The BEST episodes of Judging Amy
Every episode of Judging Amy ever, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of Judging Amy!
A family drama focused on three generations of women living together in Hartford, Connecticut. Amy Brenneman plays Amy Gray, who left New York City behind and now works as a family court judge. Karle Warren plays Lauren, Amy's daughter; Tyne Daly is Maxine, Amy's tough, opinionated mother.
#1 - Ex Parte of Five
Season 5 - Episode 3 - Aired 10/7/2003
Maxine criticizes Amy's ruling that an emotionally-fragile girl is competent to serve as a witness in her mother's murder trial. Kyle, who doesn't know how he himself made it safely home after a night of heavy drinking, has to give medical treatment to a drunken driver who killed one of his hospital co-workers on the road. Lauren receives a poor grade in math and blames it on the teacher.
#2 - Just Say Oops
Season 4 - Episode 19 - Aired 4/1/2003
Maxine tempers her frustrations over her daughter-in-law's outlandish plans for the Gray-Duff nuptuals after Peter tells his mother about Gillian's refusal to face their new baby's condition; Stu's plans for a romantic dinner to celebrate the rekindling of his relationship with Amy are derailed by an obnoxious couple at the next table; Kyle discovers why Lily has been treating him so poorly; after Amy hears the case of a pro-cannabis couple threatened with losing custody of their son after he brings a joint to school, she has a talk with Lauren about drugs; Maxine investigates when a man asserts that his ex-wife has been cheating on the drug tests required as a condition of her retaining custody of their daughter; Amy has conflicting emotions after she reads the Judge Gray tribute page on Donna's blog.
#3 - Requiem
Season 4 - Episode 20 - Aired 4/15/2003
Stu convinces a reluctant Amy to go on an overnight camping trip which ends up bringing them closer together; after planning to wed Jared secretly on the weekend, Maxine is devastated when he has a sudden, fatal heart attack in China and lashes out in her grief to everyone around her, including a rebellious teenaged client; tensions run high in the Gray household when Maxine refuses to allow anyone to comfort her, and Peter and Charles bicker over the funeral arrangements as a way of handling their sorrow; Maxine gathers family and friends at the diner for a moving memorial service.
#4 - Picture of Perfect
Season 4 - Episode 21 - Aired 4/22/2003
Maxine's first day back on the job finds her removing a boy from the custody of his mother, who was one of Maxine's clients for a short time eight years earlier; although Amy is worried about Maxine's bottling up her grief, she becomes unsettled when Kyle tells her that Maxine has been talking to Charles instead of her own children; Kyle does an end-run around Lily to get an indigent patient the reconstructive surgery she desperately needs after an accident; Amy hears the custody case of a teenager whose divorced parents disagree about sending her to a school for overweight children.
#5 - CSO: Hartford
Season 4 - Episode 22 - Aired 4/29/2003
On ""Take Your Daughter to Work Day"", Lauren learns how lucky she is when she spends the afternoon with Maxine, and Rebecca becomes seriously injured after she falls during a seizure; Kyle continues to drink; Stu reassures Amy that she's a permanent part of his life after she fails to make a fabulous first impression during lunch with his opinionated mother; Bruce struggles to get a boy discharged from probation; after begging Lily to rehire Heather, Kyle is shocked when she refuses to return; Heather and Zola let the men in their lives know that they've got romance on their minds.
#6 - Marry, Marry Quite Contrary
Season 4 - Episode 23 - Aired 5/6/2003
Amy must decide if it's in a teenager's best interest to get married; Bruce investigates when he suspects that a teenager's probation violation isn't as innocent as his parole officer claims; Amy struggles with telling Lauren that she's dating Stu; after worrying about Gillian's insistence that the baby's fine, and a girl, Peter decides to let her hold on to her beliefs when he discovers that they're having a boy; Lily considers accepting a job offer in New York; Michael confesses to Amy that he was to blame for their divorce.
#7 - Shock and Awe
Season 4 - Episode 24 - Aired 5/13/2003
A stressed out public defender goes ballistic in Amy's courtroom; Maxine tries to figure out why a woman who lost her son wants to give up her foster child; Kyle tells Lily how he feels, but it doesn't go as he hoped; Amy is confused about whether or not Stu actually proposed marriage; Gillian goes into labor with unexpected and seemingly tragic results.
