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Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Tue Jun 20, 2017 4:11 pm
by Blackasmidnight
Anyone have a problem with the three pages of Laura's pages being found? In FWWM, Laura had already given the diary to Harold Smith BEFORE she encountered Annie in her dream later in the movie. Therefore, she never had a chance to write Annie's message/warning in her 'secret diary.' Any theories?

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Tue Jun 20, 2017 4:34 pm
by BigEd
Blackasmidnight wrote:Anyone have a problem with the three pages of Laura's pages being found? In FWWM, Laura had already given the diary to Harold Smith BEFORE she encountered Annie in her dream later in the movie. Therefore, she never had a chance to write Annie's message/warning in her 'secret diary.' Any theories?
If you move beyond the assumption that all scenes in FWWM are chronological, then there is no issue here. The fact that we chronologically see Laura "wake up" from back to back dreams, doesn't require a continuous timeline. I believe that the prior diary entry was around Halloween (we'll assume the prior October), so that can suggest that she had the Annie dream, and wrote it in her diary, three or four months before her death. Nothing "requires" it to happen the same time as the picture-room dream or her waking up to the real world.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Tue Jun 20, 2017 6:17 pm
by 4815162342
It was pretty clear that the Annie dream happened after the picture on the wall/"don't take the ring Laura" vision/dream, which definitely happened after she came home and found Bob about to look at her diary, as at that point she was carrying the picture with her, and the grandson warned her that Bob had found the diary. Doing a cut to the past at that point makes no sense from a narrative point of view. If Leland did it, it's a continuity error.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Tue Jun 20, 2017 7:07 pm
by BigEd
4815162342 wrote:It was pretty clear that the Annie dream happened after the picture on the wall/"don't take the ring Laura" vision/dream, which definitely happened after she came home and found Bob about to look at her diary, as at that point she was carrying the picture with her, and the grandson warned her that Bob had found the diary. Doing a cut to the past at that point makes no sense from a narrative point of view. If Leland did it, it's a continuity error.
It's only a continuity error if you insist that all of the scenes are chronological. FWWM was only a 2 hour movie. You only have so much time to tuck in dreams and then showing Laura waking up, to let the audience know it was a dream.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Wed Jun 21, 2017 3:57 am
by 4815162342
BigEd wrote:
4815162342 wrote:It was pretty clear that the Annie dream happened after the picture on the wall/"don't take the ring Laura" vision/dream, which definitely happened after she came home and found Bob about to look at her diary, as at that point she was carrying the picture with her, and the grandson warned her that Bob had found the diary. Doing a cut to the past at that point makes no sense from a narrative point of view. If Leland did it, it's a continuity error.
It's only a continuity error if you insist that all of the scenes are chronological. FWWM was only a 2 hour movie. You only have so much time to tuck in dreams and then showing Laura waking up, to let the audience know it was a dream.
As I said, a random cut to a past dream in the middle of a present dream makes no sense from a narrative point of view.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Wed Jun 21, 2017 5:09 am
by Gabriel
Blackasmidnight wrote:Anyone have a problem with the three pages of Laura's pages being found? In FWWM, Laura had already given the diary to Harold Smith BEFORE she encountered Annie in her dream later in the movie. Therefore, she never had a chance to write Annie's message/warning in her 'secret diary.' Any theories?
She had hoped to retrieve the diary from Harold, so she tore out some pages and carried on writing, with the intention of sticking them back in once the danger had passed. Leland found these pages in her bedroom and showed them to her in the train carriage ('I thought you knew...!')

Alternatively, the Annie dream is a recurring one and the rest of the dream was new.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Wed Jun 21, 2017 8:46 am
by asmahan
Gabriel wrote:
Blackasmidnight wrote:Anyone have a problem with the three pages of Laura's pages being found? In FWWM, Laura had already given the diary to Harold Smith BEFORE she encountered Annie in her dream later in the movie. Therefore, she never had a chance to write Annie's message/warning in her 'secret diary.' Any theories?
She had hoped to retrieve the diary from Harold, so she tore out some pages and carried on writing, with the intention of sticking them back in once the danger had passed. Leland found these pages in her bedroom and showed them to her in the train carriage ('I thought you knew...!')

