Twin Peaks (Season 3)

[Spinal]

Good to hear about GoT. Saving it for bedtime.

[Spinal]

Oh, man. I was laughing so hard at that confrontation outside Dougie's house. That may as well have been a commercial for TM.

[Russ]

That confrontation outside Dougie's house. That may as well have been a commercial for TM.

That was TV on crack, that's what that was.

[Spinal]

That was TV on crack, that's what that was.

And what a brilliant commentary on gun culture in America. You have hitmen, mobsters and the FBI in a suburban neighborhood and the scariest guy turns out to be a slighty inconvenieced accountant.

[Stay Puft]

Wow, this episode confirmed all the most unsavory theories about Mr. C's reign of terror. This dude is pure evil.

How's Annie?

Diane's use of the phrase "Let's Rock" basically confirms that she is a doppelganger or a Black Lodge spirit or something

Give this man a medal.

(Obvious in retrospect, but I really thought that was a subversion/misdirect. Good call, Spinal!)

[Stay Puft]

Also, pour one out for Dougie

[Spinal]

Cooper's revival just drove home how remarkable MacLachlan has been as 'Dougie'. You didn't need him to say a word. As soon as you saw his change in physicality and the difference in his eyes, you knew he was back. Sure, Dark Cooper may have a different hairdo, but MacLachlan is doing most of this work of differentiating characters purely on his own.

[Stay Puft]

All. The. Awards.

The best part of the scene is Cooper acknowledging the kindness of those around him, and thanking them for guiding him back. It all keeps coming back around to Cooper's basic human decency. The one part that surprised me is how primed he was for action, i.e. he knew all about the doppelgangers and even how they were made. It would seem he has been talking a lot with Mike. Leave it to Cooper to make friends even in the Black Lodge, haha.

This episode covers so much ground that by the end I had nearly forgotten one of the best moments... the very beginning, when Jerry stumbles into the last place I ever expected to see him. Incredible scene. When he first appears coming over the hill I actually held my breath for a second, because I thought a Woodsman was appearing to confront Mr. C and Richard... and then I just started screaming with laughter.

BAD BAD BAD BINOCULARS

Every single scene this episode was 100%. I can't believe it's already over next week.

[Spinal]

Every single scene this episode was 100%.

Yep. Also loved Candie's line reading, agreeing with Cooper about the Mitchum brothers having hearts of gold.

[Russ]

Yup. Also loved the house band's backwards "lodge-style" playing of Audrey's theme during the closing credits. Too many great bits to count.

[Grouchy]

"I am the FBI".

I almost cried.

[Spinal]

Of course I love the original series and the characters. But what I’ve enjoyed most is not when The Return made me say, “Aw, it’s so nice to see that/him/her again.” It’s when the show made me say — as it has, over and over — “Wow, I’ve never seen that before.” The sooty Woodsman intoning poetry while crushing a man’s skull, the woman with eyes sewn shut, the void behind Sarah Palmer’s face: It’s good to see Mr. Lynch’s coffee has not been switched to decaf.

A loving assessment from two NYT reviewers.

[Spinal]

So far ...

So, by my count, here's the things that will hopefully be resolved/answered in the next few episodes ....

Who is Naido? Don't know
What happened to Billy and why does it matter? Don't know
Is Audrey stuck inside some kind of existential limbo or what? Answer seems to be on the way
Was Sarah Palmer that girl who had the creepy bug walk into her mouth? Don't know
What was making all that noise in Sarah Palmer's house when Hawk showed up? Don't know
How did that ring get in Major Briggs' stomach? Don't know
What the hell is going on with Diane? ANSWERED!
What's up with that mysterious sound at the Great Northern? Don't know
What does it mean that Laura Palmer is "The One"? Don't know
What is the Experiment? Don't know
Does Janey-E know more than she lets on? Possibly answered, she seems to be just who she claims to be
Why does Cooper need to remember Richard and Linda? Don't know
What is the one-gloved man's destiny? Don't know

EDIT: Also, who was it that called Dark Cooper on the phone claiming to be Phillip Jeffries? Don't know

[Milky Joe]

DIANE = NAIDO

I think #4 is a resounding YES.

Hard to imagine all of those will be answered in the last two eps, but that's OK. If they do I'd be amazed, but I don't need every dot crossed and every I t'd.

[Spinal]

Hard to imagine all of those will be answered in the last two eps, but that's OK. If they do I'd be amazed, but I don't need every dot crossed and every I t'd.

Nor do I. I initially made that list because I was reading things about how the show had hopelessly opened up too many loose ends to come to a satisfying conclusion. I didn't think it was true then and I think it's even less true now.

Your Naido theory seems sound, although I'm very curious as to how that will play out.

I also think Judy is [

Show Spoiler

Major Briggs. One last Wizard of Oz reference before Lynch calls it a career. Judy + Garland.