#8 - Motion Sickness
Season 5 - Episode 1 - Aired 9/23/2003
When Amy is transferred to criminal court, Bruce stays behind in juvenile court, and she inherits Spencer, an insolent clerk; Lauren has an extremely unhappy first day at junior high, but things brighten up on day two when, much to her mother's dismay, she finds a boyfriend who is a year older; after accepting Stuart's proposal, Amy begins to have nightmares about the wedding; recently unemployed as a result of budget cuts, Donna helps Peter care for his sons while Gillian languishes in a coma; Ellen, D.C.F.'s newest employee, uses her experience as a former foster child to help Maxine deal with a teenager who's run away from her foster home; fed up with his impudence and disloyalty, Amy fires Spencer and hires Donna, who's recently graduated from law school; Amy's predecessor in the criminal division threatens her with retribution after she considers overturning his decision to suppress evidence in a capital murder case; Gillian finally emerges from her coma.
#9 - Going Down
Season 5 - Episode 2 - Aired 9/30/2003
After she's released from the hospital with a clean bill of health, Gillian reveals that she had a near-death experience during Walt's delivery, but can't seem to find anyone who believes her; when Amy claims that she has no time to organize the wedding, Stu volunteers to make all the arrangements; tragedy occurs when Maxine's pleas to the police to publicize the disappearance of a foster child fall on deaf ears; it's apparent that there's no love lost between Stu and David when they end up at the same cocktail party; Kyle and Lily have an intense encounter in a hospital elevator; Amy's frustration with the difference between the criminal and juvenile court systems increases as the Hawkins trial concludes; Kyle is unsuccessful in his attempt to get Lily to change her mind about moving to New York.
#10 - Looking For Quarters
Season 4 - Episode 18 - Aired 3/18/2003
Maxine unwittingly provides Amy with the information she needs to decide whether promoters are responsible for the death of a teenager who died from an ecstasy overdose during one of their raves; Maxine and Sean join forces to persuade a couple to take back their former foster child after she's released from work camp; Amy and Maxine disagree about Amy's being overprotective of Lauren; Sean lets Maxine know he's angry about her judgemental attitude toward Eric; after conferring with Martin, Kyle decides to pursue a romance with Heather; Kyle goes off the wagon when he and Heather throw a party to celebrate their successful evaluations; after Lily sees them kissing at the party, she decides not to reveal that a random drug test is being conducted the next day, and Heather is fired; Bruce distances himself from Amy in an effort to convince Zola that there's nothing going on between them.
#11 - Tricks of the Trade
Season 5 - Episode 4 - Aired 10/14/2003
Amy presides over the case of a prominent athletic star accused of rape. Maxine, feeling the pressure to find a new place to live, considers selling the diner. Kyle tries to locate a kidney for a young patient who needs a transplant. Stu and Amy still can't come to terms on where to go for their honeymoon, with their wedding only a month away.
#12 - The Wrong Man
Season 5 - Episode 5 - Aired 10/21/2003
Still grieving over the loss of Jared, Maxine finds it difficult to listen to Amy and Stu plan their wedding; Bruce is less than thrilled working for Judge Bell; Gillian is sad and irritable that she's having difficulty bonding to Walt, and can't seem to talk to Peter about what's troubling her; Kyle feels betrayed when Lily makes her decision about the new attending physician; Amy teaches Lauren and her friends a harsh lesson about popularity, friendship, and the cruelty of cliques; after Zola seeks Amy's help in reaching out to Bruce, he confesses that her role in the Jason Darby case may have put an end to their relationship; Kyle is put in legal jeopardy when he saves the life of a man injured in a bar fight; Maxine overcomes her initial skepticism about the latest claims coming from a young boy known for filing false complaints against the men in his mother's life, and discovers that this latest accusation may have merit, much to the dismay of the boy's mother, who doesn't wa
#13 - Into the Fire
Season 5 - Episode 6 - Aired 10/28/2003
In court for the sentencing phase of a capital murder trial, Amy must decide whether to stop the proceedings when one of the lawyers makes inappropriate remarks in the course of his closing argument. In a private dinner with Lauren, Stu reveals a hitherto hidden fear of children. Kyle feels awkward on meeting his new boss, who he discovers he already knows from an AA meeting.
