Seinfeld: Season 08 (1996)

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A few sensitive viewers bailed out on Seinfeld at the end of season seven, in response to George's (Jason Alexander) apathetic reaction to the "death by envelope" of his fiancée, Susan. Others realized that a "show about nothing" can do just about anything, and thus stuck with Seinfeld as it entered its eighth season. As a reward for their loyalty, those viewers were treated to such first-rate episodes as the season opener, "The Foundation," in which Jerry (Jerry Seinfeld) crosses paths with the girl whose name "rhymes with a female body part," Kramer (Michael Richards) takes up karate, and Elaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) "becomes" her boss, J. Peterman (John O'Hurley). A few weeks later, Seinfeld's lifelong obsession with Superman manifests itself in "The Bizarro Jerry," in which we meet a group of people who are the exact opposites of the Seinfeld gang. Other highlights: a visit to a woman's prison yields strange results in "The Little Jerry"; Kramer begins to wonder what life would be like in a coma in "The Comeback"; a toothbrush in the toilet is the catalyst for disaster in "The Pothole"; Lloyd Bridges guest stars as 80-year-old physical fitness freak Izzy Mandelbaum in "The English Patient," which is also the episode in which Kramer gets involved with smuggling Cubans (cigars, that is); and in the season finale, "The Summer of George," things come full circle from the season opener, with another character "clinging to life" (sort of) in a hospital bed. ~ Rovi