Episode 16

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LostInTheMovies
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Re: Episode 16

Post by LostInTheMovies »

Dead Dog wrote:I may be in the minority here, but I see this episode as a near disaster. It begins with a corny, pointless slo mo shot off our Merrymen walking through what looks like a city park, a cheap location they'd clearly just settled on. And then a glut of low angle, tilted shots to try and hide the fact they are in a park. Of course Donna is shot walking through the same park, so we have to have more extreme low angles to hide the fact that we are in the same location. And then our boys return to the same location to stand around and talk about what Bob is.
Haha, good point - never noticed this. Which I guess could be taken to mean it worked, but I DID always get a bit irritated with the strained angles and that thought only makes it worse.
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Re: Episode 16

Post by Dead Dog »

Don't get me wrong, Episode 16 is part of Twin Peaks, and I love anything Twin Peaks. I just don't like this particular entry as much as some others do.
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Re: Episode 16

Post by The Man »

p-air wrote: I think the part I like the most - besides the “Tibetan Book of the Dead” recitation bit which seems to be almost universally liked
I don't even remember Cooper reciting while Leland was dying. It's fascinating though, because Cooper is clearly the Magician, the shaman who walks between two worlds (l got that from Lost In Movies' videos?). Twin Peaks itself seems to be a Book of the Dead, a revelation about what happens after we die.
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Re: Episode 16

Post by mtwentz »

LostInTheMovies wrote:
Dead Dog wrote:I may be in the minority here, but I see this episode as a near disaster. It begins with a corny, pointless slo mo shot off our Merrymen walking through what looks like a city park, a cheap location they'd clearly just settled on. And then a glut of low angle, tilted shots to try and hide the fact they are in a park. Of course Donna is shot walking through the same park, so we have to have more extreme low angles to hide the fact that we are in the same location. And then our boys return to the same location to stand around and talk about what Bob is.
Haha, good point - never noticed this. Which I guess could be taken to mean it worked, but I DID always get a bit irritated with the strained angles and that thought only makes it worse.
I thought those angles were Tim Hunter trying to mimic Lynch, which frankly, I thought he did a pretty good job of doing (it's not an easy trick to pull off).
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Re: Episode 16

Post by djerdap »

mtwentz wrote:
LostInTheMovies wrote:
Dead Dog wrote:I may be in the minority here, but I see this episode as a near disaster. It begins with a corny, pointless slo mo shot off our Merrymen walking through what looks like a city park, a cheap location they'd clearly just settled on. And then a glut of low angle, tilted shots to try and hide the fact they are in a park. Of course Donna is shot walking through the same park, so we have to have more extreme low angles to hide the fact that we are in the same location. And then our boys return to the same location to stand around and talk about what Bob is.
Haha, good point - never noticed this. Which I guess could be taken to mean it worked, but I DID always get a bit irritated with the strained angles and that thought only makes it worse.
I thought those angles were Tim Hunter trying to mimic Lynch, which frankly, I thought he did a pretty good job of doing (it's not an easy trick to pull off).
Lynch isn't really an avid user of canted angles. It looked to me like Hunter was mimicking Terry Gilliam, and not doing a very good job with it.
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Re: Episode 16

Post by TwinPeaksFanatic »

The scene with the most emotional impact is definitely Leland's death, in my opinion. I suppose it does help ease the sorrow of what he did to know that he was truly sorry for it in the end. I wrote a recap for this episode here --> http://twinpeaksfanatic.blogspot.com/20 ... de-16.html

:D
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Re: Episode 16

Post by Gabriel »

Random thoughts...

Just rewatched this. It feels every bit like a network-enforced wrap up: 'OK chaps! We've used every conventional and unconventional method in the book to catch this guy and he's killed again, so let's just catch him!' And they do. And you kinda think 'Why didn't this simply happen in episode one?' All that amazing material in the previous episodes, all that investigation, was for what? A lightning strike in an empty studio set! Victories have to be won. Cooper just suffered a massive defeat and yet the defeat some how made the resolution seem terribly easy. It rings falsely to me.

