Parts 3 & 4 - Call for help & ...brings back some memories (SPOILERS)

Discussion of each of the 18 parts of Twin Peaks the Return

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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by BookhouseBartender »

Watching paint dry indeed! :D

Overall, I'm pleased. This is just flat out, bat crap crazy. That first half of epi 3 was absolutely phenomenal, and the Briggs cameo was perfection. But the moment Bobby saw Laura's picture and the music began to play was the first moment since The Log Lady that I really felt something, a deeper emotional connection to the material. I was crying right along with him. Up til then, my reactions to this series were purely aesthetic and cerebral.

I make absolutely NO apologies for reveling in the moments that scream 'old school' Twin Peaks or FWWM. I'm taking the whole thing in on it's own merits with an open mind, and judging accordingly. I'm thoroughly enjoying this for what it is, but I'm not fooling myself into thinking it's flawless. It isn't. I can still love and appreciate this in spite of its flaws. Or maybe even because of them.

Mind is spinning right now, more later...
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by happyrat98 »

Anyone else love Tamara Preston?
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by Mr. Reindeer »

Jerry Horne wrote:That scene with Wally is a new low in the Twin Peaks Universe. Embarrassing.
Not sure I agree with "a new low" -- at least it didn't degrade preexisting characters like the scene of Will fawning over Lana -- but yes, for me, that was the only scene in the Parts released tonight that was absolutely painful -- felt very much of a piece with the portion of season 2 that DKL has recently claimed "sucked." The gag of Lucy refusing to compromise on the first name, and the kid resultantly receiving Brando's last name, is hysterically funny and very "Andy & Lucy." But the prolonged shtick imitating The Wild Ones and The Godfather was cringe-worthy. Subtle tributes to The Fugitive and Vertigo are cute and fun; an actor doing a (lousy) full-on Brando impression for minutes at a stretch is.....not what I want to see Lynch spending his time on. Meh. Forester, a favorite actor of mine, was utterly wasted in his first scene on subpar comedy.

Getting the negative out of the way: The pacing is glacial. I say that as someone who adores IE (the "Pomona Bus" scene is one of my favorite film sequences ever) and LH, and worships any and all scenes featuring Ed Wright and Hank Worden. In some scenes here, I think the slow pace works like gangbusters; in others, it's fatal (particularly the comedy scenes ) -- I don't love DKL directing straight comedy under the best of circumstances, but all the Andy/Lucy stuff has been really poorly cut IMO, with pauses between unfunny-to-being-with lines lasting for interminable lengths). Based solely upon these four Parts -- and I reserve final judgment until I've seen the whole "movie" -- the thread speculating that the 18-hour runtime will be a flaw seems on the mark.

DKL has said that enforced runtimes help him sculpt a work; I think several of the scenes in the first four Parts could definitely have benefited from a sped-up pace. Exhibit A is the sequence of Coop & Sunny Jim. Parts of this sequence strike me as possibly the best sequence on the new show so far: silly humor mixed with genuine character development and pathos, Coop re-finding his humanity through interaction with the most innocent form of human, Coop trying coffee and giving a thumbs-up for the first time since his re-entry into the world...and a phenomenal new Badalamenti piece to accompany the proceedings! But the fricking thing just drags and drags on. It survives and it's still an instant classic, IMO, but that's in spite of the dragged-out editing, not because of it. Ultimately, I love that DKL is doing his own damned thing, and whatever this ends up being, I'm convinced based on what I've seen that I'll love it, as messy as it may end up being. But I do think that some tightening-up would have probably benefited at least the stretch that we've seen so far.

Albert, Gordon, and Denise don't sound at all like their original "voices" (except Gordon's wonderful dialogue about the guy being sent to the North Pole!). I'm talking writing and acting. As a DKL fan more than a TP fan, I didn't think I'd be saying this, but I miss Harley Peyton and his Albert dialogue. Albert feels sadly generic and interchangeable here. While I admittedly thoroughly enjoyed watching Chrysta Bell strut about in a pencil skirt, the characters openly drooling over her -- and particularly making it the entire focus of what may end up being Denise's only scene in the show -- is uncomfortable.

Margaret is heartbreaking. Can anyone say for sure that that's someone other than Bowie on the phone? And, whem did DKL bring in Don Davis to say "blue rose"? Was that CGI?
Last edited by Mr. Reindeer on Mon May 22, 2017 1:07 am, edited 4 times in total.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by BEARisonFord »

happyrat98 wrote:Anyone else love Tamara Preston?
Jury's still out for me, but whatever Chrysta Bell is selling, I ain't buying.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by Ross »

Mixed feelings from me so far. Way different than I imagined though. Virtually no Badalamenti music. The special effects are really bad. Including the look of the red room.

