Smiling Friends has officially capped off its third and final season with Adult Swim, so it’s time to go back and rank all of the episodes to find out which of them is the best of the best. Smiling Friends was one of the most beloved original projects to make its debut with Adult Swim in the 2020s, and each new season of the animated series was better than the last. The sudden end might have come as a surprise, but the final season did end up being the best season of the series to date as well.
Smiling Friends series creators Zach Hadel and Michael Cusack have brought the series’ run to an end after three seasons, and with the final episodes airing last weekend it’s now a great time to look back on all ten episodes to see which of them have been the best overall. Read on below for our ranking of Smiling Friends‘ Season 3 episodes, and let us know your favorites because every episode is bound to be someone’s favorite as they’re all so different.
A ranking of Smiling Friends episodes overall is basically splitting hairs amongst them. With so many wildly different elements of animation, comedy, and even emotion in each episode, it can be tough to compare them to one another. But the penultimate episode of the series is undoubtedly the weakest. It’s a bit unfair as Hadel and Cusack noted how it was one of two episodes made during the original production order and dropped when the final was announced, but you can also sense that vibe with the episode itself.
Taking on artificial intelligence and providing some hilarious commentary behind it with its ultimate reveal, this episode does feel a bit flat compared to the rest of the season. Outside of confirming Allan’s connection to a real-life passionate fan, it likely won’t stick out in fans’ memory.
It’s also the same case for the final episode of the series, but “Charlie’s Uncle Dies and Doesn’t Come Back” gets a boost for being a surprisingly great cap off for the series. It not only finally gives fans a look at Charlie’s uncle (paying off a running gag for Charlie since the first season), but also pays off the long running rivalry between Allan and his landlord in one of the best reveals in the entire series overall. It’s a very strong way to go out despite some of its more aggressive moments with Charlie’s uncle, and the final line going to Mr. Boss makes a ton of sense.
“Mole Man” is likely going to be a more divisive episode among fans this season as it directly addresses the Smiling Friends fandom itself. Mole Man pushes his obsession with Pim and Charlie to an unsightly level, and calls out many of the ways fans have praised the series with their use of “realistic dialogue” and more. The end of the episode brings it full circle as Mole Man decides to just completely reject the main duo as an extra bit of meta commentary, and we even get a fun Allan and Gelp side story as the “Smooling Fronds.” The joke about Mole Man being ashamed of his privates does run a bit thin, however.
Speaking of running thin, that’s also unfortunately the case for a couple of more episodes this season as “Squim Returns” introduces fans to the first Smiling Friend that Mr. Boss ever hired. Squim is intentionally one-note as his forceful positivity begins to grate on the other characters (even leading to him getting gunned down twice at the end), but that also unfortunately means that he begins to grate on the audience as well.
Intentional or not, the joke really did get run into the ground early. Thankfully, the chaos with Charlie getting so sick from eating a parasite kabob takes things up a notch with some fantastical animated sequences a jokes.
“Silly Samuel” runs into this problem as well, but it’s much better balanced as it serves as a reintroduction to the Smiling Friends vibe for the premiere. Much like Squim and Mole Man, Silly Samuel is a one-note kind of character that if you don’t really gel with, then the episode will be a bit tougher to get through. But there’s a better balance to it as the entire episode is heightened to really push Silly Samuel to the edge.
His overt aggressiveness reaches such a fever pitch it gets to a new level of hilarity, and it’s counterbalanced by the inspection at the Smiling Friends office really leaning into the wacky. Also, “Hey it’s me Charlie” really took over social media as the first standout gag of the season.
Smiling Friends revisited Mr. Frog with each season, but his final outing was certainly the biggest endeavor. The episode reveals that he’s basically won over the entire world, and has fallen into depression as a result. This episode says goodbye to Mr. Frog as he leaves his worldly life, and does ring a bit more true in the wake of the animated series’ sudden ending. It hits far more emotionally than you’d expect, and yet that juxtaposition makes it all the funnier because this creative team was able to pull it off. Mr. Frog is one of the series’ icons, and fans couldn’t have asked for a better send off.
There’s just so much to love about this one. Not only do you get a ton of great introductory gags as the Smiling Friends head to Mr. Boss’ cabin (the Super Monkey Ball joke really took over social media), but then you get a great story as Pim and Charlie end up dealing with Mother Nature. It’s probably Mr. Boss’ best episode as he really runs the gamut of each of the wild emotions you’ve come to expect from him. Then coupled with the hilarious back and forth with Allan leading to some wild visuals, this episode continues to standout as a highlight.
But if you’re talking visuals and great jokes, the final Halloween special has all of that in spades. It not only manages to pull off some truly creepy moments, but also hilariously goes into that ironic “what if Pim but truly messed up” kind of Internet humor territory for a fantastically violent payoff. Even with all of that to take care, the episode doesn’t forget to bring some great jokes. The millions of cars suddenly showing up at the end is probably the best final episode gag in the entire series, and that alone gets this episode this high in the ranking.
One of the running jokes that fans had about the series on a whole was that Glep didn’t seem to do much in the Smiling Friends office, and that was finally addressed with his own episode. Revealing Glep’s surprising centuries long origin story, it’s a fantastic exploration into who Glep is. While the series often pokes fun at the fact that fans takes its characters seriously, “The Glep Ep” actually is an emotionally resonant one for Glep’s place in the series.
It’s also surprisingly an origin story for Mr. Boss as well as it reveals why he started the company in the first place. It’s a big episode for fans with a lot of great jokes, and it’s just one of the best episodes in the series overall.
But if you’re looking for the best episode of Smiling Friends‘ final season, it’s gotta be “Shmaloogles.” It’s such a perfect encapsulation of everything the series does well that you’d be hard pressed for a better example of an episode to share with someone who’s never seen the show before. It’s not only got a wacky new idea with hilarious characters (a Smurfs riff this time around), but also has some wildly violent moments. It also has one of the best cut to montage gags in animation history, and has to be the biggest laugh of the season.
More importantly, it also emphasizes why Charlie and Pim are such a great duo. Charlie is the more grounded and realist of the two, and Pim is the more optimistic and willing to deal with silliness. But it’s Charlie’s final realist solution that ultimately saves the day (with a dose of the “realistic dialogue” the show has poked fun at before), and saves Pim. It’s a great showcase of why these two characters work so well for Smiling Friends, and hopefully it’s not the last we’ll ever see of this duo.
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