]

[Russ]

I also think Judy is [

Show Spoiler

Major Briggs. One last Wizard of Oz reference before Lynch calls it a career. Judy + Garland.

]

LOVE this theory.

[Spinal]

LOVE this theory.

I wish I could take credit. But once I read it, it made instant sense.

[Stay Puft]

That Judy theory makes a lot of sense.

I'd safely say Janey-E is who she appears to be. Also, One Punch Man's destiny is almost certainly to protect Naido. But I guess we'll find out soon.

What's up with that mysterious sound at the Great Northern? Don't know

It's Mike!

I guess this is still an unanswered question (like, what IS up with it?) but I definitely think it's Mike. In the international pilot, this sound appears when Bob is in the basement, after he says he would like to sing with Mike again. He hears the sound and says "Mike? Mike, can you hear me?" This is also the sound that The Arm makes when he rubs his hands together in the Red Room (I can't remember which episode this ends up being, but I think it also happens in the international pilot). And finally, the sound appears again in last week's episode, to lead Bushnell out of the room, so Mike can talk to Cooper when he wakes up.

Here's a sound mystery that's bugging me, though: Have we ever heard the sounds that the Fireman tells Cooper to listen to again? I went back and watched that scene but I can't recall if that sound has ever appeared again at any point. There's a lot to keep track of here, so I imagine a full rewatch when this is all over is going to be very interesting/rewarding.

[Spinal]

By golly, you're right!

[Spinal]

Here's IndieWire's list of questions going into the finale. Compare and contrast.

• Why is Laura “the one”?
• Where’s Audrey?
• Who is Linda?
• Who is Judy?
• What’s up with Naido?
• What the F is up with Sarah Palmer?!
• Is anyone else a tulpa?
• What happened to the little girl in New Mexico?
• Are Red and Chad doomed?
• What’s up with that humming sound?
• Who — or what — will Freddie punch?
• Where is the real Diane?
• Does Mr. C still stink?
• Will Agent Cooper bring back his iconic catchphrases in Twin Peaks?
• Who will be the closing band at The Roadhouse?
• Is this the end of “Twin Peaks”?

[Milky Joe]

Your Naido theory seems sound, although I'm very curious as to how that will play out.[/SPOILER]

Diane said "I'm in the Sheriff's station" right before being whooshed back into the lodge, which I took to mean that Naido is either her real form or a sort of decoy containing her consciousness.

[Stay Puft]

This is it folks, I can't believe we're already at the end...

...are we finally gonna talk about Judy?

Will we see the monkey again?



[

Show Spoiler

Animal life!

]

I probably won't be able to catch this until tomorrow so I'm dodging the internet until then.
See you on the other side, Match Cut.

[Spinal]

HOLY CRAP ... [

Show Spoiler

did they go back to 1945?

]

[Spinal]

I love this ending. An appropriate balance between resolution and continuing mystery.

[Melville]

The final two episodes were overwhelming and disorienting. They went a long way toward correcting the main thing I disliked about this season: the literalization of the mythology. In the original, Bob and Mike and the black lodge felt both real and unreal, symbols and spirits and also somehow real people living over a convenience store committing horrible acts and flicking matches at Leland when he was a boy. A lot of this season made it all too definite for me, too concrete and less attached to real trauma and abuse. And that seemed to reach its most off-putting heights in the evil stone ball Bob vs garden-glove man videogame/superhero fight, in which the formerly terrifying figure of Bob was reduced to...an evil stone ball. But then immediately afterwards we get a giant superimposed image of Coop telling us that this goofy story of good triumphing over evil is a dream. And then we get an hour and more of the impossibility of overwriting the original story of abuse with this new story. Coop can seemingly never complete his mission, never rescue the girl.

Obviously this ties into some of the dominant themes of Mulholland Dr and Lost Highway, in which Lynch showed stories of ideals and dreams contrasting and ultimately failing to replace horrible realities of infidelity and murder. But in Inland Empire, he in a sense reversed that. The repeated stories of infidelity and murder were just that: repeated stories, like the idealized stories that countered them. Both stories are powerful. The fiction has a reality either way, and vice versa.

In Twin Peaks, rather than the story of infidelity and murder, there's the story of abuse, the story of the girl down the lane. Again, Lynch seems to be saying that this story has some primal power in our understanding of the world. In the more mythological bits like Ep 8, there seems to be suggested almost metaphysical voodoo power to it, as if it somehow plays a role in the cosmic structure of things. But in Eps 17 and 18, it is repersonalized in the best way: this is a story of Laura's real abuse. It cannot be undone. She can't be taken home again because her home is forever a place of menace and horror. And even the attempt to understand it, to give it some grander meaning and context, is resisted. Coop's mission in the last hour is incomprehensible. It's patterned with things we know but can't understand.

But given what's in Inland Empire, I'd guess Lynch doesn't want us to take away only that bleak message. All the stories are there. The cheery story of Dougie and Janey E also has power, and Janey E does get her Dougie in the end.