counterpaul wrote:“Albert, sometimes I really worry about you.”
Lynch has told us, and shown us, in so many ways throughout this project that the most important thing is to settle in and let the journey happen as it may. Gordon and his guest, and Gordon's genuine, kindhearted concern over Albert's impatience, might be the best distillation of this theme yet.
Absolutely agree. A long-winded scene that literally ends with someone staring at David Lynch, frustrated but patient, seemed like the perfect metaphor for an audience that's probably been waiting for something like the old Twin Peaks, but particularly old favourite characters, only to find it's taking ages until we properly Return to anything resembling the old show, with all our heroes in town. I really liked that scene though. The way Cole's lady friend made her exit, slipping her shoes on, applying lipstick, straightening her dress, felt like someone was slowly and deliberately packing something away, or at least putting it away for later, as if to say "this part of the story is over".
With that in mind I also felt that the guy vacuuming the closed bar was a call-back to the sweeping scene from Episode 7, particularly as it ends up with a shadow character at the bar on a phone. And I figure that there's a reason, and maybe these episodes are the ones that divide The Return into three acts, and that the things that appear in this episode reflect the tying up of some of the loose ends, and pointing certain things towards their final destination:
- Tammy is officially inducted into the Blue Rose team.
- Jerry finally escapes from the woods.
- Sarah Palmer warns that "Men are coming".
- We finally see the Palmer house but get the sense that something is wrong here.
- We've confirmed that the police know Richard Horne is responsible for the hit and run and Miriam's near death, so they just need to find him.
- 'Chekhov's key', sitting so deliberately on the desk, finally falls into the sheriff's hands - not because Ben thinks it's important but because he feels it would be a lovely memento for his brother.
- The warden is assassinated, so Hutch and Chantel finally head on to Vegas, where Dougie is.
- Audrey finally appears, but we are left with a scene that delivers more questions than answers (although we finally have confirmation of who Billy is), and seems to end on a cliffhanger of a question.
- Diane gets around to checking out the coordinates, and we finally have a signpost pointing directly towards Twin Peaks.
- Even the final scene, where Trick turns up and says he was almost run over - was that Richard fleeing from Twin Peaks, or someone else arriving?
I also loved the fact that Charlie is sitting at a desk with lots of paper work, and wants Audrey to leave him alone, so he can get it done. That seems to be echoing all the things we're worried will not get resolved before the end of the night. Come on, Audrey, we need to get this paperwork done. It's in following an apparent diversion from his work we then get a bunch of exposition that seems to give us answers. And maybe there's a parallel with Norma's paperwork that she's been sitting on all this time. Nadine too has an office full of paperwork that's unchanged. Maybe these are three distinct threads (the Horne lineage, the Briggs lineage, the crazies) that have been deliberately going at a slow pace that will now (finally!) get pushed into sharp focus. Hopefully Sarah's story too, although the Palmer lineage apparently ended with the death of Laura and Leland.
'Act two' starting with the mostly flashback episode 8 worked well, so I figure that episode 13 will, if it's the beginning of an 'act three', have some big things to impart. In any case I'm pretty sure we'll hit the ground running, even if we don't jump straight back into the Black Lodge (I suspect that might be episode 16, with the "No knock, no doorbell" title).
Further observations:
- I saw one person mention Jerry either had blood on his hands or red gloves and have to admit, I spotted that but wasn't sure which one it was either. Anyone had a chance to rematch that scene yet?
- I got a better glimpse at the photo of the arm with the coordinates than I did in the previous episode, and it died seem to me like the there was a circle of cleaner skin near the beginning of the coordinates. It did make me wonder if it was an indication that the Blue Rose FBI had tampered with the picture and were deliberately pointing Diane in the direction of the town of Twin Peaks. At the same time, as someone who regularly uses Photoshop, it did look like really bad tampering - I can't imagine someone would do that deliberately unless they've got a terrible eye for details... which makes me more inclined to believe it was an genuine clean spot on the arm.
- Diane still looking as shifty as ever and drinking a lot - she's done a terrible job of appearing to be on their side, even if they hadn't been tapping her phone.
- Loved that when Hawk climbed the steps to the Palmer house the camera was angled in such a way as to make the ceiling fan clearly visible. It really helped me feel like this was the Twin Peaks of years ago.
- There was a line I wasn't too sure about that Sarah said to Hawk at the door - was she talking about a "bad story" or a "backstory"? In either case, what was that story?
- I've never really liked the Dr Amp stuff but, strangely, I didn't mind it this time around. I didn't realise how precisely it matched what we've seen before, and somehow my familiarity with it made me listen to it a bit more and not automatically dismiss it as the ramblings of a crazy guy (I figured he was just rehashing the same advert in order to sell more of his shovels). Does the gold shovel have anything to do with the alchemic references we've had in past episodes?
- Audrey says that someone named Chuck told her that someone named Tina was the last person to see Billy. Charlie mentions that Chuck stole Billy’s truck. I assume that Billy is the missing farmer, but I wasn't sure whether to assume 'Chuck' was someone who stole the truck for Richard, or a nickname for Richard (for some reason). What are other people's assumptions?
- I'm wondering if all the bands are doing a second set. I wouldn't mind seeing some more Nine Inch Nails, however unlikely that the Roadhouse could get them in for two nights.
It was perhaps a little misleading to call this episode "Let's rock!" and then not really having any such hinted at momentum following the "Let's rock!" scene. But I found that kind of funny.