The episode was written by Jeff Pinkner and Drew Goddard and directed by Paul Edwards, and premiered on October 11, 2006, on ABC.

The characters of Sun and Jin are featured in the episode's flashbacks; on the Island, they and Sayid attempt to discover the whereabouts of Jack, Kate, and Sawyer.

On the sailboat, Sun, Jin-Soo Kwon (Daniel Dae Kim), and Sayid Jarrah (Naveen Andrews) argue about what to do because Jack Shephard's (Matthew Fox) party has not shown up; Sun goes against her husband's wishes and agrees with Sayid to sail to a new location.

Meanwhile among the Others, Ben Linus (Michael Emerson) orders Colleen (Paula Malcomson) to put together a team and capture Sayid's boat.

Kate Austen (Evangeline Lilly) and James "Sawyer" Ford (Josh Holloway) are forced to work in a quarry, digging and carrying rocks.

They start discussing plans to escape, not knowing Ben is monitoring their conversation via security cameras.

He shows this by citing various current events, such as the re-election of George W. Bush to the American presidency, the sudden death of Christopher Reeve and that the Boston Red Sox have won the 2004 World Series.

[8] Previously, a season two episode had seemed to confirm that Jin was infertile, leading to ramped up speculation online that Sun was pregnant by her lover Jae Lee.

[13] When "The Glass Ballerina" first aired, it was the seventh most watched episode of the week in the United States, with 16.890 million viewers[14] and a 6.9 rating in the key demographic of adults ages 18–49.

Yes, it's sad that Jin and Sun have suffered through some painful relationship problems, but if it's not going to have a direct impact on events, there is no reason it should be in the episode.

Lost critic Andrew Dignan of Slant Magazine noted that like the season premiere, the episode "mostly serves to add uncomfortable wrinkles to one of the show's saints, going so far as to make the consistently sympathetic Sun quite unlikable.

[2] On a list ranking all the Lost episodes, the Los Angeles Times ranked "The Glass Ballerina" 80 out of 110 episodes, explaining "A good flashback (to Sun and her pre-island lover) and a terrific last scene -- wherein Jack learns the Sox won the Series -- can't make up for a listless on-island plot.