The WORST episodes of 227
Every episode of 227 ever, ranked from worst to best by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The worst episodes of 227!
This popular sitcom that starred Marla Gibbs, who played Florence Johnston for many years on The Jeffersons, got her own show. She played Mary Jenkins, a housewife who lived with her contractor husband, Lester and their 14-year-old daughter Brenda. Mary's best friend was Rose Lee Holloway, who used to sit out with her on the stoop of the apartment building (#227) and discuss many things, especially Sandra Clark, the wise-cracking, hyperactive, and often scatter-brained woman from upstairs. Rose had a daughter named Tiffany. Next door to the Jenkins was the gossipping, yet loving, Pearl Shay, a crotchety busybody who lived with her grandson Calvin Dobbs, who was Brenda's first love. Throughout the final two seasons, several new characters appeared. Broadcast History September 1985-June 1986----Saturdays----9:30 p.m. June 1986-May 1987----Saturdays----8:30 p.m. June 1987-July 1987----Saturdays----8:00 p.m. July 1987-September 1988----Saturdays----8:30 p.m. October 1988-Jul
#1 - Double Your Pleasure
Season 4 - Episode 4 - Aired 11/5/1988
Sandra's cousin Conchita (also played by Jackee) comes to visit, and her finacee follows her to America. Conchita does not want to marry Carlos in an arranged marriage so she asks Sandra to tell him for her. The two go back and forth with whether or not they want to marry each other, until finally Conchita realizes that she does love Carlos and they decide to get married.
#2 - A Yen for Lester
Season 4 - Episode 7 - Aired 11/26/1988
Lester and Raymond decide to buy a Jaoanese Restaurant together. Pearl and Rose each put in $500 and receive a stock of the restaurant. When the deal is sealed, the kitchen staff all quit, right before a Japanese tour group arrive to eat. They all hustle to try to serve them but it is a disaster, as Pearl cannot cook (or understand) Japanese food and the ladies are horrible waitresses. The chef returns and decides to buy the restaurant from Lester and Raymond at the same price they bought it for.
#3 - And the Survey Says...
Season 4 - Episode 6 - Aired 11/19/1988
Mary is a star player of "Family Feud"... in her house. She decides to try out for the show when it visits Washington D.C. Sandra also decides to try out, and when she and Mary argue during the interview, the producers decide to air a Neighbor's version of "Family Feud." She and Sandra pick teams from a hat and Sandra's team wins on the show. But in the final round, they only make 199 points-- one point away from 200, which was needed to win. Sandra decides to split the money they won (almost $1000) among everyone on both teams.
#4 - Gone Fishing
Season 5 - Episode 21 - Aired 2/24/1990
Julian recruits Mary to help him keep 227 out of the hands of his soon-to-be ex-wife (Rosalind Cash). (tvguide.com)
#5 - You Gotta Have Art
Season 5 - Episode 20 - Aired 2/17/1990
While helping Eva straighten up the gallery, Mary inadvertently creates a pop-art sensation, and spends some of her 15 minutes of fame on ""The Joan Rivers Show.""
#6 - The Perfume Game
Season 5 - Episode 10 - Aired 12/2/1989
Sandra comes up with a slogan for a new perfume, but she thinks it stinks when her ad-agency boss steals her idea. (tvguide.com)
#7 - No Place Like Home
Season 5 - Episode 24 - Aired 5/6/1990
Mary dreams that she's homeless after misinterpreting a plea for help from a street person (homeless advocate Theodore Hayes) as a threat to her safety.
#8 - Reunion Blues
Season 5 - Episode 9 - Aired 11/25/1989
Dylan's mother moves in with him after leaving his father, and starts stepping out with Julian (Paul Winfield). (tvguide.com)
#9 - Flying Down to Leo's
Season 5 - Episode 8 - Aired 11/18/1989
En route to Lester's birthday party, Mary and Sandra run into gang members who want them as their biker chicks. (TVguide.com)
#10 - Video Activity
Season 5 - Episode 7 - Aired 11/11/1989
Bobby Brown shoots a video at Brenda's high school, while Brenda plagiarizes an old essay of Mary's to win a part as an extra. Brenda kept putting off writing it by going to pep rallies, football games, and parties with Calvin at Morgan State, and on Sunday night, she still does not have her paper done. When Mary wrote it (25 years earlier), she received an A+, but Brenda gets a C and is not one the five chosen to appear in Bobby Brown's video. Meanwhile, Julian bribes Travis into bringing Bobby Brown to his penthouse so he can discuss going into business ventures with each other. Bobby Brown decides that he does not want only five students to appear in his video, but the whole class. Brenda is allowed to be in the video but she is stil grounded and has to write 3 more papers for Mary.
#11 - Looking Back
Season 4 - Episode 8 - Aired 12/3/1988
When Mary throws pictures of Sandra, Rose and Pearl away, they each find them and reminisce over the past 3 227 seasons.
#12 - We the People
Season 1 - Episode 17 - Aired 2/1/1986
Lester's old boss comes to visit the Jenkins from Hawaii. While there, Rose hires him as the building repairman and lets him live an efficiency on the third floor. Pearl begins to notice that people go up to visit Lou and never return. She and Mary investigate and find out that Lou is homeless and his homeless friends are the ones that have come to live with Lou. It turns out his business in Hawaii went belly-up, and Lou lost everything. Mary has sympathy for them and feeds them, while trying to keep the news from Rose, because she would have to put them out based on the housing codes that they are breaking. Lester finds out about an abandoned building that his company will fix-up so the homeless people will have some place to live. This will also give Lou the chance to get back into business again.
