Louis C.K. has the remarkable ability to zero in on an uncomfortable life truth, and force viewers to confront it. The best Louie episodes leave me with a knot of painful recognition in the pit of my stomach. It happened with "Bully" back in Season 1, and now it's happened again with “Cop Story."

The bulk of episode 3 follows Louie as he reluctantly spends a night out with Lenny (a phenomenal Michael Rapaport), a police officer who used to date the comedian's sister. Viewers quickly realize that Lenny is depressed and slightly unhinged, a lonely middle-aged man who never figured out how to connect with other people.

After an unpleasant evening enduring Lenny's insults, roughhousing and one-sided conversation, Louie has enough and tells him to stop.

"It can't be that big a surprise to you that somebody's having a hard time being around you," he says. "You're hitting me and you're physically hurting me and that's where I have to draw the line."

Lenny protests, but Louie responds, "I'm telling you that it hurt and you don't get to deny that. When a person tells you that you hurt them, you don't get to decide that you didn't."

I found myself nodding wide-eyed in recognition at this line, which was cathartic for me to hear. Who in their adult life hasn't tried to establish boundaries in a relationship, only to have someone dismiss them?

At this point, Lenny's transparent attempts to conceal his insecurities with teenage bravado fall apart.

"What about you hurting me?" he says, turning the blame around on Louie. "How do you think that makes me feel?"

"I know that I'm hard to be around. It is no surprise."

Louie (Louis C.K.) and Lenny (Michael Rapaport) in Season 5, episode 3, "Cop Story." Image: KC Bailey/FX

Lenny's downward spiral only continues from there, as he admits to Louie that he's thought about committing suicide.

This show is among the best at making wholly unlikable characters (like bully Sean and his abusive father Mike from Season 1) seem sympathetic. However, C.K. does not achieve this by showing their virtues, but rather by presenting them through a fatalistic lens. He often takes the stance that humans are ultimately powerless to change their fates.

Louie, then, never tries to fix any broken souls; instead, he shows them compassion, compelling viewers to do the same.

As Mike explains why he hits his kids ("That's what I know. My dad hit me, and his dad him"), Louie sits and listens.

When Lenny has a meltdown after realizing he lost his gun, Louie finds it for him.

Seeing someone so desperate for human connection hits a nerve because we've all desired it at some point, too. The episode forces us to look the Lennys of the world in the eye, and face that discomfort head-on. C.K. wants us to feel those emotions, rather than push them away.

Overall, "Cop Story" is a powerful episode and one of Louie's all-time best.

Meanwhile, its pre-credit sequence features an entirely different mini-plot, which C.K. uses as a platform to preach to viewers — something he does frequently (e.g. in Season 4, "So Did The Fat Lady," Vanessa delivers a lengthy diatribe against society's treatment of larger women). Although these lectures can be inelegant and verbose, they're also often poignant; this one is no different.

While trying to buy expensive pots, Louie is ignored by a young saleswoman (who we later discover is the owner of the store), and proceeds to scold her for providing poor customer service. After a hostile exchange, the saleswoman eventually gets Louie to admit that he's uncomfortable around young people, and gives a thought-provoking explanation why that's worth repeating here:

Because we're the future. You don't belong in it. Because we're beyond you, and naturally that makes you feel kinda bad. You have this deep down feeling that you don't matter anymore

But wait, that's a good thing. The saleswoman continues:

Doesn't it follow that if you're a good parent and your kids evolve and are smarter than you, they're gonna make you feel kinda dumb? So if you feel stupid around young people, things are goin' good.

Perhaps C.K. doesn't have such a cynical worldview, after all.