Interesting to see the electricity motif tying in with the strobe lights of the lodge. Interesting that Leland says 'they' made him do things, as well as just BOB made him do things. Personally, although the death scene is nicely handled, it abrogates Leland's responsibility for his sick crimes, which disturbs me. BOB infestation or not, he's a sick, violent, twisted psychopath who, like many psychopaths, is outwardly charming but 'has a big hole where his conscience should be.'

What's with the crashed car at the end? Did BOB, the owl, force a car off the road? (I can't believe I ever wrote a sentence that bizarre?) Who was in the car, because clearly someone had been chucked through the window?

After the emotional rawness and terror of Episode 14, this feels terribly safe. Smiling good guys drinking coffee in a warm, sunny Californian park that seems a million miles away from the cold, bleak, stormy woodlands of the pilot episode.

No Audrey. I guess her last decent scene was in the previous episode, her storyline about to be cut dead.

The episode feels to me like one of those 'final' episodes where the network has cancelled a show and the producers have wrapped up everything in 45 minutes.

In some ways, it would have been better that this was the last episode of the original show. I'm glad David Lynch returned for the finale, because, as a wrap up, this was a weak episode. It was saccharine when I wanted candy.
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Re: Episode 16

Post by Agent Earle »

Gabriel wrote:
Just rewatched this. It feels every bit like a network-enforced wrap up: 'OK chaps! We've used every conventional and unconventional method in the book to catch this guy and he's killed again, so let's just catch him!' And they do. And you kinda think 'Why didn't this simply happen in episode one?' All that amazing material in the previous episodes, all that investigation, was for what? A lightning strike in an empty studio set! Victories have to be won. Cooper just suffered a massive defeat and yet the defeat some how made the resolution seem terribly easy. It rings falsely to me.
To me, that's exactly why the swiftness of this resolution works - because it comes after such a terrible defeat and at a cost of another human life (I mean Maddy's, of course, not Leland's, although the episode truly strives to make him an additional victim in all of this, as well). The latter feels almost as a toll for a relatively happy ending we get after all.

Gabriel wrote:
What's with the crashed car at the end? Did BOB, the owl, force a car off the road? (I can't believe I ever wrote a sentence that bizarre?) Who was in the car, because clearly someone had been chucked through the window?
I think the car's supposed to represent a part of some kind of junkyard in the middle of the forest. The said vehicle seems like it has been lying in the woods for quite a stretch of time, it's not like an aftermath of some accident that happened moments ago. Or that's my interpretation, at least. It would make sense for the Lodge spirits to be drawn to old, disused, decrepit etc. things, empty shelves of their former selves, sorta.
Gabriel wrote:
After the emotional rawness and terror of Episode 14, this feels terribly safe. Smiling good guys drinking coffee in a warm, sunny Californian park that seems a million miles away from the cold, bleak, stormy woodlands of the pilot episode.
Disagreed. The warmness and sunniness of that scene work because they underline the darkness, bleakness, and storminess of the things that just got resolved. In addition, it shows you the lightness and blissfulness as a possible facade under which the grim, the serious, the horrible lays - you know, the deceitfulness and indifference of the outwardly picture-perfect scenery that Lynch was always compelled to look under/behind (note the opening scene of Blue Velvet, for instance).
And I didn't notice anyone of the assembled lawmen smiling. They looked more like perplexed, at a loss for words, trying to somehow make sense of the horror they just witnessed.
Gabriel wrote:
No Audrey. I guess her last decent scene was in the previous episode, her storyline about to be cut dead.
Why would be necessary for Audrey to be a part of this particular conclusion? She was previously not revealed to be any kind of crucial element in the Laura Palmer saga, after all. And let's not forget about one more descent scene (more than descent, in fact) that she's got coming to her still, the one in the very next episode where she comes to say goodbye to Cooper and in which they resolve their relationship in a satisfyingly mature way once and for all.
Gabriel wrote:
The episode feels to me like one of those 'final' episodes where the network has cancelled a show and the producers have wrapped up everything in 45 minutes.