Alternatively, the Annie dream is a recurring one and the rest of the dream was new.
This explanation actually makes sense, nice.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Wed Jun 21, 2017 10:27 am
by federicomiozzo
I guess we simply have to face it's a continuity error, that's all. It doesn't take away beauty from the masterpiece TR is.
They simply could not avoid using the FWWM Annie dream and other material because of the depth and beauty and mystery it adds to the story, also because plot-wise it is the best link to help Twin Peaks Police in understanding that the Cooper that went out was not the one that came in, and to take (finally) the supernatural part of the show to top all of he other factors ( a thing that they were not able to do completely in the original series)

Plus, Laura is going to be really important in the series in future episodes (just look at "Laura is the One" title and Leland's "Find Laura" to Coop.
I guess since the editing is done there is not any way to twist facts with new informations to make thing go smoothly and this will remain a continuity error that hard-core fans will speculate about.

But a third Diary, or a meals on wheels return to Harold Smith's house to add the Annie Dream information, or that the event in FWWM are not in chronological order, or that the ream was recurrent, etc... they ll look like cringeworthy attempt by fans to try and make it look like no "mistake" was done, when indeed it was, and it is not the only one (electrical pole number 6 and New fat trout say Hello).

The this is that I have many friend that are watching the new season and ALL of em they comment "it's cool but I don't get anything of what's happening", "wow, but man I don't get whats going on". So, yeah, a continuity error might be unimportant for casual watchers, but TPTR is really not so appealing or in any way easily understandable for newcomers or casual watchers.
I have to stop the episodes A LOT to help my partner (which is a HUGE Lynch's and Twin Peaks fan) to help him connect the dots JUST to make him understand what is going on.

I LOVE this 18 hour film, I absolutely love it, and even the fact we are here talking about it's a great thing.
I am watching it as an ART film, as I did with Eraserhead when I have the guts to put the DVD on.
Nevertheless, unless Frost/lynch are such geniuses that in the next episodes they will come out with the REAL explanation that puts this "pages mess" in order, this is and will be simply a continuity error of lame writing. It must be hard for the writers to deal with such a mythological series like Twin Peaks and all of its plot's ramifications.

From the vibe I got of Hawk's explanation to Truman during Episode 7 I am pretty convince that THAT is the explanation they are going to stick with: those pages were torn from the 2nd diary which Harold had and this will never "sit well" with FWWM events.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Wed Jun 21, 2017 12:15 pm
by Gabriel
federicomiozzo wrote:I guess we simply have to face it's a continuity error, that's all. It doesn't take away beauty from the masterpiece TR is.
They simply could not avoid using the FWWM Annie dream and other material because of the depth and beauty and mystery it adds to the story, also because plot-wise it is the best link to help Twin Peaks Police in understanding that the Cooper that went out was not the one that came in, and to take (finally) the supernatural part of the show to top all of he other factors ( a thing that they were not able to do completely in the original series)

Plus, Laura is going to be really important in the series in future episodes (just look at "Laura is the One" title and Leland's "Find Laura" to Coop.
I guess since the editing is done there is not any way to twist facts with new informations to make thing go smoothly and this will remain a continuity error that hard-core fans will speculate about.

But a third Diary, or a meals on wheels return to Harold Smith's house to add the Annie Dream information, or that the event in FWWM are not in chronological order, or that the ream was recurrent, etc... they ll look like cringeworthy attempt by fans to try and make it look like no "mistake" was done, when indeed it was, and it is not the only one (electrical pole number 6 and New fat trout say Hello).

The this is that I have many friend that are watching the new season and ALL of em they comment "it's cool but I don't get anything of what's happening", "wow, but man I don't get whats going on". So, yeah, a continuity error might be unimportant for casual watchers, but TPTR is really not so appealing or in any way easily understandable for newcomers or casual watchers.
I have to stop the episodes A LOT to help my partner (which is a HUGE Lynch's and Twin Peaks fan) to help him connect the dots JUST to make him understand what is going on.

