Twin Peaks: The Return (Spoilers)

Non-Phish General
#1

We are now several weeks into Showtime’s limited run of Twin Peaks: The Return, and we need to talk.

EPISODE 8

Good grief, David Lynch. Of all the David Lynch’s in the world, you’re the David Lynchiest.

Last nights episode of Twin Peaks is getting a lot of praise. It was 45 minutes of avant-garde, film school bullshit. It was Eraserhead, not Twin Peaks. It made no attempt to be accessible. It made no attempt to be coherent. It made no attempt to tell a story. But it is David Lynch, so it must be amazing. Here is Nine Inch Nails.

** Spoilers** ** DO NOT READ BELOW THIS LINE IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED** - Not that I really know what happened.

At the end of episode 7, Bob/Dale is released from prison. That is where this episode picks up.

Free from prison, Bob/Dale is shot by his partner - Ray (who Bod/Dale was planning to double cross). As Bob/Dale lay dead on the ground, a bunch of ghost coal miners dance, smear blood all over Bob/Dale’s body, and extract a bubble containing the essence of Bob from Dale’s body.

4 minutes of NIN performing at the roadhouse.

We are then taken back to 1945, and we witness a beautiful shot of the first nuclear explosion in super-slo-mo. The essence of Bob is ejected from this explosion.

There is a gas station, and time lapse footage of coal miners randomly milling about this gas station.

Then things get weird.

We are taken back to what is possibly the same dimension Dale visited when he was astral projecting. (Remember the woman without eyes?) Here we see The Giant and some woman. The giant levitates, and ejects a golden orb containing the essence of Laura Palmer from his mouth. The woman kissed the orb and loaded into some sort of tube, and sent the orb to Earth. Either the orb moved very slowly, or time between dimensions must be relative, because this is all happening in the 1940’s on Earth, and Laura Palmer was born in 1971.

We are then taken to the 1950’s, where we watch a frog/bug hatch from an egg in the desert.

A boy and a girl are on a date, and the girl finds a penny. At the end of the date the boy kisses the girl.

A coal miner drifter walks to a radio station, kills the DJ, and repeatedly recites a poem. This is broadcasted over the radio. This poem either hypnotizes the listener or kills them like the culling song from “Lullaby”. I’m not sure which.

Somewhere in there the body of Bad-Dale reanimates.

#2

don’t forget that many die from the song, but the girl falls asleep (presumably) and that freaky bug crawls into her mouth, although there is the extra weird moment where it seems she opens her mouth to accept the bug in. that was fucked up.

maybe there is some suggestion that Bob and Laura (or is it “Bob” and “Laura”) are like a yin yang of good and evil or something, created in one of mankind’s most heinous acts? i dunno something like that.

my boyfriend has started wondering if there is direct connection between the miners and the scary man behind Winkies from Mulholland Drive.

LOL it was like, erm… THE Nine Inch Nails ( :eh: ) got a music video out of it! at least they were appropriately gnarly, i have a friend a lifelong NIN fan who walked out of a show a couple years ago cuz Trent was wearing white and trying to get the crowd into a clap along :wink:

^btw thanks for starting a thread! :clap:

#3

I was live streaming the episode through the Showtime app, and the last ten minutes kept freezing, and jumping to catch up. I didn’t think I missed anything because of the pacing of the episode, but clearly I need to re watch the last ten minutes!

Oh my god. I love the idea of a shared David Lynch universe. This idea can even be (slightly) supported by the fact Mulholland Drive was originally supposed to be a spinoff of Twin Peaks revolving around Audrey Horne.

#4

i can’t believe there’s no episode tonight what ddddoooo we dooooo lollll :confused:

so at this point there is no dougie jones… that body disintegrated. cooper came back but is missing his soul or essence or whatever the little gold ball represents. but then there’s DoppelCooper who may have just lost his soul or whatever… i wonder if Cooper could end up back “inside” either body at this point?

#5

I really wish there had been an episode last weekend.

Seeing as we are clearly trying to assemble a puzzle that is missing many pieces, it is a waste of time to try to figure out what is going on.

Anyway - Here is what I think is going on.

