Teresa Banks and Carrie Page

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Cappy
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Teresa Banks and Carrie Page

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Lately, the character (or plot device?) of Carrie Page has reminded of Teresa Banks, the girl from Deer Meadow who was murdered one year before Laura Palmer.

There seems to be a few obvious similarities, but it never actually occurred to me until recently, when I was reading theories suggesting Dale Cooper was dreaming the Deer Meadow sequence in FWWM (or that Chet Desmond is some version of Cooper, or Desmond and Agent Stanley are both Cooper somehow). Those ideas never really appealed to me, but they are starting to make sense in light of the Odessa stuff in part 18.

When I look at the Carrie Page stuff, it almost feels like it doesn't have any connection with anything in Twin Peaks previously depicted. Cooper doesn't act like himself, Laura certainly doesn't act like herself. The geography is different, the music is different. There is a miniature white horse in Carrie Page's home, and the Fat Trout electrical pole (number 6) is outside her house, but the similarities might end there. She also has a portable medical toilet in her living room, which reminds me of Beverly Page's ailing husband, but which could also be just a coincidence.

The whole Odessa segment can feel like a strange outlier within the Twin Peaks experience, but when I notice how Carrie Page seems to echo Teresa Banks, I begin to consider the significance both characters might have for the greater narrative. At first glance, both women are waitresses. Both seem to earn low wages, and are involved in illicit or illegal activities (Teresa with prostituting and drugs, Carrie with a dead guy on her couch). Both are subject to FBI investigations (although Cooper/Richard might not be on an official investigation, at least not in the typical sense). Teresa Banks is dead, killed by a client who first chose to engage with her due to her resemblance to Laura Palmer ("you look just like my Laura", Leland Palmer says to himself in FWWM). Carrie Page is alive (we assume), sought out by Cooper/Richard due to her resemblance to Laura Palmer. Carrie Page is in some sort of bad situation, and jumps at the first opportunity to flee it. Teresa Banks was mixed up in a blackmail scheme that got her killed, and might have also been involved in drugs with the local police somehow, but could have just have easily jumped in a car with Cooper/RIchard were he to just show up at her front door one day.

As stated above, both women have the number 6 electrical pole outside their homes. They also both seem to come into contact with the Tremonds/Chalfonts, with Teresa living near them, and Carrie coming into contact with them after traveling with Cooper/Richard. Both women are touched by the Spirit World characters, and both are tied together by their resemblance to Laura Palmer. I personally don't see the resemblance between Teresa and Laura, but it's her perceived resemblance by Leland Palmer that makes her of interest to the story.

I don't think this says anything definitive about the overall Twin Peaks experience, but Teresa Banks and Carrie Page sort of bookend the overall narrative. Teresa is dead a year before the show, the FBI's first whiff of the show's overall mystery (Gordon Cole's long Blue Rose case history not included), and we close the show on Carrie Page, a person who is reminiscent of Laura Palmer at first glance, but who seems to have just as much (if not more) in common with Teresa Banks. I think there is some sort of thread that ties all three of these women together, perhaps one them is dreaming the other two's lives, or two of them are dreaming, or all of them are dreaming, or they are all fractured versions of the same character.

Perhaps Teresa Banks is they key to the whole story, her dead body being akin to the corpse in Diane Selwyn's apartment in Mulholland Drive, and Carrie Page is like the reconstituted Diane Selwyn at the end of MD, looking just like Betty Elms, with the suggestion that this is the real Diane and Betty was the dream. Perhaps Teresa Banks dreamt up Laura Palmer, and Carrie Page is what happens when she wakes up? I don't think transplanting the structures of other Lynch films onto Twin Peaks can definitively "solve" Twin Peaks, or is even fair to Twin Peaks, but looking at other Lynch projects can give us clues for how to approach Peaks.

This could also shed light onto the Cooper/RIchard character. Richard acts nothing like the Dale Cooper we knew in the original series, in fact, he's probably closer to the Mr. C character, although he's silent nature is more reminiscent of Dougie. But if Carrie Page echoes anything about Teresa Banks, then it's very possible that 'Agent Richard' possesses shades of Agent Chet Desmond. RIchard possesses Desmond's matter of fact way of speaking, his propensity for violence, his utter lack of humor. And if he is simultaneously investigating a case in 1988, 1989, and whatever year Season 3 and episode 18 takes place, he might very well ask "what year is this?".