#14 - Kilt Trip
Season 5 - Episode 7 - Aired 11/4/2003
Forced to substitute for an ailing colleague just two days before her wedding, Amy presides over a felony murder case involving a 14 year old boy and makes a controversial decision to overturn the jury's verdict; Stu's groomsmen are less than thrilled when they realize that they'll be wearing kilts instead of tuxes at the wedding; Kyle hatches a plan to surprise the rest of the family with Vincent's presence at the wedding, and gets a surprise himself when he walks in on Vincent and Heather making out; Amy forgets to get a sub as the judge on call, and ends up signing one warrant after another for David; Maxine's search for an apartment goes poorly, and the attempts of a co-worker and Stu's mother to be helpful only make things worse; Amy's pre-wedding jitters turn into a full scale panic attack as the ceremony begins; realizing that she doesn't want to marry Stu, she calls the wedding off; later that evening, Vincent tells Amy that Carole has left him for her oncologist.
#15 - The Long Goodbye
Season 5 - Episode 8 - Aired 11/11/2003
Back in Hartford after a few days in Maui to collect herself, Amy is faced with returning a room full of wedding presents, dealing with friends and family who can't resist commenting on her train wreck of a life, and trying to reach an ex-fiance who refuses to speak with her; a reluctant Kyle, saddled with the job of firing one of the nurses, ends up being threatened with a lawsuit after bungling the job; realizing that her recent career change is a bad fit, Amy returns to juvenile court and presides over the case of feuding teenagers who have been spurred on by their mothers; Maxine is at a loss in dealing with a teenager who is angry about being removed from an abusive foster home; Donna inadvertently keeps interrupting Bruce's attempts to explain why he missed Amy's wedding.
#16 - Rumspringa
Season 5 - Episode 9 - Aired 11/25/2003
Maxine confronts the D.C.F. commissioner over his budget cuts when she discovers that young girls in the foster care system are being moved from group homes into a locked psychiatric facility to save money that is evidently being redirected towards decoratating the commissioner's office; when Todd is about to be fired for bucking hospital protocol in an effort to save a young boy's hand, Kyle stands up for him despite their ongoing conflicts; after an Amish teenager becomes pregnant during rumspringa and decides to return to her community with her daughter, the child's father countersues for sole custody, and Amy must make the incredibly difficult choice between having the mother be shunned by her family and the father never seeing his child again; fearing that Maxine is spinning so out of control that his job is in jeopardy, Sean cuts back her hours and strongly urges her to see a therapist; concerned about the effect that peer pressure at her public school is having on Lauren, Amy go
#17 - Sex and the Single Mother
Season 5 - Episode 10 - Aired 12/16/2003
Amy presides over the custody case of a young boy whose mother thinks he is being harmed by the Neanderthal on-air posturings of his shock-jock father; Maxine discovers that becoming a therapist in lieu of becoming a patient doesn't work out for anyone involved; Kyle mends his fences with Heather and helps her bring some solace to her dying father; Gillian begins to doubt her feelings for Peter as she strikes up a friendship with the father of one of Ned's playmates; Amy becomes flustered when David doesn't seem to be interested in a relationship, and makes a fool of herself in confronting him with a complete misinterpretation of his reasons.
#18 - Christenings
Season 5 - Episode 11 - Aired 1/6/2004
The rift between Peter and Gillian widens at Walt's christening; Maxine overcomes her resistance and resumes therapy; when a tree that's been neglected crashes through Amy's kitchen window, she mistakenly calls in a landscape designer who reveals a keen insight into the state of both Maxine's garden and her soul; a young girl appears in Amy's court charged with reckless endangerment for running a pro-anorexia web site; Maxine is disturbed when the frustrated mother of a boy with a chronic neurological disorder turns from conventional medical care to a dubious faith healer in an effort to help her son; Amy is mortified when an upheaval during her sushi dinner date with David ruins both the evening and David's new and very expensive shoes.