I don’t think that Bob and Laura are Yin and Yang. Bob is a bad dude, who appears to have been created organically by the evil actions / intentions of man. It is also established that he is a bad dude in the first season, as well as “Fire Walk with Me.” What he did to Leland, then what he made Leland do to Laura, Maddie, and Theresa, and all the twisted shit that we can assume he did while inhabiting Coop or DoppelCoop’s body. (I think he may have sexually assaulted Diane … and possibly Audrey.) So I agree that he is likely the Yin.

That would mean that Laura would have to be the opposite, and that is where the theory kind of falls apart. Laura was complicated. She was a call girl. She witnessed a dude get murdered and was totally cool with it. Then there were her lesser crimes like the fact that she was a cocaine addict, who used sex to coerce her boyfriend into becoming a drug dealer, and she was juggling boyfriends. Doesn’t exactly paint a picture of someone who diametrically opposed to the embodiment of evil. I can only think of two good things that we know that she did. She prevented Donna from getting sexually assaulted while on drugs at the road house, and delivered food for meals on wheels.

I think that her purpose was to be a beacon (and unfortunately sacrificial lamb) to draw the attention of both the evil (Bob) and the good (Dale or possibly someone else even).

Dale is the most likely candidate. It is possible that he has some sort of person orb within him… I guess. But we didn’t see the coal miners tear it out of him when he was shot by Josie. (I don’t know if that is evidence of anything!) Also we know that Dale is capable of doing morally questionable things (specifically having an affair with his partner’s wife.)

Or maybe Laura was the plan but the plan failed, and Dale is plan B.

F*ck, I’m pretty deep in the weeds here!

Or maybe there is two Yins and two Yangs. There were two evil spirits (let’s not forget that the one armed shoe salesman was possessed by Mike, but then that evil spirit repented… wait…what?!) So maybe Bob and Dale mirror each other, and Mike and Laura mirror each other.

Or maybe there isn’t a Yang (but I would think there would have to be), maybe she was a beacon to attract Bob, and someone who The Giant and The Man From The Other Place knew would be able to stop Bob but was otherwise unaffiliated with either lodge.

Or… hear me out… Maybe the person who is able to stop Bob isn’t Dale at all. Maybe he is just the second domino that eventually leads to the downfall of Bob.

But all of this is working off the premise that Laura was created to stop Bob, when in reality we have no f*cking clue what any of that was actually about.

F*ck!

F*ck you, David Lynch!

#6

F*ck you, David Lynch!

This has been my general feeling every time I’ve seen a Lynch show/movie. I don’t think he knows what half of the imagery means himself and he throws it in because it looks cool and to fuck with fans. He’s an evil, evil man.

#7

^ HAHA :laughing:

New episode tonight! You with me Tanas?

#8

omg brah i was right there waiting for like 15 minutes for 9:00 to click play :laughing:

well, i guess they didn’t feel any need to answer anything from the last episode lol.

that’s not quite true. i wasn’t expecting DoppelCooper to wake up and be more or less himself still but he clearly is. loved the tim roth/JJL scene! LOL its like this show has become a time capsule for the 90s :wink:

yeah i was probably a little lazy and rushed in my Bob/Laura idea… tho it does seem the Giant and Señorita Dido “generate” Laura and purposefully send “her” to earth in response to either the A bomb or Bob. also i’d forgotten that during the A bomb scene there is that segment in the middle where we see the Convenience Store for a few minutes (still NO fucking clue what that was about unless it was some kinda “time distortion”?) and then fades to that freaky “creature” barfing out Bob. it cuts right back to inside the explosion so i think the message is this is all happening “inside” the event. there’s gotta be a reason both the freaky creature barf scene and the fortress are both in black and white… like the same dimension or something.

i guess that’s the big thing from ep 9… when the FBI is interviewing Shaggy ( :wink: ) and he’s FREAKING but confirming its like there’s another dimension to step into. i can’t quite tell if they entered the Black Lodge or someplace else but wherever that reality is we are seeing it become more and more expansive than just the Lodge.

#9

^ I’m so glad that they got back to Shaggy and explained how he fits into this convoluted mess.

I really liked last nights episode. It really set some wheels in motion… I think.

DoppleDale is moving towards Bobby Briggs, Hawk, and (new) Truman. They will be converging on Jack Rabbit’s Palace in two days… possibly. (The fact that there are two dates on the paper will definitely come in to play…maybe.)

