Twin Peaks re-reviews

General discussion on Twin Peaks not related to the series, film, books, music, photos, or collectors merchandise.

Moderators: Brad D, Annie, Jonah, BookhouseBoyBob, Ross, Jerry Horne

Neosmith
Roadhouse Member
Posts: 47
Joined: Wed Mar 28, 2012 7:56 pm

Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by Neosmith »

Anybody here notice how in the last several years, various pop culture websites seem to be doing a full-on rewatch of every episode of the series, along with reviews of all of them?

I've found at least three thus far:
AVClub: http://www.avclub.com/tvclub/tvshow/twin-peaks,29/

Chud.com: http://www.chud.com/26390/lost-found-tw ... -2-finale/

Badass Digest: http://badassdigest.com/2012/07/25/tv-t ... -and-1.03/

I highly recommend reading through all of the Chud.com articles, which really delve deep into the series. The examination of the final episode alone is fantastic, going so far as to compare the final episode to Mark Frost's original script. The whole Arthurian mythology angle is especially interesting.
User avatar
TheArm
Great Northern Member
Posts: 542
Joined: Mon Oct 01, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Los Angeles, CA

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by TheArm »

The CHUD ones are my favorites. These reviews on Seriable are also really good: http://seriable.com/twin-peaks-pilot-review/

And while not a blog or a website, the wonderful in-depth discussions on each episode on the Twin Peaks Podcast: http://twinpeakspodcast.libsyn.com/
"Fire...walk...with...me...MEEE!!!"
User avatar
TheArm
Great Northern Member
Posts: 542
Joined: Mon Oct 01, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Los Angeles, CA

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by TheArm »

Oh, and can't forget Television Without Pity's great recaps/reviews - http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/show/twin-peaks/
"Fire...walk...with...me...MEEE!!!"
User avatar
MargaretLanternman
New Member
Posts: 10
Joined: Sun Oct 21, 2012 11:52 pm
Location: Mulholland Drive

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by MargaretLanternman »

It's funny because I started re-watching season 1 not too long ago.
Image
User avatar
enumbs
RR Diner Member
Posts: 255
Joined: Thu Sep 24, 2015 4:44 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by enumbs »

Sorry to bump a very old thread, but I've been reading the old Badass Digest (now 'Birth Movies Death') recaps of Twin Peaks and they've been making me so angry! Even the one person who continually defends the show seems to do so rather halfheartedly, and no-one even seems interested in examining the show on more than the most superficial level. This recap of the finale in particular pretty much broke my brain:

http://birthmoviesdeath.com/2012/11/21/ ... 1-and-2.22

Has anyone else had this experience? Or been annoyed by other articles which seemed to miss what Twin Peaks was really all about?
User avatar
LostInTheMovies
Bookhouse Member
Posts: 1558
Joined: Tue May 20, 2014 12:48 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by LostInTheMovies »

Yes! Especially Fire Walk With Me. In general I find the media take on Twin Peaks to be pretty glib. There's no sense that the show had any meaning beyond being an offbeat fad in the early 90s, and it's usually all about the first season which just scratches the surface of what the show accomplished. Now you've piqued my curiosity though to look at this and see how much I cringe haha.

I found these recaps of the series to be pretty good: http://www.popoptiq.com/tv/tv-reviews/retro/twin-peaks/.

EDIT: (Looking at your link, that's actually one of the ones I had in mind! Though I've read worst. The weird thing is the woman who is an apologist for even the worst of season 2 absolutely loathes the film. Despite the film's reputation creeping up in the past decade, thanks to stuff like Mark Kermode's video or Calum Marsh's review, I feel like the tide didn't REALLY turn until the Entire Mystery release last summer.)
User avatar
Gabriel
Great Northern Member
Posts: 787
Joined: Thu May 03, 2007 12:53 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by Gabriel »

