With Linden slated to leave at the end of the episode, "What You Have Left" had the important task of keeping her in town. Of course, she has to stay or the show wouldn't have a main character, but it has to be for a plausible reason or it'd be lame. And the episode effectively shows us precisely why she's staying, drawing the tension across the episode as Linden and Holder do legwork we'd see on other procedurals.
What makes the investigative portions of The Killing more interesting than normal procedurals is that there is an actual sense of the evidence being built up. The leads are not random or tangential, but each dedicated to finding the truth. Linden and Holder seem to be getting closer to the truth, shifting their attention from Bennet as the sole killer to his wife and Bennet as the accomplice. So far, all the pieces appear to be in the right places, but the season still isn't halfway done yet and it's to soon for everything to be over.
The episode also thrusts the show into the next arc, Stan learning that Bennet is the prime suspect and driving him out somewhere, presumably to harm him, and it ties into the debate between Richmond and the mayor, who says that we have to be tough on crime because it'll encourage more criminality. If Holden's source is right, and Stan did kill people before, it would support the mayor, assuming Stan will commit crime. After all these years, Stan would still turn to crime given the right circumstances.
Richmond's campaign takes a big hit after Richmond defends Bennet--or at least the idea that one should be presumed innocent--defying Jaime and Gwen's senator father. Now that he's picked a side, Richmond will have to see how the public reacts.
In the possibly relevant, possibly not category, Holder talks cryptically with his informant friend about his two sides and Terry seems to have had an affair with Ames and is deeply hurt when he doesn't respond to her.
Score: 9.2/10