One of my favorite scenes from the original run was when Major Briggs and Bobby were talking at The Double R, and the Major told Bobby about his dream. This conversation took place when Bobby was (seemingly) an incurable f*ck up, but it showed that the Major knew that Bobby was going to be alright. I bring this up because there is a bit of a callback to this scene.

The cat is about to be out of the bag that there are two Dales. The DNA results are going to flag the FBI, who are going to find DougieDale in Vegas… probably.

I don’t know what is going on with the Horne family. I am glad that Ben turned down Ashley Judd’s advances. She appears to be plotting something, something involving her dying husband. Jerry has been tripping for several episodes. Audrey is nowhere to be found. And Johnny might have just died when he ran headlong into a wall. What is that ringing?!

There is a new character who I find funny, but others might not. Let’s say that you were born and raised in the real world. You have a pretty strong grasp on how “normal” human interactions go. Then you are plucked from the real world and dropped into Twin Peaks, where you notice that these people aren’t reading from the same libretto. This character is Chad, the corrupt cop. He is skeptical of the supernatural things that everyone else seems to accept without hesitation, and he is constantly annoyed by the bizarre actions of everyone around him. The scene where he is eating in the conference room, and is asked to leave. As Sheriff Truman, Bobby, and Hawk stare awkwardly into the middle distance, he collects his stuff, and tries to walk out with his hands full. Hawk, who is standing right next to the door, just continues to stare into the middle distance, not even thinking about getting the door for Chad. Chad has to ask Hawk TWICE to get the door for him. This was one of my favorite scenes from the episode.

What’s the deal with armpit rash girl? Zebras? Penguins?

One thing that REALLY bothers me about the show is the sound. I don’t know if it was Lynch that did this, but whoever is in charge of sound direction loves picking up the ambient background noises (typing, phones, cars, birds, rain, etc.), so the mics are turned up so loud there is considerable white noise. Then when there is dialog, they compress the audio in such a way that you can hear the exact moment the track is compressed.

#10

Tanas, I think you might be right. Laura Palmer might… just might… be the key. :wink:

#11

ahhhh shit dude omggg still haven’t made time to fire up sunday latest!!! can’t wait should probably right NOW :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

#12

The show is moving at a better clip since that trippy episode 8.

Spoilers

Shelly’s daughter is the worst. Aside from Coop and Cole, Shelly was possibly the most likeable character from the first two seasons, seeing her daughter suck as much as she does makes me feel really bad for her. In this episode she nearly kills Shelly and risks the lives of others because she is awful. The only people in that town past or present that I dislike more than Shelly’s daughter are: Shelly’s Daughter’s Husband, Leo Johnson, and Audrey Horne’s Son.

Shelly was 17 or 18 and childless in the original run - the new series starts up after 25 years passed. The oldest Shelly and Bobby’s daughter could possibly be is 24 years old. I like Amanda Seyfried just fine, but this character was definitely miscast.

Some punk ass kid finds a gun in the back of his parents’ minivan and opens fire on The Double R, while Bobby, Shelly, and their daughter are talking about how much their daughter’s husband sucks. Bobby reacts to the shooting, and then has to deal with a driver who won’t stop honking. Most characters in the Twin Peaks: The Return universe behave as though they are on drugs. If I had to guess, this lady was on meth. She was awful. Then some kid puked all over her. I had mixed feelings about this.

Hawk and Truman look at an old Nez Perce map. Hawk explains the symbols on the map, and Truman asks about a specific symbol. Hawk tells him that he does not want to know about that symbol. Truman, ever the inquisitive mind, is totally ok not knowing. Margaret, The Log Lady, calls and gives more cryptic warnings. Truman does not have time to look at a deputy’s new car.

Weird things are happening in South Dakota, and Cole got to see some of it first hand. Albert prevents Cole from getting sucked into an alternate dimension. While that is going on, Diane witnesses one of those “coal miners” (which we now know are called woodsmen) sneak up on a cop car and rip the top of Shaggy’s head off. She decided not to say that she saw anything until well after the fact. She is working with Evil Coop for some reason. Cole and Albert are aware, so they are watching her closely. Albert particularly.