I think we'll have to accept that there'll be loads of dross written about TP. We all discuss the stories and the characters, the style of direction, how it was edited. Now we're going have to read about Amanda Seyfried's dresses and hairstyle, whether Kyle Maclachlan and Robert Forster are sex symbols and discussions about on screen sex acts between younger characters (the obligatory 'Has a Twin Peaks gone too far?' articles with old photos of James and Donna from 1989 and remarks about the failure of FWWM.) The media has always loved to create a 'narrative' (ratings falling, ratings rocketing) behind the scenes dramas and romances and, if anything, it's become far more trivial and pointless now than it was 25 years ago.
User avatar
the haystack
Roadhouse Member
Posts: 37
Joined: Sun Oct 18, 2015 9:00 pm
Location: Seattle

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by the haystack »

enumbs wrote:This recap of the finale in particular pretty much broke my brain:

http://birthmoviesdeath.com/2012/11/21/ ... 1-and-2.22

Has anyone else had this experience? Or been annoyed by other articles which seemed to miss what Twin Peaks was really all about?
My condolences to your brain, no seriously. These people define feckless. Mark Twain (well, someone earlier, no doubt, but I'll attribute it to Twain) had a great saying about better to be silent and thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt.
Gabriel wrote:I think we'll have to accept that there'll be loads of dross written about TP. We all discuss the stories and the characters, the style of direction, how it was edited. Now we're going have to read about Amanda Seyfried's dresses and hairstyle, whether Kyle Maclachlan and Robert Forster are sex symbols and discussions about on screen sex acts between younger characters (the obligatory 'Has a Twin Peaks gone too far?' articles with old photos of James and Donna from 1989 and remarks about the failure of FWWM.) The media has always loved to create a 'narrative' (ratings falling, ratings rocketing) behind the scenes dramas and romances and, if anything, it's become far more trivial and pointless now than it was 25 years ago.
...and missing the comprehensive greatness of Lynch/Frost, arguably among our greatest contemporary geniuses; indeed, missing the all.
Log Lady lives
User avatar
LostInTheMovies
Bookhouse Member
Posts: 1558
Joined: Tue May 20, 2014 12:48 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by LostInTheMovies »

All true. That said, I have mixed feelings about the renewed hype the show will receive (as I did when the 24th anniversary, blu-ray release, and especially the "gum you like" tweets sparked brief flare-ups in the media last year).

On the one hand, some of the thinkpieces are going to be absolutely insufferable, as will be the retrospective pieces building up to the show. However, I have confidence that once the new series gets going Lynch and Frost are going to be confronting critics and viewers with many things they choose to overlook when discussing the original show. It's easy to write a "25 years ago" piece that ignores the second season & FWWM but it will be harder to do so when major elements of those parts of the show are unfolding week-to-week.

As for the more trivial stuff, I'm mostly ok with that as I think it creates an aura of fun around the show and brings in viewers who might stay away from something that is marketed as being uber-serious. The way I see it, the more bases Twin Peaks touches with its hype & appeal, the more new fans it will ultimately attract and the broader it will be able to deliver what it has to show. Yeah, some of those will be casual viewers who are then turned off when it isn't as easy as they thought it would be, but along the way I think it will pick up people who didn't think they'd enjoy Twin Peaks.

I find that great art can connect with a mass audience if it's presented in the right way. I can't wait to see how this all goes.
User avatar
enumbs
RR Diner Member
Posts: 255
Joined: Thu Sep 24, 2015 4:44 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by enumbs »

I suppose what's particularly aggravating in this case though is that these people aren't simply recollecting a vague popular notion of the show, but actually watching it episode by episode. It utterly astounds me that anyone can watch an installment of the show directed by Lynch and simply write it off as a bit weird and nothing more. None of the writers seem to feel anything watching the lodge sequences, preferring to analyse the plot mechanics through this cold, ironic lens. I just... I just...