Why was Ronette in the Lodge? Is she dead?
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by Pöllö »

Episode 4 was the best thus far due to the scene with Bobby and the jail scene. Also hearing actual MUSIC when Coop drinks his coffee made me feel something. I really hope that this will be an upwards trend. So far it feels like Lynch took all of his projects and just threw them in together.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by Jerry Horne »

I like some of the brooding underscore, but not enough Badalamenti! When we heard 'Dark Mood Woods' I thought okay here we go, then it's gone. At least track some more of the older cues. Minor quibble?

Some good stuff though! The big lady with the dog killed it! Denise/Cole scene was top notch. I'll re-watch before any more comments.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by Chester Desmond »

I agree with what most people have said in here...

I am gonna watch all 18 episodes because it is Twin Peaks and clearly is an exercise in futility/masochism.

This has fallen far from my expectations. I love weird, I love David Lynch, I was prepared for weird, I was not prepared for horrible quality. I was expecting Fire Walk With Me because David Lynch stressed how important that film was to this series... and not only was I "okay" with that, I loved that. I am NOT in the "I just like ABC series quirk" group.

This was no Fire Walk With Me, not by far.

I would love to feel bewilderment, excitement, thrill, mystery, but I feel none of those things. ...and it's not the plot line, I dig the plot line more or less, it's the execution, the production. It's awful.

I hate to say it, and I sincerely hope it isn't true, but was this just a last hurrah for David Lynch to cash in on the franchise? To leave some substantial payout to his children in his will? Nobody who watched all 4 parts can say "Wow this is the best thing he's ever done", at least I can't. I can't even say it is "okay", let alone good.... and I liked Inland Empire.

I am not gonna harp on and on, but I am truly heartbroken. I feel bad. This has made me very sad. I have this sensation that i have to vomit that i can't shake and its not the horrible CGI dead body graphics or violence either.

I am sorry if my comments upset anyone but I m just entirely heart broken, I feel like a part of me has been ripped out, this goes way beyond just disappointment. I just love Twin Peaks and that universe SO MUCH. I won't go into details but Twin Peaks was the source of escapism for me during my preteen/teen years that were very abusive and turbulent. Twin Peaks was my "family".

It would be different if this was a fuck up made by someone other than its creators, I could black list it, but Lynch and Frost did this. What were they thinking? This isn't "pure heroin" it's pure shit. I just want to say to them "what the hell were you thinking?"

I'm going to bed now, I wlll try to reconcile this tomorrow.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by Pöllö »

Chester Desmond wrote:I agree with what most people have said in here...

I am gonna watch all 18 episodes because it is Twin Peaks and clearly is an exercise in futility/masochism.

This has fallen far from my expectations. I love weird, I love David Lynch, I was prepared for weird, I was not prepared for horrible quality. I was expecting Fire Walk With Me because David Lynch stressed how important that film was to this series... and not only was I "okay" with that, I loved that. I am NOT in the "I just like ABC series quirk" group.

This was no Fire Walk With Me, not by far.

I would love to feel bewilderment, excitement, thrill, mystery, but I feel none of those things. ...and it's not the plot line, I dig the plot line more or less, it's the execution, the production. It's awful.

I hate to say it, and I sincerely hope it isn't true, but was this just a last hurrah for David Lynch to cash in on the franchise? To leave some substantial payout to his children in his will? Nobody who watched all 4 parts can say "Wow this is the best thing he's ever done", at least I can't. I can't even say it is "okay", let alone good.... and I liked Inland Empire.

I am not gonna harp on and on, but I am truly heartbroken. I feel bad. This has made me very sad. I have this sensation that i have to vomit that i can't shake and its not the horrible CGI dead body graphics or violence either.

I am sorry if my comments upset anyone but I m just entirely heart broken, I feel like a part of me has been ripped out, this goes way beyond just disappointment. I just love Twin Peaks and that universe SO MUCH. I won't go into details but Twin Peaks was the source of escapism for me during my preteen/teen years that were very abusive and turbulent. Twin Peaks was my "family".

It would be different if this was a fuck up made by someone other than its creators, I could black list it, but Lynch and Frost did this. What were they thinking? This isn't "pure heroin" it's pure shit. I just want to say to them "what the hell were you thinking?"

I'm going to bed now, I wlll try to reconcile this tomorrow.
I understand your point of view and you don't have to apologize for it. I for the most part agree with you - I've generally been underwhelmed and let down thus far.

Twin Peaks is my favorite show of all time and has also been a form of escapism for me. I just love that world and for now, aside from that Bobby scene, I'm not feeling it. I was prepared for FWWM but this most definitely is not that. More like Inland Empire meets Eraserhead.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by counterpaul »

I'm not even sure I should be here reading/writing as I'm absolutely still processing. My head/heart/gut are all swimming. This feels utterly essential is my first reaction.