#13 - The Fourth Time Around
Season 2 - Episode 19 - Aired 3/21/1987
When Lester goes to watch the game at a friend's house, Mary and the ladies decide to have a girl's night out. They go to a club/bar where Pearl meets man. They hit it off. When Pearl comes home, she tells Mary that she and Felix are engaged. Mary seems to be the only one concerned about it, while Rose and Sandra want to throw her a bridal shower. Mary thinks that he is after Pearl's money. Pearl doesn't care what Mary thinks, and she and Felix get married any way. When she returns from her honeymoon, Mary apoligizes, but Pearl has bad news. Felix passed away. She admits to Mary that they knew that he was dying. Because she loved him and didn't want him to be lonely, they married so soon.
#14 - The Great Manhunt
Season 2 - Episode 4 - Aired 11/8/1986
After Sandra sees her neighbors (a married couple) interact with each other and with their daughter, Sandra decides that she wants a husband and a child. She goes out on a series of dates which end in disaster becasue of Sandra's openness about wanting to be married and have a child. She finally decides that since she can't find a suitable husband that she'll just get artificially insiminated. Mary and Rose try talk her out of it. But nothing is more of a rude awakening than when Sandra witnesses Cathy going into labor and she sees how Jim was there for her every step of the way. Then Mary and Lester talk about the night Brenda was born and how they really needed each other then. Sandra changes her mind and decides that when she does have a baby she would like to be married so she can have a husband that loves her and loves their child.
#15 - A Matter of Choice
Season 2 - Episode 12 - Aired 1/17/1987
Lester has a chance to do a big project and give a friend who's out of work a job. But things change when he learns that the company whom he'll be working for sponsors apartheid. So he has to choose which is more important.
#16 - War is Heck
Season 5 - Episode 11 - Aired 12/9/1989
When Calvin wants to quit school and join the Army, Lester puts him through his paces at a mock boot camp.
#17 - Where Do We Go from Here?
Season 5 - Episode 15 - Aired 1/6/1990
Lester falls asleep during church and dreams that he and Mary visit both Heaven and Hell. While in both places, they return to earth to see what has happened to their family and friends. While in Heaven: Brenda inherits Lester's construction company and is a success when Calvin, her husband takes over. Pearl has moved in with them. Rose still hasn't come to terms with Mary's death. While in hell: Calvin becomes a failure and sells the business to Julian for $500. Brenda is pregnant and the family is in poverty. Rose has married Julian and they have raised the rent of the building big time.
#18 - Best Friends
Season 3 - Episode 24 - Aired 5/7/1988
When Mary's high school friend comes to visit, everyone is excited to meet her because she is a famous writer, psychologist, and romance adviser (like Dr. Ruth). Mary imagines what it would be like to be that famous and well liked. She begins to get jealous when Brenda tells her that she wants to be like Dr. Butler. She tells Lester how she feels and he admits that he thinks Thelma may be jealous of Mary and her stable life. Mary and Thelma get in an argument about who is jealous of whom and they bring up a lot of things that happened in the past. They wind up laughing about how silly they were acting and make up.
#19 - Jackee
Season 4 - Episode 23 - Aired 5/11/1989
Sandra has moved to New York, but finds herself jobless after she finds out that the film company that she works for specializes in porn films! So once she find her apt., she meet a woman who tells her about a job opening at her job. Sandra goes with her the next day and gets the job at the spa. Sandra finds out that her new friend's boyfriend is using her, but when she tells her, she doesn't believe Sandra. Finally, when she hears it for herself, she cuts the boyfriends loose and her and Sandra are back on good terms.
#20 - The Class of '90
Season 5 - Episode 23 - Aired 4/29/1990
Just before Brenda gets ready to graduate high school, Mary is rushed to the hospital with appendicitis. Mary gets a lesson in plastic surgery from her roomie; and Lester gives low marks to his father's girlfriend.
#21 - How the West Was Fun (2)
Season 5 - Episode 6 - Aired 11/4/1989
Conclusion. Lester puts together a posse to find the womenfolk when the water rustlers take them hostage.
#22 - How the West Was Fun (1)
Season 5 - Episode 5 - Aired 10/28/1989
At a dude ranch, Mary lassos Rose and Sandra into a treasure hunt, and Dylan takes a likin' to a filly. Part 1 of two
#23 - Young Man with a Job
Season 1 - Episode 22 - Aired 5/3/1986
When Calvin has a hard time finding a part-time job, Brenda and Pearl persuade Mary to convince Lester to offer Calvin a job working at the construction site. But when Calvin proves to be inept with his hands, he gets terminated. With some helpful advice from Mary, Calvin later lands five interviews.
#24 - Blues
Season 3 - Episode 20 - Aired 2/27/1988
Brenda's grandfather arrives with a Wailing Eddie record in tow. While letting Brenda listen to it, she accidentally scratches it and her grandfather is devastated. She doesn't understand what's so special about the blues anyway. Mary and Lester find another rare copy, and it too is ruined accidentally by Brenda. This episode is cut with scenes of Sandra and Rose singing the blues and narrated by Brenda. Towards the end of the episode, she finally understands what the blue is all about, because she has them. Her grandfather is upset with her and everyone is coming down hard on her about the broken record. She and her grandfather reconcile and Pearl gets Wailing Eddie to come to the Jenkins' and sing.
#25 - See You in Court (a.k.a. They're Playing Our Song)
Season 3 - Episode 8 - Aired 11/21/1987
Mary and Sandra go to court over song royalties.