Bah, forget it.
User avatar
LostInTheMovies
Bookhouse Member
Posts: 1558
Joined: Tue May 20, 2014 12:48 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by LostInTheMovies »

Good point.
User avatar
LostInTheMovies
Bookhouse Member
Posts: 1558
Joined: Tue May 20, 2014 12:48 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by LostInTheMovies »

This 2-3 paragraph comments gets more right than the entire article! http://birthmoviesdeath.com/2012/11/21/ ... -717087366

EDIT: Honestly, a lot of these comments are really good. Kinda sad that a site like that gets so many quality commentators whereas other, arguably superior commentaries may not.
User avatar
David Locke
RR Diner Member
Posts: 306
Joined: Fri Jul 09, 2010 4:24 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by David Locke »

I remember coming across that birthmoviesdeath site's roundtable on FWWM and finding it awful not just because I disagreed but because their insights were so consistently shallow and juvenile (I dunno how old they are, but they give the impression of being barely out of high school). Their only recourse against such powerful and sincere material as FWWM and Episode 29 is to put on those ironic n' detached glasses and act like they're so above it all. This might be passable if their "jokes" were actually funny. I mean, I think every TP fan was at least a little, just a little bit outraged when seeing how Episode 29 ended, knowing (at least until last year) that there would be no conclusion to it. Yet these commentators let that understandable reaction color their entire appreciation of the episode. It just reads like the most amateur attempt at criticism: "NOTHING HAPPENED!! ABSOLUTELY NOTHING" Oh really... Want to exaggerate a little more? And that's not even mentioning that the most praiseworthy thing in the last two episodes according to these people was the friggin' Miss Twin Peaks contest. I don't know whether their appreciation of such was fully ironic or partly ironic but it just says a lot about how these people -- all three of them! -- were such a wrong fit to watch and observe and critique this particular show.

Okay, I'm done, I think. That kind of immature "criticism" just gets to me.

Speaking of other sites: Chud was very insightful and I find the AV Club's reviews pretty good, with some very good comments too. Phipps also unfortunately gives the stock-standard pan of FWWM at the end of it, which is unsurprising but still too bad. There are some good rebuttals in the comments there though. I do enjoy reading those recaps and comments whenever I'm going thru the show, and I particularly like Phipp's critique of Episode 16 and the whole mid-S2 slump.
User avatar
LostInTheMovies
Bookhouse Member
Posts: 1558
Joined: Tue May 20, 2014 12:48 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by LostInTheMovies »

I remember reading the AV Club's reviews right after I watched the series (I'm pretty sure I didn't read them while I was watching) & just before I wrote my own episode guide. Phipps was definitely disappointingly one-note about FWWM, but he did write a (kinda sorta) reassessment when the blu-ray was released in which he admitted that even if he still didn't quite like it, it had given him much more to mull over than many other films he'd given better reviews to. https://thedissolve.com/features/exposi ... win-peaks/

I feel like that piece is kind of Exhibit A for the case that The Entire Mystery profoundly shifted the conversation on FWWM.
User avatar
enumbs
RR Diner Member
Posts: 255
Joined: Thu Sep 24, 2015 4:44 pm

Re: Twin Peaks re-reviews

Post by enumbs »

Yes, those AVClub reviews are much better, and at the very least their pan of FWWM had a degree of thoughtfulness about it. If I remember correctly the writer wrote a much more in depth piece on the movie and the missing pieces, I'll have to root it out. Even though he didn't like the film he at least gave it some consideration, and attempted to explore the complexities which mean it continues to resonate.

And you're right, it's not the verdict of the BMD recap that irritates, but the general attitude. I was also annoyed (albeit to a far lesser extent) when listening to the Fire Talk With Me podcasts, resulting from the admittedly snobbish feeling that those involved simply didn't "get" the show. Although the opinions were broadly positive, I still felt the commentary often seemed to miss the point. I remember I bailed when the first time viewer of the show praised the wake sequence in episode 17, saying how great it was that all the characters were brought together. People see different things in art I guess...

EDIT: I see Lost has beaten me to the punch with the article I mentioned, good find!
Last edited by enumbs on Sun Oct 25, 2015 3:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Post Reply