Dougie’s boss, having enough evidence, decides to pay the $30m claim to the casino owners. Dougie brings the check along with a pie. Jim Beluchi and the other guy decide not to kill him, and take him out to dinner. They have a good time. Dale hears a song and has a “Desperado” moment. He then eats some pie, which was apparently “damn good.” Get it? Because that was a thing he said.

I have learned only a few of the new characters names, and that is a sign of shitty characters. ______'s Daughter, ______'s Son, Jim Beluchi, Tom Sizemore, Tim Roth, The Other Guy, ________'s husband are descriptions. Of the characters introduced this season I have only learned a few names: Hastings, Dougie Jones, Sonny Jim, Candy, Tammy Preston, and Ike the Spike - that is about it.

#13

finally caught up! double dipped the most recent two episodes last night on a true night off from Terrr :crazy:

shelley’s daughter sucks but she’s not far off from where Laura palmer was at the same age 25 years ago… kinda good girl, but going bad… hideous husband getting her fucked up on coke and who knows what we haven’t seen yet. seems like shelley’s got some background issues too perhaps with the failure of marriage to Bobby and whatever that weird dude coming to the RR was all about. seems like maybe their broken relationship has a trickle down to her daughter. maybe that’s why she’s so resilient to the idea of leaving/divorcing gross dude from Get Out

the Bobby/shooting/screaming lady scene was pure insanity. from the honking horn to the screaming lady i was already disoriented. then the zombie girl rises and it gets worse. i’m not surprised Bobby was frozen i mean WTF. DEFINITELY david lynch paints a world distorted by drugs and pretty fucked up ones. still, pretty hard to figure what to make of that scene other than twin peaks is pretty fucked up. probably trying to illustrate something about Bobby ultimately. the shot where the kid is standing by the minivan like “What?” and Bobby gives him the WTF look and then notices the kid and the Dad in the same pose… GENIUS

loved seeing “The Symbol” on the map. as far as i know i’ve only seen it on the Ring previously but its coming together. fire… Fire Walk With Me :wink:

i am SO SURPRISED that Diane is playing evil. i wonder what the origin of this is… either Diane was never a good guy so to speak or has she been played by DoppelCooper and she believes its him? the SD encounter was trippy as shit… Portals and vortices and interdimensional travel… ACID SHIT BRAH :smiley:

i wonder if there is any cohesion to the Black Lodge world? we have seen the Lodge, the Fortress and now this staircase… it is hard to discern which other parts of the A Bomb episode (was it 8?) took place in which reality.

shelley’s daughter is named Becky. the casino guys are the Mitchum Brothers.

so yeah… Laura is the One. i can’t put my finger on what but even more evidence that Laura (or maybe even “Laura”) is something beyond ordinary. maybe she represents the way we get lost and distracted by shitty stuff here in this life but i think its heading for good/evil Laura/BOB showdown for the fate of reality.

Candy omfg :laughing:

#14

:laughing: That was probably my second favorite thing in this episode. #1 being when Agent Cole looks at Hastings in the back of the car and loudly (obviously) says, “He’s dead.” :clap:

Laura’s connection to all of this is driving me crazy. Cole had that vision of her when he opened the door. Margaret, or at least her log, seems to know something about Laura. (I have a theory about her log BTW - If you aren’t planning on reading “The Secret History of Twin Peaks” I will share it with you) We saw her in the first or second episode, when she is in lodge talking backwards to Dale, then she looks ups and screams…then she is gone. :think: :think: :think:

I loved when they sent her out onto the floor to fetch Tom Sizemore, and she immediately gets side tracked. You see her waving her hands around and pointing things out. It turns out she was talking about air conditioning. :laughing: :laughing:

#15

I’ve been distracted by Phish and life in general, so I haven’t posted about Twin Peaks: The Return in a while.

The last couple of episodes have moved the plot forward, at the pace of a dirge: which is actually up-tempo compared to earlier episodes.

  • DougieDale is still a Zombie.

  • We find out that Truman knows that Richard Horne killed that little boy, and attempted to kill the woman who witnessed it. Richard Horne is Ben Horne’s grandson (Audrey’s son).