I'm not saying that Teresa Banks and Chet Desmond are any more or less real than Dale Cooper and Laura Palmer, or Carrie Page and "Richard". Maybe some of these characters are dreaming or misremembering the others (and themselves), maybe not. Maybe "Richard" is an amalgam of Chet Desmond and Dale Cooper, and Carrie Page a mix of Teresa Banks and Laura Palmer, or maybe not. I don't have any definitive conclusions here, but I will say that the ending to Season 3 feels more like an ending when I view it in light of it's connections to Teresa Banks. It creates even more of a full-circle quality than Laura and the Palmer house does, and makes some of the looser ends of the story feel less... loose.

Has anyone else felt a strong similarity between Carrie Page and Teresa Banks? And to a lesser extent, between Richard/Cooper and Chet Desmond?
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Cappy
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Re: Teresa Banks and Carrie Page

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It's also interesting to think, that if Carrie Page is somehow a version or continuation of Teresa Banks, and if Teresa Banks was killed trying to blackmail Leland Palmer, then perhaps Carrie Page's arrival at the Palmer's front door is the ultimate realization of that goal. Teresa didn't get what she demanded from Leland Palmer (in fact she was murdered by him), and now she's going to expose him by showing up at the Palmer house in some unspecified year.

I wonder how Leland, Sarah, or even Laura would react to Teresa randomly appearing and crashing their facade. Would Leland react angrily, or feign confusion and sympathy for this strange woman? Would Sarah scream hysterically, or just look on with her worried scowl? And would Laura feel embarrassed that her personal life was exposed to her parents, or sad at the news of her father's adultery, or traumatized by the ultimate implication? Obviously the illusion of their perfect family was destroyed when Laura found the missing pages in her diary and subsequently realized who BOB was, but a living Teresa could have had just a disruptive effect. Perhaps another person telling Laura who her father really was would have been harder to accept than her gradually figuring it out on her own terms, I don't know. But I guess we could also view the owl cave ring as an extension of Teresa, and that was essential to Laura seeing the truth of her father. So in a sense, Teresa already did make her way into the Palmer house and expose Leland.

And Chet Desmond was last seen reaching for the ring. If "Richard" is somehow a continuation of Chet Desmond, then maybe the final moments of episode 18 are him finally connecting Teresa's murder back to the Palmers, the screaming and power going out the sound of their idyllic home destroyed forever.
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Cappy
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Re: Teresa Banks and Carrie Page

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Aside from the connections between her and Carrie Page, there are also some echoes of Teresa Banks and her circumstances in S3. These might all very well be circumstantial, but it's interesting to wonder if Lynch/Frost were intentionally calling back to her character or not.

- Blackmail: In FWWM, Teresa Banks attempts to blackmail Leland Palmer. This plot does not advance very far, so we do not know exactly what Teresa was asking for and offering in return. It's probably logical to assume that she was asking for some amount of money, and threatening to expose her affair with Leland Palmer if her demands were not met.

In S3, Dougie Jones is blackmailed by men in relation to a large gambling debt. They send a picture of Dougie and a prostitute (Teresa Banks was also a prostitute) to Dougie's home in an effort to force him to pay them back. (Also, I don't know if this is worth mentioning, but a corpse bearing a resemblance to one of Dougie's blackmailers appears in Carrie Page's living room in Odessa)

- Head Bashing in Trailer: Teresa Banks is fatally bludgeoned in the head by Leland Palmer. This takes place in a trailer, but it is suggested that the Chalfont's trailer could be the scene of the crime.

Miriam Sullivan suffers several blows to her head at the hands of Richard Horne. This does not kill her, but it also takes place in a trailer. Richard attacked Miriam to prevent her from implicating him in a hit and run, although she had already mailed a letter to the police detailing Richard's crime.

Two violent head wounds in a trailer, both perpetrated with the intent to stop a woman from exposing an unpleasant truth about her attacker.

