Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group

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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

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AhmedKhalifa wrote:
mine wrote: Sometimes I get the sense that Lynch is like a religion (Linchianity? Linchology? Linchism?). You don't try to understand Lynch, you just believe in him.
I guess it's because a lot of staunch Lynch supporters seem to think that everything Lynch does is almost flawless or defies criticism, or that he's infallible. I believe Lynch's greatest achievement is that he really did convince some people that he's so good and so original that he shouldn't be questioned or critiqued at all, and that if you don't like something he made then "you just don't get it".
There's definitely a cult of personality around him. Some people explicitly approached TR in a way that exclusively allowed it to be the new standard all future TV and film is going to be judged against.
The vast majority of reviews and posts of TR are for the most part about Lynch rather than the show itself. So more often than not TR is judged as being the latest addition to Lynch's opus rather than on it's own merits. People's opinions are heavily informed by their pre-existing Lynch admiration. It's school book confirmation bias.

One piece of evidence of this is that the people who are on the underwhelmed side are much more consistent in what their issues are including what the finale is perceived to be about and a number of other specific issues. On the other hand people who are satisfied with it provide widely different and often contradicting interpretations/theories as to what makes TR such a success in their opinion.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by Gabriel »

nick1218 wrote: Eraserhead was the first feature of a promising "different" type of director. You can love Eraserhead yet not want to follow the career of one who does nothing but Eraserhead type films. It is not hypocrtical to like eraserhead and even The Grandmother yet have disdain for IE or TR. It is about timing for one thing, plus Eraserhead, which I watched again during TR is simply far better.
I found it interesting how much of TPTR seemed to be about referencing past glories. So many times, I found myself thinking things like: 'That's an Eraserhead moment,' or 'That's a Wild At Heart moment.'

It was, for me, the equivalent of a televisual greatest hits album, tied together with a sketchy 'plot.' Like Inland Empire, it felt more like watching a doodle pad: lots of interesting ideas for scenes randomly thrown together with little connection to one another.

Lynch has proven he can expertly handle the craft of filmmaking. Films such as The Straight Story and The Elephant Man prove he can create a narrative, draw tremendous performances from actors and can – daring to say it – touch the viewer's soul with warmth and humanity in his images. In IE and TPTR, he seems to have ditched the craft and gone purely into artistic experimentation and self-indulgence. Sadly, It's what happens when you get thrown a load of money and are given complete control without anyone to whom you have to answer.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by Rhodes »

Gabriel wrote:Lynch has proven he can expertly handle the craft of filmmaking. Films such as The Straight Story and The Elephant Man prove he can create a narrative, draw tremendous performances from actors and can – daring to say it – touch the viewer's soul with warmth and humanity in his images.
You liked The Straight Story and The Elephant Man. That's fine, of course. But that's not the kind of experience people waited for 25 years anxiously, wouldn't you agree? Twin Peaks isn't an ordinary show. Just a nice, touching story (like there are hundreds) doesn't cut it.

Your reply is probably that you would have prefered such a show over what we actually got. Of course, you're entitled to that opinion. But I think that Lynch should at the very least have tried to make something memorable. And he did just that. Maybe he failed (I don't agree), but it is beyond doubt that he tried.

I think there would have been no excuse for making just a nicely crafted standard story with some warmth and humanity.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by Gabriel »

Rhodes wrote:
You liked The Straight Story and The Elephant Man. That's fine, of course. But that's not the kind of experience people waited for 25 years anxiously, wouldn't you agree? Twin Peaks isn't an ordinary show. Just a nice, touching story (like there are hundreds) doesn't cut it.

Your reply is probably that you would have prefered such a show over what we actually got. Of course, you're entitled to that opinion. But I think that Lynch should at the very least have tried to make something memorable. And he did just that. Maybe he failed (I don't agree), but it is beyond doubt that he tried.

I think there would have been no excuse for making just a nicely crafted standard story with some warmth and humanity.
Nope. And you're deliberately, obtusely misinterpreting what I said. I waited 25 years for more tales of the lives of people in Twin Peaks; to see what happened to the Haywards, the Palmers, the Hornes, the Hurleys and so on. I wanted backstabbing businessmen and women, mayoral skullduggery, murders, mills, One-Eyed Jacks, cross-border drug smuggling. Basically, I wanted a new season of Twin Peaks, picking up from the old telling further stories of the town and its inhabitants. What we got was a memorable stinker.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by krishnanspace »

Did Mark Frost actually contribute?The return felt like it was a proper Lynchian experience.I mostly missed the small town feel from the original series.Nothing can replicate it.One more thing i didnt like was the overcrowded cast.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by mtsi »

Way too many tailing off storylines, plots and pointless cameos. A tight cohesive story would have capped a legendary career. We did get Lynch, full bore. ..that's true. The problem was the emphasis on BORE.