1) First, and I think most importantly, this is about being lost. At a soul-level. Really from the very start (though it obviously becomes much clearer once Coop gets out of the lodge), Coop is utterly at sea. Something is missing and I have a feeling, much like with Leland, it's because his actions out in the world over the last 25 years are not something that he can totally separate himself from. I really was surprised at just how awful the Cooper out in the world became. I had this idea in my head that he might have spent the last 25 years struggling with horrible urges--perhaps isolating himself in some way to protect others--but Lynch and Frost gave me no such comfort. So, what we're dealing with here (and, four hours in, I feel confident the show will be all the better for it), is a real spiritual reckoning in the making. The "good Dale" is a shell because he was utterly defeated. He has to build himself back up completely from scratch. And he has to find Laura to do it. Wow! That is an incredible, heartbreaking premise!

2) Structurally and thematically, the show is circling (maybe orbiting or spiraling is more accurate--I haven't come up with exactly the right curve-based metaphor yet) around Twin Peaks. Twin Peaks (both the town AND the series itself, I think!) is absolutely the center, and of course when we're there we feel the most at home--and so far my intuition that Twin Peaks will play an increasingly large role as the show continues seems to be correct--but we're not home yet. Far from it. And that is absolutely the right way for this to work. Because, again, the story is about being lost. It's about trying to get home. Home is there the whole time, but Coop has forgotten it. He has that key to room 315 in his pocket--there's surely no place else to go but home--but it will be a long journey. So, we must also take that journey as viewers. I think the tone, the music, everything people have complained is missing or hardly there (those who are complaining), NEEDS to be missing. The log has told us that something is missing and the log is not wrong. This IS the story, folks. The destination is clear, but the path is long and difficult.

3) This is worth it's own sub-section, though it's basically a continuation of the above. The scene with Laura is incredibly important and heartbreakingly sad. Coop is barely present. Laura is there, I feel, to extend to him the same generosity that he offered her when she saw her angel. But he is even more lost than she was, and he is unable to accept it or even recognize it. Laura is the only figure he definitely recognizes, which is a good sign, but he only just barely does. He knows she died. He seems to feel some kind of connection. But everything is blunted and distant, and so Laura is pulled away. It's a tragic scene.

4) I want to address the criticism that things are being over-explained. I disagree, but I totally understand why people might feel that way. The thing is, Twin Peaks has always basically worked like this: The Arm/The Giant/MIKE/BOB/Coop himself/sometimes other people explain things all the time, but the explanations are insufficient. The explanations fall apart upon scrutiny. That is the nature of explanations in Twin Peaks. We listen, we think we're learning, but then we find that complexity only increases and explanations that seemed solid are later utterly contradicted. I expect much the same fate for most if not all of the explanations we've received so far. Let's not get ahead of ourselves. This is just getting started.

5) The effects: Guys, Lynch is not and has never been interested in "realistic" VFX. From the moment he started playing around with computers in the early 2000s, he's consistently made stuff exactly like this. Realism is simply not the point. I freaking LOVE the Evolution of the Arm! It's beautifully ungainly and uncanny. And, my god, the stuff in Part 3 was simply gorgeous! I think this IS indeed the kind of stuff he's been carrying around in his head since he wrote the Ronnie Rocket screenplay (and TP's connection to RR is NOT new--lyrics from Sycamore Trees are lifted directly from dialogue in RR, the whole eeeeelectricity business in FWWM is straight out of RR, and of course TLMFAP was directly inspired by Ronnie himself) and here he is finally REALIZING it on screen! My GOD I love Coop's journey in Part 3. My god!

7) Random thoughts:

7a) I am utterly intrigued by whatever it is that Jacoby is up to.

7b) I ADORED Lucy's irrational fear of cellphones! I loved everything about it. Beautiful, beautiful, hilarious stuff!

7c) It seems almost like Lucy, Andy and Hawk (but especially Lucy) are in a kind of time-warp version of the Twin Peaks sheriff's station and the real work is going on behind the scenes. I don't mean this literally--I'm not proposing an alternate-world theory of any kind here--but just that the past is strong with them, again, especially Lucy. I freaking love Lucy in The Return, by the way. Her every scene!

7d) Speaking of the sheriff's station--when that back room with all the deputies was finally revealed, I couldn't help but think of all the extra deputies in the original series who only showed up when some event occurred that necessitated them. Now we know where they were hiding all the rest of the time! Harry just didn't like going in there, I guess. :)

7e) Deputy Bobby Briggs! Yes, there's maybe a touch of fan service there (though Lynch clearly always loved Bobby, so it was as much DKL-service as fan-service), but it felt right. I completely buy it. In fact, I honestly don't know what else he would be doing with his life. And the scene when he spotted Laura's files was straight-up beautiful. It felt 100% genuine and earned to me. I cried.