- Roadhouse Phone Call: While formulating her blackmail plot, Teresa calls Jacques Renault at the Roadhouse to inquire about Laura and Ronette Pulaski's fathers. Jacques is stationed behind the bar during this conversation.

In S3, Jean-Michel Renault (played by the same actor, Walter Olkewicz) is shown behind the bar at the Roadhouse arguing with someone on the phone about teenage prostitutes. This is probably just a coincidence, but it's easy to imagine Jacques Renault having the same arguments with (or about) the teenage Teresa Banks, on the same phone and behind the same bar.

- Drifter Waitress: After Carrie Page, the only S3 character who is strongly reminiscent of a Teresa Banks is Ella, played by Sky Ferreira. We don't know much about Ella beyond what is revealed in her booth scene at the Roadhouse, but she is apparently between waitressing jobs, and has some weird underarm rash. She could be viewed as being on drugs, and speaks incoherently about a penguin.

Teresa was also a waitress. She did not have an underarm rash, but did suffer some kind of numbness in one of her arms. She did use drugs (specifically, cocaine), but appeared markedly more well kept than Ella. Teresa never had a run in with a penguin, although the mask worn by Ms. Chalfont's grandon outside the Red Diamond Motel evokes memories of a penguin and it's beak. (Speaking of Red Diamond Motel, it sort of re-appears in S3 as The Dutchman's Lodge, home to whatever Phillip Jeffries is now)

Maybe some of these connections are coincidental and a bit of a reach, but it can allow us a way to connect a few of the disparate dots in the Twin Peaks world.
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Cappy
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Re: Teresa Banks and Carrie Page

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Oh and one other thing that just occurred to me...

- Identity Confusion Intercourse: In FWWM, Leland covers Teresa Palmer's face after intercourse, and asks "who am I?" To which she replies "I don't know."

This might be echoed in the final episode of Season 3, where Diane and Cooper have very mechanical intercourse, and Diane covers his face. It's not clear why she does this. I think on some level this scene is supposed to be reminiscent of the sexual assault she suffered at Mr. C's hands, hence her pain and inability to look at Cooper, but the act of covering Coop's face could also be a part of some ritual that allows them to cross into another reality (or at the very least, change identities into Richard and Linda).

If that is the case, then did Leland covering Teresa's face have the effect of turning them into new characters altogether? Obviously Leland already had a schizoid identity with the BOB stuff, but perhaps this fractured Teresa into some different character down the road (I'm looking at you, Carrie Page).
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Andromedeaux
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Re: Teresa Banks and Carrie Page

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I think you may really be onto something. What you said - all of it. I am watching that entire car sequence w Leland and Mike in FWWM in a new light. Really indicative of some kind of identity superposition Teresa and Laura (or Carrie). The very next scene when Laura is in her room and she has a flashback of Mike in the RV coming "out of the blue" and we see her realize that the same ring Mike wears is on Teresa. In Laura's version, Teresa is basically superimposed over Laura wearing the ring in lingerie next to Ronette. Leland visualizes Laura in this scene, not Teresa. Then we see Leland promptly pay Teresa and remark "I chickened out". It's as if Leland has no knowledge of the ring and its effect and Laura has a haunting realization about its effects, who Leland is, and maybe even who Mike is and how he is related to Bob. How they are both related to her father and his conscience (lack thereof).

I have other impressions, not developed. But this is the most insightful TP post I've read in a while.
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Re: Teresa Banks and Carrie Page

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Andromedeaux wrote:I think you may really be onto something. What you said - all of it. I am watching that entire car sequence w Leland and Mike in FWWM in a new light. Really indicative of some kind of identity superposition Teresa and Laura (or Carrie). The very next scene when Laura is in her room and she has a flashback of Mike in the RV coming "out of the blue" and we see her realize that the same ring Mike wears is on Teresa. In Laura's version, Teresa is basically superimposed over Laura wearing the ring in lingerie next to Ronette. Leland visualizes Laura in this scene, not Teresa. Then we see Leland promptly pay Teresa and remark "I chickened out". It's as if Leland has no knowledge of the ring and its effect and Laura has a haunting realization about its effects, who Leland is, and maybe even who Mike is and how he is related to Bob. How they are both related to her father and his conscience (lack thereof).