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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by Gabriel »

mtsi wrote:Way too many tailing off storylines, plots and pointless cameos. A tight cohesive story would have capped a legendary career. We did get Lynch, full bore. ..that's true. The problem was the emphasis on BORE.

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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by Rialto »

Rhodes wrote:
Gabriel wrote:Lynch has proven he can expertly handle the craft of filmmaking. Films such as The Straight Story and The Elephant Man prove he can create a narrative, draw tremendous performances from actors and can – daring to say it – touch the viewer's soul with warmth and humanity in his images.
You liked The Straight Story and The Elephant Man. That's fine, of course. But that's not the kind of experience people waited for 25 years anxiously, wouldn't you agree? Twin Peaks isn't an ordinary show. Just a nice, touching story (like there are hundreds) doesn't cut it.

Your reply is probably that you would have prefered such a show over what we actually got. Of course, you're entitled to that opinion. But I think that Lynch should at the very least have tried to make something memorable. And he did just that. Maybe he failed (I don't agree), but it is beyond doubt that he tried.

I think there would have been no excuse for making just a nicely crafted standard story with some warmth and humanity.
There's a tendency to believe that something difficult to watch, must be difficult to create. It's quite the opposite. Shows/films that attempt to pull the heartstrings are ten a penny. Those that actually get people where they live are rare, and take true talent.

The funniest comedy is far harder to write than the most experimental art film. Without true understanding of people, of what they fear and where they hurt, there's no brilliance, and no authenticity.

Don't be too quick to dismiss every simple story as Hallmark Channel schmaltz. It's too easy to put every cool image or thought that crossed your mind out there. Far harder to take those moments, dig into the heart of what they mean to you and craft them into a narrative that really connects.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by Gabriel »

Rialto wrote:
There's a tendency to believe that something difficult to watch, must be difficult to create. It's quite the opposite. Shows/films that attempt to pull the heartstrings are ten a penny. Those that actually get people where they live are rare, and take true talent.

The funniest comedy is far harder to write than the most experimental art film. Without true understanding of people, of what they fear and where they hurt, there's no brilliance, and no authenticity.

Don't be too quick to dismiss every simple story as Hallmark Channel schmaltz. It's too easy to put every cool image or thought that crossed your mind out there. Far harder to take those moments, dig into the heart of what they mean to you and craft them into a narrative that really connects.
Funnily enough, defenders of the new show are mocking people who are disappointed for having an 'Aristotelian' view of storytelling. Personally, I'll take that as a big compliment!!
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by referendum »

There's a tendency to believe that something difficult to watch, must be difficult to create. It's quite the opposite. Shows/films that attempt to pull the heartstrings are ten a penny. Those that actually get people where they live are rare, and take true talent.

The funniest comedy is far harder to write than the most experimental art film. Without true understanding of people, of what they fear and where they hurt, there's no brilliance, and no authenticity.

Don't be too quick to dismiss every simple story as Hallmark Channel schmaltz. It's too easy to put every cool image or thought that crossed your mind out there. Far harder to take those moments, dig into the heart of what they mean to you and craft them into a narrative that really connects.
it is difficult to know what to make of this sanctimonious gush.
. Twin Peaks S3 clearly did ' get [alot] of people where they live', and was clearly made by someone with ' true talent'. In it's quieter moments it demonstrated a ' true understanding of people, what they fear and where they hurt'' and so in your terms manifested the requisite '' brilliance and authenticity''. Lynch clearly obeyed your imperative to '' to take those moments, dig into the heart of what they mean to you and craft them into a narrative that really connects '' - and they did connect for alot of people. But not for others - you, clearly, included. It is hard also to understand how a film-maker so conscious of aesthetic surface, image-making and personal style can be characterised as '' difficult to watch''. That was not the problem here. Nor do i think it was particularly difficult to create. The film-makers just ' let it flow'... sometimes to the point where they might have switched the tap off.

