tries to impress his date by using Aladdin (and it turns out that it’s a big and dangerous trend among fans), and it all comes to a sweet end that ties it back to the Ted films. It was a great season finale all around.
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4). Loud Night
Matty gets some incredible moments of his own through Ted‘s debut season thanks to his old school casual racism and sexism, but his highlight episode manages to challenge all of this in a very heartwarming way without sanding off that edge. Using the fact that Ted was brought to life with a Christmas wish in a fun new way, Matty’s toy truck comes to life to give him another being to bounce all of his ideals off of. But the twist is that the toy truck is much more toxic.
It’s an episode that reveals while Matty is abrasive and has terrible points of view, he’s not completely without hope of being a better person. It’s a very emotional episode where Matty and Blaire argue over her sexual orientation, and it lets Matty finally humble himself in a way that he really hadn’t before when he finally apologizes to her and reaches out to deepen their familial connection. It’s probably one of the most emotional episodes of the season.
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3). Desperately Seeking Susan
Susan is arguably the best character in the entire series as though she’s used in relatively small doses throughout, Alanna Ubach makes the most out of each single line. That makes her focus episode all the better when Blaire attempts to get to why Susan and Matty are together in the first place. She’s a dedicated wife and mother, but used to study teaching so Blaire thought Susan was forced to give up on her dreams. But this episode flips it all around completely.
Because throughout much of the series before fans had wondered why Susan was with someone as aggressive and ignorant to her feelings as Matty, but it’s revealed that Susan loves her life the way it is. It’s great to see an example of how good of a teacher she would have been, but ultimately chooses the life she has over that. It’s a great look into what makes its secretly best character tick.
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2). Just Say Yes
Ted has what can honestly be considered a pitch perfect premiere episode. The episode’s stand out jokes not only went viral on social media (“Yeah, but they got him.”), but it’s also a perfect sitcom episode that lays out each of the characters and the conflicts between them that we’ll see in the rest of the season. Ted ends up going to school together with John, Blaire almost gets kicked out of the house for selling Ted marijuana, Matty is revealed to be a very hardcore fan of Sylvester Stallion, and it’s such a great balance.
All of these ideas and emotions play together perfectly with the many jokes that are fired off at every opportunity, but it’s soon made clear just how much is packed within a single episode. It teases the kind of greatness we’d get to see in the episodes to come, and really helped to emphasize how well Seth McFarlane has nailed down the American sitcom.
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1). My Two Dads
Even with such a strong premiere episode that balanced each of the characters, the truly funniest episode of the season by far comes right after. Thanks to the premiere already setting up the stage, “My Two Dads” was able to build on that even further with John and Ted dealing with their first major trouble against the school bully. Starting out with a fun prank call, it soon goes awry when the two of them end up becoming a loving father figure for the bully instead.
But not only is this just incredible to see play out as a twist on a common sitcom trope, all the while Matty is worried about revealing his Vietnam secrets during a colonoscopy. The subsequent reveal of the secret is one of the raunchiest jokes in the entire season, but the severity of the speech Scott Grimes gives for it (as it’s a play on a big crime of war confession) leads it to be one of the most incredible moments of Ted overall. It’s such a great showcase for how the show can surprise, and there’s a hope we’ll get even more of this in the new season.
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