In some ways, it would have been better that this was the last episode of the original show. I'm glad David Lynch returned for the finale, because, as a wrap up, this was a weak episode. It was saccharine when I wanted candy.
And yet, that final shot of the owl flying through the ominous-looking forest completely undermines whatever feeling of closure, peace and tranquility you could get from the preceding 44 minutes. I love it! I remember my excitement during the initial airing of this episode when the end credits rolled - where on Earth could this lead to next?! What freaky things have they got in store for us??? In any case, the matter didn't seem over to me, not in the least.
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Re: Episode 16

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While the execution of the scene is troubled to say the least, the idea of Coop finally solving the case by dipping into his subconscious and remembering what he knew all along but had forgotten is thematically congruous with the series in general. Like Cooper, Laura's journey involves finding out that BOB is Leland-- a fact that she had also known but was unable to remember. I would opine that Cooper remembering what Laura said in the dream WAS the right way for him to find the killer, but the set-up of the guys at the Roadhouse, the awkward Leland-Ben switcheroo, followed by Cooper's literal interpretation of his dream really hampered what should have been a great scene.

Also I wonder if Lynch had any input on this episode? Certain elements of this episode seem to factor into his other work. Leland smashing his head into the cell wall is practically replicated with Fred in Lost Highway, as well as with Cooper and the mirror in Episode 29. Also, the fact that BOB killed Laura because she wouldn't be his new host is revealed in this episode and is a critical plot point in FWWM.
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Re: Episode 16

Post by Rami Airola »

I've been watching the series now that season 3 is about to begin.

This episode used to be one of my favorites.
However, in the past 10(?) years I've started to see its faults but it still has been of the best episodes to me.
But this time, oh my, I was surprised how much I cringed through the episode...

The tilted camera angles are extremely distracting.
I hate the part where Cooper explains how his dream connects to all of this.
"Robertson, son of Robert!" REALLY!?

I'm not even sure what I think about the bar scene either. So now Cooper thinks one of the people there is the killer. Leland looks like he's got no idea they are on to him even though he seemed to be really worried and starting to plan things when Donna mentioned the second diary to him. And Cooper really doesn't have one single clue about who the killer is but then Leland eats the gum and Cooper remembers what Laura said in the dream. I mean, I'm all for Cooper using weird "magic" things as his methods to solve crimes but this goes a bit too far in being essentially something where all that happened before didn't really matter and the answer is given to him without any real effort.

And then Leland offers himself to help Ben when he is accused for being Leland's daughter's killer. And somehow Cooper and co. think this is a genious plan. But it really isn't anything else than Leland (and Bob!) being unbelievably stupid right there. I think even stupidity and demon possession cannot explain that. It's just lazy writing.


There are some great moments though. I love the moment when Donna tells Leland about the second diary. I love Leland's expressions there.



But overall, while the next episode is arguably worse, I think I even enjoyed episode 18 much more than I enjoyed this. And I'm truly puzzled about this sudden turn of taste.






One thing I started to think in Leland's confession and death scene (and by the way, I think Leland goes a bit over the top during the confession - I'm not particularly fond of the WOO WOO WOO moment) was that when Leland talks about him not remembering when Bob was gone I'd like to think it's more like "willingly" not remembering things. Like, when we do things we wouldn't normally want to do but in the heat of the moment do - be it sexual things, crimes, hateful things or whatever else - we are not what we'd deep down like to be. And when the moment is gone we don't really want to remember that side of ourselves anymore. We don't want to remember how awful we have been. We don't want to know how much bad things we have caused to others. When we are back into being our "good selves" we wash those nastier moments away from our minds until we do it again. It wasn't me who did it. That's what Cooper in fact actually suggests in the next episode where he says to Sarah that Leland didn't do those things, or at least not the Leland you knew.
So I'd like to think the death scene was about the battle of consciences. And Bob is also about a battle of consciences.

What I mean is, when we are in that heatful moment where we are about to do something we wouldn't normally want to do we first forget what we would like to be - our normal conscience is given to our other side. And when we are past that moment we forget we were what we didn't want to be. And perhaps Leland always remembered killing Laura but this was the first time he actually realized in with his normal conscience what he had done. Just like sometimes when we have done something bad to someone else we might go on normally for years and years until at some moment we have the realization of what it actually was that we did back then and we feel remorse and regret. But until then our conscience has been run by our other side at least what comes to that exact bad thing we did.


Rami Airola wrote: Also, the moment when Bob screams and the lightning strikes, is very interesting to me. It kinda connects Bob to electricity for the first time ever. We hear his scream and see the lightning, and when it cuts to Donna, the lightning and the scream immediately stops. So this is all something that doesn't really happen in the physical world, but happens and exists in a more abstract plane. I kinda like to think that it means lightning could be the fury of Bob. "I have the fury of my own momentum."