I LOVE this 18 hour film, I absolutely love it, and even the fact we are here talking about it's a great thing.
I am watching it as an ART film, as I did with Eraserhead when I have the guts to put the DVD on.
Nevertheless, unless Frost/lynch are such geniuses that in the next episodes they will come out with the REAL explanation that puts this "pages mess" in order, this is and will be simply a continuity error of lame writing. It must be hard for the writers to deal with such a mythological series like Twin Peaks and all of its plot's ramifications.

From the vibe I got of Hawk's explanation to Truman during Episode 7 I am pretty convince that THAT is the explanation they are going to stick with: those pages were torn from the 2nd diary which Harold had and this will never "sit well" with FWWM events.
I actually remember watching that scene in my local cinema at the first screening on the day of release and, when that scene showed up, I thought to myself 'Oh no! She's already given it to Harold, so she can't save Cooper!'

Thing is, if we go by Leland stating that he'd read Laura's diary and 'thought she knew,' it becomes impossible for the missing pages already taken to include the revelation that Leland was BOB, since Laura was horrified when she saw Leland walk out of the house and couldn't believe he was BOB.

Realistically, that means Laura had carried on writing diary entries somewhere, since that was the way she handled all her traumas and, indeed, how she channeled BOB – perhaps even depowered him somewhat – as he sought to possess her.*

So, given she liked to throw all sorts of things in her secret diary, ripping out a few pages to glue back in later makes sense. On assumes Laura didn't expect to die when she gave the diary to Harold after all. She simply didn't know when she'd be back.

(* actually, the extended 'smile' scene is the only Missing Piece I wish had stayed in the film... and the Cooper bathroom scene as a post-credit sequence, of course!)

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Sun May 10, 2020 6:21 pm
by Mr. Reindeer
I was torn between starting a new thread and reviving a very old one, but it probably makes the most sense to continue here...

There are two things I want to address here: the overlap between TSDoLP and the filmed material (when entries from Jennifer’s book are seen or referenced onscreen), and the headache-inducing timeline of the torn-out pages.

In terms of the first point, here’s a list of all the instances I’ve found of the filmed material using excerpts from Jennifer’s book. If you caught anymore, please let me know and I’ll add them to the list! I freeze framed pretty laboriously when I was working on my timeline a few years ago, but sometimes it’s pretty tough to read cursive writing while pages are being quickly flipped onscreen. Obviously, there are also many contradictions between the book and the show/film (which I went into in my timeline), but here I’m just interested in indexing moments when the show/movie canonize the book.

— The 7/23/1984 entry (“Waltzin’ Matilda” dream) is glimpsed in Episode 15 when Cooper flips through the diary while taunting Ben in the interrogation room (canonizing Jupiter the cat on the show, as well as an interestingly creepy reference to Sarah)
— Harold reads Donna some of the 10/03/1985 entry (“dreams of big, big men”) in Episode 11
— Although not a direct diary reference on the show, Donna in Episode 12 tells Harold the same skinny-dipping story recounted in the 10/18/1985 entry in TSDoLP
— The entry dated 10/04/1989 (obviously an impossible date on the show given Laura’s date of death) is referenced by Cooper in Episodes 14 and 15 (“Someday I’m going to tell the world about Ben Horne...”); on the show, Cooper says this was written less than two weeks before her death (and the show rephrases the wording)
— The 10/31/1989 entry from the book (again, the book date doesn’t gibe with Laura’s death) ends abruptly with a torn-out page (Nancy brings Laura her stuff from OEJ on Halloween); in a nice bit of continuity, a continuation of this entry is seen on one of the torn-out pages in Part 7
— An Undated entry (the penultimate entry in the book, pages 179-181 in my edition, discussing a session with Jacoby) is seen in FWWM when Laura flips through her diary, when she notices that pages have been torn out. In the book, this entry is preceded by a torn-out page and followed by two more torn-out pages, then a final entry. In the film, it is preceded by an entry about rainy weather in Seattle which does not appear anywhere in TSDoLP, and before that is a torn-out page. The ending of this same entry from the book is seen on a torn-out page in Part 7, contradicting it being an intact part of TSDoLP “as found” in Jennifer’s book (see below)