That the series was clearly uneven and flawed has been discussed endlessly in here, but pointing the finger at it for being ' inauthentic' as you apparently do above is surely having a laugh? If it had had a little less of a conscience about being authentic it would have perhaps qualified as better drama. The problem, if anything, was surely that it's heart was too much in the right place, rather than - as you apparently suggest - the opposite. ''Don't be too quick to dismiss ''. You said it, man.
Last edited by referendum on Sat Sep 16, 2017 2:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by BOB1 »

Mr. Reindeer wrote:It's interesting to me that a lot of the people saying "I've loved everything DKL did until IE" and "DKL forgot about/stopped caring about telling a story with IE" seem to conveniently leave Eraserhead out of the conversation. I'm genuinely curious: how many people who feel either of the above sentiments like Eraserhead? Because IE and TR feel to me like a direct return to that style in a lot of ways.
Good point but...

Eraserhead had one thing that The Return painfully lacked (imo Inland Empire, too) - artistic self-control. At least that's how I feel Eraserhead: as if every scene there has been thoroughly thought over, double-checked, triple-checked, fiveyears-checked for mistakes, for smallest details. I am not that much of an Eraserhead fan - I kind of find the movie to be about nothing but aesthetically, artistically, formally, it is perfect. It seems to me like there is not one piece of dust on the set which is not where it was meant to be.
While in The Return so many things are placed completely at random... I don't need to repeat myself. If somebody wants to convince me that The Return has an immense potential because of its many layers or because of unusual approach to filmmaking, that's fine; I can say: I don't buy it, I don't get it, it's not my cup of tea, whatever. But if someone wanted to convince me that in The Return Lynch really cared about all details and that nothing is random there, I'd say it simply is not the truth.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

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referendum wrote:In it's quieter moments it demonstrated a ' true understanding of people, what they fear and where they hurt''
But did it?

I'm going over these 18 hours in my mind and where do I feel this 'true understanding of people...'? ......

Primarily: Cooper after his awakening in Pt.16
Even more primarily: Log Lady & Hawk, all the way.

What else?
Many of Frank Truman's scenes due to Forster's truly great performance.
Gordon's "I'm worried about you, Albert" (I agree with most of anti-Gordon comments here but that was a great moment).
Ed sitting lonely at his gas station.
Ben and Beverly here and there, perhaps.

I'm clearly forgetting a lot, still I find this 'true understanding' very much missing throughout all of those 18 parts.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

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Rialto wrote:
Rhodes wrote:
Gabriel wrote:Lynch has proven he can expertly handle the craft of filmmaking. Films such as The Straight Story and The Elephant Man prove he can create a narrative, draw tremendous performances from actors and can – daring to say it – touch the viewer's soul with warmth and humanity in his images.
You liked The Straight Story and The Elephant Man. That's fine, of course. But that's not the kind of experience people waited for 25 years anxiously, wouldn't you agree? Twin Peaks isn't an ordinary show. Just a nice, touching story (like there are hundreds) doesn't cut it.

Your reply is probably that you would have prefered such a show over what we actually got. Of course, you're entitled to that opinion. But I think that Lynch should at the very least have tried to make something memorable. And he did just that. Maybe he failed (I don't agree), but it is beyond doubt that he tried.

I think there would have been no excuse for making just a nicely crafted standard story with some warmth and humanity.
There's a tendency to believe that something difficult to watch, must be difficult to create. It's quite the opposite. Shows/films that attempt to pull the heartstrings are ten a penny. Those that actually get people where they live are rare, and take true talent.

The funniest comedy is far harder to write than the most experimental art film. Without true understanding of people, of what they fear and where they hurt, there's no brilliance, and no authenticity.

Don't be too quick to dismiss every simple story as Hallmark Channel schmaltz. It's too easy to put every cool image or thought that crossed your mind out there. Far harder to take those moments, dig into the heart of what they mean to you and craft them into a narrative that really connects.
My issue with defining difficult/experimental/abstract as more difficult to create and hence objectively better is that it actually comes down to a stylistic choice rather than artistic value. All it takes to create something superior is follow the conventions that define it as such or in this case dismiss those that define it worthless.
In this context the impression I got from The Return is that it was created with a bar set conveniently extremely low. The absolute dismissal of explanations/reasons/answers/purposes/themes only means it took an everything goes approach. It makes the creators job exceptionally easy. And Lynch knows perfectly well he can get away with it.

Ever since the 3rd season was announced there's been this notion that some people will be disappointed with it because they expect a soap opera and it still persists now after the 3rd season wrapped out as the only plausible reason for someone to be underwhelmed by it . Aside from the fact that I don't know who the hell wanted a soap opera, it seems that The Return's virtues are mainly in it not being a soap. What it isn't seems more important than what it is so it conveniently avoids being judged for what it is. It's as if it needed low grade cheap formulaic shows as foil to claim superiority.