#19 - People of the Lie
Season 4 - Episode 10 - Aired 12/10/2002
Amy must decide if a little girl in the middle of a bitter custody dispute is being molested by her father; doing research for a paper, Donna shadows Maxine during a day in which she deals with the neglected children of a severely depressed mother who refuses treatment; Kyle receives an unwelcome visit from his mother and sister; after employing a private investigator to follow Amy for over a year, Michael sues for full custody of Lauren; the decorator that Amy hires to redo the kitchen disparages Maxine's taste.
#20 - Thursday's Child
Season 4 - Episode 2 - Aired 10/8/2002
Amy's discovers that the man the police have in custody may not be her stalker after all; Maxine refuses to give up on a client who may be the victim of police brutality; after Bruce denies having romantic feelings for Amy and they agree that confusion and alcohol led to their embrace, they decide to be friends who don't kiss; Kyle applies for a residency and is confronted by his sponsor for not working his program; a persistent attorney paves the way for Bruce to regain his court position; Amy must decide if a retarded teenager is competent to make her own reproductive choices.
#21 - Every Stranger's Face I See
Season 4 - Episode 3 - Aired 10/15/2002
As Amy decides the fate of a ten year old boy who was kidnapped by his adoptive parents when they lost custody to his birth mother, she finds an answer to some of her own family's pressing concerns; Bruce is back at work as Amy's C.S.O. and is completing his community service at a soup kitchen; Amy gets the silent treatment from Lauren when she won't let her become a cheerleader, but both sides are forced to relent when Gillian unwittingly spills the beans about her own and Amy's cheerleading pasts; Maxine's refusal to sell her house to buyers she doesn't like leaves Peter feeling angry and unappreciated, so she hatches a plan that heals both him and a badly abused client; at the behest of his sponsor, Kyle applies to every residency program in the area, and Amy agrees to write him a letter of recommendation; Maxine finally finds the perfect buyer for her house.
#22 - The Frozen Zone
Season 4 - Episode 4 - Aired 10/22/2002
Amy presides over the custody hearing of a boy whose mother died in the collapse of the World Trade Center; an old friend offers Kyle a job with a pharmaceutical company, and Maxine counteroffers with the job of heading the Center; Amy relandscapes her new home and accidently throws out Ethel, the antique heirloom rosebush Maxine's grandmother brought over from Ireland in 1889; after initially spurning her offer, Bruce agrees to speak at Zola's press conference for convicted felons; and Maxine helps Sean over some rough spots as Eric's foster father.
#23 - Cause For Alarm
Season 4 - Episode 5 - Aired 10/29/2002
Amy must decide whether a teenager is responsible for the death of an infant she was babysitting; Maxine investigates an abuse case at the home of a disabled veteran and his adopted granddaughter; Kyle is torn between keeping his lucrative job as a pharmaceutical rep or accepting a residency at a low-ranked hospital; Amy has an alarm system installed in the house as her stalker escalates his harassment; Maxine and Peter are at odds after Maxine attributes Peter's promotion within the ranks of a Revolutionary War reenactment group to the publicity surrounding her engagement to Jared.
#24 - Roses and Truth
Season 4 - Episode 6 - Aired 11/5/2002
Amy must decide if a student raped his teacher or was seduced by her; Kyle is unhappy about his nonmedical duties at St. Michael's; Maxine tries to locate the mother of an abandoned newborn; after Jason menaces Amy while she's driving Lauren and Eric home, Bruce suggests getting a restraining order; fearing the worst about her health, Gillian gets the diagnosis she's dreamed of for years.
#25 - Damage Control
Season 4 - Episode 7 - Aired 11/12/2002
Amy hears the case of a young boy charged with obstruction of justice for not revealing the name of the man who took pornographic pictures of him; Maxine contends with a woman who allows her abusive husband to violate a restraining order; Peter and Charles negotiate a prenuptial agreement for their parents; Jason Lobdel eludes Amy's police protection as he continues to stalk her; everyone walks on eggshells as Gillian suffers through ugly hormonal mood swings; Jared gives Maxine the diner; Amy's plan to censure an attorney backfires.