In terms of the torn-out pages, we have a few aspects to address. First, we know Leland/Bob tore out pages before Laura ever left the diary with Harold; when Laura flips through the diary in FWWM, it appears that there are at least three torn-out pages. Subsequently, he seemingly somehow tore out more after she left it with Harold (see below). For what it’s worth, in Jennifer’s book, there are nine torn-out pages noted after the diary was found, although I doubt L/F gave any thought to sticking to that number religiously. Of these torn-out pages, Leland left an unspecified number near Glastonbury Grove after Laura’s murder, which Hawk finds in Episode 8 (and which Gordon confirms to be diary pages in Episode 13, although they are said to be faded and we never hear if their contents were discerned). Interesting that Leland/Bob left these near the crime scene as a potential clue (or perhaps he accidentally dropped them)...too bad we’ll never know their contents. Leland apparently still retained three pages after that, which he kept on him and stashed in the sheriff’s station restroom upon his arrest (this is assuming Hawk—who notably was not present for Leland’s arrest—is correct, and that it wasn’t Mike or someone else who took/stashed them). Then, we have Harold removing a single page from the diary and leaving it with the “other” Mrs. Tremond just before his suicide. And finally, we have Harold tearing the diary apart before his death, with Cooper saying “a great deal of it has been mutilated”...which makes it a bit puzzling how Hawk can say with such certainty that one mystery page is still missing after they find the three in TR!

Now, here’s the timeline of Laura leaving the diary with Harold and the subsequent entries/missing pages apparently written after the fact. (I’m basing these dates on my understanding of the timeline, which I think is shared by most fans. No dates in regards to these entries appear onscreen, except where specifically noted.)

— 2/16: Laura first discovers that pages have been torn out and leaves the diary with Harold, saying she doesn’t know if she can come back, claiming that the diary will be safe with Harold since Bob doesn’t know about him (this contradicts Laura writing about Harold in Jennifer’s book); also, one assumes that Laura could still continue visiting Harold under the guise of her Meals on Wheels route without arousing suspicion, and she might indeed come to this realization once her panic subsides.
— 2/18: (Page torn out, found in sheriff’s station bathroom, seen/discussed in Part 7) Laura writes about her Annie dream/vision from the prior night (perhaps Annie telling Laura to write it in her diary is what inspired her to return to Harold’s; I like to imagine Laura goes directly there after taking the painting down)
— 2/22 (one side of the torn-out page Harold left with the “other” Mrs. Tremond before his suicide, date specifically referenced by Donna in Episode 16 when she reads it) Laura recounts her side of the Cooper Red Room dream and whispering Bob’s true identity (this dream would be the night before she consciously realizes Leland is Bob in FWWM, but she has been fearing/suspecting it for almost a week, and has been subconsciously aware for likely much longer, so it’s not a stretch that she would be able to articulate it in a dream)
— 2/23: (the other side of the page Harold left with Tremond; again, Donna reads the entry aloud and specifically references the date) Laura resigns to die this night to keep Bob from hurting her anymore
— 2/23: (Page torn out, found in sheriff’s station restroom, seen/discussed in Part 7) At 1:30am, Laura writes an entry that ends, “NOW I KNOW IT ISN’T BOB. I KNOW WHO IT IS.” (the date of the entry is never mentioned onscreen; I’m basing the date solely off the FWWM chronology of when Laura becomes fully conscious that Bob is Leland). This entry is problematic for several reasons: the 1:30am time implies that Laura left to go to Harold’s in the middle of the night and risked Leland/Bob following her; also, since the 2/23 entry from Episode 16 was on the flip-side of a prior entry from 2/22, it seems that logically this entry comes after that one...but the flip-side of THIS entry is the end of the penultimate entry from Jennifer’s book, which was seen already written in FWWM before Laura drops the diary at Harold’s.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2020 12:59 pm
by 4815162342
I don't see any point in bothering with the Secret Diary fanfic. Lynch never read it, and he doesn't even care about his own continuity! I would stick to TV + FWWM, to make it a bit less messy.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2020 11:47 am
by AXX°N N.
4815162342 wrote:I don't see any point in bothering with the Secret Diary fanfic. Lynch never read it, and he doesn't even care about his own continuity! I would stick to TV + FWWM, to make it a bit less messy.
Sheryl Lee read it and used it to inform her performance, and seeing as she's a major driving force for the movie, for that reason alone I don't think it's entirely right to disregard it.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Wed Aug 05, 2020 5:51 am
by 4815162342
AXX°N N. wrote:
4815162342 wrote:I don't see any point in bothering with the Secret Diary fanfic. Lynch never read it, and he doesn't even care about his own continuity! I would stick to TV + FWWM, to make it a bit less messy.
Sheryl Lee read it and used it to inform her performance, and seeing as she's a major driving force for the movie, for that reason alone I don't think it's entirely right to disregard it.

