Jasper wrote:]If we have glyphs in the Owl Cave which include the symbol on the ring and tall man and short man images, as well as legends (told by Hawk) about the Black Lodge, then how does that work with the lodge spirits arriving in the 1950s? Perhaps the lodge was there, and that is where humans (and spirits?) have always met their shadow selves, and BOB, MIKE et al are simply hanging out there... Presumably the cave paintings and the legends shared by Hawk go back hundreds or thousands of years
This. I'm not even sure how much Lynch was aware of the stuff coming out of the mind of people like Harley Peyton late in Season 2. Like Earle's rant about the dugpas. I'm not sure if the story of dugpas was supposed to apply to spirits like MIKE and BOB or something else. Either way it's never mentioned again (for the best since it just repeats Madame Blavatsky's mis-characterization of that Tibetan sect). When Lynch rewrote Episode 29, he threw out stuff like the Hooded Guardian that Major Briggs had been seeing for example. So because of all the different writers and directors, I'm not sure. I didn't really care for the Owl Cave stuff as I felt it was trying to make the mythology a little too physical or literal or something.
I like your idea that the Lodge has perhaps always existed and BOB and MIKE have simply invaded it. The 1950s back story that Engels has dropped bits and pieces of makes NO SENSE to me at all though (even for TP lol!). Like, how does delaying the Inauguration ball to watch
I Love Lucy stop time and create some kind of dimensional vortex to allow the Lodge entities to come through? Or did it pull them through against their will, since there's that whole idea of them wanting to return home? What is the deal with MIKE and BOB living originally "living underneath the Formica table" that Engels said in the FWWM documentary on the blu-ray?
OH and, back to the Convenience Store and the Lodge again. Do only BOB and Little MIKE go there then? It seems like in the extended scene, the rest of the entities seen above the Store dissolve or fade into the trees. Except, the next time we hear of Mrs. Tremond and the Grandson, they appear to be physically present (albeit somehow replacing the space-time of whoever's house they are in). Which brings to mind in the script where she says, "Why not be composed of materials and combinations of atoms?" It almost seems like some of them went into the trees, some to the Lodge (and to "fell a victim" or possess people), etc.
If I put on my writing cap, I can imagine that MIKE, while in control of Gerard, had the evil incantation tattoo'd on Gerard's arm. It may actually have been Gerard who...removed the arm...MIKE may have then misrepresented Gerard's act as being MIKE's own in order to manipulate Cooper and co.
Thank you for putting on your writing cap! Those are exactly the kinds of ideas I'm so interested in. That would certainly explain the incongruity. In Episode 13, when Cooper is withholding Gerard's medication, I noticed the Agent asks him, "You know this man [Bob]. Why did you lie to me before?". Gerard, convulsing, looks terrified and answers, "It wasn't me. Don't you understand? It wasn't me?!!" before he makes "the change" to MIKE. That got me thinking--so was MIKE actually in control when Cooper and Harry interviewed way back in Episode 4, and his story about the car accident, his 'Mom' tattoo, his snooping around intensive care because of his friend the veterinarian etc. all a lie to throw the police off his trail? But if so then why did he appear in Cooper's dream looking like Gerard in the first place? I had assumed he did that because, unlike BOB, he wasn't hiding and wanted Cooper to find him. But maybe Cooper seeing MIKE and BOB in his dream was all the LMFAP's doing (linking them all up somehow across the worlds) when he is rubbing his hands with his back turned?
Continuing in Episode 13, MIKE says, "Ah but when I saw the face of God, I was
purified." He clearly points to Gerard's nub and says, "I took off the arm. But remained close to this vessel, inhabiting from time to time for one single purpose [to stop Bob]." So...I'm not really sure who is supposed to be doing what when, unless MIKE is, as you suggested, just lying and taking credit for Gerard's actions. Which, if so, poor Gerard--cutting off his own arm and MIKE can still possess him.