7f) Speaking of tears, Margaret's scenes were just heart-rending. And I'm very glad it was Hawk she contacted. Again, it just feels correct.

7g) I thought the Ben and Jerry scene worked well, and I strongly suspect it will add up to something. Again, we're orbiting Twin Peaks, and it is structurally necessary that the town only gradually opens itself up to us. And of course we'd spend the most time, at first, with the characters investigating Coop. I think the Ben we have here is a genuine melding of the Ben we last saw, doing his "learning to be good" project, with the man he always was. He struggles, I expect, every day to figure out how to reconcile who he wants to be and who he knows he can be if he doesn't keep himself in check. I'm sure, in 25 years, he has slipped up more times than he'd care to remember, and so he soldiers on. That's what I saw from Ben in that brief scene. Jerry was definitely still Jerry--a little less manic, to be sure (which is natural!)--but still Jerry. It was a fantastic scene. I certainly hope we get more.

7h) Sarah. Oh, Sarah. It seems impossible that, once all is said and done, she will not come out the beating heart of this thing. Again, it is building slowly, as it must, but Sarah is the one living key. And I'm already seeing parallels between Coop and Sarah. I think that will be important.

7i) And James! What a marvelous small moment. So much heart in such a small moment.

I'm settling in. I have a million other as-yet unformed thoughts. I don't know how I'm going to deal with only getting an hour at a time from here on out. My one disagreement with Lynch here might end up being that this SHOULD have been delivered as a massive 18-hour experience all at once rather than a weekly series. I mean, it is absolutely not built like episodes of a show. It IS in fact a giant movie, and I don't want to watch it in tiny chunks! I'll get over that, though.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by BEARisonFord »

I should mention that Robert Forster is just an absolute joy to watch and he feels perfectly at home here. I love Michael Ontkean and I love Harry S. Truman, but Forster really softens the blow. I can't wait to see more of him. He's truly effortless in his craft.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by Rami Airola »

These episodes were fantastic :shock:

It made a complete u-turn. Didn't like the first two episodes. Loved these.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by N. Needleman »

Was that Ronette??
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by ryst »

Chester Desmond wrote:I agree with what most people have said in here...

I am gonna watch all 18 episodes because it is Twin Peaks and clearly is an exercise in futility/masochism.

This has fallen far from my expectations. I love weird, I love David Lynch, I was prepared for weird, I was not prepared for horrible quality. I was expecting Fire Walk With Me because David Lynch stressed how important that film was to this series... and not only was I "okay" with that, I loved that. I am NOT in the "I just like ABC series quirk" group.

This was no Fire Walk With Me, not by far.

I would love to feel bewilderment, excitement, thrill, mystery, but I feel none of those things. ...and it's not the plot line, I dig the plot line more or less, it's the execution, the production. It's awful.

I hate to say it, and I sincerely hope it isn't true, but was this just a last hurrah for David Lynch to cash in on the franchise? To leave some substantial payout to his children in his will? Nobody who watched all 4 parts can say "Wow this is the best thing he's ever done", at least I can't. I can't even say it is "okay", let alone good.... and I liked Inland Empire.

I am not gonna harp on and on, but I am truly heartbroken. I feel bad. This has made me very sad. I have this sensation that i have to vomit that i can't shake and its not the horrible CGI dead body graphics or violence either.

I am sorry if my comments upset anyone but I m just entirely heart broken, I feel like a part of me has been ripped out, this goes way beyond just disappointment. I just love Twin Peaks and that universe SO MUCH. I won't go into details but Twin Peaks was the source of escapism for me during my preteen/teen years that were very abusive and turbulent. Twin Peaks was my "family".

It would be different if this was a fuck up made by someone other than its creators, I could black list it, but Lynch and Frost did this. What were they thinking? This isn't "pure heroin" it's pure shit. I just want to say to them "what the hell were you thinking?"

I'm going to bed now, I wlll try to reconcile this tomorrow.
Thank for sharing your POV. Twin Peaks was one of the few things in my teen years that was a bit of an escape as well. However, if I may offer some perspective, from your language, it seems as though you're taking this very personally, as if David Lynch and company have done something negative to you, personally. You may have had huge alternate expectations based on your own memories and nostalgia of the original show and your own upbringing but the reality is, it's still someone else's art. A much as we want it to belong to us. It doesn't belong to us. It' simply for us to enjoy it or not. If you're truly heartbroken from your disappointment in the show, then perhaps you still need to reconcile those very abusive and turbulent years which seem to still resonate with you in some way. I know this is a tv show we are discussing but since your post was so much more than that, I just wanted to offer my perspective.
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Re: Parts 3 + 4 (Spoilers)

Post by Ross »

N. Needleman wrote:Was that Ronette??
Yes- the lady in the Lodge saying her mother was coming. I didn't understand why she was in there.
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