Now, it could just be all about giving Bob's scream an effective, albeit quite clichéd, emphasis. Sure, there are tons of movies that have thunder and lightning appear when a character screams in torment without any sort of metaphysical context, but I like to think that's not all the added lightning is supposed to mean. Maybe when Bob screams a lightning strikes, or when a lightning strikes Bob screams. Do Bob and other "Lodge inhabitants" move through electricity, or are they in fact deep down electricity themselves? It's quite an interesting thing to think about this as the human brain works with electricity.
Wow, through that moment I was thinking that I used to have a theory about the moment lightning strikes and Bob screams but couldn't remember at all what it was.
I was very surprised to see my a few years old post about it here :O
Didn't remember this at all and now as I read it again I thought "yeah, that's how it goes!" :D
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Re: Episode 16

Post by Mr. Reindeer »

Dead Dog wrote:I may be in the minority here, but I see this episode as a near disaster. It begins with a corny, pointless slo mo shot off our Merrymen walking through what looks like a city park, a cheap location they'd clearly just settled on. And then a glut of low angle, tilted shots to try and hide the fact they are in a park. Of course Donna is shot walking through the same park, so we have to have more extreme low angles to hide the fact that we are in the same location. And then our boys return to the same location to stand around and talk about what Bob is. Not sure why this couldn't have been done somewhere else.
You know what the laziest part of this is? In the final scene of the episode ("the evil that men do" scene), Albert & Coop are wearing different shirts/ties than they are in the rest of the episode. Great continuity, right? They dried off and changed!

Except...they're wearing those exact same shirts and ties in the FIRST SCENE, because they shot both scenes at the same time and presumably couldn't be bothered to factor in a wardrobe change.
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Re: Episode 16

Post by Cipher »

Panapaok wrote:Also, Ben Horne is supposedly arrested for Laura's and Maddy's murder. Why would Leland come with them at the Sheriff's Station as his attorney, since Ben is the supposed killer of his daughter and niece.
I just rewatched this episode and this stood out to me as being so, so sloppy. That's unbelievable.

In general, I'm not a fan of how the murderer is revealed to Cooper, nor how at odds this episode stands with the more humanistic take on the story in Fire Walk With Me. The final "evil that men do" scene goes some way toward rectifying this, but the script feels so rushed, and so pat, in so many ways that it overshadows the drama.

Cooper's presenting everything as a clue -- from the dancing to a drastic misinterpretation of the obvious intent of the original "they are his children" line (fear and pleasure; not his hosts!) -- is also really ridiculous and unnecessary.

It was interesting to discover that this was the hour that confirmed the Tremonds' supernatural properties though.

The Book of the Dead quoting and Cooper's insistence on Leland's spiritual innocence don't sit right with me here, but insofar as it might be recontextualized into part of his downfall in episode 29 (unable to confront the shadows in people; facing an uncanny doppelgänger of Leland who unconvincingly says he did not kill anybody), I suppose it comes to work as part of a whole.
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Re: Episode 16

Post by Snailhead »

I think this episode is OK with some great moments. I really, really wish Lynch had directed it - he probably would have cut down some of the awkward dialogue and taken it somewhere unexpected.

I wouldn't have minded something from the lodges helping Cooper to figure it out, but in a less on the nose way would have been appreciated. I have to say I don't find that Tim Hunter quite conveys the moodiness of Twin Peaks in his episodes. The episode he directed in Season 1 is fine, very solid, however it stands out as the least atmospheric entry of the early run - not quite as memorable (aside from a few odd moments, like the llama.)
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Re: Episode 16

Post by David Locke »

Does anybody else feel like the ridiculously literal-minded deconstruction of Cooper's dream outside the cell was basically what was being parodied by the Lil scene and subsequent deconstruction by Desmond in FWWM? He's doing the same kind of absurd dissection of every little gesture, every "clue," for some symbolic fixed meaning. It just struck me as funny, is all. :D
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Re: Episode 16

Post by Snailhead »

^ Hadn't thought of that, but it totally fits! I dig it.
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