posted
So, as I've mentioned in other threads, I got rid of cable a few yaers ago and have been working my way through a multitude of TV episodes on DVD from Netflix as a replacement. I'm fond of crime/police/mystery dramas, and a co-worker suggested that I might like Twin Peaks. I have to say, I'm not really loving the show, and I'm more than a little confused.
I just finished the first disc of the second season and last night I realized what's bothering me the most about it is that it moves so freaking SLOW! I started timing scenes that don't seem to go anywhere I can't believe how long they allow nothing to happen on this show. The credits alone are a minute and a half long.
So, I know there are two Twin Peaks movies, so I'm thinking I'll skip the rest of the 2nd season (maybe another 20 episodes) and just watch the movies (which I understand are pretty much the same story in condensed version).
Any reason I should continue watching this one?
Posts: 2069 | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
The first season and the final episode of the second season are awesome. The mystery was never meant to be solved, but the network didn't think they could keep audiences strung along, so they forced David Lynch to reveal Laura's killer. Then he lost interest and let other people take control, after which the show became very stupid until the iconic final episode, which was supposed to be a cliff-hanger for a third season that never happened.
And the movie is infamously terrible. If you don't like the series, don't insist on torturing yourself with Fire Walk With Me.
Posts: 2804 | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Don't worry about trying to make sense of it, just enjoy the ride in all its bizarre, confusing, over the top weirdness.
Posts: 867 | Registered: Dec 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
If you're going to watch Fire Walk With Me before completing the TV series, please wait to watch it until you've seen Episode 14: Lonely Souls. I still suggest watching the movie after the entire series because one of the minor characters in the movie only enters the series at episode 24. The movie makes the most sense (as much as it could) after seeing the whole show.
Besides Fire Walk With Me I'm not sure what other "movie" you're referring to. I think you mean the extended first episode that was sold in Europe. That version of the pilot, I believe, is the first episode + a "movie ending" that tied up the Who Killed Laura Palmer thread. However, that ending isn't the same ending as the TV show.
I love this series and have watched through it about three times. What draws me to it are the characters, and less the plotline (especially second season). They're memorably strange. Lots of people hate the show, though. Here I admit that parts of the second season are particularly weak. There are some awful story arcs involving minor characters like James. David Lynch didn't play as big of a part in the writing of the show during the 2nd season.
For any other fans out there: I had the lodge ring made for my boyfriend a few years ago. Here is one photo and this is a view from behind the stone. We used screencaps from the movie to get it as close as possible.
Posts: 1261 | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Interesting. I wouldn't have considered James a "minor" character, but I have to say, the story line about him, Donna and Maddie is the least compelling so far.
Is the ring important in the series? I haven't noticed anyone wearing and/or talking about a ring.
Posts: 2069 | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I believe it only appears in the movie. It's supposed to give the appropriate wearer protection from the Black Lodge. Here is an example of the ring in the movie.
Posts: 1261 | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
The second series takes a departure from the somewhat grounded first season by delving more obviously into the paranormal. I don't think it's much of a spoiler at all to tell you that the little man pictured in the link above is someone you saw in the second episode and was in the Black Lodge (or, a waiting room of it, maybe?).
Posts: 1261 | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
My memory is that a lot of people followed the series expecting that eventually there would be revelations to make everything make sense... And there never were.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Should I worry that I think I understood Twin Peaks, and Fire Walk With Me, quite perfectly, and have no real confusion about any of it?
Also, should I worry that I think Fire Walk With Me is a wonderful movie (I cried at the ending) about goodness at work in the world?
(I say this, and yet I like to pretend that most of the second season does not exist.... "The owls are not what they seem." Pfff. Screw you, TV writers.)
Posts: 2267 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
With the exceptions of Eraserhead and Inland Empire, I find all of his movies pretty easy to explain.
And just because David Lynch doesn't explain it doesn't mean he can't. He has said many, many times that he feels that to explain what his work means to him would detract from the experience he was trying to create, as he is a big believe in the concept of each viewer taking away their own meanings ....
Also, Blue Velvet makes perfect sense.
Posts: 2267 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
I love Twin Peaks, but it's one of those quirky things that most people just won't enjoy. I tried to get my fiance to watch through it with me, and while she faked it for a while, she never finished the second season.
Actually, the one person I would have thought could enjoy Twin peaks walked out halfway through the second episode. It is his opinion, after watching several David Lynch movies, that Mr. Lynch "hates the audience."
I actually enjoyed most of the second season, at least the parts that focused on Cooper. I never liked anything involving James and Donna, and the second season didn't do anything to help me enjoy their characters.
posted
The second season departure from the first might explain why I ended up not finishing the series. All I know is that I enjoyed the show at first, but somehow drifted away and ended up not caring.
It wasn't that I wanted the mystery solved. I understood to solve the mystery was to destroy the premise of the show. The murder plotline was an introduction to the town and the people. The idea, to me, was that the whole town murdered this girl in an indirect fashion, and that the only difference between them and the killer was the actual murder.
Strangly, I found "Northern Exposure" took over its quirkiness of place and character without the murder and seriousness. The X-Files took over its moodiness and sense of unsettling mystery. Neither of these would have existed the way they did without "Twin Peaks" as a precursor.
Posts: 2207 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Occasional: Strangly, I found "Northern Exposure" took over its quirkiness of place and character without the murder and seriousness. The X-Files took over its moodiness and sense of unsettling mystery. Neither of these would have existed the way they did without "Twin Peaks" as a precursor.
The X-Files perhaps owes more to Kolchak the Night-Stalker and the more horror oriented episodes of genre anthology programs like The Twilight Zone.
Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
