Jerry Seinfeld set the trend for comedians playing fictionalized versions of themselves in their namesake sitcoms. While Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Jason Alexander, and Michael Richards could all distance themselves from their petty and vindictive Seinfeld characters, Jerry Seinfeld had to play a petty and vindictive character called Jerry Seinfeld, so that distancing from real life was a lot trickier.
Around the fourth season of the show, specifically in the episode “The Airport,” the writers of Seinfeld figured out they could break the comedy rule that things don’t work out for comedic characters and have good things happen to Jerry’s semi-fictitious stand-in to contrast him with the misfortunes of supporting players around him.
The Bubble Boy
In a parody of the John Travolta-starring made-for-TV melodrama The Boy in the Plastic Bubble, season 4’s “The Bubble Boy” sees Jerry getting roped into visiting a kid with a condition that confines him to a plastic bubble on the way to Susan’s father’s cabin.
However, Jerry doesn’t manage to get to the kid’s house before George has accidentally hospitalized him during a game of Trivial Pursuit gone awry.
The Race
Jerry finally got to become his hero Superman in the episode “The Race.” He starts dating a woman named Lois, whose boss, Duncan, is an old high school classmate of his, and the only one who caught on that he gave himself an unfair head start in a race during their school days.
Duncan challenges Jerry to another race to prove he can beat him. Jerry accepts the challenge, but at the start of the race, he mistakes Kramer’s backfiring car for the starting pistol and gets another head start, set to John Williams’ iconic Superman theme.
The Implant
Teri Hatcher guest-starred in “The Implant” as a woman whom Jerry met at the gym. When Elaine suggests that she has breast implants, Jerry breaks up with her.
However, Elaine stumbles into her in the sauna and incidentally discovers that "they’re real...and they’re spectacular." So, Jerry tries to win her back.
The Doorman
Jerry butts heads with a doorman (played by Jerry Seinfeld’s real-life close friend Larry Miller, who was once on the shortlist to play George Costanza) in the aptly titled season 6 episode “The Doorman.”
He’s visiting Elaine at Mr. Pitt’s apartment while he’s on vacation and what follows is a long rivalry that leads to trouble with the cops.
The Soup
When a terrible comedian named Kenny Bania gives Jerry a brand-new Armani suit that doesn’t fit him, Kramer talks him into demanding something in return and he ropes Jerry into taking him out for a meal. They go to a restaurant called Mendy’s, where Bania orders a soup and says he’ll save the meal for another time.
Whether soup constitutes a meal is irrelevant; the act of going to a restaurant and sitting down together is what matters, and Jerry didn’t want to go through all that again.
The Mango
In the season 5 premiere “The Mango,” when George is concerned that his new girlfriend is faking her orgasms, Elaine reveals that she faked hers “all the time” when she was dating Jerry.
This sends Jerry into a spiral of self-doubt as he calls all his exes to see if they had orgasms while they were together and eventually asks Elaine to give him a chance to give her a real one.
The Pen
Seinfeld fans were introduced to the hilarious world of Del Boca Vista and its uniquely insane residents in the season 3 episode “The Pen,” in which Jerry and Elaine travel down to Florida to see Jerry’s parents. Jerry opens a can of worms when he accepts Jack Klompus’ offer of an “astronaut pen” that can write upside down.
After insisting that Jerry take his pen, calling it “a personal favor,” Jack starts spreading insulting rhetoric about the Seinfelds around the community.
The Kiss Hello
Jerry protests the idea of kissing people to greet them in season 6’s “The Kiss Hello,” and ends up getting ostracized from the community as a result.
This episode has the distinction of being the show’s 100th episode. It was technically the 102nd episode to hit the airwaves, but it was the 100th produced, so the cast and crew considered it to be the 100th-episode milestone.
The Switch
After realizing his girlfriend doesn’t laugh at any of his jokes and her roommate does, Jerry suggests pulling off “the switch.” George initially believes that it can’t be done.
They put their heads together over a few pots of coffee and eventually come up with a scheme: suggest a threesome. Unfortunately, it backfires as Jerry’s girlfriend is into it.
The Puffy Shirt
Over dinner with Kramer’s new “low-talker” girlfriend in season 5’s “The Puffy Shirt,” Jerry and Elaine can’t hear a word she’s saying. As a result, Jerry accidentally agrees to wear a ruffled pirate shirt on national television.
He feels ridiculous wearing it, and an on-air roasting from Bryant Gumbel prompts Jerry to reveal his true thoughts about the shirt, torpedoing the low-talker’s fashion business.