Twin Peaks

[Eighthours]

1 hour ago, Fitzcarraldo said:

Part of the brilliance of The Return, for me:

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is that, by the end, I didn't want the real Cooper back. I loved Dougie and his sections, on repeat watches, are some of my favourite bits of the show – it's like Lynch is making his own Jacques Tati film. I always find it interesting that everybody's lives improves for having met Dougie, who is present and lives for the moment. Cooper returns and fucks everything up because of his hubris and his inability to let go. To just leave Laura alone and let her be with her angel. He's stuck in the past when the world has already moved on.

 

I think Cooper not returning until the end was in line with the whole theme of the season. You can't go back. You can manipulate time and space and create a new alternate reality, but that trauma and grief you've tried to erase will always be there. In trying to save Laura, Cooper just makes her relieve the worst moment of her life all over again.

 

Having Cooper come back like it was 1990 would have been the easy choice. The fan service choice. Lynch said fuck you, you can't have him. And the show was better for it imo.

 

I understand people wishing we had classic Cooper for longer, but I think that would have been a misstep. Lynch is a genius because I didn't even know this was the third season I wanted until he gave it to me. In hindsight, I can't see how the show would have worked at all by giving into nostalgia and fan service. Thankfully, Lynch is a clever man and went the other way, as his wont.

 

 

It's not 'fan service' to include your main character in your sequel TV show! Do you want me to list the actual fan service stuff in The Return, based on your post? Let's start with Doctor Jacoby's radio transmissions. I'll stop when I get to 10.

[Benny]

2 hours ago, Eighthours said:

 

I liked it a lot, but I do think that:

 

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The absence of proper Cooper until the very end was a real misstep, considering that it's likely we're not going to get another season. 

 

 

Spoiler

The fact he wasn't in it until the end is part of the point. It's a direct response and commentary on the prevalence of male protagonist driven shows of that era, which is why Cooper is replaced by two distinctly simplified facsimiles: a cartoonishly evil and all powerful villain, and literally a walking Mary Sue type character.

 

[Fitzcarraldo]

1 hour ago, Eighthours said:

 

It's not 'fan service' to include your main character in your sequel TV show! 

 

I never said it was. The main character's in The Return a lot, actually.

[englishbob]

Watched the original series when it originally broadcast.

 

For the first time in decades I did the whole lot again a few years back - series 1 is great, series 2 is patchy - some really terrible padding going on, and then the recent series 3 the return was just gold all the way through - especially "Gotta Light?" - the weirdest thing I'm still processing years after watching it

[Garwoofoo]

The original ending to Twin Peaks was and is absolutely legendary. I can’t believe they came back 25 years later and fucking did it again. The best ending to a series, ever… twice. 

[Anne Summers]

Just started watching The Return again, which is something I've been looking forward to for the last five years. I've thought about it a lot since, listed to the Mark Frost audiobooks , and watched videos like the excellent Twin Peaks Explained YouTube vid that's been linked in here. Also watched a few Lynch films like Mulholland Drive, Blue Velvet and Lost Highway for the first time. But only just felt the time is right for a proper start-to-end rewatch. Have spent the last five years thinking it's the most excellent, magical piece of TV ever created so let's see how a rewatch affects me. 

[DeciderVT]

I still think about this Phillip Jeffries scene from time to time. Probably my favourite part of The Return.