I have other impressions, not developed. But this is the most insightful TP post I've read in a while.
Thanks! Yeah, the whole car sequence with Leland and Mike + the dual flashbacks/recalls of Leland and Laura is just such a great stretch of cinema -- probably one of the most compelling depictions of memory retrieval I've ever seen. But yeah, it does contain suggestions of identity confusion, especially with the way it edits between Leland's recollection and Laura's recollection. Their memories almost blur in parts, making it almost seem like Laura is recalling blackmailing Leland and being murdered by him (or recalling Teresa have these experiences, if you don't subscribe to the idea that they are somehow aspects of each other).

Also, as others have pointed out, the intersection where Mike confronts the Palmers is reused in S3 as the scene of Richard running over that kid. Maybe there aren't any overt similarities between the two scenes beyond that (death of innocence?), but the No. 6 electrical pole is shown to be at this spot in 2014 (or whatever year S3 takes place), thereby linking this intersection to Teresa Banks' trailer in Deer Meadow and Carrie Page's house in Odessa. Is this intersection where their characters somehow intersect as well?
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Cappy
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Re: Teresa Banks and Carrie Page

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Along with the Mo's Motor intersection, Lynch also reuses the Red Diamond City Motel location. It reappears in S3 as The Dutchman's Lodge, existing above a Convenient Store.

Red Diamond City Motel is the location where Leland spots Laura and Ronette in the motel room, where he is first forced to confront the potential consequences of his actions. As he flees the scene, Teresa starts to get ideas that lead to her attempted blackmail of Leland. And of course, after Leland splits, Laura notices Teresa's ring, a detail that later helps her to piece together BOB's identity.

The Dutchman's Lodge, on the other hand, is a darkened motel and parking lot. What's left of Phillip Jeffries seems to occupy two different rooms, and there are Woodsmen and a 'bosomy woman' character around the premises.

I really just thought the reuse of this filming location was a total coincidence, but there is one detail that got me thinking that the choice of this location was not only intentional, but also meant to add significance to the scenes featuring it in FWWM. At the end of Ep. 15, the 'bosomy woman' character is shown standing in this garage/car port type of area:

Image

After Leland sees Laura and Ronette in FWWM, he begins to retreat and bumps in Teresa right in front of that same area:

Image

The above shot should be of Teresa watching Leland walk away, right before he passes by Ms. Tremond's grandson, wearing the Jumping Man mask. In Ep. 15, a shot of the Jumping Man (or his mask) is flashed when a Woodsman activates an electrical device that allows Mr. C to visit the Dutchman's Lodge. On some level, this begs the question of the relationship between Red Diamond City Motel and The Dutchman's Lodge, are they the same place, different versions of the same thing, etc.

My first impression of this is similarity between the roles of Teresa Banks and the 'bosomy woman'. The latter functions as a literal gatekeeper, unlocking a door so Mr. C can gain information. Teresa organizes a sexual encounter for Leland, which although this event never comes to fruition, it does force Leland to confront the effect his actions have had on his daughter. Teresa, in a sense, is a gatekeeper, unlocking a truth about Leland that he does not want to confront. And when the memory of Teresa (and her ring) compel Laura to see that BOB and Leland are one and the same, she performs a similar roll again. Teresa Banks was the key that Laura used to uncover a truth. Leland killed Teresa in part to prevent her from performing this function, but even in death, she still found a way to open the door. The 'bosomy woman' does this literally, while Teresa performs this action in a more symbolic manner.
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Re: Teresa Banks and Carrie Page

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And I guess the last thing that ties Teresa Banks into Carrie Page (or Season 3) is a relatively small thing, but maybe it is worth mentioning.

In FWWM, when the FBI agents are asking Irene questions at Hap's Diner in Deer Meadow, that random older man asks them something like "are you talking about that little girl that was murdered?"

In S3, Audrey Horne asks Charlie "is this the story of the little girl who lives down the lane?", which is echoed when The Arm says the same thing to Cooper in Ep. 18.

Are all three characters referring to the same little girl? If so, why would Audrey and The Arm be talking about Teresa Banks of all people?

I mean the last thing we can say with much certainty about Audrey is that she was blown up in a bank, but I really suspect that had nothing to do with Teresa Banks.
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