Penny regrets sleeping with Raj, however, it turns out they didn't actually have sex. Leonard breaks up with Priya, Amy pushes Sheldon in their relationship and they eventually become boyfriend and girlfriend, Penny and the other women become a clique of their own, Howard prepares for his wedding and going into space to the International Space Station and Leonard asks Penny out as they begin "Leonard and Penny 2.0".
Several high-profile celebrities appear in the season. In "The Transporter Malfunction", actor Leonard Nimoy appears as a voice actor, playing an action-figure Spock that Sheldon imagines talking to him. In the following episode, "The Hawking Excitation", cosmologist Stephen Hawking appears as a guest star. Astronaut Mike Massimino appears in "The Friendship Contraction" and "The Countdown Reflection". Stephen Hawking went on to appear in the season 6 episode "The Extract Obliteration" and the season 7 episode "The Relationship Diremption". Mike Massimino later appeared in the season 6 episodes "The Decoupling Fluctuation" and "The Re-Entry Minimization". The season finale depicts Howard Wolowitz traveling to the InternationalSpace Stationon board a Soyuz rocket. Thanks to technical consulting from astronaut Mike Massimino, who also plays himself on the show, the production crew was able to put together sets that realistically depicts the Soyuz capsule and the ISS. The Soyuz capsule was constructed based on photos from NASA, the Kansas Cosmosphere for dimensions, and scavenged parts from an aerospace junkyard in Los Angeles.
Episodes
Release
Critical reception
The fifth season received critical acclaim. On Rotten Tomatoes, 100% of seven critics gave the season a positive review. Oliver Sava of The A.V. Club gave the season a B+ rating. He described Raj as the "weak link of the show" as he has not " like the rest of the cast" and is "trapped in season one mode". Sava gave high ratings to episodes where Raj did not feature prominently, such as "The Pulled Groin Extrapolation" or "The Russian Rocket Reaction" and described "The Wiggly Finger Catalyst" as "one of the series' worst", giving it a D+ rating. Sava's favorite relationship on the series is between Amy and Penny. Jenna Busch of IGN disliked the previous season but said that season 5 "is far more balanced"; Busch gave season 5 episodes ratings between 5.5 and 9, with an average rating of 8.0. She also noted that the show has "matured" by including other women in the main cast. Tom Gliatto from People gave the season 3 out of 4 stars, stating that it is "bright and obvious as a cartoon, yet written with a clean, precise patter of jokes".
Awards
At the 64th Primetime Emmy Awards, The Big Bang Theory was nominated for Outstanding Comedy Series, but Modern Family on ABC won. The show was also nominated for Outstanding Technical Direction, Camerawork, Video Control for a Series and Outstanding Multi-Camera Picture Editing For A Comedy Series. Jim Parsons was nominated for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series for "The Werewolf Transformation", but lost out to Jon Cryer. Mayim Bialik was nominated for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for "The Shiny Trinket Maneuver", but lost out to Julie Bowen.
In Canada, The Big Bang Theory aired on CTV Television Network. The season premiere garnered 3.72 million viewers and the finale was watched by 4.04 million households. Most episodes were the most watched programme in Canada that week. The highest rating in season 5 was 4.05 million, for "The Infestation Hypothesis", and the lowest rating was 3.17 million, for "The Stag Convergence".