  • We meet back up Audrey Horne, who is a completely different character than she was 25 years ago. She is married to Charlie. Charlie is the most frustrating pile of shit television has ever seen. Every time this pile of shit speaks or is on screen, I hope someone pulls out a gun and shoots him in the fucking face. Congrats, Lynch! You have created the most loathsome character in television history. Ramsay Bolton is sympathetic compared to this guy.

  • Norma has franchised the diner. This eats up a lot of time, and is completely irrelevant to the story.

  • Johnny Horne survived his run in with the wall. Due to being tied up he was unable to prevent his mother from being robbed by Richard.

  • Las Vegas police discover Dougie Jones’ real identity, and do nothing with the information.

  • The Mitchum Bros buy Dougie a new car and a play set for Sonny-Jim.

  • Sarah Palmer is a drunk who doesn’t like turkey jerky (and who can blame her), and watches a 20 second boxing clip on a loop.

  • Tom Sizemore has agreed to testify against Duncan Todd, even though he knows that is a death sentence.

  • DoppelDale proves to be a badass when he beats a giant in an arm wresting contest, and proceeds to kill him with one punch to the face. He then finds out Phillip Jefferies ordered Ray to kill him. He then kills Ray. For those playing at home, Phillip Jefferies (aka Agent Jefferies) was part of the “Blue Rose” task force. He was the first agent from this task force to mysteriously disappear. He was played by David Bowie in the movie. For some reason Jefferies wanted the Bob orb from DoppelDale.

  • Shelly is dating Red (who I just found out is not the same person as Ray), so I guess she likes bad boys.

  • Tammy Preston joined the Blue Rose Task Force.

  • Diane knows more than the FBI about what is going on.

Five episodes left? I don’t think David Lynch has any intention to provide a satisfying ending to the season (and likely series: Showtime has said that it is unlikely that Twin Peaks will be saved again).

#16

Kinda surprised this is my first time commenting in this thread. This whole season has been so fucking weird… yet enjoyable. But more and more I find myself thinking this:

Considering Lynch tends to know what he’s doing, I’m willing to guess this is intentional. And I’m not sure how to feel about it just yet.

#17

I’m currently in the midst of rewatching the original seasons before starting the newest. I find I don’t love it any less than I did the first time around. Bob is still creepy as hell. Andy still cracks me up. I’ll be back, late as usual.

#18

Ok, I didn’t post from the previous week, so… Sarah Palmer is some sort of other worldly being; Big Ed and Norma finally get together; Evil Coop finds Jeffries who is some sort of water heater; the guy with the gloved hand punches a couple of dudes and nearly kills them; the woman with no eyes is in lockup with the corrupt cop, the guy Audrey is looking for, James Hurley, and the Gloved Man; and Dougie sticks a fork in an outlet.

If you haven’t seen it already, stop what you are doing and watch the most recent episode of Twin Peaks: The Return.

SPOILERS!

SPOILERS!

SPOILERS!

This was the most satisfying episode, by a wide margin.

  1. Evil Coop and Richard Horne drive out to some random rock (for which Dale has Coordinates). Coop sends Richard up to the rock where he promptly gets electrocuted to the point of vaporization. Coop then confirms that Richard was in fact his son.

  2. Diane tells The FBI her story about the night she met Coop, and confirms that he raped her. She then pulls out a gun to shoot Cole, but is swiftly gunned down by Agents Preston and Rosenfield. She is then seen in the Black Lodge where it is reveal that she, like Dougie Jones, was manufactured.

  3. The assassins who Evil Coop sent to kill Dougie meet their ends when an angry home owner asks them to move their van, and they refuse to acquiesce. The lady shoots at the angry home owner, and he pulls out a machine gun and returns fire. For a brief second, it appears they might drive off to fight another day, but are then violently mowed down by the angry man.

  4. Agent Cooper wakes up from his coma / stupor. He becomes the beloved Dale Cooper of old, and gets right back to business, and is on his way to Twin Peaks (with Mitchum Brothers in tow).

  5. Audrey finally makes it to the roadhouse where Robert Louis Sevrenson (Eddie Vedder) is playing. Then the film noir music comes on and Audrey is invited to do her silly little dance from the original run. When a fight breaks out she asks her husband to take her home, she then wakes up in some sort of completely white room (with no black currents, and as far as I know it is nowhere near the station).

Lots to take in. Lots of baddies get killed. Great episode.