In practice it would be an apples and oranges scenario but the value of the orange seems to be mainly in it not being an apple.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

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In it's quieter moments it demonstrated a ' true understanding of people, what they fear and where they hurt''

But did it?
well, it had it's moments. There was a lot of guff surrounding them, but they were there, yeah, like a regular tick. They weren't noisy, and tended to be asides to what else was going on...i am not going to try and list them, but i can think of scenes with mullins, scenes with dougie, the scene with albert and the coroner having dinner, a couple of janey e moments, some of the roadhouse stuff, some of the log lady moments, parts of the audrey or the becky/stephen thread, other scenes...almost like an aside to camera, the series kept taking the time to slow down and take a breather and have these little moments of a sort of quiet acknowledgement of what people are like, and a willingness and patience to hear people out, regardless, dotted about in there amongst all the song and dance routines and the action and the business. I think Lynch has an eye for that kind of sideways glance that shows us something about character, or rings true in an unexpected way, amidst all the rest of the psycho -melo - drama. At least, I have always found it a feature of his work and for me it was present here.

So, yeah, I think it did.

Sure the series had many flaws but not having any understanding of people seems like a bad place to start. It's almost trying too hard to find fault. There's enough problems visible already without looking for faces in the wallpaper.
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Re: Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group (SPOILERS)

Post by Novalis »

Gabriel wrote: I wanted backstabbing businessmen and women, mayoral skullduggery, murders, mills, One-Eyed Jacks, cross-border drug smuggling.
I'm not a native of this thread but I saw this and found it difficult not to respond. I too really enjoyed and appreciated all these aspects to and elements of the original series. They feel very much intrinsic and essential to it. By essential I mean that I don't think you could take these away from the original and just leave the FBI, local law enforcement, murder mystery and the lodge elements in as a kind of skeletal narrative. It might work as some kind of story but it wouldn't have been Twin Peaks as we know it.

Where I disagree is in my perspective of hindsight. All of the above was so very fresh and interesting for me in 1990, and I had never imagined such tangled bundles of stories of hope and despair and mystery could sit so well together. I loathed the soap operas of the time because they attempted to dramatise all these things at the same time but did so in a way that ended up diluting every possible ounce of interest and empathy I had as a viewer. Twin Peaks was markedly different (apart from a very few story arcs) in that it absolutely held my attention and left me begging for more each episode. Considering the TV of the time, it was like a bright flame against a very washy background. However, this was the early 90s. Since then the warmth, depth of feeling and quirkiness of the show has become something of a standard against which TV is measured, and it has spurred TV onwards and upwards. Things have improved; there's no longer a dearth of things to watch like there used to be but an overabundance of TV, catering to every possible aesthetic of interest in human relationships. To repeat the same atmosphere and qualities that the original series had now would be to risk losing it like a drop of water in the ocean. To repeat the kind of historic disruptive innovation that the original show had, it was necessary to do something else with the material.

With this in mind, I was not waiting 25 years for 'backstabbing businessmen and women, mayoral skullduggery, murders, mills, One-Eyed Jacks, cross-border drug smuggling' because as far as I could see a large part of those 25 years (especially the last 10-15) have already been dominated by these sorts of storylines and hooks. From where I'm standing, they've been done to death, and it makes no sense repeating them 'in the key of' Twin Peaks because they won't stand out from the background any longer as something discernibly different and culturally significant.

Now I'm not defending every choice Lynch and Frost have made. Many of my posts elsewhere are less than complimentary, and sometimes downright acerbic about S3. But on the whole I do appreciate it a great deal.

What I can't agree with is the idea that we were waiting for something like an uninterrupted continuation of S2. Already by 1992, the tone and stylistics of FWWM, for example, had already shifted everything to a better place for me. I liked what Lynch was doing there -- it felt fresh again, and something was added when re-watching the original season. As time went by and the old episodes started to feel more and more dated, I discovered that I relied on that film more and more to bridge my changing tastes. And in 2017, S3 has made the original show much more watchable again. I'm re-watching it right now, painstakingly poring over it, and loving it for all the different ways it responds to a new context.

I recognise that you never said 'we' were waiting for those stories to continue, but that you were. However, judging from many of the posts I read on this thread (and I read a lot of them) you are far from alone in this. But it certainly wasn't everyone. It wasn't me. I expected nothing less than a slap in the face to contemporary TV and its formulas, and I felt I got it. Obviously, expressing this opinion at any length takes us off topic so I won't labour it. I think the key point I was making here was actually a very simple one: different people had very different expectations. Stating the bleeding obvious really, ain't I? So I'll stop now.
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