Informing a performance doesn't make it useful for tracking dates for plot continuity. Also, no matter what informs a performance, it's still just saying the lines on the page, and if the people writing those lines don't care about the Diary, the result won't reflect it very much.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Wed Aug 05, 2020 9:06 am
by AXX°N N.
4815162342 wrote:
AXX°N N. wrote:
4815162342 wrote:I don't see any point in bothering with the Secret Diary fanfic. Lynch never read it, and he doesn't even care about his own continuity! I would stick to TV + FWWM, to make it a bit less messy.
Sheryl Lee read it and used it to inform her performance, and seeing as she's a major driving force for the movie, for that reason alone I don't think it's entirely right to disregard it.

Informing a performance doesn't make it useful for tracking dates for plot continuity. Also, no matter what informs a performance, it's still just saying the lines on the page, and if the people writing those lines don't care about the Diary, the result won't reflect it very much.
The people writing the lines do care, though. You see portions of the book someone took the time to write out in longhand in Laura's prop diary as she flips through it in FWWM. They even cared enough to continue an entry Jennifer wrote 25 years ago, which until then was partially unfinished, on-screen and legible in the new season, as Mr. Reindeer has tracked. They've also previously taken lines from the diary and had the actors read them aloud. Whether Lynch read it or not, which iirc has conflicting accounts, it's clear that the production itself has involved its content consistently over the course of each production, whether literally or performatively. If all we should pay attention to are TV+FWWM, then the diary or at least selections of it exists there already, anyway. And it's not as if the original series + movie were ever free of their own continuity strangeness.

Re: Laura's diary pages (Potential Spoiler?)

Posted: Wed Aug 05, 2020 1:51 pm
by 4815162342
AXX°N N. wrote:
4815162342 wrote:
AXX°N N. wrote: Sheryl Lee read it and used it to inform her performance, and seeing as she's a major driving force for the movie, for that reason alone I don't think it's entirely right to disregard it.

Informing a performance doesn't make it useful for tracking dates for plot continuity. Also, no matter what informs a performance, it's still just saying the lines on the page, and if the people writing those lines don't care about the Diary, the result won't reflect it very much.
The people writing the lines do care, though. You see portions of the book someone took the time to write out in longhand in Laura's prop diary as she flips through it in FWWM. They even cared enough to continue an entry Jennifer wrote 25 years ago, which until then was partially unfinished, on-screen and legible in the new season, as Mr. Reindeer has tracked. They've also previously taken lines from the diary and had the actors read them aloud. Whether Lynch read it or not, which iirc has conflicting accounts, it's clear that the production itself has involved its content consistently over the course of each production, whether literally or performatively. If all we should pay attention to are TV+FWWM, then the diary or at least selections of it exists there already, anyway. And it's not as if the original series + movie were ever free of their own continuity strangeness.
A few tiny snippets do not outweigh the outrageous number of discontinuities with the show + fwwm. For all we know (and I believe this happened), they gave those to JL to include, not the other way. Annie page is not in the book...because fwwm didn't exist yet.