It’s rare that a show manages to capture the kind of unique magic that the Netflix series The OA captured. The show is a bizarre mix of a mysticism, mystery, and a straight up love story, but somehow the series manages to blend all of those genres together into a seamless narrative unlike anything that has ever been seen on television before.
The OA won over audience with its unique storytelling and absolutely riveting mysteries, and each episode seemed to stand out in one way or another. But like with any television series, it seems like certain episodes of the show resonated more deeply with the audience than others. No TV show can be judged in a completely objective way, however there are obviously some episodes of The OA that are particular fan favorites. So here are the 10 best episodes of the entire series, according to the ratings of IMDb.
Away: 8.4
The marketing strategy for The OA was a strange one in that it was pretty much nonexistent, but as the first season went on it became easy to see why. Watching the beginnings of The OA was sort of like being Alice falling down the rabbit hole, it was clear that there were huge things going on but the audience and characters couldn’t make heads or tails of it yet.
And it’s no surprise that Away is one of The OA‘s highest rated episodes, because after taking the audience on this insane mystery ride the show finally revealed just what Hap was doing with all of his experimental subjects.
Paradise: 8.5
Paradise directly followed Away, and while it seems like it would be hard to top the revelation that Hap was repeatedly killing his abductees and bringing them back to life, this episode managed to do just that.
The NDE crew is still unaware of what their true destiny is and most of them don’t believe what OA is telling them, and Scott seems to be having a premonition that the next time he is experimented on will be his last. He winds up being right, however, as Homer and Prairie spend all night practicing the movements, and they miraculously bring Scott back from the dead.
Mirror Mirror: 8.6
The OA plays a lot with the concepts of life and death, and the revelation that there are many dimensions and that people are capable of traveling to different dimensions makes it seem like death is only a semi-permanent state of existence.
So when Jesse, one of the five that OA left behind in the original dimension, commits suicide and Steve tries and fails to bring him back, it’s a shocking and heartbreaking turn of events. The group was already on a huge journey of discovery, but the loss of Jesse seems to spur them all on even when they’re facing the worst odds.
Magic Mirror: 8.6
The beginning of season 2 of The OA was obviously a huge game changer, as it should be. OA actually successfully jumped dimensions, but now she (as well as the audience) has to orient herself to this completely foreign world.
The absence of the friends she left behind is obviously something that the audience was acutely aware of, because Magic Mirror (the first episode of season 2 that addressed her makeshift family of five) is one of the show’s highest rated episodes on IMDb. It seems like the five are losing hope, until the newly deceased Rachel ‘s spirit returns to their home dimension and sets them on a new path of discovery.
Nina Azarova: 8.9
There are a lot of powerful overarching themes throughout The OA, and one of the strongest and clearest is the concept of death and rebirth. It’s actually interesting that OA’s main goal in season one is to hop dimensions and wake up in another version of herself, because she has already metaphorically and has literally died and been reborn as someone else multiple times anyway.
When she arrives in the second dimension, she is in the body of Nina Azarova, a woman who is her and not her. After keeping the woman inside of her sublimated for so long, she finally brings her back to the surface in this episode.
The Medium & The Engineer: 9.0
One of the main mysteries in season 2 of The OA is the existence and purpose of a certain house in Nob Hill, but this episode is where OA and Karim finally begin to understand what makes it so special.
The house appears to be just another element of inter-dimensional travel. As OA gets closer to understanding how this piece fits into the overall puzzle, there are developments in other parts of the story that make it look like Homer is getting closer to the truth and Hap is getting closer to being discovered. Oh, and there’s dancing robots that help Hap’s newly discovered traveler bail on this dimension too.
Treasure Island: 9.0
Before she and the rest of Hap’s unwilling squad actually made the jump to another dimension, Prairie theorized that while all of these dimensions were different, there would be common threads between them.
Treasure Island seems to prove that theory right. After waking up in Nina Azarova’s body and unsurprisingly acting very unlike “herself”, OA is confined to a mental institution on Treasure Island, which happens to be home to the rest of the NDE family and where Hap (and surprisingly, Homer) is still keeping Scott, Renata, Rachel, and now Prairie, captive, mirroring their experiences in the previous dimension.
Angel Of Death: 9.0
Season 1 of The OA left off on one hell of a cliffhanger, and the show’s fans were understandably desperate to know what exactly happened to Prairie, Homer, and the rest of the characters after the conclusion of the season finale. And when season 2 picked up, the episode was disorienting to say the least.
Eventually it’s revealed what exactly happened to OA, but not before laying the groundwork for a whole new mystery that would unfold throughout the season. It was definitely thrilling to see OA reunite with Homer, Scott, Rachel, and Renata, but the circumstances of their reunion were a surprise to be sure.
SYZYGY: 9.1
The OA is no stranger to introducing some wild ideas into their narrative and finding ways to make it work, but there are some particularly standout memorable elements in this episode that are off the wall, even for The OA.
Hap actually winds up meeting another dimensional traveler in SYZYGY, and he is as surprised as the audience is to realize that he’s not actually the first to discover this kind of traveling. However, the real shocking moment of this episode is when OA meets Old Night, a giant octopus that she telepathically communicates with as a part of some bizarre medium show at an underground club.
Overview: 9.4
After a torturous season of OA trying desperately to get Homer to remember who he was in their home dimension, Homer finally recalls everything he’s forgotten. But in the typical tragic style of The OA, it’s just too little too late.
Hap shoots and kills Homer, and OA desperately begs Homer to meet her in the next dimension. Hap and OA do wind up making it to a new dimension, a dimension where they are apparently on the set of the TV show The OA. And that is the end of the episode, as well as the end of the series.
