Episode 5 (Twin Peaks)

"Episode 5" features series regulars Kyle MacLachlan, Michael Ontkean and Richard Beymer, with guest appearances by Chris Mulkey and David Patrick Kelly.

Glatter has noted that the episode exemplifies the themes of longing and desire which she feels characterize the series; she has also called to attention its careful balance between tragic and comic elements.

Exterior scenes in the episode were filmed in California's Angeles National Forest and blended with stock footage of Washington to enhance the setting.

FBI agent Dale Cooper (MacLachlan) and Twin Peaks sheriff Harry Truman (Ontkean) continue to investigate a murder in the small mountain town, while local businessman Benjamin Horne (Beymer) schemes to burn down its sawmill to further his property empire.

However, other inhabitants of the town have their own suspicions: the violent, drug-dealing truck driver Leo Johnson (Eric Da Re) is seen as a possible suspect, especially to his wife Shelly (Mädchen Amick), who has found a bloodstained shirt among his belongings.

Cooper, Truman and Doctor Hayward (Warren Frost) discuss Johnson's bloodied shirt, learning that the blood is not Laura's but that of drug smuggler Jacques Renault.

Jennings' husband Hank (Chris Mulkey) has been released from prison, while Hurley's volatile wife Nadine is increasingly becoming mentally unwell.

That same afternoon, Bobby attends family counseling with Dr. Jacoby (Russ Tamblyn), the town psychiatrist who also saw Laura as a patient prior to her death.

At a party in the Great Northern to welcome the new investors, Benjamin and Catherine Martell (Piper Laurie) secretly discuss their plan to burn the town's sawmill the following night and buy the land cheaply, unaware that Audrey is spying on them.

[9] Glatter similarly lauded the comic performances of most of the cast, particularly singling out the "dry wit" of Beymer and his chemistry with guest star Kelly.

She felt that the series struck a good balance between its humorous elements and its dark subject matter, playing its serious moments with an appropriate level of gravitas and avoiding becoming a "self parody".

[16] Daniel J. Blau of Television Without Pity pointed out the sexual undertones of the episode, noting in particular Briggs and Shelley's playing with a pistol as clear phallic imagery.